Buscema. Hell, I like Tim Truman more than Barry Windsor-Smith's run.

Buscema could do mud and blood and action better. He could also do character types better.

BWS could do the exotic, the mysticism, the details of culture in clothes and architecture, jewelry and towers and palaces. He could do mood and atmosphere better.

I've heard them described as with Buscema, you could smell the sweat. With BWS you could smell the incense.

But being a Pre-Raphaelite and BWS fan I have to go with him. My own work, is much closer to this aesthetic than to Buscema's. And of course, Marvel's Conan was my first introduction to the character, and while BWS's art at the beginning left me indifferent at first, his evolution by the end of his work on the character was beautiful to behold. And to study. The sheer beauty and detail of it appeals to me much more than Buscema's, whose own work could have its moments too.

Big John could draw better women tho, so there is that.

Don't get me wrong, Rick -- I don't dislike Barry Windsor-Smith's Conan at all. There's quite a lot to like about it. But I think that Windsor-Smith captured the DeCamp/Carter interpretation of Conan, while Buscema and Truman represent Howard's Conan better.

I also got tired fast of Big John's depiction of Conan's face as some sort of cross between a Neanderthal and a smashed up boxer whose facial bones have been forcibly realigned. There's no reason at all for that. There was nothing in Conan's physical description that fits that, even if that seems to be what some people think he should look like.

Neal Adams, actually, got closest to what REH described.

I don't care for BWS overall, and Big John is one of my favorites, so this one is easy for me.

This is making me as sad as the political threads used to do.

This is very true. People tend to think of Conan as being muscle-bound, and he was more described as being trim and athletic.

Buscema Conan is kind of like Swan Superman to me -- it's just what I think of as Conan.

Buscema.

I just think he's better over all. No slight on BWS who is more talented than most of the field IMO. Buscema is the best artist in the history of American comics for my money.

Buscema was more consistent, but BWS at his absolute best on Conan was more impressive than Big John's best, IMO.

Give me you ass!

They're so different it's almost like asking about two different characters. I like both for different reasons but I'm going with BWS. It was a tough call but mostly made for the brutish look that Buscema gave Conan.

I'm with Bully on this. Particularly, when Buscema inked himself.

Or Tom Palmer.

I used to be a BWS guy and never really paid much attention to Buscema's Conan -- until I read REH. While Conan is very lean, I also recall him being described as a "giant", packed with "corded muscle". I don't look at Buscema's Conan and think of him as muscle-bound like a bodybuilder -- I think of him as a guy with a giant frame who has natural muscle packed onto him.

One thing that really surprised me as I made my way through BWS' Conan run was how shoddy a lot of his anatomy work was. Even later in the run and on his famous Red Nails story, there were a lot of issues with both faces and the body.

Yes, the body body.

Whoops!