DC Showcase: Jonah Hex 2010

Set in the Old West, a ruthless outlaw named Red Doc Michael Rooker rides into a dusty local saloon, craving more whiskey and a fight. His swagger catches the eye of Madame Lorraine Linda Hamilton, a sharp-eyed prostitute who senses a clean profit in his bravado. She lures Red Doc upstairs while a frightened bar girl Michelle Trachtenberg watches from below. Just as they settle in, Lorraine murders the outlaw, pockets his cash, and orders two henchmen to dispose of the body—an elimination pattern she has used on many men before.

The next day, bounty hunter Jonah Hex Thomas Jane arrives in town, his disfigurement turning heads and making him an oddity in the crowd. After tussling with an arrogant young gunslinger who taunts him, Hex goes into the saloon to press the bartender about Red Doc—who carries a $5,000 bounty—but the bartender Jason Marsden insists he never saw him. The bar girl, the earlier witness, informs Hex about Madame Lorraine, a calculating operator who offers services only to men with money and then vanishes those men. Hex buys drinks for everyone in the room to draw Lorraine out and, when she appears, Hex steps into the upstairs space and deflects a bullet by tossing his hat.

Lorraine quickly proves herself a dangerous foil: Hex knocks her out again after a tense struggle, and the bar girl’s informant role helps keep Lorraine’s scheme intact as the bartender is easily gunned down when he tries to shoot Hex with a shotgun. Hex then proclaims that the drinks are on the house, signaling his control of the scene and his intent to uncover Red Doc’s whereabouts. He forces Lorraine at gunpoint to reveal Red Doc’s location.

They descend into an abandoned mine, where Lorraine leads him to a dark hole that opens into a caved-in lower shaft. Hex locates Red Doc’s body and, as Lorraine tries once more to stab him with a knife lodged in one of the corpses, he anticipates the move and knocks her out again. When she comes to, Hex stands outside the shaft with Red Doc, while Lorraine pleads that he can’t leave her alone. He answers with a harsh reminder that she already has plenty of companions—those she has murdered—before walking away. As Hex departs, Lorraine trembles at the sight of the many victims she has left behind; the single lamp in the shaft slowly goes out, leaving her trapped in the dark.