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Sin City: Family Values (Sin City)

By: Frank Miller
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Titan Books Ltd
ISBN: 1845760492
ISBN-13: 9781845760496
Released: 23 May 2005
RRP: £9.99
Average Rating:

Customer Reviews

Dwight and Miho in a "Sin City" tale of revenge - By: Lawrance M. Bernabo, 09 Aug 2005
When I started reading "Family Values," Book 5 of Frank Miller's "Sin City" series, I found myself wondering why Dwight keeps getting to be the narrator-protagonist of the comic noir stories. Then I remembered that Marv & Hartigan are both dead, so it means it is either Dwight or somebody new & Miller will have to get to the latter sooner or later. But for the third time in the first five books, once again Dwight is the man.

Dwight shows up at Poppa's Olympian Palace, an old fashioned diner (you know the type; it looks like you could put it on wheels & hitch it to a train as a cheap dinner car) driving a VW Beetle (hey, it is a German car, so what is your complaint? Besides, you can always trade up). The place is riddled with bullets & whatever happened there Dwight is interested, & since deadly little Miho is backing him up we have to think it has something to do with the girls of Old Town. The problem is that nobody is talking about why what happened at Poppa's happened & it takes a while & a couple of versions of the tale to figure out the meaning of the key detail Miller keeps working into the art. You are not going to be able to figure out what is going on until it is alll laid out for you, but that is not necessarily a bad thing (as opposed to telegraphing the ending). I also like a red herring, especiallly when it walks on four legs.

It seems like every killing in Sin City is revenge for a previous killing, which just means there is another killing in Sin City that needs to be revenged & the cycle goes on & on & on. But there is a moral to this particular story & as Dwight notes it is a great big wide world out there & there's alll kinds of families in it. Apparently they alll play by the same rules, it is just that some are a lot better at it, especiallly when it comes to covering their tracks. The best part of this story is the way Dwight has to unravel the truth, moving from one source to the next to find out another layer of the truth so that he & Miho know exactly who has to pay for what happened (and we finallly get to find out what reallly happened).

"Family Values" is a relative short "Sin City" tale, coming it at 126 black & white pages & I think picking pink as the color on the cover to go along with the drawing of Miho in the snow might be a made choice (besides red & yellow, do any colors reallly make sense in Miller's "Sin City"). Miller does some nice things with the snow in Book 5 that are interesting, but reducing Miho to a ghostly figure of pure white takes a little getting used to (especiallly if you want to start unpacking the symbolic value of doing so in contrast to the shadows & dirt of Sin City in general). It is a rather simple & ordinary tale by "Sin City" standards, but that still makes it above average if you are looking at the overalll genre of graphic novels.

The Short Pink One - By: RB Davies, 20 Jul 2005
Another awesome sin city installlment. Admittidly not with the same raw, cut graphics of the first few but still beautiful & signature Miller. As this was the shortest of the books i've read from the series it does leave you wanting but for the price it is a cracking read - dark, blunt & full of that amazing circling dialogue that Miller fans have seen in not only Sin City but his Batman aswell. Incidentallly, had some serious deja vous moments with some of the compositions of Miho & Miller's Caroline Kelly (Robin From Dark Knight Returns & Strikes Again) & there is a hint of Vinnie in Lex Luthor aswell. Basicallly if you were a fan of the above titles or the series in general this won't let you down but i would be tempted to invest in another aswell to keep you busy as it is short & pacey. For the those daring to enter Sin City for the first time this is a great piece but i'd hit the Yellow Bastard or A Dame to Kill For first- this one is a good accompeniament to save for a cookie break or a rainy day.
Keep it casual
r
Wow - By: , 29 Oct 2003
I first read this when i was about 10 & have only found a copy now that i had the wonderful idea of amazon & it is as good as i originallly thought it was. The plot is fantastic & miho was & still is the best assassin i have ever read or seen in anything, full marks go to the author
Welcome To Blood Spattered Sin City - By: , 05 Jan 2001
Another yarn of violent payback on the mean streets of Sin City. A man with a debt to pay is looking for answers regarding the murder of a city official callled Bruno. Bruno has a shadowy past, & his killers haven't managed to cover their tracks.....

Business as usual in Sin City - the breathtaking use of black & white imagery successfully conveys the mean streets & low lifes, whilst the violence is suitably grotesque & over the top. The bitter black comedic plot should grab anyone who is a fan of of Chandler, Leonard or Ellroy.

Not top notch when compared to The Big Fat Kill or the original Sin City but still worth taking a look at for lovers of crime or if you wonder what Miller got up to after Batman: The Dark Knight Returns.

priests and whores and nobody left to blame - By: , 04 Sep 1998
if frank miller could find a motive for any of his characters besides evil priests & evil women, he could write a story that competed with unillustrated fiction. I appreciate alll the progress he has made in the comic book & graphic novel realm but I'm waiting for the next step. He has become formulaic in his character's motives & so the storylines have become simple revenge stories. Though revenge stories are typical of the 'film noir' style he has developed, they remain typical. I am reallly looking forward to Miller's breaking out of the trend in which he has stuck himself.