Criminal Volume 5: The Sinners TPB [Paperback]

Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips smash another homerun with Criminal: The Sinners. The writer and artist turn their attention back to Tracy Lawless, arguably their fans' favorite character in the series, and definitely my personal favorite.

I love Tracy. He's a damaged soul, a war hero turned vigilante after tracking down the murderers of his brother. This graphic novel opens up a year after Tracy has finished avenging his brother and has taken on his brother's debt to Sebastian Hyde, one of the bloodiest criminals in the city.

With his background as a military soldier in special ops, becoming a hit man for Hyde seemed like a natural thing and a good fit for Tracy. It wasn't, and that is where the problems start to occur. I liked the friction between Tracy and Hyde because it feels so right. Hyde would want to use Tracy for everything he could, but Tracy is a guy used to fighting for some kind of idea, and not waging war on innocents.

As always, Brubaker and Phillips throw in plenty of violence and dark streets. Throughout the history of the series so far, the city has started growing and taking in a character of its own. I like the neighborhoods the usual group of suspects that hang around in the shadows.

I enjoyed the twist where Tracy gets a lateral promotion from hitman to gumshoe in Hyde's organization. Hyde's paranoia that someone else is edging into the city causes a lot of tension that rolls down onto Tracy.

Adding to the mix is Sabrina, Sebastian Hyde's wayward daughter. Her entrance onstage sets up a lot of problems to come. The fact that Tracy is also sleeping with his employer's wife adds more danger.

The set up for the string of murders is well done, and I couldn't guess what was going on for certain until Brubaker lifts the curtain in the graphic novel and reveals the killers. Even then I wasn't quite certain about what was going on.

Brubaker is also fond of throwing in an oddball character and subplot, and that's exactly what he does with Army CID investigator Yocum, who's searching for Tracy after he deserted the military. I'm wondering if Yocum is going to figure into any more Brubaker stories because I really liked the character.

The story Brubaker spins out about Evan is wonderfully heartbreaking. The kid steps onto stage and brings a lot of emotion to the mix.

Story and character, plot and counterplot, all whiz through in a dizzying mix of violence and death. Brubaker's eye for the corruption of man cuts as deeply as swallowing a mouthful of broken razor blades. Nobody does crime fiction like this in comics.

At the risk of angering a lot of people I'm going to stick my neck out and say I Hate Sin City! I think it's misogynist crap peopled with two dimensional characters and bad hokey dialog. It's Micky Spillane in comic book form. Graphically intense, with an undeniable beauty to its rendering of violence, but that's its only redeeming value. Pretty pictures are not enough for me if to enjoy the reading experience.

This is what Sin City should be; hard boiled characters (some good, some not) with complex motivations, whose lives spin out of control when exposed to the violence and indifference of the mean streets of the big city.

If Frank Miller has become the Micky Spillane of comics, then Ed Brubaker is the heir apparent of Dashiell Hammett. Dashiell Hammett Complete Novels: Red Harvest, The Dain Curse, The Maltese Falcon, The Glass Key, and The Thin Man (Library of America #110)

Superficially, the Criminal series bear some similarities to Sin City, in that a tapestry is being woven which is inter connecting all of the graphic novels. Each one is its own individual story, but if you read them all, you'll find a supporting character in one story may take a more active role in another. Some times characters will bump in to each other on the way to the center stage of their own dramas. This device isn't utilized to the extant that Miller does, but it happens.

The Sinners stars Tracy Lawless who previously starred in the graphic novel Criminal Vol. 2: Lawless. In that story he went a.w.o.l. in order to find the killer of his little brother. Raised in a broken home by a criminal father, his little brother tried to follow his dad's footsteps in a misguided attempt to earn his love and approval, while Tracy went his own way enlisting in the military.

But violence begets violence, and here we find him still a.w.o.l. working off some imaginary dept to a dead brother, until his sense of honor is satisfied. And so the son becomes the father, as his moral compass gets more and more compromised, and his surety and sense of purpose increasingly muddled.

He's become "the worst hitman in the world". The kind that will only pull the trigger if he feels the person truly deserves it, and his employer is losing patience. But he's given one last chance to work off his debt, and is charged with finding out who's killing "made men" around town. But he's no gumshoe, and is in over his head, and the choices he's made over the past year will as likely get him killed from his prey as from his employer. But none of that matters, if in his mind, he can get square.

Tracy is a character more comfortable in a field of battle than in the morally ambiguous streets of the big city, where decisions and choices have far wider implications, and consequences may not be felt 'till much further down the road.

Which is why it's good to read both graphic novels. Yes, they each stand alone, but as a pair you get to chart the character's arc, and make no mistake, all of the graphic novels form a piece of a whole. What Ed Brubaker is doing here is writing one grand novel with an ensemble cast where the city is as much a character as the people in it.

The art by Sean Phillips is wonderful. There is a gritty, textured quality to his art somewhat reminiscent of Dave Mazzucchelli's in Batman: Year One and Daredevil: Born Again (the last good thing Frank Miller ever wrote along with Ronin and Darknight Returns).

The colors by Val Staples, in which he'll wash entire pages in reds, blues, violets, etc. burnish the page with an emotional texture that enhances both story and art.

If this were a movie, it would have been directed by Roman Polanski, written by Robert Towne, starred Robert Mitchum, and the cinematography would have been by Sven Nykvist. (check this little gem out for a 1970's noir entry worthy of appreciation The Yakuza)

If you like crime comics, if you like hard boiled fiction, if you like film noir, give this a chance. You won't be disappointed!

If you've read and loved the previous Criminal volumes than you'll love this as well, it's still great, and adds to the intertwining continuity of the series. If you didn't care for it, you're not going to suddenly love this one. And if you're a new reader wanting to try this crime comic out, don't despair, this is totally new reader friendly, you don't have to go into this reading the previous four volumes. The knowledge of Tracy's previous story is helpful but not required.

This story is about Tracy Lawless being a hitman for Sebastian Hyde (the mob boss of the city). He's having moral issues with killing people; he doesn't want to kill someone unless they deserve it, he does research to make sure they are reprehensible people first, similar to Wesley from the Wanted movie. The problem with this is that it slows down his job as being a hitman, and he's even walked away from a few jobs, earning the scorn of Sebastian. And suddenly there's been someone showing up and killing important criminal figures in the city, and Sebastian decides to give Tracy one last chance and get to the bottom of it. That basically sets up the story, you find out who is behind the killings very early on, and it's fun to see Tracy struggle with bogus leads and have no idea who is behind the killings. To make matters worse, someone from his military past shows up and is looking for him.

For the long-term readers, we see the Undertow and Gnarly again, and we are introduced to Sebastian's wife and daughter.

Philip's art is masterful as always.