The prose of THE BLACK STAR reads a little something like this:
“Niane fled down the jungle path on frantic, stumbling feet. Her gown was torn. Her slim white legs were scratched and bleeding. She panted for breath, young breasts heaving and straining against the fabric of her gown….”
Judging by the way the hair on those Ogres is blowing back, I’d say Gandalf’s command is a bit too late. And Hunkbutt is thinking “Glad I’m upwind from that one!”
Back in my day, we had to wear cast-iron jockstraps. None of this sissy Under Armour stuff. Many guys lost a nut to one of those things. But did we complain?
If Frazetta ever painted Lord of the Rings, Frodo and Sam would be ripped and wearing g-strings and chains. While the book says hobbits are tough as gnarly tree roots, Frazetta would make them look it. Sam would be winner of World’s Strongest Hobbit from lifting fully-laden wheelbarrows over his head while climbing Hobbiton hill.
I thought, “That’s a pretty good Frazetta ripoff, but what about the farting? Frank wouldn’t… oh dear.”
Was Thongor named for the preferred style of underwear?
Is Diodoric the blond one? Why does he have (as @Alice said) the body of a steroid freak and the head of the St. Pauli girl? Did he also take her ballet slippers?
@Ray P: GSS! A delightful mental image to be sure. Frazetta did actually do some Lord of the Rings illustrations, and Frazetta-ized women and orcs, but alas, no near-nude body builder hobbits.
Soon to be a major motion picture that … never got made.
I was reading on Wikipedia about one of the guys behind the old Amicus Productions movie studio, best known for being the British company that wasn’t Hammer Studios.
Wikipedia says: “Unable to purchase film rights to Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Barbarian stories, Subotsky instead bought the rights to Lin Carter’s “Thongor” stories in 1976. Subotsky himself adapted Carter’s 1965 novel The Wizard of Lemuria. United Artists agreed to bankroll the project – now called Thongor in the Valley of Demons – in 1978, but subsequently withdrew for unspecified reasons.”
@Tor Mented: I read the first in the “Thongor” series. Never was interested enough to pick up further installments, but I got the impression that Carter was trying to do EXTREME! Conan – “my character is like Conan, but with even better stats!”, you know.
A peek at the Goodreads listing says this is a novel set in the Thongor universe, but much later, in Atlantis. And there never were any more of this proposed trilogy.
Other info from that:
“…stuff just starts happening, then keeps happening, like a DM endlessly rolling on a random encounter table”
“Double pretentious given other excesses: Excessive Object And Location Capitalization…”
@Tor: there were lots of British companies that weren’t Hammer – Rowntree Macintosh, for example. As film companies go, Amicus had jumped ship from the horror stuff around 1973 (they’d been doing those Anthology films) while Hammer flogged the dead horse with increasing desperation (‘Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires’, for example). Amicus hit paydirt with Doug McClure drililng to the North Pole in a balloon and finding Atlantis (or whatever) but stopped after their big hit ‘At the Earth’s Core’ (one of only four Eady Levy films to make a dent at the UK box office) and the team behind them got into financial difficulties and had to make ‘People that Time Forgot’ under the aegis of a different company, sans Subotsky and with his evil twin, Samuel Z Arkoff, running things with Max Rosenberg. So a run of hits that started with ‘It’s Trad, Dad’ ground to a halt. They rallied for ‘The Monster Club’ in 1980 but that was it.
To be honest, if Milton Subotsky adapted the book it would have had a better plot, a decent part for Peter Cushing and an abrupt slingshot ending.
@Tat:
I looked up Rowntree Macintosh to see what movies they made, so you got me there.
But I found out that it’s spelled Mackintosh, so we’re even.
Let’s not forget Tigon British Film Productions, another “that’s not Hammer” studio that made some excellent films, including “Witchfinder General” and “The Blood on Satan’s Claw.” And then there’s the very obscure GIB Films. They made a seldom-seen version of “The Fall of the House of Usher,” released in 1950. It’s on YouTube and worth a look if you like old-school, b&w, German Expressionism-inspired films.
