CONAN: THE DAUGHTERS OF MIDORA AND OTHER STORIES

I grabbed this digital volume in a sale when Dark Horse's Conan license ended a couple years ago. It contains a number of stories of varying length, which were originally published between 2004 and 2012. So without further ado, let's dive in!

"TROPHY"
Script by Tim & Ben Truman | Art by Marian Churchland
Letters by Brandon Graham

This eight-page tale is a short, light-hearted opening to the volume, but it's a nice showcase of what Conan is all about, hitting all the major marks. Conan, lugging a sack with him, wanders into a desert village and stops at a fancy inn for some refreshment. He regales the patrons with stories of how he acquired the various treasures in his bag, getting them drunker and drunker until they all pass out -- at which point he purloins their valuables and departs for the next inn on the road.

Like I said, it hits all the marks: Conan the wanderer, coming out of the desert to civilization. Conan the barbarian, as we see, through his stories, scenes in which he kills various powerful warriors through increasingly creative and violent means. Conan the carouser, drinking heavily and enthralling a roomful of revelers with his tales. And Conan the thief, making off with their belongings after his stories are done. If somebody knew nothing about Conan, this would be a nice little primer for the character -- which is possibly why it was placed first in this collection!

WONDER WOMAN/CONAN #1 - 6

"A CROW WITHOUT MERCY" | "BLADE, BRACELETS, AND BLOOD AND SAND"
"THE DANCE OF WICKED CROWS" | "WAR AND THE WIND RIDER"
"LIKE BLOOD FROM THE SKY" | "A FEAST OF FORBIDDEN FLESH"
Writer: Gail Simone | Penciler: Aaron Lopresti | Inker: Matt Ryan
Colorists: Wendy Broome with Tony Avina | Letterer: Saida Temofonte
Editor: Kristy Quinn | Group Editor: Jim Chadwick

I bought the digital collection of this series on a lark during a Wonder Woman sale at Comixology a while back. I like Gail Simone (though I've honestly read very little of her work outside of her brief DEADPOOL/AGENT X run of a couple decades ago), I like Aaron Lopresti, and I like Conan and Wonder Woman -- so why not give it a try?

The story, in my opinion, is more like a Conan adventure guest-starring Wonder Woman than a true team-up of co-headliners. I have no problem with that, but it seems worth mentioning. It follows Conan as he makes his way into a city of slavers, where he watches a woman battle in a gladiatorial arena. Conan believes he recognizes her as his first love, a girl from a tribe of women who he once knew as Yanna. Leaping to her aid, Conan is captured and imprisoned with the woman.

Of course this is actually Wonder Woman -- it's not a mystery and so the story makes no attempt to hide it. However she has no memory of her true self, and the real puzzle for readers is -- what's the deal here? Is this what we used to call an "Elseworlds" story? I.e., is this just sort of a case of "What If Wonder Woman existed in the Hyborean Age"? As the issues progress, Conan trickles out his history with the girl, Yanna, who he believed killed when they were both teens. But, come issue 5, it becomes clear that this really is Wonder Woman. She's been lost to time, and her fellow Amazons, sent back to the past by Queen Hippolyte, find her and bring her home to present-day Themyscira.

SPRINGTIME GRAB BAG

It's time once more for that annual tradition where I dig through the various and sundry comics I've bought but have yet to read, and review some of them. This year, I've got offerings in the queue from DC, Dark Horse (sort of), and Dynamite.

We'll start on Monday with the first DC offering, a crossover I would've gone nuts for as a child: HE-MAN/THUNDERCATS. I bought this one a few years ago via Comixology, I think around the same time I also picked up BATMAN/TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES ADVNTURES, but I just never got around to it until now.

We'll follow that up with another crossover, also half from DC: WONDER WOMAN/CONAN. The Conan half of the story comes from Dark Horse, back when they still had the license. And then we'll keep the Conan theme running with a book I grabbed in a Comixology sale when Dark Horse lost that license: CONAN: THE DAUGHTERS OF MIDORA & OTHER STORIES. But our Hyborian Age antics won't end there! The following week, we'll read our first of two books from Dynamite: RED SONJA: THE BALLAD OF THE RED GODDESS, written by Sonja's co-creator, Roy Thomas.

After that, it's one final Dynamite offering: FLASH GORDON: KING'S CROSS, a limited series which sort of revisited the concept of the 1980s DEFENDERS OF THE EARTH cartoon series, in that it teams up King Features' best-known comic strip action stars -- Flash, the Phantom, and Mandrake the Magician. And then we'll hop over to IDW for a look at last year's STAR TREK/TRANSFORMERS series.

