Red Sonja | |
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File:John cassaday red sonja.JPG | |
Publication information | |
Publisher | Marvel Comics Dynamite Entertainment |
First appearance | Conan the Barbarian #23 (February 1973) |
Created by | Robert E. Howard (story) Roy Thomas Barry Windsor-Smith |
In-story information | |
Notable aliases | Red Sonya of Rogatino |
Abilities | A sword-master in peak human physical condition, martial arts expert, as well as knowledge and experience of fighting the supernatural. |
Red Sonja, the She-Devil with a Sword, is a fictional character, a low fantasy sword and sorcery heroine created by Roy Thomas and Barry Windsor-Smith. She first appeared in Conan the Barbarian #23 (Marvel Comics). The character was loosely based on Red Sonya of Rogatino in Robert E. Howard's short story "The Shadow of the Vulture" (The Magic Carpet, January 1934), which Roy Thomas rewrote as a Conan story for the Marvel comic. Thomas also somewhat based Red Sonja,on another character-Dark Agnes de Chastillon .
(also known as Agnes de Chastillon, Dark Agnes, Agnes de La Fere and The Sword Woman) is a fictional character created by Robert E. Howard set in 16th Century France. The stories were not printed until a long time after the author's death.
The character of Agnes was beaten by her father and almost forced into an arranged marriage. She avoids this by killing the bridegroom and running away. She meets Etienne Villiers, who at first attempts to sell her to a brothel, and Guiscard de Clisson, a mercenary captain who trains her as a swordswoman. When de Clisson is killed, Agnes heads for Italy with Villiers.
Like the later character Red Sonja, who was based on another creation of Robert E. Howard, Agnes has red hair and a short temper. Unlike that character, her skill is a mixture of innate talent and training, compared to Sonja's skill being a divine gift.
The character may be partially based on Novalyne Price[1].Swordsmomen like Red Sonja,Belit,Valaria may also be based on Novalyne Price.
The character now appears monthly in her own series, as well as a series of mini-series and one-shots, all published by Dynamite Entertainment. The main Red Sonja series features a wide array of cover artists as well as the regular creative team of writer Michael Avon Oeming and artist Mel Rubi.
Red Sonja has become the archetypical example of the fantasy figure of a fierce and stunningly beautiful female barbarian who typically wears armor resembling a bikini or lingerie.
The origin story for Red Sonja, "The Day of the Sword", first appeared in Kull and the Barbarians #3 by Roy Thomas, Doug Moench and Howard Chaykin, and was later redrawn by Dick Giordano and Terry Austin for The Savage Sword of Conan, issue 78.
In this story, Red Sonja lived with her family in a humble house in the Western Hyrkanian steppes (modern Ukraine/Russia). When she had just turned 17 years old, a group of mercenaries killed her family and burned down their house. Sonja survived but she had been brutally raped by the leader of the group, leaving her in shame. Answering her cry for revenge, the red goddess Scathach appeared to her, and instilled in her incredible skill in the handling of swords and other weapons on the condition that she would never lie with a man unless he defeated her in fair combat.
In the current Dynamite comic book series, Sonja's origins are portrayed in "flashbacks" within each issue beginning with issue #8. The goddess makes her first appearance in the new series in issue #12, which also marks the return of the deadly sorcerer Kulan Gath.
In 1973 Roy Thomas adapted the Robert E Howard short story "Shadow of a Vulture" into Conan's Hyborian age in Conan the Barbarian #23. "Sonja" is slightly different from Robert E. Howard's original "Sonya". Besides tweaking the spelling of her name, Thomas transformed her from a sword- and pistol-wielding supporting character of the late Renaissance into a sword-wielding heroine of Conan's prehistoric Hyborian Age.
In 2006 Red Sonja LLC brought a lawsuit in Delaware Federal Court against Paradox Entertainment alleging Trademark Infringement and unfair competition. Paradox claims the rights to 'Red Sonya' [sic] as part of the Howard Library, even though no copyright renewal was filed for the story "Shadow of a Vulture."
Red Sonja LLC succeeded in securing settlement in the nature of all of Paradox's rights in the story "Shadow of a Vulture" and Paradox's endorsement of RS LLC's trademark in Red Sonja regardless of spelling.
