It began in the early 1930s, when a square-jawed detective named Dick Tracy caused quite a stir in the comics. Soon comic books would be filled with forthright heroes, nasty hoodlums, G-men, and the most infamous criminals. Crime comics were bold, wild, and bloody - and the most popular comic book genre of the mid-forties and fifties. Mike Benton, author of Taylor's award-winning History of Comics series, explores the colorful history of this genre:...