All of this will take us through April, and when it's done I'll reveal what's coming up next: something from the House of Ideas, a place we haven't visited in over a year, if you can believe it!

GUNSMITH CATS BURST VOLUME 5

"MINNIE-MAY'S SOUVENIRS" | "REHABILITATION" | "BECKY FARRAH"
"DRUG TRAFFICKING" | "ANYTHING BUT DRUGS" | "HAO SHIFU" | "LIFT THE BAN"
"I CAN'T BACK UP" | "150 MPH SHAKE!" | "PERCY" | "MISTY'S DETERMINATION"
"GOOD NIGHT" | "FINAL CHAPTER: FACES OF CHICAGO"
Presented by Kenichi Sonoda
Translation and Lettering: Studio Cutie

Forget everything I said last week about Goldie's name. I mean, except for the part where it should be "Goldie Musso". For whatever reason, in this volume she's identified by the original series' English spelling of "Goldie Musou", rather than the previous volume's "Goldy Musso".

Anyway... the final GUNSMITH CATS BURST book opens with May and Ken returning from their honeymoon in Japan, to find a glum Rally waiting. She tells them that Misty now lives with Goldie, and the group sets up a plan to figure out why. They know Goldie's new drug is called Dark Ball (an evolution of her "Powerball" drug from the original series), and suspect it has brainwashing capabilities similar to Goldie's older products. Becky gets Bean on board to procure a Dark Ball sample, and May brings the sample to her contact in Chinatown, Granny Hao.

But the only way Bean can get the Dark Ball is by agreeing to run drugs for one of Goldie's dealers, breaking his promise to Rally. Word of Bean's run is leaked to the police, and Detective Bacharach returns to action, ambushing Bean when he picks up the drugs and coercing him into a race to the state line. Bean, who actually enjoys his little back-and-forths with Bacharach, agrees.

GUNSMITH CATS BURST VOLUME 4

"THE POST-BALL STORIES" | "CHATTING AWAY"
"A FAMILIAR FACE FROM THE PAST" | "GOLDY" | "THE SCAR'S MEMORY"
"GUARD GOLDY!" | "ONE-HANDED" | "THE WOUNDED ONES"
"A SHOOTOUT IN THE SMOKE" | "FLASHBACK?"
"LOST MEMORY, RECOVERED MEMORY" | "AFTER THE HOUSE PARTY"
Presented by Kenichi Sonoda
Translation and Lettering: Studio Cutie

Before we get started, I should make a general note about the translation of GUNSMITH CATS and GUNSMITH CATS BURST, and a specific note regarding the spelling of Goldie's name. Dark Horse's original run of GUNSMITH CATS in the nineties was credited as being translated by Dana Lewis and Toren Smith (collectively known as "Studio Proteus"). The pair handled the entire series from start to finish. I commented a bit on some of their scripting when I looked at those volumes last year. Mostly everything read fine, but there were some tics here and there that I didn't like. But the main thing to note about the Lewis/Smith work is that they adapted their script for a pretty natural and flowing English language experience.

BURST, on the other hand, is translated by a group called Studio Cutie -- and they seem to take a much more literal approach with their script. Obviously I don't know what Sonoda's original Japanese script looked like (and I can't read Japanese so it wouldn't matter if I ever saw it), but Studio Cutie's work feels like a straight translation with no liberties taken to adjust the words and phrasing for an English-speaking audience. More or less, it reads like some of the "scanlations" of manga I've seen on the web now and then -- somewhat stilted in places, with occasional weirdly archaic words thrown in (such as Roy, in this very volume's opening chapter, asking Rally if she considers Bean Bandit a "comrade").

Overall, I think I like the script from Lewis and Smith, which, while occasionally mired in tics I disliked, had a more naturalistic style to it, over the BURST script from Studio Cutie.

THE UNBOXING - JANUARY 2019

We'll kick things off this month with the Christmas Unboxing -- a few gifts from my family on December 25th. First and foremost among these is STAR WARS ART: RALPH McQUARRIE, a massive two-volume slipcased set collecting all the artwork McQuarrie did as a concept artist on the original STAR WARS movies. I'm positively in love with these books, and I may have to do a post about them at some point, if I ever get around to it.

Also, from my wife, we have Fantagraphics' CARL BARKS DISNEY LIBRARY: THE LOST PEG LEG MINE and CARL BARKS DISNEY LIBRARY: THE BLACK PEARLS OF TABU YAMA. I think I mentioned last year that my wife has been giving me these books every year for Christmas for a few years now (Fantagraphics releases two volumes per year). I believe there are only around ten books left before the full series is collected, but I could be mistaken. In any case, I read Barks' stories through Gladstone Comics when I was in elementary school, but I've never touched them since. Still, somehow they're indelibly burned into my brain to the point that every time I get a new volume, memories rush back as if I just read them yesterday.

