100 Bullets 2: Split Second Chance

Comic Info

100 Bullets #9

Reprints 100 Bullets #6-14 (January 2000-September 2000).  100 unmarked, untraceable bullets can change your life.  For a man like Chucky it could even the odds after a stint in prison while for ice cream man named Cole it could awaken something he had forgotten.  Dizzy meanwhile is off on a trip to Paris which will raise more questions…who are the people dolling out the briefcases and what is the Trust?  100 bullets can change a person’s life, but it isn’t always for the best.

Written by Brian Azzarello, 100 Bullets Volume 2:  Split Second Chance is a DC Comics crime comic released under the Vertigo imprint.  Following 100 Bullets Volume 1:  First Shot, Last Call, the collection features art by Eduardo Risso.  Issues in the collection were also released as part of 100 Bullets—Volume 1 and 100 Bullets Omnibus—Volume 1.

I wasn’t very impressed by the first volume of 100 Bullets.  I read it about when this volume was coming out and the series had so much hype.  I found the dialogue stereotypical and the story so-so.  While I still feel that the assessment is true, 100 Bullets 2:  Split Second Chance shows some hope of where the series can go.

I still think Azzarello can’t write dialect.  It is like a bad 1970s version of some weird Blaxploitation movie written by whites who have a vision of what it should sound like.  Why this version works better is that it doesn’t come into play as much as the first volume.  There is a bigger focus on the stories and less on the dialogue of the characters.

100 Bullets #12

The story begins to get into what I do like about 100 Bullets.  I think the whole story of the Trust and the Minutemen is interesting (or at least potentially so).  It is a shadow group that pulls the strings behind a lot of events in America and the world.  Dizzy’s trip to Paris gives her some depth into the situation involving Graves and Shepherd and where their “magic bullets” come from.  Azzarello smartly doesn’t give away the answers, but comics like this run the risk of extending the mystery out too long and testing the readers’ patience.

100 Bullets has its moments, and it has some decent storylines…but for me it is largely hit or miss.  I am a bit torn if I want it simply to be individual stories of how a person reacts to the temptation of inconsequential revenge or the reasons behind the opportunity.  Collections like this in general are better for me with the series being more of an anthology book with the Trust and bigger issues mixed in the background.  I don’t love a lot of the continuing characters and feel a lot of the characters when the series becomes an anthology can also be written off…but if 100 Bullets hits its target, it can be a decent read.  100 Bullets 2:  Split Second Chance was followed by 100 Bullets 3:  Hang Up on the Hang Low.

Preceded By:

100 Bullets 1:  First Shot, Last Call

Followed By:

100 Bullets 3:  Hang Up on the Hang Low