Category: Crime

Breaking Bad: Francavilla is Wired & My Predictions for the Finale

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We’re about six hours away from the series finale of Breaking Bad.  My guess is you still need a little something to hold you over.

How about Wired’s profile of Franco Francavilla’s Breaking Bad minimalistic episode posters?

Or… my predictions for the Breaking Bad finale?

I think that Walter is going to die, but first he’ll earn a bit of redemption.

Here’s how I see it going down:

  • Walter will free Jesse from the White Supremacists.  I believe he will use the Scarface machine gun for this.  Although Walter initially wanted Jesse dead (blaming Jesse for Hank’s murder), I think the months alone in the cabin have given Walter time to reflect and the desire to set things right before he dies.  Jesse will be given money and Robert Forster’s character will get him away to a new life.
  • Walter will use the Ricen to kill Lydia.  By killing Lydia and the white supremacists, this will effectively stop the distribution of the Heisenberg meth.  This will also allow Walter to get his money back for his family.
  • Walter will set things up for his family’s security.  I’m not sure if they will assume new identities or the money will be filtered to them after the dust settles.
  • Walter will confess to everything.  The dust will settle after Walter confesses to everything and clears Skyler of any knowledge of his drug-related activities.  His confession will do two things: 1) Clear Skyler and 2) Cement his legacy as an “empire builder.”  I do wonder if Walt will turn himself in after everything is set for his family’s security or if he will get the family taken care of and wait until he is close to dying from the cancer.

The great thing about Breaking Bad is, you never know what is going to happen.  So don’t be surprised if I’m wrong.  Dead wrong.

Gravedigger: The Scavengers and The Predators

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If you’re a fan of great crime comics, you should be reading Gravedigger by Chris Mills and Rick Burchett.  I’ve been singing the praises of Gravedigger since before it was released.  I knew from the premise and with Chris and Rick at the helm that Gravedigger would be a winner.

And it is.

Gravedigger is currently running as a free webcomic.  Their first story, The Scavengers is up and completed.

The second Gravedigger adventure, The Predators, has just started.

Both contain adult language and situations (it is a crime comic after all) and so they are not for kids!

Oh, and you may “recognize” one of the thugs… and I don’t mean the guy that looks like Lee Marvin.

Good Cop, Bad Cop: An Oral History of The Shield

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The Shield was an amazing series and remains a favorite over a decade after it premiered on FX (back when hardly anyone tuned in to FX).

If you’re a fan of The Shield, then you’ll want to check out Good Cop, Bad Cop: An Oral History of The Shield by Jason Matloff.  Before you click over, please know the article/interview, like The Shield, contains adult language and discussion and is NOT for kids.

Thanks to David Chen for the Tweet.

“Mob City” – 2 New Teaser Posters

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TNT just released two new teaser posters Mob City starring Jon Bernthal.  The photo above is one of them.

The series is based on  L.A. Noir: The Struggle for the Soul of America’s Most Seductive City by John Buntin.  Here’s how ComingSoon describes the series…

It’s a world of glamorous movie stars, powerful studio heads, returning war heroes, a powerful and corrupt police force and an even more dangerous criminal network determined to make L.A. its West Coast base.

How can you not be excited about THAT?

If you want to see the other teaser poster and learn more about the series check out Coming Soon: TNT’s Mob City…

New Evidence Points to Black Dahlia Killer

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“What if I did kill the Black Dahlia, they can’t prove it now.”

Steve Hodel has long believed that his father, George Hodel, was the Black Dahlia Killer.

It’s not just that his father was a prime suspect in the case.  Or that his father was a doctor (experts believe that the killer had medical knowledge and experience).  Or that his father’s handwriting matched that of the killer’s.

Steve Hodel has discovered new evidence including receipts tying his father to the murder as well as evidence connecting his father to a symbol carved into Elizabeth Short’s hip and he recently shared it with a CBS Los Angeles station.

Dave Wachter and Jimmy Bobo

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Dave Wachter is back and he brought his take on Sly from the Bullet to the Head. I met Dave a few years ago and became an instant fan. I wasn’t the only one to discover Dave’s fantastic sketches! How can you not like a great guy who is a terrific artist?

At HeroesCon this year I asked Dave to draw Sly from his first major movie, the Lords of Flatbush and another piece of Sly from his latest film, Bullet to the Head.  Last week, you saw Dave’s take on Sly as Stanley Kowalski, so this week we have Sly as Jimmy Bobo.

