April 24: My favourite fictional character
Here. Let me transcribe a paragraph for you.
"The little guy's face was a bloody mess. Between the puffballs of blue-black flesh that used to be eyelids, the dull gleam of shock-deadened pupils watched Dilwick uncomprehendingly. His lips were swollen things of lacerated skin, with slow trickles of blood making crooked paths from the corners of his mouth through the stubble of a beard to his chin, dripping onto a stained shirt."
That's the opener for Mickey Spillane's book, The Twisted Thing, featuring the best hardboiled private eye of all time, Mike Hammer. Hammer is better than Sam Spade. He's better than Philip Marlowe. Mike Hammer is the quintessential tough guy. When I, The Jury was first published in 1947, it caused a sensation. The climax had Mike Hammer intentionally shoot the woman he loved. Why? Because she killed his best friend. For Mike Hammer, loyalty trumps everything.
I was introduced to Mike Hammer not through the books but through the 1980s television series starring Stacy Keach. Oh what a glorious show that was, and still is. The 80s were a great time; TV writers could write whatever they wanted and not have to worry about the politically incorrect juggernaut rearing its ugly head. The Mike Hammer show was unabashedly sexist. Every woman on the show wanted to sleep with Mike Hammer. Most of them were walk on parts, completely unnecessary to the plot.
An example: Mike would be walking down the street when a buxom woman, walking her dogs, would stop him. "Excuse me," she would ask, "but what do you think of my puppies?"
"They're nice," Mike would say. "The dogs are pretty cute too."
But this kind of groan-inducing dialogue was light years away from the tortured and driven narrative that Mike Hammer unfolded in the books. He was Batman without the costume, operating out of an office building instead of a batcave. He battled evildoers with a .45 Colt. His friends: his secretary, Velda, and Pat Chambers of the New York City homicide department. He had an endless string of contacts and acquaintances. He was a little psychotic. He was a terror to criminals but totally benevolent around any law-abiding citizen.
Shortly after Mike Hammer meets Dilwick in The Twisted Thing, he kicks the crap out of him. Later in that story, a prospective client asks Hammer how good a detective he is.
Hammer's reply:
"York, I've killed a lot of men. I shot the guts out of two of them in Times Square. Once I let six hundred people in a nightclub see what some crook had for dinner when he tried to gun me. He got it with a steak knife. I remember because I don't want to remember. They were too nasty. I hate the bastards that make society a thing to be laughed at and preyed upon. I hate them so much I can kill without the slightest compunction. The papers call me dirty names and the kind of rats I monkey with are scared stiff of me, but I don't give a damn. When I kill I make it legal. The courts accuse me of being too quick on the trigger but they can't revoke my licence because I do it right. I think fast, I shoot fast, I've been shot at plenty. And I'm still alive. That's how good a detective I am."
Now if that isn't a sweet soliloquy, I don't know what is.
Want a good thrill? Check out some Spillane.
"The little guy's face was a bloody mess. Between the puffballs of blue-black flesh that used to be eyelids, the dull gleam of shock-deadened pupils watched Dilwick uncomprehendingly. His lips were swollen things of lacerated skin, with slow trickles of blood making crooked paths from the corners of his mouth through the stubble of a beard to his chin, dripping onto a stained shirt."
That's the opener for Mickey Spillane's book, The Twisted Thing, featuring the best hardboiled private eye of all time, Mike Hammer. Hammer is better than Sam Spade. He's better than Philip Marlowe. Mike Hammer is the quintessential tough guy. When I, The Jury was first published in 1947, it caused a sensation. The climax had Mike Hammer intentionally shoot the woman he loved. Why? Because she killed his best friend. For Mike Hammer, loyalty trumps everything.
I was introduced to Mike Hammer not through the books but through the 1980s television series starring Stacy Keach. Oh what a glorious show that was, and still is. The 80s were a great time; TV writers could write whatever they wanted and not have to worry about the politically incorrect juggernaut rearing its ugly head. The Mike Hammer show was unabashedly sexist. Every woman on the show wanted to sleep with Mike Hammer. Most of them were walk on parts, completely unnecessary to the plot.
An example: Mike would be walking down the street when a buxom woman, walking her dogs, would stop him. "Excuse me," she would ask, "but what do you think of my puppies?"
"They're nice," Mike would say. "The dogs are pretty cute too."
But this kind of groan-inducing dialogue was light years away from the tortured and driven narrative that Mike Hammer unfolded in the books. He was Batman without the costume, operating out of an office building instead of a batcave. He battled evildoers with a .45 Colt. His friends: his secretary, Velda, and Pat Chambers of the New York City homicide department. He had an endless string of contacts and acquaintances. He was a little psychotic. He was a terror to criminals but totally benevolent around any law-abiding citizen.
Shortly after Mike Hammer meets Dilwick in The Twisted Thing, he kicks the crap out of him. Later in that story, a prospective client asks Hammer how good a detective he is.
Hammer's reply:
"York, I've killed a lot of men. I shot the guts out of two of them in Times Square. Once I let six hundred people in a nightclub see what some crook had for dinner when he tried to gun me. He got it with a steak knife. I remember because I don't want to remember. They were too nasty. I hate the bastards that make society a thing to be laughed at and preyed upon. I hate them so much I can kill without the slightest compunction. The papers call me dirty names and the kind of rats I monkey with are scared stiff of me, but I don't give a damn. When I kill I make it legal. The courts accuse me of being too quick on the trigger but they can't revoke my licence because I do it right. I think fast, I shoot fast, I've been shot at plenty. And I'm still alive. That's how good a detective I am."
Now if that isn't a sweet soliloquy, I don't know what is.
Want a good thrill? Check out some Spillane.
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