Slaine: Warrior’s Dawn
Writer: Pat Mills
Various Artists
Creating a fantasy world isn’t easy, and even harder if
you’re taking the story into comic books. Yes, Conan did it, as did Sojourn and
Dragonlance, but we comic fans tend to like adventurous super heroes. Every now
and then, however, we are gripped by an adventurous barbarian. This one happens
to be named Slaine.
He is Slaine Mac Roth of the tribe called Sessair. The
story, I will say simple a couple of times here, does go forward in such a way
as to keep you reading. The artwork does it better, because, for an old comic,
it’s almost experimental. And according to the foreword by Pat Mills, the many
artists who worked here took a lot of flack from the major fan base of 2000 AD.
The artwork is really what stands out in Slaine Warrior’s Dawn. Epic. More, it
pushes the story right into an adventurous, vibrant land. In the beginning,
Slaine is fighting a T-Rex-like Time Monster. He looks mean; not mean enough. I
mention that only because you get the simplicity of most of the stories: Slaine
is truly some kind of Conan for the British world, but in the beginning he’s
just another coy disguise for a ruthless Celt barbarian. Maybe he’s closer to
barbarian than even Conan is. Maybe …
While the similarities to Conan are obvious in the
beginning, like having a companion named Ukko who’s quite greedy (Conan had
similar lackeys), this hero stands on his own. The core of the stories, when
compared to the core Conan comic adaptations from decades ago, sometimes are
better. The artwork is by far better, even if you want to argue the Conan vs
Slaine idea.
These tales of high adventure lack in characterization, but
appeal to the eye and have a great combination of action and dark horror. I
kept stopping, not used to the five page short stories which the book is full
of, but there is another difference between this barbarian and other warriors.
After all, Slaine is a 2000 AD creation, by Pat Mills I believe, and most of
the older 2000 AD trades are full of 5 page shorts, even if it is a bigger arc.
The differing range of artists who worked on Slaine add
plenty to each story, and it allows us readers to get a chance to see many
different visions. And Pat Mills, I am guessing in his early years, doesn’t
quite match the scope of the artists’ talent. The stories are far too simple. I
digress.
You get darkness and light, character details and shadows of
monsters. And even though the artists each open a different box, they tend to
capture the story in a way that, though different, fits in with the characters.
As a whole book, it shows promise, but seems to be more a
work in progress waiting for the big bang to happen. But it is an older 2000 AD
book with an older style. It did begin the story of a hero rivaling the very
best in all of fantasy comic books.
