#15 - #19 "Hang Up On The Hang Low"
What's It About: Father and son - Curtis & Louis Hughes - are reunited by Agent Graves. The two of them are bonded together by the work that Curtis does.
What's Happens: In #15, Curtis is introduced as a middleman who collects payment for his boss, a loan shark called Neno. His son, Louis (Loop), lives with his mom and is just trying to find his way in life. Agent Graves steps in and offers Loop the opportunity to kill the father who left him when he was still a baby. However, Loop realised that he couldn't kill the father he wanted so badly to know.
In #16, Loop meets Neno, and later Curtis and Loop stumble on a drug distributing shop whose owner happened to owe Neno money. A black man who was going to pay big bucks for the drugs comes into the scene. Father and son take the money and scram. When Loop goes home, he meets his cousin and his girlfriend - Carlo & Sophie - first seen in #8. Meanwhile, Curtis is re-acquainted with Graves.
#17: Curtis and Graves talk about their past working relationship between them and with The Trust. In the end, Graves offers Curtis the chance to murder one of the members of The Trust (not revealed who). Curtis refuses and then leaves to meet Neno. Curtis lies to him about the drugs and money he stole. When Curtis is ordered to blow up a shop which was way late in payments, Neno's men beat the hell out of him, leaving him to die.
#18 follows Loops' one man revenge against Neno's organisation. In short, Loop does accomplish his mission with Graves' guns, despite being beaten to a bloody pulp. At the airport, Lono arrives.
The conclusion in #19 is tame in action but full of meaning. Loop rejectes Graves offer to kill that member of The Trust, just like his father. Loop finds the stolen money which is father left for him, but he and Carlo bump into Lono, who is hungry for a kill. Lono kills Carlo and almost does the same to Loop until Loop mentions his father. Lono spares Loop but takes his money. To end the arc on a sour note, Loop is arrested for the murder of Neno's bodyguard (whom he killed with a broken bottle)
Interesting Thoughts: Take my word for it - this arc possesses much more in clever storytelling and suspense cliffhangers than what is actually described here. The core of the story was obviously the father and son relationship, with Graves and Neno in the middle. Despite having not seen and known each other for years, each of them wanted to make up for lost time, which explains Loop not killing Curtis, and then helping him with his money collecting errands. Curtis risked his life so that Loop could have some financial assistance in the future, and he prevented Loop from getting to him at the shop which was about to explode.
Perplexing Questions: 1. Which member of The Trust did Graves want killed?
2. Why did Graves tip the police off to get Loop arrested?
Quotable Quotes: "What matters is you gettin' what's comin' to you. You give him an out, so he can give it to you an' save face. No one gets hurt, no hard feelin's, you get paid." - Curtis Hughes
#21 - #22 "Sell Fish & Out To Sea"
What's It About: Jack, a hard-core drug addict, receives the attaché from Agent Graves, and the someone in the photo is not what he expected.
What Happens: The whole 2 issues revolves around Jack and his new buddy and fellow addict Mikey. Jack relates to Mikey all that has happened since he got the attaché. It's a personal journey depicting Jack losing his security guard job, getting into a pub brawl, reminiscing with his ex-girlfriend and later meeting up with his brother and mother. Controversially, the 100 bullets were meant for Jack himself, and at the end of #22, Jack was going to kill himself.
Interesting Thoughts: Up until this story arc, no one who had received the attaché was meant him or herself. Jack was different. Whomever was the high authority, that authority deemed Jack himself the cause of all his problems. In other words, you reap what you sow. Although it was months after he received the briefcase that he killed himself, Jack had tried to find ways, or even reasons and excuses, to not kill himself. In #21, after he had lost his job, he said "Maybe that old man was right...maybe I can fix things". And in #22, he asked his mother if she thought he was a bad person.
#23 - #25 "Red Prince Blues"
What's It About: The Trust holds its annual meeting in Atlantic City, while Mr. Graves and Cole Burns get ready to make their move on them.
What Happens: The prologue of this arc is a scene of a private gambling table, with Benito Medici as one of the players. Hank Kowalski, one of the other players, just loses out to Benito because he is unable to match the upping of the stakes of 15 thousand by Benito. When Hank is unable to get a loan, he is distraught and feels he would have won had he got the money.
In the later part of #23, Benito and Megan Dietrich have a personal discussion about business and responsibility, and is later joined by Daniel Peres. When Hank can no longer conceal his anger at losing, he wants to get back at Benito, especially since his wife, Mary, is suffering from diabetes. At the end of #23, Cole Burns lends a helping hand, telling Hank: "The golden boy with the platinum hair. Benito Medici. Room thirty-eight twelve."
