Jenny vs. The Crime Empire

As mentioned in a previous post, Futura - Chapter 12, there are some recurring creative cliches that irk the heck out of me and ruin my reading or viewing enjoyment. Author Lewis Shiner addresses many of them in his work and I have referenced it previously myself. This entry in My First Book of Noir shtick Jenny vs. The Crime Empire pokes fun at two of the most common and irksome cliches in any action fiction; that of the "Lucky Break" and "The Hostage With Access To Weapons (Who Doesn't Use Them)".

Breaking those tropes is why I found page five of Chapter 12's Futura story so pleasing. Brought into the command center before the tyrant of space, Futura proceeds to beat him near to death with her bare hands. The scene in the fictional Chapter 5 of Jenny vs. The Crime Empire was directly inspired by how I envisioned the initial conference room meeting between captive Rachel Weisz and the evil corporate executive in the film Chain Reaction should have really gone down.

A few pages from the story Jenny vs. The Crime Empire. Originally published in My First Book of Noir (1953).