Most artists depict Red Sonja wearing a very brief bikini-like costume of scale mail, usually with boots and gauntlets. As originally drawn by Barry Smith for "The Shadow of the Vulture" and "The Song of Red Sonja" in Conan the Barbarian issues 23 and 24 (1973), she did not have as full a figure and dressed a little more conservatively, in a long-sleeved mail shirt and short pants of red silk, a style that did not last long.
As told by Roy Thomas in the introduction of Red Sonja Adventures Volume 1 (Dynamite Entertainment) Spanish artist Esteban Maroto submitted an uncommissioned illustration to him when he was editing the magazine Savage Sword of Conan where he redesigned the character and for the first time showed her wearing what would become her famous costume, the silver “metal bikini”, which resembled other fantasy costumes that other Maroto heroines sported in the 1970’s. This illustration had been printed for the first time in Jim Steranko's magazine Comixscene #5 in black and white. It was reprinted in Savage Sword of Conan #1, and in Marvel Treasury Edition #15 colored but poorly reproduced, and finally restored and colored by José Villarrubia as an alternate cover for the Dynamite Entertainment edition of Red Sonja #2. Maroto drew her in this costume for a double page spread illustration in Savage Tales #3 and then for her first solo adventure in Savage Sword of Conan #1, and John Buscema drew her in this costume in the same magazine. Buscema drew her again in this costume in issues 43, 44 and 48 of Conan the Barbarian (1974) and Dick Giordano in the first issue of Marvel Feature (1975) before Frank Thorne took over from issue 2 (1976). The "bikini" proved popular, becoming well known through the paintings of Boris Vallejo and others.
These are the comic books that have featured Red Sonja as a main character:
In addition she has been featured in solo stories in the following publications:
And with
Marvel Feature #4 was reprinted in the book "The Superhero Women" edited by Stan Lee. Red Sonja was featured on the cover in a painting by John Romita, Sr. marching among Marvel Comics's female characters (clockwise: Ms. Marvel, Hela from the series Thor, Black Widow, the Wasp from the Avengers, Medusa from the Inhumans, and Invisible Woman from the Fantastic Four).
Sonja has been featured in several novels by David C. Smith and Richard L. Tierney with covers by Boris Vallejo:
Red Sonja makes an appearance on the Conan TV series, in the episode, "Red Sonja". She is on a mission to rescue a young wizard who was kidnapped. When one of Conan's partners sarcastically asks why the village didn't send their best warriors, Sonja replies, "They did send their best warrior, mulebrain!" She was played by Angelica Bridges.
She was played by Brigitte Nielsen in the 1985 film Red Sonja, which also starred Arnold Schwarzenegger as Prince Kalidor (a Conan clone). The film was directed by Richard Fleischer. It performed poorly at the box office, and was also widely panned by critics.[citation needed]
Avi Lerner and Danny Dimbort's Millennium Films and Randall Emmett and George Furla's Emmett/Furla Films announced they have acquired the rights to produce and distribute a feature film based on the “Red Sonja” property as well as the allied and ancillary rights. The picture will be produced by Randall Emmett, George Furla and Avi Lerner as well as executive produced by M. Dal Walton III, Luke Lieberman, Nick Barrucci, Danny Dimbort, Trevor Short and Boaz Davidson. The property is currently out to writers and directors.
A remake of Red Sonja is currently in the works. It is currently in pre-production and very little has been decided on. It is scheduled to be released in 2010.[1]
On June 6, 2006 comic news site Newsarama reported that Red Sonja, LLC (which holds rights to the Roy Thomas version of the character) filed a lawsuit on four counts against Paradox Entertainment (which claims rights to Red Sonya as part of the Howard library, though no renewal record for The Shadow of the Vulture exists) in US Federal Court in April 2006. The four counts are claims of copyright infringement, trademark infringement, trademark dilution, and unfair competition.[1] The lawsuit was settled in January 2008, on the second day of the hearing, for a sum of $1 each. Red Sonja LLC paid $1 to Paradox for the rights to Howard's Red Sonya and permission for the Red Sonja stories to continue being set in Conan's Hyborian Age. Paradox simultaneously paid $1 to Red Sonja LLC for the exclusive print-publication rights for The Shadow of the Vulture now that one of the characters belongs to Red Sonja LLC.[2]