You can see more of Dave’s art at his site. – Craig

Edward Zero: Secret Agent, Sociopath, Hero?

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I posted about Zero before.  At that time I said it was a new comic series by Ales Kot [writer] and Michael Walsh [artist] that looked interesting.  Here’s how the advance solicitation described it…

                         SAVING THE WORLD. ONE MURDER AT A TIME.
Edward Zero is the perfect execution machine – a spy who breaks the rules to get things done. When a stolen device appears in the center of a long-running conflict, Zero comes to retrieve it.  The problem is, the device is inside a living, breathing, bio-modified terrorist and there’s an entire army after it.

 I just learned that although the series will contain a series of rotating artists, each doing one issue.  I also discovered a bit more about Edward Zero…

ZERO is a secret agent. Edward Zero. He’s the perfect execution machine, in a sense — throw him at a problem and he wil solve it. Just remember that the way he reaches the solution may not always be to your liking, because he’s a bit of a sociopath.

But what happens when a sociopath realizes ideas and systems he based his life upon are deeply broken and not at all what they were supposed to be?

“New” Theory on Who Killed JFK – “JFK: The Smoking Gun”

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I was just five when President Kennedy was assassinated.  I was on vacation with my grandparents in Florida.  My grandfather had taken me with him on a quick trip to a supermarket.  A man came running into the store yelling that the president had been shot.  All of the adults seemed scared.  We hustled back to the hotel and my grandparents stayed glued to the tv to get the latest updates.

As the years passed, there was always a lot of talk about “who was really behind” the assassination.  Was it the mob?  LBK?  Castro?  With each passing year it seemed another theory rose up to explain how the most powerful man in the world was killed.  I read each theory and filed it away.  None seemed more plausible than it was a lone nut with a high powered rife.

Still, I was always willing to give the next theory a listen.

Now there’s a new documentary that is …

based on the work of Colin McLaren, a veteran Australian police detective who has undertaken a four-year investigation into the killing.

His theories are based on the work of Howard Donahue, who spent two decades probing the assassination and whose work was presented in the book Mortal Error: The Shot That Killed JFK, by Bonar Menninger.

This theory postulates that Oswald fired the first shot that hit President Kennedy.  Then as Secret Service Agent George Hickey drew his weapon and jumped on the back of the President’s Limo, his gun accidentally discharged shooting President Kennedy in the back of the head.  This theory also explains the…

…the different ballistic profiles of the two bullets that struck Kennedy… Mr Menninger insisted that they do not believe that Agent Hickey intentionally fired at Kennedy. Rather, the Huffington Post reported him as saying, ‘this was a tragic accident in the heat of the moment.’

But the pair do allege that the government moved swiftly, with the help of Kennedy’s brother Robert, to cover up the Secret Service’s involvement and save the agency from embarrassment.

While I don’t think that this new theory is more likely than a lone gunman with a high-powered rifle, I am willing to give it a listen.  JFK: The Smoking Gun will be broadcast on the Reelz Channel on November 3.

Thanks to Joey and the Huffington Post for the link.

Raymond Chandler’s Little Known Cameo in “Double Indemnity”

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Double Indemnity is one of my favorite noir movies.  I’ve seen it a bunch of times.

Raymond Chandler, who wrote just seven novels, is one of the founding fathers of modern detective fiction.  I’ve read a lot of Chandler and knew he co-wrote the screenplay [along with director Billy Wilder] adaptation of James M. Cain’s novel of the same name.

Until recently I didn’t know that Chandler had a cameo in Double Indemnity.  What makes this an even greater find is that there are no known film or television interviews with Chandler!

 

Thanks and a tip of my fedora to Adrian Wootten and The Guardian.

Steven Grant and the Making of “Two Guns”

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Steven Grant is a writer than I’ve written about many times.

Grant is the co-creator of Damned with Mike Zeck.  Grant is also the writer of the first Punisher mini-series [which took the character from a second-tier guest star to one of the most popular Marvel characters of all-time] as well as the best Punisher stories ever told.

Grant is also the creator [along with artist Mataes Santolouco] of the comic mini-series Two Guns.  As, you’re probably aware, Two Guns is now also a movie starring Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg.  Grant has written an interesting article that he calls Temporary Madness: Lessons Learned from Watching “Two Guns” Get Made.  You can read part one here and part two here.

Thanks and a front row seat to Two Guns for CBR.com.