Sin City: Hell & Back

This is the final volume of the Sin City yarns it is also my least favorite of the collected works.  This is somewhat of an odd duck in my opinion compared with the other stories.  The main character Wallace is ex-military part Rambo & part Bruce Lee.  The character from the story Blue Eyes comes back in this story.  Hell & Back is story about a reluctant hero saving a damsel in distress & the evil of human trafficking.  The main difference between this volume & all of the rest of the Sin City books is that there is a happy ending for the hero.  It just seems that Frank Miller was running out of steam by this point of the series & the final scene of Wallace & Esther driving away from Basin City never looking back seems to be a fitting way of saying goodbye to the series.

Sin City: Booze, Broads & Bullets

This is an anthology book that collects very short stories about the characters of Sin City.  The most important story in this book is Blue Eyes because it for shadows events in the final volume Hell & Back.  However it was not my favorite story within this collection.  The story Just another Saturday Night is referenced in the Hard Goodbye & explains what Marv went to jail for before the Hard Goodbye.  My favorite stories in this collection are Silent Night & The Customer is Always Right.  Silent Night shows Marv in the same light as Hartigan with a morale code protecting the innocent it is also the closest thing to a Nuff Said issue in the Sin City books.  The Customer is Always Right is the story that Robert Rodriguez filmed to show to Frank Miller before he got the go ahead to make the first Sin City movie it is an awesome little short & helps set the tone for the entire movie.

Sin City: Family Values

This is the 4^th Dwight story the 3^rd one is in the anthology book Booze, Broads & Bullets; it is referenced in this story but is not essential to understanding Family Values.  This is my favorite story of the entire series it is a basic revenge story.  Family Values is the girls of Old Town taking down an entire mob family for revenge of the death of one of their own the principle players are Dwight & Miho.  Dwight provides the dialog & backstory while Miho provides all of the rollerblading ninja action.  This has made these two characters my favorite in all of the Sin City books. 

Sin City: That Yellow Bastard

This was 1 of the 4 stories included in the Sin City movie.  This is used to be my favorite because the character Hartigan has a code of honor that surpasses any of the other characters in the stories.  He sticks by this honor to protect the innocent throughout the story.  This story also delves into the background of Nancy Callahan who is seen dancing in the background at Kadie’s Saloon.  Even though all of the main male characters in the Sin City yarns possess a code chivalry Hartigan goes above & beyond this he even rejects Nancy’s advances do to his code of honor.  This makes the end of the story that much more inevitable; since he would die to fulfill is his personal code of honor.  In my opinion this makes Hartigan the Wolverine of the Sin City stories.

Sin City: The Big Fat Kill

The 2^nd story to feature Dwight this story was included in the 1^st Sin City film as one of the yarns.  This story also introduces us to another 1 of my favorite bad-ass characters, Miho who is technically introduced in the previous book.  This story showcases her skills although my favorite story with her is still to come.  This 1 shows her as the ultimate ass kicker, a silent assassin, the ronin of old town.  This story also has shades of similarities with Frank Miller’s other work 300 including betrayal from within.  The Big Fat Kill shows that Dwight is still on the run from the events in A Dame to Kill For.  This volume ends in a cloud of gunfire that is still smoking on the last page ending sort of ambiguously without the reader knowing whether Dwight & Gail survive or not.

Sin City: A Dame to Kill For

I have a whole new respect for this story since it is going to be the focus of the new Sin City movie.   The character of Dwight is in my opinion the star of the Sin City yarns he appears in three of the main stories this 1, The Big Fat Kill, & Family Values.  He is also probably the most relatable character in the series.  When we 1^st meet Dwight he is just an average guy trying to make a paycheck he’s been down on his luck as of late because he’s got some inner demons; who doesn’t.  Like all of the yarns there is a woman central to the story, she is the catalyst to all of the events that are about to go down & like all of the stories it is about vengeance.  The woman in this story is Ava Lord she has sort of become an archetype for how manipulative & evil a femme fatale can actually be.  She is the character that started Dwight on is dark path with is inner demons before the start of this story & she is the reason he has returned to that path.  Even in her last moments Ava is still trying to control Dwight.  All of the Sin City stories have this kind ironic ending in which it doesn’t turn out well of the anti-hero of the story.