@Bruce: I primarily remember Carter from his disappointing Conan pastiches, though I guess we all owe him a debt of gratitude for the Ballantine Adult Fantasy series.
I’d also like to say GSS to @Anon.
@Tor (36): I knew that (after growing up on Toffo, Rolo and Smarties) but the software didn’t and ‘fixed’ it.
Tigon were also culpable of ‘Blood Beast Terror’ and Norman Wisdom’s attempt at a hippy sex-comedy, ‘What’s Good for the Goose’ (directed and co-written by a pushy youngster called Menachim Golan) but British film finance and distribution in the 60s and 70s was a mess and one that even a former Prime Minister couldn’t sort out. There’s a regular pattern of films abruptly going to locations where the revenue’s been kept by the local government so they get ‘free’ facilities paid for by profits from earlier films by that company – British Lion did a lot of this, hence ‘Who?’ being in effect two different films, one starring Elliott Gould and another starring Trevor Howard, both part-filmed in Eastern Europe.
The GIB ‘Usher’ has been restored by the BFI, which is like a film getting an OBE.
I think Peter Cushing said that “Blood Beast Terror” was the worst film he ever did.
Nice to see the GIB “Usher” getting some attention. I watched it again just last week.
Ah, this old movie discussion brings back more favorite memories of my brother and I ensconced on the couch watching “Creature Features”. We used to cheer and applaud wildly when the words “Samuel Z. Arkoff” appeared on the massive 25-in RCA. My mother just sighed and brought in the milk and chocolate chip cookies.
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November 6th, 2019 at 9:54 am
Better out than in.
Do you think Mr Carter slaved over a book of baby names until he found the ones just right? “Thongor! Your dinner’s ready!”
November 6th, 2019 at 10:54 am
Not THE Ronnie James Diodric?
November 6th, 2019 at 12:25 pm
The Oompa Loompas are revolting!
November 6th, 2019 at 1:14 pm
@THX, or is it a place? (With strict limitations on underwear choices)
November 6th, 2019 at 1:21 pm
God those underpants look uncomfortable.
November 6th, 2019 at 2:32 pm
I like
Hunk
Butts, and I cannot lie…
November 6th, 2019 at 2:56 pm
Another all-guy frat hazing party getting out of hand. And now it looks like campus security has showed up.
November 6th, 2019 at 3:06 pm
This book is quoted extensively in Nick Lowe’s hilarious essay “The Well-Tempered Plot Device”:
https://news.ansible.uk/plotdev.html
The prose of THE BLACK STAR reads a little something like this:
“Niane fled down the jungle path on frantic, stumbling feet. Her gown was torn. Her slim white legs were scratched and bleeding. She panted for breath, young breasts heaving and straining against the fabric of her gown….”
Well, I never.
November 6th, 2019 at 3:08 pm
Even barbarian Gandalf looks ripped. Well, at least his right leg.
November 6th, 2019 at 3:39 pm
At a quick glance Mr Muscles here can be mistaken for the St. Pauli Girl.
Maybe he’s wearing a wig and posing as one of those Kneeling Women of Gor.
November 6th, 2019 at 3:54 pm
Either Theoderic is wearing a ballet slipper or Frazetta didn’t bother finishing the foot.
November 6th, 2019 at 4:33 pm
I kind of like the idea that the one guy is preparing to use his… wind… to launch himself at not-Gandalf.
Also, I’d like to thank @A.R. Yngve for giving us a sample of how bad this book appears to actually be.
November 6th, 2019 at 4:46 pm
@ARY (Leslie Nielsen voice) Go on
It looks like a cover for Randall Garrett’s TOO MANY THONGorS.
November 6th, 2019 at 4:56 pm
“Niane, enough with the heaving and straining you’ll injure your young breasts.”
