This book traces the history of crime comics from their beginnings to the current resurgence and analyzes the cultural forces that give rise to influential works like Frank Miller's Sin City.

Crime comic books in the 1950s caused controversy leading to their suppression and near extinction. Twenty-five years later, the dark hero, femme fatale, and bleak outlook of crime story comic books are even more striking and subversive. Terrence Wandtke traces the history of crime comics from their beginnings to the current resurgence and analyzes the cultural forces that give rise to influential works like Frank Miller's Sin City, Brian Azzarello's 100 Bullets, and Ed Brubaker's Criminal.

The Dark Night Returns is the third book published in the RIT Press' Comics Studies Monograph Series. The series editor is Dr. Gary Hoppenstand, Professor of English at Michigan State University.

TERRENCE WANDTKE is a professor at Judson University. His books include The Meaning of Superhero Comics (McFarland) and Ed Brubaker: Conversations (forthcoming from the University Press of Mississippi). He is the founder of the Imago Film Festival.