SPAWN 583
Sin City was made into a movie in 2005 directed by Robert Rodriguez and
co- directed by Miller himself. In the making are Sin City 2 and Sin City 3, scheduled for
release 2010 and 2011.
Rikke Platz Cortsen
SPAWN. Created by To d d M c F a r l a n e, Spawn made his fi rst appearance in May, 1992,
in the fi rst issue of the comic book that bears his name. Spawn was one of the original
creations from Image Comics, of which McFarlane was one of the co-founders. Th e
central fi gure in Spawn is Albert “Al” Francis Simmons, a Detroit-born African American
CIA agent whose boss, Jason Wynn, orders him assassinated. Simmons is sent to Hell
because of his status as a mercenary. In Hell, Simmons, motivated by a desire to see his
wife Wanda once more, unwisely strikes a deal with Malebolgia, a powerful lord, and
returns to Earth as a Hellspawn, an offi cer in Hell’s army.
His memory in tatters and his body misshapen beyond recognition, Spawn re-enters
the world in a state of stupefaction. Once on Earth, he soon discovers that fi ve years
have passed since his death, and that his wife Wanda Blake has since married his friend
Terry Fitzgerald, their union yielding a daughter named Cyan. Spawn was represented
as a rather conventional crime-fi ghting anti-hero in the initial issues. His most signifi -
cant encounters are with Anti-Spawn, or the Redeemer, who is later revealed to be Jason
Wynn, and Angela, who was, like Cogliostro, created by Neil Gaiman in issue #9 of
Spawn. Both the Redeemer and Angela were heavenly agents meant to counter Spawn,
although Angela eventually comes to assist Spawn several times.
Following Spawn’s encounter with the Redeemer, his suit, a crucial source of his
power, undergoes a signifi cant change (the fi rst of many), becoming more powerful in
the process. Th e suit is symbiotic and connected to his body and its nervous system;
it is nourished by necroplasm, the hellish substance out of which Spawn was created.
Spawn’s necroplasmic power is limited, and its complete exhaustion would lead to
eternal suff ering in Hell.
Spawn, given his origins, functions within a good-evil dichotomy, represented in the
early issues by, respectively, an old man named Cagliostro and the clown-like Violator,
Malebolgia’s earthly agent. Th at initial dichotomy is complicated by the introduction of
an alternative realm to Hell and Heaven through the Heap. Th e Heap is a monstrous
fi gure that formed when a man named Eddie Beckett inadvertently came into contact
with necroplasm, leading to a merging of his body with the surrounding garbage.
Spawn’s battles with the Heap result in the latter swallowing the former, transporting
Spawn to Greenworld, a kind of natural Purgatory independent of Hell and Heaven.
Spawn employs the powers accorded to him by the forces of that realm to defeat
Urizen, a god released by Malebolgia in a failed attempt to assume control of all of
Hell. Spawn, accompanied by Angela, enters Hell and destroys the weakened Male-
bolgia. He is then off ered Malebolgia’s place by Mammon, and after initially refusing
it, decides to accept it in order to transform Hell into a paradisiacal realm. His plans
are, however, thwarted by Cagliostro, who betrays Spawn, assumes control of Hell for