If I’m ever trapped in this, I hesitate to call it a reality, I’m going to open a sports bra shop.
November 6th, 2019 at 4:58 pm
There’s never a bad time for a dramatic hair swish.
November 6th, 2019 at 6:25 pm
In a time when women have burned all their bras, and men wear all the thongs …
November 6th, 2019 at 8:00 pm
Judging by the way the hair on those Ogres is blowing back, I’d say Gandalf’s command is a bit too late. And Hunkbutt is thinking “Glad I’m upwind from that one!”
November 6th, 2019 at 8:17 pm
Back in my day, we had to wear cast-iron jockstraps. None of this sissy Under Armour stuff. Many guys lost a nut to one of those things. But did we complain?
November 6th, 2019 at 8:24 pm
If Frazetta ever painted Lord of the Rings, Frodo and Sam would be ripped and wearing g-strings and chains. While the book says hobbits are tough as gnarly tree roots, Frazetta would make them look it. Sam would be winner of World’s Strongest Hobbit from lifting fully-laden wheelbarrows over his head while climbing Hobbiton hill.
November 6th, 2019 at 8:38 pm
@Ray P—He could even put those hairy feet in soft ballet slippers and they’d still look like Hobbit Hunkbutts!
November 6th, 2019 at 9:04 pm
The title logo contains a hidden “Alcoholics Anonymous” message!
November 7th, 2019 at 1:01 am
Just as the decision was about to be made by the judge, an unfortunate scenery collapse interrupted the Cimmerian Male Twerking finals.
November 7th, 2019 at 1:42 am
The blonde guy looks like he is clenching really hard to hold it in. They all must have eaten Gandalf’s Chili of the Secret Flame.
November 7th, 2019 at 6:48 am
I thought, “That’s a pretty good Frazetta ripoff, but what about the farting? Frank wouldn’t… oh dear.”
Was Thongor named for the preferred style of underwear?
Is Diodoric the blond one? Why does he have (as @Alice said) the body of a steroid freak and the head of the St. Pauli girl? Did he also take her ballet slippers?
@ARY, Alice: delightful links, thanks!
November 7th, 2019 at 7:15 am
@Ray P: GSS! A delightful mental image to be sure. Frazetta did actually do some Lord of the Rings illustrations, and Frazetta-ized women and orcs, but alas, no near-nude body builder hobbits.
https://comicsalliance.com/frank-frazetta-lord-of-the-rings-hobbit-illustrations-art/
I wonder if Deviantart has a suggestion box?
November 7th, 2019 at 12:08 pm
Strange how Tolkien never mentioned Galadriel walking about topless.
November 8th, 2019 at 1:07 am
And everyone walking around bottomless (almost). And Gollum being that jacked.
November 8th, 2019 at 1:35 pm
‘We are doomed. The iron underpants don’t work! His farts can still collapse bridgeeeees…’ (brief silence, several distant thuds)
November 8th, 2019 at 5:50 pm
Awesome thong fart opened up a new adventure in rich death-odor nectar for wild Jothean drow warriors.
Back Shartlet
by Clint Rear
November 9th, 2019 at 12:49 am
@anon: One of your best works! It couldn’t describe the cover any more perfectly. GSS!
November 9th, 2019 at 7:02 am
Amen. Quality work, @anon.
November 11th, 2019 at 6:17 am
Soon to be a major motion picture that … never got made.
I was reading on Wikipedia about one of the guys behind the old Amicus Productions movie studio, best known for being the British company that wasn’t Hammer Studios.
Wikipedia says: “Unable to purchase film rights to Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Barbarian stories, Subotsky instead bought the rights to Lin Carter’s “Thongor” stories in 1976. Subotsky himself adapted Carter’s 1965 novel The Wizard of Lemuria. United Artists agreed to bankroll the project – now called Thongor in the Valley of Demons – in 1978, but subsequently withdrew for unspecified reasons.”
