I'm fairly new to thinking about homological algebra and chain complexes in their own right, *i.e* outside of isolated examples such as for constructing simplicial homology, or for computing $Ext$ groups for some Hopf algebroid. 


Given an abelian category $\mathscr{A}$ with a category of chain complexes $Ch(\mathscr{A})$, the homotopy category
$K(\mathscr{A})$ is defined as the naive homotopy category (*i.e.* replace chain maps with chain homotopy classes of chain maps) but with quasi-isomorphisms inverted (these are the maps which induce isomorphisms on homology). This is obviously the result of placing some kind of model structure on $Ch(\mathscr{A})$. This leads me to consider a few obvious questions.


1. Are there alternate, interesting model structures for $Ch(\mathscr{A})$?
2. (How) has the advancement of model category theory impacted the study of things such as chain complexes, and perverse sheaves for example?
3. Are there any good treatments of homological algebra which makes use of the rich theory of model categories?



Model categories and chain complexes
I'll take your question as license to advertise a relatively recent paper in a slightly more specialized but concretely calculational direction: <http://nyjm.albany.edu/j/2014/20-53p.pdf>. Its title is 
Six model structures for DG-modules over DGAs: Model category theory in homological action. The theme is how different model structures can illuminate concrete calculations. I had computed the cohomology of various homogeneous spaces, way back in the 1960's, using some strange looking explicit cochain complexes. Tobi Barthel, Emily Riehl and I found that those turn out to be explicit examples of a variant kind of cofibrant approximation.