#24 is the middle issue, and builds up the tension for the conclusion in #25. Mary gets admitted into the hospital and Hank becomes desperate for money. With not much money left, he pawns his gold ring for a non-registered gun, in an attempt to rob someone. And he knows who has the surplus cash - Benito.
#25 is somewhat of a landmark issue because the readers finally get to meet the entire Trust group. Augustus Medici leads the discussion and argues that it was the right thing to dispel the Minutemen from The Trust. Daniel Peres then receives a page from Mr. Graves, and leaves the meeting, along with Megan. Megan joins Benito later and in Benito's room, he is confronted by Hank and his good 'ol pistol. Staying calm, Benito offers Hank a choice: the 12 thousand dollars he won in cash, or a 100 thousand dollar bet on the LA Lakers on that night's basketball game. Hank took the bet.
At the same time, although Daniel Peres knew Graves wanted to talk to him, he didn't expect an innocuous stab in his kidney by Cole Burns.
Quotable Quotes: Megan: "What you [Benito] just did to him [Hank]? He'll regret for the rest of his lonely life. You said youself, the team he liked (76'ers) had injuries."
Benito: "Must be why I put his money on the Lakers."
Megan: "You gave him the money?"
Benito: "No. I gave him a choice. And he took the chance. I can relate."
#28 - #30 "¡Contrabandolero!"
What's It About: Mr. Shepherd and Dizzy Cordova travel to El Paso to give a shot at recruiting a sleeper Minuteman - Wylie Times.
What Happens: Wylie works as a gas pumper - a drab job, as he describes it. In the beginning of #28, he is cheated by Eightball (last seen in #1-#3) who drives off when Wylie realises he was given a fake credit card. After swearing as much as his breath would allow, Mr. Shepherd and Dizzy arrive at the gas station. This time, Wylie cheats $10 out of them. When Shepherd tells him "Don't work too hard", Wylie says: "It's against my religion".
Later, Wylie is at a bar with his two best pals - Hopper and Dan. Shepherd arrives and chats with Wylie for awhile. Hopper somehow enrages Dizzy, and although Dan is a karate expert, he is totally bruised and beaten by Dizzy.
With Hopper out injured, Dan convinces Wylie to fill in for Hopper in a business deal which was supposed to take place. The contact turns out to be none other than Eightball. Fighting against an inner reluctance, Wylie agrees.
Issue #29 starts off with some sweet flirting between Wylie and Dizzy. Dan arrives and takes Wylie away to do that errand they were paid to do. The small errand turns out to be smuggling some contraband from Mexico into the States. They meet up with Mik Kuchenko, who provides the goods. It turns out that Mik is actually a friend of Shepherd but Mik didn't know that this Hopper was really Wylie. Wylie, Dan, and Angelina, a girl who is attempting to get into the States, are later stopped by a gang of road pirates. Dan is killed.
The conclusion in #30 starts off with some ridiculous action involving Angelina gunning down the pirates with a uzi and saving Wylie. Dizzy manages to find Wylie and Angelina at the Mexican border and gets on board the truck. The three of them go on to have a hilarious conversation (buy it to read it) until they reach the border. Although there were some misunderstanding at the customs check, they got through safely and soundly.
Back at Dizzy's motel, they open up the truck to find...Conures - rare parrots. As the stroke of bad luck would have it, the real Hopper and Eightball arrive, already realising that Wylie was actually impersonating Hopper. Wylie tells Hopper that Dan is dead and he takes it badly, while Dizzy and Eightball get into an argument (they knew each other in the first story arc). Eightball was going to shoot Dizzy when Dan knocked the gun away and fired into the air, scaring away all the parrots. In tears, Hopper says: "Doctor Dan...christ...for some fuckin' birds."
In the end, Dizzy and Shepherd leave empty handed, not knowing how to make Wylie remember the past. When Wylie asks Shepard what he meant by saying all those things, Shepard replies: "Call me when you find out. Wylie...I'm sorry. Try an' remember that."
Interesting Thoughts: This is one of my more favourite arcs, particularly because of Wylie Times. He's a slacker who does not give much shit to any nonsense that happens around him. Although he says he hates the boring life, he likes it enough to not do anything about it. The relationship between Wylie and Dizzy was also smoothly done. Brian Azzarello didn't put in any rough scenes for both of them that would hurt their platonic relationship, just witty and flirtatious dialogue. As much as I would like to see Dizzy and Wylie hit it off, as Mik Kuchenko says, "An' Dizzy, you should be his [Shepherd's] chick."
Quotable Quotes: Wylie: "Care to join me?" (in drinking)
Dizzy: "You drink cheap beer."
Wylie: "I'm a cheap date."
Dizzy: "I'm not. How 'bout I buy the beer?"