Dungeons & Dragons vintage treasures - part 6

In 1983, Marvel published 2 little storybooks under the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons trademark.

These are entitled The Forest of Enchantment and The Treasure of Time.

In The Forest of Enchantment, a young elven bard named Caruso survives an encounter with evil lizard men who are invading his forest while he was just having peaceful time...

With the help of his friend, the elven druid Filaree, they get information from Figgen of the Thieves' Guild that the army of lizard men is under the orders of Warduke who is planning to rob the Ruby of the Seven Suns which is carried by a certain Princess Mirra, whose caravan will cross through the forest the next day.

They also learn that the evil wizard Kelek has joined Warduke.

Back in the forest, stupid Caruso is made prisoner by the villains and guarded by evil thief Foxfingers. But with some luck, he manages to free himself in the morning while the Princess' party, composed of an escort of 6 horsemen, Mirra herself and her hand-maiden Bess, arrived in the forest.

At the moment of the assault, the villains got disturbed by the druid (who was hiding under a tree form all night...) and our stupid bard. Swift, the druid cast a Plant Growth spell and the bad guys got entangled.

And everything ends fine... heh.

Click image to download (.pdf)

In The Treasure of Time, Kelek the bad bad wizard is spying the good magic-user Charmay who is helding a scroll leading to "The Treasure of Time"... Kelek manages to fool her and get the scroll.

On his way back, Kelek avoids the attack of the good dwarf fighter Elkhorn with the unexpected help of Charmay who still under his charm.

Elkhorn will then seek the help of the good paladin Strongheart and they will start to investigate at Charmay's. With a magic mirror they discover that Kelek was willing to use the powerful spell. But Kelek was also watching the good party with a crystal ball... and he orders the bad bad orc assassin Zarak to stop them.

On the way to Kelek's, Elkhorn got attacked by poisonous snakes and Zarak engages a fight with Strongheart. After the defeat of the villains, they finally reach a ruined castle in which they manages to find the chest containing the Treasure of Time. But Kelek was waiting for the companions and traps them with some spells. That time, Charmay, free of Kelek's charm, arrives at the castle and order Kelek to not open the chest... but well... villains being villains, Kelek opens it and absorbs the power which makes him become young again.

In a try to attack the party Kelek discovers that if he has lost his old age he also lost his knowledge and powers ! Charmay then takes back the scroll and let the crying wizard alone. End of story.

Click image to download (.pdf)

I scanned and compiled the entire books in 2 pdf documents. Just click on pics to download. Enjoy !!

O_oV

D&D comics history special - D&DC (animated serie) related

Before the first comics related to D&D RPG were issued by american publishers, european ones did published some based on the D&D animated serie.

The first serie ever published (according to my actual knowledge), adapting all the 27 episodes of the cartoon, is spanish, entitled :

"Dungeons & Dragons - Dragones y Mazmorras" 

(DyM means D&D in spanish). It has been issued by Comics Forum, division of Editorial Planeta De Agostini from 1985 to 1986.

 

 The serie is not following the episodes order of the cartoon.

For instance, the first issue "El Ojo del Vigilante" is the adaptation of the second episode "The Eye of the Beholder", as well as the second title, "El Valle de los Unicornios", is the version of the episode 4 of the serie 'Valley of the Unicorns", and so on and so forth. (weird when you know that the spanish dubbed version of the serie - broadcast on tve channel - respected the original episodes order...)

Considering these have been printed in mid-80's, the graphics are pretty good.

Based on a weekly release, when a certain Efepé is in charge of the script, the artist is different from an issue to the next. (and so is the quality)

Here is the list of artists who worked on the serie :

Pascual Ferry (All covers, 1, 6, 10, 14, 16, 20, 27)

Francisco Javier Montes (2, 7, 15, 18, 22)

Juan Bernet Toledano (3, 9, 13, 23, 26)

Eloy Garijo Casajuana (4, 8, 11, 17, 24)

Bernardo Serrat Garcia (5)

Ramon Gonzales (12, 19, 21, 25)

               

      by P.Ferry                      by B.S.Garcia                    by E.G.Casajuana

               

by F.J.Montes                    by R.Gonzales                      by J.B.Toledano

 

In my opinion, the whole serie is a success. First of all, the quality is here, then the complete serie was published, which is not so common considering D&D comics history. Now (as far as I know) it is in spanish only, no adaptation of the whole serie being done in another language. We can still hope for some reissue someday... (IDW is actually republishing the TPB version of DC Forgotten Realms... who knows heh)

Note that the 4 first issues will be translated in dutch and published in 1988 by Junior Press (in an alternate order) :

 

Tho, next year, Marvel published :

Dungeons & Dragons Annual 1987

Here is an interesting use of copyrights. The annual is a hardcover book including a comic divided in 3 parts between which are short novels and puzzle games, all related to D&D cartoon show. (FYI, D&D annual 1986 was a children's book containing 7 short novels and 1 labyrinth game)

 

Now the amazing fact about this 1987 annual, despite the fact there is no mention anywhere in the book, is that the comic is the translated version of "El Ojo del Vigilante", first issue of the spanish serie. 

Strangely, here the story is entitled "The Eye of the Watchman".

