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Slaine: Books of Invasion and that infuriating Mills'n'Langley pair.

Started by TordelBack, 18 March, 2016, 11:57:57 AM

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TordelBack

Thanks to a lucky glance at the 'in' pile of my favourite secondhand book shop and a wee bit of negotiating, I managed to get all three Books of Invasion volumes for €20.  I've been looking for these at a decent price since I finished Lord of Beasts, and had almost resigned myself to wait for a distant omnibus reprint, but joy!  I haven't read these stories since they first ran (or the Christmas re-read of their respective years at least), and I had mixed memories of them: a salmon-leap in quality from the dismal The Secret Commonwealth, versus still-lingering distaste with [spoiler]the fridging of Niamh[/spoiler], and its manner.

I'm still working my way through them (there's a lot of pages!), and so far my feelings remaining mixed, but I thought I might jot down my reactions here as I go rather than try and fail to do it all at once.

By way of preamble, I am of course a massive fan of Sláine, it was the 2000AD strip of my teens and probably still is, and of Pat Mills, who along with counterpoint and sometime counterpart Wagner, essentially is 2000AD for me: a powerhouse of characters, ideas, imagery, factoid-of-the-week, bad puns and bald-faced socio-political tubthumping. 

However, both Sláine and Mills drive me up the flipping wall at times, for reasons that will be exposed in excruciating detail as we go on.

Anyway, first impressions (Take 2):

These books look magnificent.  Cover to cover, these are lavish, intricate, vibrant, dense, intriguing volumes.  I'm sure it's intentional, but the resemblance to a computer-age quasi-fumetti Book of Kells really is striking, for all that Langley largely eschews the kind of obvious homage to scrollwork and page layout that other artists have attempted.  Instead, it's the insane, almost irrational level of detail, of every corner of every frame being packed with ever-smaller elements, of the reader being unable to look at a single page without wondering just how ridiculously long it took to produce.  Even the cover galleries at the back form a series of gorgeous, luscious character portraits. 

And then, just to spoil the whole marvelous hypnotic effect, suddenly there's Clint's Lemmy-lookalike mate gurning out at me, or an action scene where any attempt to convey movement has been handed over to a bad PS blur effect.  Why Clint, whyyyy?

A question I'll be asking a lot.

Next:  Book I: Moloch.



Colin YNWA

I remember really looking forward to 'Books of Invasion' when I was doing my catch read of the Progs from my Wilderness Years. I have a lot of affection for Slaine and so the many proclamations that these stories led to a return to form for the series filled me with hope.

Alas it was a hope dashed. I think in part as I've just never got on with Clint Langley's art on the strip (though love it elsewhere) all a bit to Games Workshop Poster for my taste, too shiny and LARGE SCALE. The story to I remember feeling rushed at times and ultimately hollow. All that said the encouraging sign was at the end of my read of it I was looking forward to a re-read with my expectations suitably adjusted.

Well since my next full 2000ad re-read is only a few months from starting we might only be two or three years away from that finally happening!

Looking forward to seeing how you get on with it Tordelback.

Magnetica

I bought all the Langley era Slaine and ABC Warriors in the recent half price sale, on the basis that I used to love both - well their early adventures anyway, but feel I lost track of the plot with them and have decided it is high time I got to grips with them.

Also part of it was I have very mixed feelings about the art. I keep flip flopping between think it is just the most amazing stuff ever (apart from Bolland or Fabry  :)  ) and thinking its a bit stiff / doesn't help the follow of the story.

So anyway time for a re-appraisement of both plot and art, hoping that a condensed reading will really help, rather than it being spread out over years, as was the case when reading in the Progs. 

AlexF

Is it a waste of my time hoping for paperback editions of Books of Invasions 2 and 3? I can see that Langley's art suits the European album look, but consistency on the shelf takes priority, no?  :D

My recent read of the paperback edition of Book 1 was better than I'd expected. I think the lushness outweighs the stiffness, and I do love Langley's rendering of Slaine himself. The story is possibly the weakest thing in the book, but it's elevated by some great character designs (Moloch and his eye-piercing; the Golamh idea), and some effective emotional beats. The blurring effects are proper weak, though.

I've not re-read beyond that since the Progs, but my memory is that I didn't really warm to the Langley era of Slaine until the Books of Invasions were done, and Slaine got back to his wanderings with Ukko in stuff like Carnival and the Gong Beater (which would be a very different episode of Defoe than it was in Slaine.)

vark

Being French I kind of arrived late at the party. The first story of the ABC Warriors published in France was the painted Khronicles of Khaos/Hellbringer that remains to this day my favourite story (yes I had absolutely no clue of the fact that is was the so called "Dark Age" of 2000 AD*). Sláine has also been firts published in France in the 90s with the painted stuff, therefore from the Horned God to King of Hearts (and to this day all B&W older stuff from both series have never been translated in French).

Almost 10 years have passed before new ABC or Sláine stories find their way again over here with Langley's take on the characters. But before that, as I was in demand of Mills new material and Titan book material was still hard to find for me (I was not a happy subscriber at that time), the Rebellion reprints strategy changed my life. I have ordered these Book of Invasions when they first been reprinted in HC by Rebellion , and man, I was blown away. It remains to this day my favourite story by far of the Celtic Warrior. And Clint's art has played a lot in this fact. I am still amazed of the level of details in each page. And it features my two preferred moments, Sláine pissing on Oddacon's thirsty head, and the dreamlike silent piece in volume 3 when Sláine becomes Feg's version of the Horned God (this silent piece has been greatly extended by Clint in the HC version from how it appears in the prog). And in regard of the Mills script, I like (again) his overwhelming creativity, and simply the fact that reading these book of invasions were highly entertaining (the definition of a "page turner").


*by the way, to echo another very interesting thread of this forum that I have dicoverded yesterday, when Mills reffers to the Dark Age, he not only refers to editorial interference but also on his own erratic take of the character during that time (from Book of Invasions Vol 1 introduction).

ThryllSeekyr

It was my expections for those books that was reason for first joining this forum roughly ten years ago. Back then, I was having problem finding the progs or more importantly the Slaine progs & was very eagerly awaiting their graphic novels.

I don't suppose these will ever find their way into telephone book format of previous Slaine episodes & everything else really?

There was a smaller softcover edition of the first book as well. Picked this up from one of the comic book stores in the city. I don't think they ever published the other to complete the series in that edition.