I also made a number of digital purchases through Comixology via their year-end sales. From Dark Horse, several books which are no longer available to buy, since the company has now lost its license to Marvel: THE SAVAGE SWORD OF CONAN vols. 1 - 9 (the series ran much longer, but I believe this is the full Roy Thomas run, which is all I really wanted), and CONAN: THE DAUGHTERS OF MIDORA AND OTHER STORIES.

From DC, I grabbed WONDER WOMAN/CONAN and BATMAN AND THE OUTSIDERS vol. 2. From Fantagraphics, I picked up THE CARL BARKS LIBRARY: THE BLACK PEARLS OF TABU YAMA (yes, I'm double-dipping on these. I like having "digital copies" of a lot of my books) and THE DON ROSA LIBRARY: THE THREE CABALLEROS (I want to own Barks in physical format, but I'm okay going digital-only for Rosa).

And from Marvel, I got THOR BY WALTER SIMONSON vol. 3 and vol. 4, TOMB OF DRACULA: THE COMPLETE COLLECTION vol. 2, X-MEN CLASSIC: THE COMPLETE COLLECTION vol. 1, X-MEN: GRAND DESIGN vol. 2, and X-MEN: THE MAGNETO WAR.

And that about covers my merry holiday haul. We'll check in next month for more of the same!

GUNSMITH CATS BURST VOLUME 3

"KING COBRA" | "HOW TO AIM AND SHOOT" | "THE MONEY-SUCKING CAR"
"THE V8 FREAKS" | "THE DIRTY COP" | "TRAFFIC JAM"
"THE AMBUSH" | "RPG 7" | "THE STANDOFF" | "STALLED!"
Presented by Kenichi Sonoda
Translation and Lettering: Studio Cutie

The third installment of GUNSMITH CATS BURST opens with a few one-off chapters to fill space between last volume's Bean Bandit serial and this book's sequel to that story. We open with Rally getting a new car in the form of a Mustang "King" Cobra, and catching a bounty as well in the process. Then comes one of those "interesting" mainstays of the series, a chapter about Rally doing some teaching at a shooting range and allowing Kenichi Sonoda to have his characters blabber nonstop about guns, how to fire them, and how their internal workings function.

I will, however, give this story a little credit for bringing up one of my favorite subjects in serialized fiction: a timeline! At one point, Rally says that she's only been a bounty hunter for about two years -- which is approximately the amount of time covered by the original GUNSMITH CATS. I talked a bit about the series' timeline when I looked at the final volumes of the original run, specifically how certain facts didn't quite jibe with regards to characters' ages, how long Rally had been bounty-hunting, and when her father disappeared from her life. I haven't gone back to check those notes, but I strongly suspect this little tidbit doesn't really hold water either. Rally being a bounty hunter for only two years feels way too short, since she was already established in her profession when the original run of stories started.

Anyway -- after the gun range snoozefest ends, we move into the story which fills out the remainder of the book: Rally learns that Bean is entering an illegal street race, and that Bean has learned Detective Percy is entering the race as well. Bean makes no secret of his desire to see Percy dead and off his trail, but he tells Rally he won't murder the detective himself -- he does, however, plan to get Percy killed in an "accident". Percy, meanwhile, hires some terrorists and arms them with a rocket propelled grenade launcher, setting them up along a detour in the race and instructing them to kill Bean when he approaches. To make certain the race will follow this path, Percy leans on its organizer by threatening the lives of his wife and daughter.

GUNSMITH CATS BURST VOLUME 2

"FINDING SHELBY" | "EXPLOSION" | "GT 500"
"SHOOTING RANGE" | "BREACH OF CONTRACT" | "GET OUT OF HOSPITAL"
"INRUSH" | "THE PRICE TO PAY" | "MACH 1 COP"
Presented by Kenichi Sonoda
Translation and Lettering: Studio Cutie

GUNSMITH CATS BURST's first story arc wraps up somewhere around the midpoint of this second volume. As described last time, the mob had stolen Rally's Shelby Mustang and threatened to use it in a terror attack if she didn't hand over their errant accountant, Howard. This book sees Rally gather her team to stop the attack. Becky locates the car, May and fiance Ken (making his first real appearance in the series here after a cameo in volume 1) work together in an attempt to defuse the bomb, while Rally keeps watch.

