Conan the Barbarian #4

Barry Windsor-Smith's cover for this April 1971 Marvel issue crackles with tension as a helmeted, sword-wielding Conan grapples with a massive blue-furred creature amid a web-like backdrop, while a terrified blonde woman in red sprawls across scattered treasure chests in the foreground. The composition captures everything that makes Robert E. Howard's Hyborian world so compelling — muscle, menace, and glittering wealth all tangled together in a single breathless moment. Adapting Howard's beloved "The Tower of the Elephant," this early chapter of Marvel's Conan series showcases the raw energy that Roy Thomas and Windsor-Smith were bringing to sword-and-sorcery comics in 1971.