Feb 24
GK Comments: There must be something a lot more interesting going on to his right.
Published 1986
Many thanks to GK!
GK Comments: There must be something a lot more interesting going on to his right.
Published 1986
Many thanks to GK!
February 24th, 2011 at 9:36 am
I bet he’s thinking “Wish that b*tch would go away, so I can watch those men in loincloths and go back to w*nking.”
February 24th, 2011 at 9:50 am
“57 channels, and nothing’s on…”
February 24th, 2011 at 9:54 am
“Coming tonight on Bravo Midnight Classics: The Leather-Clad Centurion… Sandals and Loincloths… Sweaty Gladiators… and Big Shiny Spears.“
February 24th, 2011 at 10:56 am
Pah, whatever happened to the real men like Steve Reeves?
February 24th, 2011 at 11:57 am
Perhaps he’s looking for his briefs! Bah-dum-psht.
February 24th, 2011 at 12:25 pm
I love it when men fight with swords of fire…..or maybe it is the schwartz!
February 24th, 2011 at 1:01 pm
OMG that looks like Han Solo in is dungarees with his latest space floozy, and they have hijacked the enterprise and are watching Spartacus on the viewscreen!
February 24th, 2011 at 2:05 pm
For one horrified moment I thought the title was Gladiator In-Laws, and that the lady on the cover was looking aghast at her new husband’s family. Thank heavens it’s only Gladiator At Law!
February 24th, 2011 at 2:09 pm
I’ve counted, and it’s mathematically and anatomically correct – but she looks as if she has too many fingers.
February 24th, 2011 at 5:22 pm
I perused this very edition at my local used bookstore just recently. The plot’s just as cheesy as the cover. 😀
February 24th, 2011 at 6:56 pm
Well, I may not be a fancy pants city gladiator, but there is one thing of which I am sure … just as sure as my gladius will kill a witness, my client is innocent.
If the glaive does not fit, you must acquit.
February 24th, 2011 at 9:24 pm
“Mommy, what is that gladiator doing to that other gladiator?”
February 24th, 2011 at 10:15 pm
And yet here we have another example of the early light saber, this one pre-The Drawing of the Dark and involving less clothing.
February 25th, 2011 at 1:01 am
Those people have huge hands! Seriously, chest-wound dude looks like he swapped hands with a gorilla. Even the woman’s hand is enormous. Has anyone read the book? Is it a plot point that the characters have hands the size of catcher mitts?
February 25th, 2011 at 8:30 am
Call me slooowww, but I’ve only just realised that the two guys in the background are carrying olympic torches. Or, more precisely, the one on the left is holding an olympic torch with an amazing, gravity defying, slanted flame; while the one on the right is somehow balancing his on his index finger. No wonder everyone on this cover looks confused.
February 25th, 2011 at 9:30 am
“Honey, the Middle East is in flames and there’s talk of revolution over here…”
“Not now, woman! Can’t you see I’m watching the game??”
February 25th, 2011 at 10:26 am
Is that a young Jeff Goldbum?
February 25th, 2011 at 10:27 am
Wait I meant Goldblum!!! ….. or did I …
February 27th, 2011 at 3:56 am
It’s Barbie with Kung-Fu Grip!
February 27th, 2011 at 6:43 am
What “24” fans really crave. (And they’ll get it… in the future!)
February 27th, 2011 at 7:29 pm
Joey, do you like movies about gladiators?
March 1st, 2011 at 12:18 pm
And what, exactly, is he DOING with his oversized left claw? Opening peanut butter? Peeling paint chips? Killing a car hood with the Five Point Palm Exploding Heart Technique?
March 27th, 2013 at 12:58 am
If you squint your eyes it looks like those gladiators aren’t fighting.
March 27th, 2013 at 5:36 pm
@ JuanPaul: The damsel may have worked that one out already.
Is anyone else curious about the book in the background marked FIRST TIME IN PRINT?
November 16th, 2013 at 4:57 pm
“Got an on-the-job injury? Been tangled in your own net? Slipped and fallen while trying to impale a man with a trident? Repetitive stress injury from giving all those thumbs downs? Call the law offices of Marcus, Brutus & Smith, Gladiators At-Law. We’re on YOUR side!”
November 16th, 2013 at 5:00 pm
How is her right thumb doing that?
January 21st, 2014 at 10:55 am
Hello!! My name is Inigo Montoya! You killed my father. Prepare to die.
September 20th, 2015 at 9:25 am
@JuanPaul: I think it’s because one leg of the guy on the left is exactly the same colour as the guy on the right and vice versa.
October 25th, 2015 at 1:08 am
That awkward moment when Paul Sereno realizes Beverly Leech is more interested in television than their blind date.
October 25th, 2015 at 4:58 am
Let’s give a big hand to the unknown artist, and hope that one day he receives his dream commission to provide a cover for the James Bond novel ‘Devil May Care’ by Sebastian Faulks.
October 25th, 2015 at 8:40 am
“Oh dear, you’d get a much better score on that gladiator game if you’d stop getting distracted and look at the screen instead. And next time I see that top in the wash, it’s going straight in the bin!”
December 15th, 2015 at 2:59 pm
Holy repressed homoeroticism, Batman!
December 15th, 2015 at 3:19 pm
@Tom Noir—Repressed?
December 15th, 2015 at 3:27 pm
@B.Chiclitz: I think he’s referring to the guy the girl is pawing.
December 15th, 2015 at 8:03 pm
Exactly, the fellow whose facial expression says, “I must strive to focus on my attractive blonde girlfriend and not think at all about the bare, oiled-up, sinewy bodies of those men earnestly groping each other over there!”
November 2nd, 2019 at 4:08 am
I have this very book on my bookshelf, and I can report that the cover is somewhat accurate in the following sense.
The story’s original publishing date is in the 1950s, and the story itself could not be any more 1950s science fiction written in New York City if it tried – typical Pohl and Kornbluth stuff.
However, Baen (all hail Baen) reprinted it in the 1980s and put their artist’s idea of what the story would have looked like had it taken place in 1984 or so.
In summary, Golden Age urban science fiction meets Golden Age Baen 1980s cover – a perfect match of the heights of science fictional printing action. With giant hands.