Crime Comics Anthologies: Noir, Noir is the New Black, First Degree, Gangland, Crime Pays

There are a few crime comic anthologies out there that are worth a look. This week I want to shine a light on them.  

I’m going to lay my cards on the table. I love anthologies, collections, and short fiction. I read a couple of hundred short stories each year. But I often find anthologies to be mixed bags. There’s often a few stories that I love, a few stories that are just fine, and a few that don’t really work for me. I know that the editor is trying to assemble the best group of stories that they can. I’ve edited a couple of anthologies myself and can attest to this. For me, this is the case with comics anthologies too.

The best thing about any comics anthology is the showcase aspect. In one package I’m getting to see a bunch of different writers and artists. If they are new to me, I can track their work down and have an opportunity to try something new to me. Every anthology is a wonderful opportunity.

The downside for me is that the stories are almost always too short. They often read like samplers and the stories often feel like one piece of something larger. Like when you read a good excerpt that cuts out as soon as things start happening. I understand this is a me problem but it can lend itself to a frustrating experience because an expanded version of these stories often don’t exist.

These anthologies have great stories and showcase some great talents.

Two quick side notes with links. First, the opening story in the Crime Pays anthology (mentioned below) can be found on Simone Guglielmini’s personal site along a couple of his other crime comics shorts. Second, the Perfect Crime Party anthology is due out later this year (I believe). Here is the Amazon link for any curious.

"Murder, passion, and criminal enterprise are presented here at their darkest, directly from the most talented writers and artists in crime comics! In these thirteen pitch-black noir stories, you'll find deadly conmen and embittered detectives converging on femme fatales and accidental murderers, all presented in sharp black and white by masters of the craft."

Noir: A Collection of Crime Comics was a high profile crime anthology that Dark Horse put out in 2009. It had some heavy hitters from the crime comics world. Brian Azzarello's 100 Bullets was wrapping up. Ed Brubaker was then, and continues to be today, a hot crime comic commodity.  Noir featured a story set in David Lapham's ongoing but irregularly published series Stray Bullets that was, at that time, in the middle of a frustrating and infamous hiatus. So that story was a good get. This collection had some anticipation around it.

In it we find tales of an old man on the verge of losing the family farm who crosses paths with an injured robber on the run, a hit man's last job, a what if scenario about pushing the person standing in front of you on the subway platform, a cleaner working at night in an office building comes across something unexpected, The Playing Card Bandit strikes again but maybe he robbed the wrong person, and, in addition to the Stray Bullets story, a new story in Ed Brubaker's Criminal universe. Azzarello finishes the book up with one of the best [REDACTED] origin stories I've ever read.

This is a rock solid anthology that lived up to the expectations around its publication. Just a really good bunch of crime stories.

Note: I own a copy of Noir from when it originally came out but I read it this time on the library app Hoopla. While the original publication had 13 stories the later versions seem to only have 11 with "Stray Bullets: Open the Goddamn Box" by David Lapham and "Lady's Choice" by The Fillbach Brothers as the dropped stories. Just something to be aware of for anyone who seeks this one out (and you should!)

Noir is the New Black was originally published by Fair Square Comics in 2021 (with an expanded edition coming out a couple of years later). The subtitle says it all “Noir Stories From Black Creators”. It contains 15 shorts and one prose story by Gary Phillips with illustrations.

As is the case with many of these crime anthologies, the best stories feel like they represent a larger world that the reader would want more of. The stories contain vibrant characters and hairy situations. In the story “Ousley” I love the imagery of the Black detective sitting at his desk with his feet kicked up and blinds providing slotted lighting across the scene. It’s a visual tweak on a classic hardboiled image. In the action packed and violent “Southern Hospitality” a Black soldier returning from war posts up in a Klan bar to take revenge on those that killed his friend. In “Heart of the Matter” we get a story that is clearly based on the life (and death) or Black pulp writer Donald Goines. 

This is a really good showcase of talent. I would pair this anthology with the prose anthology Black Noir which was published in 2009 and readers should seek out the prose work of Gary Phillips. Also, the Crime Writers of Color, a great organization with lots of resources.

In this anthology, a collective of almost thirty authors from all over the globe propose a collection of short crime noir stories that celebrates the genre as well as boldly leading it into the future.

The French word for the crime thriller story is Polar. First Degree is an anthology of short crime comic stories to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Polar awards and the Polar Festival in Cognac.

This is a great sampler of stories that showcase a variety of writers and artists from around the world. But also a wide variety of story types from barely fictional tragic accounts of Black Americans interacting with the police to twisty fast paced mysteries to trying to commit the perfect crime.

I would pair First Degree with the French crime anthology show Suite Noire. As usual with any anthology, comic or otherwise, there are stories that will resonate more than others. But taken as a whole, this anthology was an absolute blast.

From isolated but deadly hit men to extra- terrestrial enforcers packing otherworldly weapons, from suburban punks with bad attitudes to gangstas with lethal solutions to their credit problems, this new bullet-riddled collected edition provides chilling stories about bad guys banding together to wreak havoc on society.

An early entry into the crime comics anthology scene, Gangland was originally published in the late 90’s and was collected again in 2000.

Ed Brubaker and Brian Azzarello both have stories here. They didn’t yet have their crime comics bonifides established. Lucius Shepherd, primarily known for his science-fiction and fantasy writing, has a story too.

I believe it is currently out of print but inexpensive used copies can be found. Worth tracking down.

The Crime Pays anthology was a Kickstarter. According to the information on the Kickstarter page there was a story competition but I don’t know what those details are. The contest happened and the Kickstarter was funded and the book came out in 2021. It is currently available on the Globalcomix site and I’m not sure if it available elsewhere. The first story is linked above.

Have you read any of these? Does the short form serve crime comics well?