Parts II and III of “Red Nails” are found in Savage Tales #3.

(EDITOR’S NOTE: Welcome to Countdown to Conan, a series ringing in the return of Robert E. Howard’s popular Cimmerian to Marvel Comics. Weekly installments are published on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. They will continue until Marvel releases their first issue of their new Conan series. This bonus Countdown to Conan feature is written by John Jack.)

Taken from Savage Tales #3 in 1973, “The Lurker from the Catacombs” (the second part of the “Red Nails” storyline) is Barry Windsor-Smith’s last Marvel work on Conan until almost 20 years later. The book was made in an era when barbarian and sword and sorcery stories in general were really beginning to take off. At the time, Marvel was publishing 3 such titles, shortly followed by DC mirroring them with titles like Claw the Unconquered and Mike Grell’s Warlord.

The third and final part of “Red Nails” is featured later in this same issue of Savage Tales.

Techotl explains they just had a run-in with the Crawler from the Catacombs as it bangs against the door repeatedly, attempting to smash through. They make a run for it and reach the border to Techotl’s tribes area of the ancient city called Tecuhtli. They arrive at a giant metal door and Valeria relaxes, Techotl bids her and Conan to not relax yet, men have been killed in front of the door to Tecuhtli. Several men welcome Conan and Valeria in and urge them to hurry.

CAPSULE REVIEW: I really enjoyed the ambiance of the first half of the story, but the second half took a hard jump off the deep end, which I found slightly confusing and poorly paced. The second part involves a deep betrayal within the deposed monarchy found within the city. I also found the crawler to be pretty poorly conceived and displayed for a title character – it best seemed presented as an afterthought. I was a bit disappointed as a lover of monsters in the sword and sorcery genre.

Overall, this is a very evenftul middle part of the story that just serves to set up the third and final installment. Very little actually happens in the story itself. I’m disappointed after I enjoyed the first part of the story and hope the final installment improves. Also interesting to note is that the tone I complained about in the first part of the story (where Conan practically forces himself on Valeria) is ten times worse this installment. It’s part of what made it tough for me to read.

This story was a letdown to me, so on a scale of 1-10, I’d rate this story a 5. On eBay, ungraded copies were readily available for $8-20 depending on condition.

– John Jack