At an impressionable age (like, full-on elementary school), I stumbled upon the delights of the turn of the century author Edgar Rice Burroughs. Kind of like a *slightly* less boring and racist H.P. Lovecraft, Edgar Rice Burroughs was best known for his Tarzan books, and I quickly tore through all 24 novels in the series before moving on to the 11 John Carter of Mars books, 7 Pellucidar Hollow-earth books, 3 Land that Time Forgot books, 5 Venus books, and 3 moon books before finally deciding that I’d had enough.
And sure, even at that young age, I realized that maybe there was something a little off with all the racial superiority talk, Tarzan’s noose, and the whole deal with the Waziri, but on the other hand have you considered that Tarzan broke the neck of a lion with a goddamn full nelson? I positively ate that shit up, nodding in kayfabe acceptance of Tarzan’s 20 FOOT vertical jump, and never once noticing that some of the stories were starting to push the bounds of plausibility. These books were, quite simply, BADASS, and that was all that mattered. And, of course, nothing was more badass than the ones that had a Boris Vallejo cover.
If you are unfamiliar with his work, Vallejo is like a slightly more photorealistic (and slightly less artistic) Frank Frazetta who insisted on extremely anachronistic hair styles for his fantasy work. But, there is no denying Vallejo could paint one hell of an oiled-up rippling example of pure-bred European masculinity. Here are a few of the more badass covers from his work on the Tarzan series.
5. Tarzan and the Ant Men
These early Vallejo paintings honestly all still had a nice painterly style that didn’t look like AI bodybuilders with 80s haircuts, so the noncomplementary comparisons to Frazetta aren’t even all that fair. And this really is a hell of a cover, depicting Tarzan’s first encounter with one of the “Minunians” having been grabbed from his tiny deer mount. The perspective here is confusing–is that a giant? Based on his position in the foreground he’s maybe smaller than Tarzan? Why is that deer so small? But either way, this is the kind of cover that would make young Isley ABSOLUTELY pick this book up to get to the bottom of all these questions. It also was the final story in the long serialized arc that began with Tarzan the Untamed below and I do like a good serialized story.
4. Tarzan and the Forbidden City
I don’t remember much about this book but it was apparently about Tarzan searching for diamonds in yet another lost valley (the plot of about 75% of these books). This one had an actual sea monster though, so that was cool (or, according to wikipedia a “unicorn sea horse,” for which I guess we’ll forgive Vallejo his artistic license here, because he really delivered a sweet sea monster). Anyway, great composition, with the striking red blood cloud really standing out alongside a confusingly unconcerned bikini babe out for a swim.
3. Tarzan the Untamed
As far as badass things go, this doesn’t look quite as hardcore as the rest of the covers seen here. But considering this is depicting Tarzan trying to cross a giant desert on foot, and is showing him seconds before he ripped the goddamn head off that vulture to drink its blood (an idea stolen for the first Conan movie), it’s up there with the best moments from the whole Tarzan series.
2. Tarzan and the Madman
This is a story about Tarzan finding a lost city of Portuguese explorers and dealing with a Tarzan look-alike, who, apparently, is NOT the Spanish actor/Tarzan lookalike Esteban Miranda from earlier books. All of which is to say, as one of the last Tarzan books, it is not the most inspired story, but what WAS inspired was the way Tarzan totally took out that giant bull (I swear in the book he ended up breaking its neck too–as was his wont)–and Vallejo nails the action here.
1. Tarzan, Lord of the Jungle
This cover is just quintessential Tarzan and Vallejo. Fighting a goddamned boa while saving a poor weak gorilla, Tarzan has never been more locked in and vascular. As a kid I was also fascinated with why that knife was shaped that way (and if it was indeed a different knife than he used on the previous sea monster), but that is a distraction from the main point: this cover (as is the case with all the Vallejo covers) is cool as shit. I don’t remember how this scene fit in with the story of Tarzan finding another lost valley with an enclave of pure-bred European crusaders, but I can 100% guarantee I read this section of the story with youthful chortle of appreciation at how badass it was.
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