November 12th, 2019 at 1:37 am
@Tor Mented: I read the first in the “Thongor” series. Never was interested enough to pick up further installments, but I got the impression that Carter was trying to do EXTREME! Conan – “my character is like Conan, but with even better stats!”, you know.
November 12th, 2019 at 3:42 am
A peek at the Goodreads listing says this is a novel set in the Thongor universe, but much later, in Atlantis. And there never were any more of this proposed trilogy.
Other info from that:
“…stuff just starts happening, then keeps happening, like a DM endlessly rolling on a random encounter table”
“Double pretentious given other excesses: Excessive Object And Location Capitalization…”
November 12th, 2019 at 3:46 pm
@Tor: there were lots of British companies that weren’t Hammer – Rowntree Macintosh, for example. As film companies go, Amicus had jumped ship from the horror stuff around 1973 (they’d been doing those Anthology films) while Hammer flogged the dead horse with increasing desperation (‘Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires’, for example). Amicus hit paydirt with Doug McClure drililng to the North Pole in a balloon and finding Atlantis (or whatever) but stopped after their big hit ‘At the Earth’s Core’ (one of only four Eady Levy films to make a dent at the UK box office) and the team behind them got into financial difficulties and had to make ‘People that Time Forgot’ under the aegis of a different company, sans Subotsky and with his evil twin, Samuel Z Arkoff, running things with Max Rosenberg. So a run of hits that started with ‘It’s Trad, Dad’ ground to a halt. They rallied for ‘The Monster Club’ in 1980 but that was it.
To be honest, if Milton Subotsky adapted the book it would have had a better plot, a decent part for Peter Cushing and an abrupt slingshot ending.
November 12th, 2019 at 6:29 pm
@Tat:
I looked up Rowntree Macintosh to see what movies they made, so you got me there.
But I found out that it’s spelled Mackintosh, so we’re even.
Let’s not forget Tigon British Film Productions, another “that’s not Hammer” studio that made some excellent films, including “Witchfinder General” and “The Blood on Satan’s Claw.” And then there’s the very obscure GIB Films. They made a seldom-seen version of “The Fall of the House of Usher,” released in 1950. It’s on YouTube and worth a look if you like old-school, b&w, German Expressionism-inspired films.
November 12th, 2019 at 6:34 pm
@Bruce: I primarily remember Carter from his disappointing Conan pastiches, though I guess we all owe him a debt of gratitude for the Ballantine Adult Fantasy series.
I’d also like to say GSS to @Anon.
November 12th, 2019 at 7:12 pm
@Tor (36): I knew that (after growing up on Toffo, Rolo and Smarties) but the software didn’t and ‘fixed’ it.
Tigon were also culpable of ‘Blood Beast Terror’ and Norman Wisdom’s attempt at a hippy sex-comedy, ‘What’s Good for the Goose’ (directed and co-written by a pushy youngster called Menachim Golan) but British film finance and distribution in the 60s and 70s was a mess and one that even a former Prime Minister couldn’t sort out. There’s a regular pattern of films abruptly going to locations where the revenue’s been kept by the local government so they get ‘free’ facilities paid for by profits from earlier films by that company – British Lion did a lot of this, hence ‘Who?’ being in effect two different films, one starring Elliott Gould and another starring Trevor Howard, both part-filmed in Eastern Europe.
The GIB ‘Usher’ has been restored by the BFI, which is like a film getting an OBE.
November 13th, 2019 at 2:28 pm
I think Peter Cushing said that “Blood Beast Terror” was the worst film he ever did.
Nice to see the GIB “Usher” getting some attention. I watched it again just last week.
November 14th, 2019 at 8:47 am
Ah, this old movie discussion brings back more favorite memories of my brother and I ensconced on the couch watching “Creature Features”. We used to cheer and applaud wildly when the words “Samuel Z. Arkoff” appeared on the massive 25-in RCA. My mother just sighed and brought in the milk and chocolate chip cookies.