Sinister Dexter VOL 02: Murder 101

Sinister Dexter #2

by Dan Abnett, Simon Davis (Illustrator), Paul Johnson (Illustrator)

Finnigan Sinister and Ramone Dexter are gunsharks: hired killers with chalk outlines 'round their souls. Need a job done? Removal? Disposal? Deletion? Call the gun-lovin' criminals The boys have killed their old boss, "Holy" Moses Tannenbaum, and created a new force in Downlode's underworld: Moses' former wife, the sultry Demi Octavo. As their new employer, Demi assigns a job for the lethal pair that's a bit of a surprise -- teaching her younger sister Billi how to be a gunshark Now the boys have to keep Billi in one piece and keep business running as smoothly as usual, not that "smooth" is the way things usually turn out in Downlode... Suggested for Mature Readers.

Collects:

- Murder 101 (Prog #1051-#1061)
- Luck Of The Irish (Prog #1062)
- Waiting For God Knows (Prog #1063)
- 60 Seconds (Prog #1064)
- The Worst Fight We Was Ever In (Prog #1067)
- A Brief History Of Gunsharks (Prog #1068)
- Pedal Power (Prog #1070)
- Things To Do In Downlode When You're Dead (Prog #1071)
- Long to rain over us (Prog #1072)
- Roll With It (Prog #1073)
- Whack the Dinosaur (Prog #1075)
- Downlode Blues (Prog #1076)
- Taking the Mick (Prog #1079-#1082)

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels

160 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2005

Reviews

[Keith · Rating 3 out of 5]

This second volume of SD adventures, while strong, isn't quite as hard-hitting as the first. The title story is the only longform tale, and it's a bit of a letdown after the antics of Gunshark Vacation -- in M101, the boys are tasked with training a teenage apprentice, which is mostly an excuse for lots of goofy approximations of teen slang that's just embarrassing.

This is also the volume that overdoes a big redesign for Finnegan, who's changed from a scary longhaired metalhead in the early stories to some kind of pale-skinned, red-nosed clown. When this shift began in the previous volume, at that point I had some question about its interpretation -- was Finnegan meant to be wearing greasepaint, or was it simply a joke about him being a pale-skinned, ruddy-nosed Irishman?

I'm still not not really sure, but it's made absolutely clear in these stories that, at the very least, Finnegan is meant to be a somewhat unhinged socipathic muppet to counter Ramone's quiet pensiveness. It's nice that each of the titular characters now have personalities that you can tell apart, but I still have no idea why Finnegan's visual redesign seemed like a good choice.

Other than that, the bulk of these stories are simply tiny mood pieces that deepen the characters and their world. In a story that takes place entirely in their car, I was reminded of some of Eisner's visual experimentation with The Spirit -- if you can remember all those little character pieces and morality tales that Eisner sandwiched in between his longer stories (and if you add a LOT of gonzo violence) you'll have an idea of what to expect here.

Apparently the collected edition of these issues left out a few of the one-offs, but the ones that got axed are nothing special. The standouts here are when you learn something significant about the characters, such as the one about Finnegan's OCD, or the aforementioned stories that experiment with visual motifs, or the one with the dinosaur.

Holy shit, the one with the dinosaur is magic.

The collection ends with the book's only other multi-parter -- a 3-chapter story that brings the boys in contact with two older gunsharks who've come into trouble. As things go awry with the older men (as events in Downlode tend to do), Finnegan remarks that it's "the end of an era." It makes sense within the context of the story, but also feels like a commentary on the collection as a whole. There's an innocence and a loopy weirdness to these stories that, I suspect, will change as we get into some of the longer stories that come later.

Which is fine, if they could just fix Finnegan's stupid red nose.

[Craig Lotter · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection is a much stronger outing that volume 1, thanks in part to the inclusion of two decent length multipart stories namely Murder 101 and closing out with Taking the Mick. It's standard 2000AD over the top, blood-soaked story telling as per the norm, featuring Downlode's primo gunsharks, Sinister and Dexter - and thoroughly enjoyable for anyone who has spent a lot of time growing up with 2000AD and Judge Dredd Megazine.

[Timo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Pretty damn quickly this series found its own stride and started to work well for me. Much fun.

[Jefferson · Rating 3 out of 5]

The painted artwork is nice but feels a little dated by modern standards -- not helped by the often dark and murky print quality. The stories are a lot of fun though.

[Stephen Stroud · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cool art, stories were mostly whatever