Dashiell Hamett's Continental Op was the prototype for generations of though-guy detectives. Short, squat and as stubborn as a mule, the Op's only enthusiasm is doing his job and, in the stories in the Big Knockover, the job means solving the bank heist to end all the bank heists, taking on a gang of freebooters, cleaning up a vice-ridden hell in the desert and dealing with assorted colourful grifters like Dis-and-Dat Kid, Alphabet Short McCoy and Bluepoint vance.
