In the world of 100 Bullets, America is secretly ruled by a criminal cabal known as the Trust, a group of thirteen criminal families. Enforcing the Trust’s will are seven agents called the Minutemen. Over the course of the series, readers learn that the origins of the Trust trace back hundreds of years, and that the earliest incarnation of the Minutemen were responsible for one of the real world’s most enduring mysteries.
100 Bullets was a Vertigo series created by Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso. Starting from a deceptively simple premise, the series grew over time to chart a secret war between hidden players at the ultimate level of power.
In time, the series’ backstory expanded to cover hundreds of years, with the series offering its own explanation for the disappearance of the first English colony in America at Roanoke.
The Minutemen Are History’s Most Legendary Enforcers
Launched in 1999 and running for ten years, and exactly one hundred issues, 100 Bullets grew more complex as the series went on, with readers learning more about the secret history of the Trust and their enforcers, the Minutemen. Some of the earliest concrete hints at the larger story came in 100 Bullets #12-14, the “Parlez Kung Vous” arc, where readers learned the Trust had been manipulating things in America for years, with the Minutemen carrying out their orders without question. However, it wasn’t made clear just how long the Trust had been in charge of things until issue #50, entitled “Pray for Reign,” where the Minutemen’s connection to Roanoke was revealed.
100 Bullets’ Minutemen And The Secret History Of America
As readers would learn, the Trust were a cabal comprised of the thirteen most wealthy, influential European families, who had declared their intentions to exit the continent and establish themselves in North America. England’s monarchy tried to buck against the Trust’s toehold of the “New World,” by establishing a colony at Roanoke. In order to send a message about their control of the continent, the Trust sent seven vicious killers to kill every man, woman and child in the settlement, leaving no trace behind other than a sign that read, “CROATOA.” The message was clear: this New World belonged to the Trust.
The thirteen families would hold their grip over the ensuing centuries, with the Minutemen growing into an institution, designed to enforce the Trust’s will on the outside world, and enforce disputes within the Trust within its thirteen families. Well before former Minuteman Victor Ray revealed the groups origins in “Pray for Reign,” 100 Bullets #26, “Mr. Branch and the Family Tree,” revealed to readers that the Trust asked the Minutemen to carry out another version of what happened to Roanoke in the present day. Feeling that the supposed powers controlling America had grown too brash, the Trust felt it was time to remind them who really called the shots.
The Minutemen’s leader at the time, Agent Graves, refused their orders, precipitating the events of the entire series. After acting against the families of the Trust, Graves put his Minutemen into hiding, slowly reactivating them throughout the course of the series. Of course as it would turn out, Graves’ motives for refusing the Trust were more complicated than any moral objection to repeating the original crime committed at Roanoke; the world of 100 Bullets as conceived by Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso has very few moral objections of any kind. The Minutemen’s leader like everyone in the series, had power in mind, and made a grand play for it.
