I actually feel sorry for some comic book companies--specifically ones like DC and Marvel, where the properties are not creator-owned--when they find themselves stuck with doing an adaptation of a movie made from one of their characters.
Since they get to see some version of the movie--either the original shooting script, a rough cut, or perhaps even the finished film--the publisher in question knows well in advance if they have a good movie (the first two Supermans, Ironman, etc.) or a complete turkey on their hands (too many examples to mention).
And that brings us to Red Sonja. Always one of my favorite characters (generally when done by either Thomas/Buscema or Frank Thorne), the movie version was a complete dud when it hit theaters, stank up the joint during its brief run, and disappeared into obscurity. But Marvel, still licensing Sonja for its comics, was compelled to adapt the movie, so:
Wow! Only two pages in and we're already getting our main character raped. What a cheery fun romp this is!
Actually, if the right creators had been on this book, he darker aspects of the Robert E. Howard world could have been handled just fine, the way they were with Conan. But for whatever reason co-scripter and penciler Mary Wilshire--a fine artist--was saddled with Vince Colletta as inker, who makes the whole proceedings look like a coloring book.
Even when there are some scenes featuring giant icky monsters, there's not a drop of atmos to be found:
The only decent material to be found here is in the all-too-brief pin-up gallery, which features some really nice shots of Sonja, like this one by book editor Larry Hama:
Actually, if the right creators had been on this book, he darker aspects of the Robert E. Howard world could have been handled just fine, the way they were with Conan. But for whatever reason co-scripter and penciler Mary Wilshire--a fine artist--was saddled with Vince Colletta as inker, who makes the whole proceedings look like a coloring book.
Even when there are some scenes featuring giant icky monsters, there's not a drop of atmos to be found:
It also doesn't help that the book was colored (credited to the infamous "Manny Handz", a tip-off this project was thrown around the Marvel Bullpen like a cheap bottle of wine) with incredibly bland, flat, day-glo colors, robbing the book even further of any sense of grit or excitement. I mean, this is The She Devil with A Sword we're talking about here! A character who, when drawn by Frank Thorne, helped usher me into puberty!
There's a couple others, some credited, some not. This one is in the latter category--too bad, since it's quite nice:
I guess, in the end, Marvel knew that the Red Sonja movie was going to be a flop, and wasn't going to "waste" any of their top talent on the movie adaptation. Maybe things will be better for the next movie based on a Marvel character: Howard the Duck.
