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- Books of Invasion Vol 1
Slaine
- Books of Invasion Volume 2
by Pat
Mills & Clint Langley
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What to Expect:
Demons slain by the dozen – you wont think it too many – and some
barely comprehensible philosophising.
Review by Pete
McCosh
19th December 06
Anyone who has seen the
first volume – or read my own tiresome eulogising of it – will know
what to expect from this. A sumptuous volume featuring top-class reproduction
of Clint Langley’s digital whizz-pokery on high quality glossy paper. New
work (albeit mostly reworked from existing images) is spread liberally throughout
and they’ve even put the pages in the right order.
So much for the format,
what about the content?
Here we get the middle two
Books in this ongoing saga which are wildly different in tone and quality. The
first, Scota, stays on familiar territory with Slaine trying to find a way to
best the Atlantean and Fomorian invaders in his own world, while “Tara”
sees him journey into the El World to seek help from the Goddess Danu herself.
Scota is the more straightforward
and by far the more enjoyable of the two. It’s in this Book that we start
to get a real sense that Slaine’s story is heading towards, if not a conclusion,
then at least a major turning point. This was hinted at in his farewell to Ukko
in the first volume, but when the significance of Scota and her husband Gael’s
names becomes clear, we realise the mythical era of the Tuatha de Danann is rushing
towards a head-on collision with the beginnings of recorded history. If Slaine
is going to continue as a series after this, then it’s going to be with
a relatively fresh start as all the familiar elements are being washed away.
Whether the rationale behind
this is editorial or authorial, it seems like Pat Mills is determined to throw
as many of his outstanding Celtic ideas at the wall as possible. With so much
flying past at breakneck speed, it’s inevitable that characters and storylines
that might have otherwise been given room to develop over a longer period are
introduced and dispensed with in the course of a single Book comprising half a
dozen episodes. Whatever else you might think of his work these days, Pat still
has a knack for creating memorable characters so it’s a shame not to get
to see more of them. Gael, the one new face who is allowed room to change and
develop throughout the Books of Invasions is a case in point. This development
makes him more interesting than anyone else and he shares some poignant moments
with Slaine.
It’s always difficult
to know how much to read into a comic strip but, with Pat Mills at the helm, you
can be sure you’re never far from a political metaphor and so it proves
here. Although it is also a direct reference to Irish folklore, the title Mills
has given his saga encourages the reader to consider some of the more obvious
interpretations.
In Slaine’s world
demons – from the Cythrons to the Fomorians – have always represented
civilisation and progress. Like Satan tempting Jesus in the wilderness, they come
offering secret knowledge in return for our heroes willingly enslaving themselves.
The way the Fomorians “ride” humans as their Golamhs further extends
this idea. In days gone by, this relationship could have easily fitted into Third
World War as a comment on evil corporations exploiting the poor, but today it
seems to suggest the relationship between a major power – such as, say,
the US – and a client state. Who are the Atlanteans meant to represent in
this? Well, they are a nomadic, stateless people who have returned to claim Tir
Nan Og as their own ancestral home, determined to wipe out the current occupants
with the help of a greater power..
Whether all this
subtext is intentional or simply the result of an overactive imagination on my
part, it doesn’t intrude into our enjoyment of the story itself in Scota:
demons are still dispatched by the score and nobody thinks it too many. Unfortunately,
the same cannot be said about Tara. If we are seeing the end of Slaine for the
time being, then this Book is where Pat has decided to pack in everything he can
think of about women and their wily ways. This is not a good thing as Pat’s
searing insights include suggesting that women aren’t really like us blokes;
they say one thing and mean another; best just grin and bear it, eh?
To illustrate this, we are
introduced to a number of different women, every one more of a sitcom cliché
than the last. There are the ball-busting ice maidens who make up the pagan Priesthood,
the bunny-boiling shrew Fais. Then we have the gang of El Women who are at once
slutty, coquettish, indecisive, assertive and contrary; I suspect they are based
on Pat’s observations the last time he went to a nightclub. Finally, Danu
herself is portrayed as the sort of stroppy teenage girl who wants to make her
two ill-shaven suitors fight in the car park before she’ll get in the back
of anybody’s Ford Escort.
The backdrop of a matriarchal,
tribal society and strong female characters like Nest and Niamh have always been
as much a part of Slaine as axes and overwrought insults. Which only makes this
ill-conceived rubbish seem worse. Certainly, some of it is supposed to be humorous,
but there is the distinct impression that Pat has tried to say something fundamental
about the roles of men and women in society and ended up with some material Jasper
Carrott would have thought twice about including in his stand-up circa 1982. If
you really want to read comic with a cranky Scotsman’s take on how women
are treated in the modern world, pick up a copy of Kill Your Boyfriend.
I’m sorry to go on
at such length about this, but Mills has always made a point of dragging the political
into his entertainment, so I feel it only right to take him to task when it doesn’t
work. There is the faint possibility that this is all supposed to be ironic and
it’s intended to subvert the idea that barbarian warriors only ever think
of women in a few narrowly defined roles, but subtlety has never been Pat’s
strong suit.
Clearly, these books are
being put together as a showcase for Clint Langley’s artwork, rather than
Pat Mills’ storytelling. In these stories, Langley seems to have made a
conscious effort to work on the backgrounds (something which was lacking in the
previous volume) but this is not without its own problems. There are occasions
– notably the Egyptian sequence – where the poor integration of reference
photos is pretty jarring. It’s not quite Luke falling down the centre of
Bespin, but it could be a lot better. Throughout the book, there is an overuse
of red and orange flame effects that becomes quite enervating as time wears on,
but I’ll concede that the script doesn’t leave the artist much choice,
with it’s plethora of bloody battle scenes, leyser guns and the like.
These criticisms are relatively
minor and I enjoyed little touches like the title page of Tara where scale has
been thrown out the window and we see massively different sized figures, reminiscent
of a medieval tapestry. I’d also be very interested to know where he got
his reference material for some of the images of Scota.
Despite my misgivings about
some aspects, there is still a lot to enjoy in this collection. The main story
of the battle against the invaders is the usual enjoyable mix of gore and long-winded
battle cries. Gael, Scota and, to a lesser extent, Fergus provide some good character
moments, while the banter between Fais and her Fomorian “rider” turn
them into a barbarian R2 and C3P0.
It’s hard to know
who to recommend this to. Ultimately, nobody’s going to pick this book up
out of curiosity as anyone interested in seeing Langley’s art showcased
in this format will have made up their minds after the first volume. Both Pat
and Clint polarise fan opinion to such an extent that you’re unlikely to
catch someone shelling out for it if they’re not a fan, particularly based
on such an equivocal review. What I would say is that you should bear in mind
that the second instalment of a trilogy always looks better once you’ve
seen them all. You wouldn’t want to miss out on a great ending would you?
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