This is the eighteenth installment in our Red Sonja themed cover galleries, continuing from the first gallery. Below, we present ten selected covers from various comic books, which feature Red Sonja and dinosaurs.

• title: Red Sonja: She-Devil with a Sword (1977)
• publisher: Marvel
• cover artist: Frank Thorne
• writers: Roy Thomas and Clara Noto
• artist: Frank Thorne
• issue: #5 of 15
• release date: September, 1977
• episode: "Master of the Bells!"
• commentary: In this cover, the "Fighting First Lady of Swords and Sorcery" takes on a creature that has more or less dinosaur-like attributes, although the beast happens to have several features not associated with the fossil records, including (i) purple coloring, (ii) two heads and (iii) a prehensile tongue. Still it seems clear that the artist, Frank Thorne, used a dinosaur along the lines of an allosaurus, which lived during the late Jurassic period, as the physiological model for the base creature.

• title: Conan the Barbarian (1970)
• publisher: Marvel
• cover artist: Geof Isherwood
• writer: Roy Thomas
• artist: Mike Docherty
• issue: #248 of 275
• release date: September, 1991
• episode: "The Peril and the Prophecy"
• commentary: In this cover by Geof Isherwood from 1991, Red Sonja joins Conan in a battle against a dinosaur-like creature that possessed the head crest and body structure of a corythosaurus, a creature from the upper Cretaceous period. The duck-billed beak of the herbivorous corythosaurus is replaced with a mouth full of teeth in this adaptation.

• title: Red Sonja: She-Devil with a Sword (2005)
• publisher: Dynamite
• cover artist: Arthur Adams
• writers: Michael Avon Oeming & Mike Carey
• artist: Mel Rubi
• issue: #02 of 80
• release date: July, 2005
• cover: B variant
• commentary: In a variant cover to the second issue of the first Red Sonja series with Dynamite, Art Adams pays homage to the Frank Thorne cover, included at the top of this gallery. While the scene is the same, down to the placement of the skulls at Red Sonja's feet, virtually all of the details have been updated, from Red Sonja's hair to her boots. The dinosaur too has undergone several changes. While it retains the two heads and purple hue, its tongue are not quite as long and the shape of its cranium has been altered to accord with advances in paleontology that occurred during the three decades that separate the publication of these two covers.

• title: Red Sonja: She-Devil with a Sword (2005)
• publisher: Dynamite
• cover artist: Marc Silvestri
• writers: Michael Avon Oeming & Mike Carey
• artist: Mel Rubi
• issue: #04 of 80
• release date: January, 2006
• cover: A cover
• commentary: Having just vanquished a dinosaur that calls to mind a stegosaurus, a creature of the late Jurassic period, Red Sonja appears ready to defend herself against a new foe. Slain in shin-deep water, the monster calls to mind a semi-terrestrial existence in prehistoric swamplands.

• title: Red Sonja: She-Devil with a Sword (2005)
• publisher: Dynamite
• cover artist: Richard Isanove
• writers: Michael Avon Oeming & Mike Carey
• artist: Mel Rubi
• issue: #05 of 80
• release date: February, 2006
• cover: A cover
• commentary: Red Sonja slips beneath this dinosaur, cutting a lethal incision along the length of its underbelly, from which its entrails will soon drop. From this perspective, the identification of this dinosaur is inconclusive. It appears to have forelegs much smaller than its hind legs. One may guess that it is a creature that can walk upright in a bipedal mode or ambulate as a quadruped when necessary. Such questions are largely moot since the beast will have breathed its last in another one or two strides.

• title: Red Sonja: She-Devil with a Sword (2005)
• publisher: Dynamite
• cover artist: Brandon Peterson
• writer: Michael Avon Oeming
• artist: Mel Rubi
• issue: #08 of 80
• release date: March, 2006
• cover: D variant
• commentary: In this cover by Brandon Peterson, Red Sonja peers over her shoulder while standing over a beast that appears to be a hybrid between a stegosaurus and a crocodilian of one kind or another. Curiously, by the gape of its maw and the lively curve of its tail, the beast still appears to be not only alive but angry, a fact which seems at odds with the relaxed pose and downcast sword of Red Sonja. Moreover, her focus appears not to be directed at the dinosaur at all but rather at some other subject not captured by the artist.
  
  We have featured covers by Brandon Peterson in galleries with themes including
  • Dinosaurs: #6
  • 2016 & 2017: #11

• title: Red Sonja: She-Devil with a Sword (2005)
• publisher: Dynamite
• cover artist: Jim Balent
• writer: Michael Avon Oeming
• artist: Mel Rubi
• issue: #16 of 80
• release date: November, 2006
• cover: G cover
• commentary: This cover by Jim Balent is clearly another homage to the Frank Thorne cover, which kicked off this gallery. There are more liberties taken in this version than in the Art Adams adapation. Most obviously, the dinosaur now only has one head, though it retains the purple skin and also keeps the prehensile tongue wrapped around Red Sonja's waist, which was originally present in the Thorne cover but dropped by Adams. This dinosaur also resembles more a velociraptor, a dinosaur of the Cretaceous Period.

• title: Red Sonja: She-Devil with a Sword (2005)
• publisher: Dynamite
• cover artist: Jackson Herbert
• writer: Eric Trautmann
• artist: Marcio Abreu
• issue: #67 of 80
• release date: June, 2012
• cover: B variant
• commentary: This cover by Jack Herbert looks as if it could be the follow-on to entry #5 above. After having gutted the dinosaur, Red Sonja takes a well-earned rest atop its hulking corpse. The background places her in some primordial realm, replete with steaming jungle, volcanic mountain range and a pterosaur, drawn by the clamor of the fight, to feast on the remains of Sonja's defeated foe.

• title: Red Sonja (2019)
• publisher: Dynamite
• cover artist: Roberto Castro
• writer: Mark Russell
• artist: Mirko Colak
• issue: #11 of ongoing series
• release date: December, 2019
• cover: K, 1:7 retailer incentive
• commentary: In this cover by Roberto Castro, Red Sonja faces a monstrous opponent that is part snake and part dinosaur. The head of the beast calls to mind the styracosaurus, a dinosaur of the Campanian stage of the Cretaceous period. The distinguishing characteristic of the styracosaurus was the four to six long parietal spikes extending from its neck frill. The styracosaurus possessed a smaller jugal horn on each of its cheeks, which in this beast have been moved to the brow. The styracosaurus also bore a single horn protruding from its nose, which has been omitted entirely in the creation of this fictional monster. In any case, Red Sonja appears unwilling to have her bones join the remains of previous meals that line the creature's lair.

• title: Swords of Sorrow (2015)
• publisher: Dynamite
• cover artist: Emanuela Lupacchino
• writer: Gail Simone
• artist: Sergio Fernandez Davila
• issue: #2 of 6
• release date: June, 2015
• cover: B variant
• commentary: What is better than a cover that features Red Sonja fighting a dinosaur? A cover in which Dejah Thoris, Princess of Mars, and Vampirella, Scourge of Drakulon, join Red Sonja in fighting a dinosaur. This beast looks like it can readily be identified with the tyrannosaurus rex, the most famous carnivorous denizen of the Maastrichtian age of the upper Cretaceous period.