A warm, richly painted scene showing Sláine, resplendent in tribal tartan and a gleaming new silver hero-harness according to the caption box, kneeling beside a shaggy hound and resting a hand on its head. Captions establish that Sláine is discussing the question of an alliance with Cathbad his druid, weighing whether they have the Cauldron of Blood's power to inspire and regenerate their dead, or whether they'll need treasures from the other tribes as well if they're going to destroy the Fomors. It's a genuinely quiet character moment, warmth between man and dog rendered with real tenderness, wrapped around dense worldbuilding dialogue lifted straight from the deep well of Celtic and pseudo-historical mythology Pat Mills built the Sláine strip out of, Fomors, druids, tribal alliances, magical cauldrons of regeneration. Bisley became the artist most associated with Sláine's visual identity after joining 2000 AD in 1987, and it's worth noting that his path there started with an unrelated painting entirely, editor Pat Mills spotted a piece Bisley had done of a robot cradling a baby and offered him work on the relaunched ABC Warriors first, with Sláine and Judge Dredd following soon after. Scenes like this one, a tribal warrior-king and his dog rendered with genuine affection amid a backdrop of complex tribal politics and mythic stakes, are exactly what made Bisley's Sláine feel like a lived-in world rather than just a string of fight scenes, the painted intimacy of the dog's posture and Sláine's gentle hand doing as much storytelling work as the caption boxes around them.
Slaine and his dog
