582 SIN CITY
In A Dame to Kill for (1994) the photographer Dwight gets framed by his devious
ex-girlfriend Ava Lord. Enlisting the help of Marv and the women of Old Town he is able
to make Ava pay for her deeds and get his revenge. Th e Big Fat Kill (1996) fi nds Dwight in
yet another precarious situation when he has to help cover up the murder of a crooked cop
named Jack who was killed by the girls of Old Town. Both the mob and the police would love
to take over Old Town and Jack’s murder could be their chance. Th e fi nal showdown refers
to the battle of Th ermopylae—a story Miller would later go on to elaborate in the graphic
novel 300. Th e main antagonist in Th at Yellow Bastard (1997) embodies all meanings of the
word yellow. He preys on little girls and is maimed by the policeman Hartigan in an eff ort to
save 11-year old Nancy Callahan from rape and murder. Eight years later he wants to get his
hands on Nancy and Hartigan has to fi ght him again.
Once more Dwight is the main character in Family Values (1997), where he has
been sent on a mission by the girls of Old Town. With him is deadly ninjette assassin
Miho and their target mob family is made to understand that family can expand
beyond blood relations. A collection of small stories with the characters from Sin City
is put together in Booze, Broads, and Bullets (1998). Saving a girl from committing sui-
cide takes ex-Navy Seal Wallace to Hell and Back (A Sin City Love Story)(2000) as he
has to fi ght powerful moneyman
Wallenquist to free the mysterious
woman.
Sin City is a revision of the clas-
sic noir crime comics bordering
on pastiche but defi nitely an hom-
age to a kind of comics the Comics
Code helped obliterate. Th e set-
ting is dark, the violence is graphic,
and the heroes are men of action
most often in pursuit of danger-
ous dames or damsels in distress.
Th is central plot is underlined by
the many close-ups of determined
male faces and the repetition of
silent, full-page images of scantily
clad women. Sympathy is on the
side of the lone avenger or the few
and supposedly powerless against
the many and powerful. No matter
how hard the rain falls, how hope-
less the situation seems or how
black the night is, in Sin City there
is always a way out for those who
choose to fi ght.Benicio Del Toro as Jack Rafferty, in the 2005 film Sin City,
directed by Frank Miller and Robert Rodriguez. Dimension
Films/Photofest