I believe this is due to the translation process.

As well, the entire story suffers from a poor english. 

Printed in Italy, I do believe the translators were not native english speakers...

     

You can find the entire scanned version of this book (as well as 1986 one) on Dungeons & Dragons cartoon encyclopedia, the blog by Rogull72.

In the same vein, the same year, Marvel released :

 

Dungeons & Dragons Summer Special

This Marvel Summer Special 1987 is the translated version of "Prisión Sin Paredes", issue 4 of Dragones y Mazmorras (that went out in 1985).

      

Contrary to the Marvel Annual, this issue contains only the comic.

If there is no title on cover, it appears on the first page (which follows 2 pages of introduction, kind of summary of the animation's opening). As expected it takes up the title of the corresponding TV episode "A prison Without Walls".

I have to disagree with Zakiyah on the quality of the art. Especially when she said on her page (which no longer exists actually) that Annual's one was so awful and that this Summer Special's is decent... I tend to think the exact opposite. The adaptation of the spanish comic in this US format is a real shame for a bunch of reasons. The printing is of a very poor quality, the inking badly done. (Have a look at Dungeon Master in both pics and compare...)

The framing is just a joke... I let the margins on both scans for a comparing.

And translation... just as bad as it was in the Annual...

None of the onomatopoeia has been remade... just wondering since when "í" (inversed "!") is used in english XD... And icing on the cake... XD XD XD... they forgot to clean up some bubbles before putting translated text in...

yes si master amo !                             who...what ¿?¿

But well, even considering all these fails... this issue is still a must-to-have for any D&D comics collector.... pretty rare and so... vintage heh XD

A priori, no other translated version of Dragones y Mazmorras were published.

But here, in France, a strange adaptation of the episode "The Valley of the Unicorns" was issued. It is from 1987 (feb/mar release), by Editions de la page blanche and is simply entitled :

Le Sourire du Dragon - Donjons & Dragons

Le Sourire du Dragon being the title of the animated serie in France when broadcast on Antenne 2 channel.

(The license Donjons & Dragons was already existing in France that period... so I am wondering why the serie got entiltled differently... copyrights issue ? Desire to avoid any controversy ?)

Now on first page we have the title of the story : La vallée des Licornes

(No need I translate that heh...) 

 

It is not really a copy of the spanish version. Just something else. 

The artist seems to be a certain Eugster according to the signature on first page and last frame. The graphics are on the whole awful but some pages denote a certain artistic sense (at least a very colorful one heh). Now my interrogation is to know if this comic got inspired by the spanish version or if both their layouts result from the cartoon sketchbook/celluloids.

(I ll watch the episode in near future to get an idea)

As a pic is worth a thousand words, here are the 2 first pages of the comic followed by the 2 first pages of the DyM issue for an insight :

 

As written on the cover, this is issue n°1. I have searched for other ones but found nothing yet. I so can t assure it is the only existing issue in this serie but it is highly probable.

Heh, here ya are, Nostalgia ! :P

Note also that characters from the D&DC appear in The Grand Tour (1996) and in Rick and Morty vs. Dungeons & Dragons (2018).

PS : If you, oh reader, have any info about a non listed D&D animated serie-related comic, please feel free to contact me !

O_oV

D&D comics history part 9 - DragonStrike (Marvel)

In D&D comics history, Dragon Strike "Before the Strike !" is an interesting piece.

First, it s been released in february 1994 by Marvel, when the previous D&D licensed comics series ended in 1991 and when the next ones will only be published in 1996.
So, this was the only D&D related comic during a 5 years period.

Now, Dragon Strike (the board game) being a simplified version of Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game, it is still not officially licensed under D&D...
(I long hesitated to include this title within the collection for this reason...)

Second interesting point is the return (very short in the end...) of Marvel in D&D comics.
(reminder : D&D cartoon ads were published in Marvel comics and magazines...)

Now, concerning the comic itself, this is far from being a masterpiece.

It contains 32 pages (including 8 ad pages).

Story by Jeff Grubb, art by Mike Harris and Frank Percy (inker).

This is just an introduction to something, characters meeting along the story to form some party to fight against some bad guy.

We have the blond barbarian-typed warrior with his long sword (bastard one ?) and his friend the ranger (?) elf with his Green Lantern-like costum and his bow... who will meet later the female thief with her whip and her short (on front cover) or long...(p.29) sword and finally the blue-dressed wizard who wears some weird wolf-headed helmet..

Most amazing thing, imo, is that only the villains and the good king have names in this story... the good guys being called, even when shouting at eachothers, by their class and not their names (which are still unknown at the end of this issue...)...well except the elf...who is designated by his race...

If the scenario is just about the grouping of a party to start some quest (really like if some D&D's DM wanted to make it really really short...), the lack of depth in story and the proficience of mistakes concerning D&D rules are just huge...

Try to beat up some skeleton warriors with a bow... o_O

Oooh ! He-Man & Green Lantern !   :P

Art itself is just acceptable for the time it was issued.

Some nice things here and there...

We can believe the plot would have lead somewhere as Jeff Grubb is well known within the D&D novels readers.
(reminder : he was also in charge of scenari on the Forgotten Realms serie)

But this first issue will also be the last : Fail ! o_O