The Black River

Well, it's been a while since I did one of these articles, but today was one of those drudgingly boring sorts of days,ripe for blogging. So out of that dreadful, painfully awkward boredom, I present to you a game I was rather fond of all those years ago; I give you HeroQuest! I used to love this game! What am I saying,I still love this game. It's easy, it's challenging and most of all, it's still a lot of fun to play. In fact,it's one of the simplest board games of this type I've ever played. Though I do believe it to be more of a hybrid of both fantasy and sword and sorcery,the distinction isn't clear,nor is it all that important in this game. On one hand you have orcs and elves,and on the other you have a barbarian and an evil sorcerer, who to me appears very similar to Skeletor from Masters of the Universe. I was lucky to find myself a copy of this game at an outlet store back in the early 90's, still brand new in the shrink-wrap. I'm glad I

I'm not even gonna write a summary or anything, I could but with only four hours sleep in two days, I'm sure you can forgive me for having not done so. Now this is just a little side-track from what I have planned for my next blog, I'm sure you've seen this before, but it's always fun to watch regardless. Please enjoy.

"Between the time when the oceans drank Atlantis, and the rise of the sons of Aryas, there was an age undreamed of. And onto this, Conan, destined to wear the jeweled crown of Aquilonia upon a troubled brow. It is I, his chronicler, who alone can tell thee of his saga. Let me tell you of the days of high adventure!" I'm not a huge fan of Arnold Schwarzenegger on a personal level,but I can easily say that Conan the Barbarian is perhaps one of my all-time favorite movies. I remember first seeing it shortly after it's debut on VHS all those years ago and have easily watched it over 300 times since that day. Though I didn't know who Conan was back then,I became an instant fan from the first moment I saw it. The thunderous orchestral soundtrack,was enough to captivate and hold my attention even still,to this day. Since it was first released,there we're plenty of lame knockoffs which easily paled by comparison. Anyone who's ever seen the Ator series or T

Today's subject is a very special one,which is proving quite difficult for me to even begin without wanting to sound like a Wikipedia article. In the same light,I'd decided I didn't want to delve into the life and death of Frank Frazetta too heavily,there are more than enough websites with that information available on-line. Then again,I didn't want this particular article to be all pictures. All style and no substance so to speak. Instead I wanted to focus on his life's work and the stunning imagery he created over the course of his career,but in doing so,no matter how much I fought against it;the pictures won the battle over words. Because let's face it,that's what he did best. The death dealer Frazetta had a way of forming chaos into something more tangible. Each painting told a story of it's own,usually in the form of conflict between men or beasts or victory over a captive female. Strong,independent women we're also common themes in his

Fire & Ice is by far one of the best animated features in the sword and sorcery world. It's the kinda movie you can watch countless times and it's still just as good after the first time seeing it. It has the perfect mix of creatures and primitive cultures to make it as fantastic and otherworldly as possible,while lacking the infamous "cornball moments" most noticeable within the genre. Initially Fire & Ice was a collaboration between Roy Thomas ( who wrote the better part of the Conan series for Marvel comics) Frank Frazetta and of course Ralph Bakshi. The film used live actors who we're animated through rotoscoping,which became popular long before digital animation was made widely available. Though rotoscoping was heavily used in Bakshi's other films,never before had it been utilized with such spectacular detail as with Fire & Ice. Lunch! I fell in love with this movie several years back and hadn't seen it up till that point;in fac

So I was in a goodwill not too long ago,searching for anything that might be remotely interesting in the books section;when I came across an old paperback bearing an unmistakable cover done by Ken Kelly,one of my favorite artists in the S&S (sword and sorcery) genre. What I found strange about the cover was a muscular Conan like figure,wielding both a sword and battleaxe,except this barbarian had horns on his head,pointed ears and eyes like a reptile of some sort. "This isn't Conan!" I said to myself. But yet, I recognized Ken Kelly's artwork anywhere,he was after all the go-to guy in Conan artistry,after Frazetta of course. The book's title wasn't up to par with Conan either,I mean The Alien? Seriously? But it was only fifty cents,so I caved in and bought it for the measly asking price. Once I got it home,I sat it aside,where it collected dust for the next two months. I figured,I'd probably never read it,but it's got a nice cover by one of my