Fatale Volume 3: West of Hell

Arrived on time and in perfect condition, I love Ed Brubaker and this is him at his noir best!

Unlike the previous two volumes, this trade collects four prequels to the Fatale series. Two of which features our mysterious Josephine and two other stories that feature women who share the same resemblance to Jo. All the stories are connected is one way or another.What I liked about this volume it almost answered the questions we've had about Josephine in the past books. We now know that she is not alone in who she is and what she can do; there are other women who have the power to control men. I liked how the stories were put together. Ed Brubaker is good at story telling.The thing I didn't like about this book and the reason I gave it a lower rating then the others, was for the fact it was too short. I felt like this need one or two more women like Jo to show the Femme Fatale is a recurring thing in the past. This would have been better if it was a stand-alone graphic novel, rather than within the series.Overall, this was a good book and so far a perfect series. If you're new two Fatale and want to start read it, this book is a good place to start. Trust me: Josephine has the power to control men just as Ed Brubaker has the power to control his reader. We're under Jo's spell.

This is the third collected volume of the comic book serial "Fatale" by Ed Brubaker (script) and Sean Phillips (art) - David Stewart did the colors on this part.The basic story combines a classic noir tale of the beautiful seductive damsel in distress with a Lovecraftian horror saga which spans centuries. The first two collections introduced us to Josephine or Jo who is the femme fatale. The protagonist is Nicholas Lash. Years ago, Nicholas's father was a photographer who had worked with a newspaper reporter, Dominic Raines. Raines after leaving the reporting game in the 1950's became a successful crime/noir novelist. Upon his death Nicholas was left as the executor. In going through the estate he finds an unpublished manuscript of Raines and meets Jo. The substance of the manuscript is based on events in the 1950's and are intercut with the contemporary world where Nicholas is drawn to helping Jo who is being pursued by a murderous cult.This third collection jumps the time line further back into the past and shows us a much earlier versions of Jo - one in medieval Europe, one in the west just before the turn of the century and one in the 1930's. Each tale is self contained and at first may be confusing because they don't seem to directly advance the tale as established in the first two collections but please bear with the creators. They are laying the background for the concluding collections four and five and the details found here are important clues of what is really going on: the nature and limits of Jo's power, the nature of the cultists, and what might be the endgame.Because it is setting the stage for the later sections it can seem jarring when compared to the earlier rapid pace tales which were in a sense a long chase - but it is worth it.

Ed Brubaker has never disappointed me throughout the numerous volumes of work he has written. This volume gives a little insight into the origin of Josephine (the main character). This volume explores her history by traveling around in time to around 3 to 4 different time periods, but it's done in a fashion where there won't be any confusion for the reader (attempting this sometimes loses the reader and causes them to backtrack during the story, taking your focus away from flow). Great story, characters, and illustration. Sean Phillips shines in this area of pulp novel art. I absolutely recommend this entire series!

This whole series is so damn great. This volume answers some big nagging questions, while of courae leaving you with even bigger questions.

If this series has a five act structure, Ed Brubaker takes this volume and expands on the mythology of the Fatale in a way that is both interesting and baffling. There are three tales that may or may not be different characters for Josephine, and in three radically different time periods. The earliest character is an origin story but also seems the least like Josephine in art style, but each letter story the character physically resembles Jo more and more. Matilda in 1282 has a clear origin “A Lovely Sort of Death” and being a young outlaw named Bonnie in 1883 Colorado in “Down the Darkest Trail.” If the characters are the same character as Josephine or if they are just perils, the relationship to the Demon cult becomes both clearer and mystified.In short, different readers have read it differently: some having Josephine be all three women who are immoral and have power over men, and some reading it is as convergent lives. The ambiguity seems deliberate particularly as Philips has the character design move closer and closer to Josephine as we know her. We know Josephine goes by many names, and we know she is referred by squid faced demons as "the Consort" and Alfred Ravenbrock later says that Josephine isn't aware of what she is. Furthermore, there are some men immune to her but Brubeck never goes into why.Brudeck's mythology here becomes harder to decide if it is merely confused or if it trying to keep mystery up for the readers interest. I suspect a little of both. I miss the Nicholas Lash framing story, but I also appreciate what Brubeck and Philips were attempting here.

I was collecting the single issues of this series via my local Comix shop...But, due to the Byzantine nature of comic book distrbution, I missed more issues thani recieved.WOW. whata story.Thanks AMAZON.

Story quality wise the series is just as great when it started. But you get one less issue in this volume than you do in the previous two, but are still being charged the same price.

The story gets better and better- a lot of the back story here.

Die Saga um die femme fatale geht weiter und wird um 4 sehr gelungene Episoden ergänzt, die sich im Mittelalter, im Wilden Westen, in den 30ern und im 2.WK ereignen. Blutig, aufschlussreich, monströs. Das kann gern auf diesem hohen Niveau weitergehen.

Dans ce troisième volume de leur série associant les univers de Dashiell HAMMETT et d'H.P. LOVECRAFT, Ed BRUBAKER et Sean PHILLIPS consacrent les 4 chapitres à relater une partie de l'histoire de l'héroïne principale de la série, Josephine, au cours des années 1930 et 1940, mais aussi les histoires respectives de prédécesseurs, Mathilda et Bonnie, qui lui ressemblent beaucoup, au plan physique comme en ce qui concerne la forme de malédiction qui les frappent. Au passage, la supporting cast s'enrichit de personnages forts, tels que celui de Milkfed.A signaler que si l'on a pas encore acheté les précédents tomes, on peut accéder à cette série en commençant par ce volume et remonter ensuite dans le temps au premier tome, 'Fatale 1: Death Chases Me' (suivi de 'Fatale 2: The Devil's Business') !BRUBAKER et PHILLIPS sont en grande forme et il faut souligner aussi la grande qualité de la mise en couleurs d'Elizabeth BREITWEISER et de Dave STEWART.

Im dritten Sammelband der Reihe "Fatale" nehmen Ed Brubaker und Sean Phillips vom Hauptplot und erzählen stattdessen vier kleinere Geschichten aus Jos Vergangenheit (sielend in den 1920ern und in Rumänien des zweiten Weltkriegs, also in den 1940ern) in denen mal wieder deutlich wird, wie ALT sie eigentlich schon ist. Viel interessanter sind jedoch die zwei anderen Geschichten, eine im Mittelalter, eine im wilden westen, in denen zwei andere Frauen die Hauptfiguren stellen.Der Clou: Sie scheinen die gleichen Fähigkieiten wie Josephine zu besitzen! Sie ist aso nicht die erste und (vielleicht auch nicht letzte) Frau, der dies alles passiert ist! Und obwohl der dritte Band von Fatale wieder nicht so richtig mit der Sprache rausrücken wollen, was es denn nun mit alldem auf sich hat, so bekommen wir doch wieder einige Andeutungen, kleine Details, Hinweise, die natülich nicht befriedigen, sondern nur weiterhin neugierig machen sollen.Verflucht sollen die Leute sein, die wissen wie man gute Mysterien schreibt.Und so schließt man auch diesen, weiterhin gut gezeichneten (diesmal sogar mit einigen neuen Gesichtern. Hut ab Mister Phillips), Bad, rätselt bleibt neugierig und wurde weiterhin gut unterhalten. Nicht mehr und nicht weniger.Mal sehen, wer als nächstes von Josephine mit in den Abgrund gezogen wird.4 von 5 Sternen.

continuing in the same theme , but this is more a series of vignettes rather than one coherent whole - provides a lot of background without moving the story forwards any ( like the middle act in a film) . However , each is worth reading on its own and overall thoroughly enjoyable .