But of course things go awry -- Rally is forced to start the car before May and Ken have finished disarming it, then learns that the bomb is set to explode if she drops below eighty-five miles per hour, so she's forced to drive it into an abandoned construction site where it explodes. No one is killed, but Rally is down one dearly beloved automobile.

Other stuff goes on here, but like I said last time, it all feels very repetitious from stories we saw in the original series. The mob, a bomb, Rally and Bean on opposite sides of a situation -- it's like Sonoda threw some darts at a board spelling out his standard plots and then ran with whatever result he got. I suppose it's possible that with GUNSMITH CATS out of first-run circulation for a few years, he wanted to ease readers back into the story with something familiar, but I can't help feeling he misfired (no pun intended) if that was the idea. Familiar it is, but because of that it's also kind of boring.

GUNSMITH CATS BURST VOLUME 1

"SHORT SERIES #1" | "#2 GUNSMITH CATS MINI THEATER HP (HIGH POWER)"
"#3 HIDDEN GUN" | "BURST" | "OASIS" | "MONROE INN"
"MUZZLE TO MUZZLE" | "GIMME MORE SLICES OF TAKE!" | "RETURN" | "DEAL"
Presented by Kenichi Sonoda
Translation and Lettering: Studio Cutie

After the original GUNSMITH CATS series ended, Kenichi Sonoda revisited the characters a handful of times before eventually restarting it as an ongoing story with BURST. Those few intermediary appearances are a trio of one-shot stories called the "Short Series". The first of these is a pretty straightforward affair in which our heroines Rally Vincent, Minnie May Hopkins, and Misty Brown protect a hooker who's seen too much from a group of hitmen dispatched by a cocaine-dealing senator. It reminds us that in Sonoda's version of Chicago, nearly everyone in a position of power is corrupt in some way or another (which may not be far from the truth, though this heightened reality has a crooked senator conspiring with a crooked assistant district attorney to kill a hooker, which seems a bit extreme).

The second "Short Series" installment is one of those dreadfully boring affairs in the gun shop, where Rally and Minnie May work on a custom weapon for a client and gab away about it as if it's supposed to be interesting. I think I said this when I looked at the original GSC last year, but these scenes absolutely kill me. Sonoda is a gun nut, of course, and it's his prerogative to gush about them in the context of his stories -- and I suppose it's to his credit that he doesn't do this sort of thing too much -- but devoting an entire manga chapter simply to two characters talking about a gun is absurd. There's no story here; it's like I'm reading an infomercial for a Browning pistol! (Though there is a funny bit on the last page: when May learns along with readers that the client is Rally's information broker, Becky, May says that had she known, she wouldn't have put as much effort into polishing the gun.)

Our final "Short Series" story is short and sweet; a straight action affair in which Rally attempts to bring in a bounty but is attacked by his cohorts. They disarm her and hold her at gunpoint, but she manages to get the drop on them with the tiny pistol she keeps hidden up her sleeve. Sonoda throws a bit of pathos into this one, as the bounty's daughter witnesses the entire thing and cries for him in the end as Rally hauls him away.

GUNSMITH CATS BURST

That's right, if it's the start of a new year, it must be time to read some manga here at NOT A HOAX, and for 2019 that means it's time for one more round with Rally Vincent, Minnie May Hopkins, Bean Bandit, and the rest.

Last year I looked at Kenichi Sonoda's popular GUNSMITH CATS manga series as released here in the United States by Dark Horse Comics. That was the original run, which spanned 1991 through 1997. But, after taking several years off to work on other projects, Sonoda revived the series in 2004 for five years of further adventures. GUNSMITH CATS BURST was also released by Dark Horse in the U.S. not long after it concluded publication in Japan (indeed, there may even have been some overlap between the Japanese series ending and the American editions starting, though I'm not certain).

Unlike the original GUNSMITH CATS, which I'd read a number of times when I started my review project last year, I've only read BURST once, a volume at a time, as it was released by Dark Horse in the United States circa 2007 - 2010. So while I remembered a great deal of the original series' plot, this next round will practically new to me, as I recall very little about it.

Where I covered the original series in eight posts, each looking at half a volume of the huge GUNSMITH CATS REVISED EDITION books, this will be a shorter project. BURST didn't last as long as GSC, and was released in five normal-sized manga volumes -- so for this project we'll just cover one book a week for a total of five weeks, taking us into February.

Stand by, because we begin... one week from today!

Available on Amazon: Volume 1 | Volume 2 | Volume 3 | Volume 4 | Volume 5

THE UNBOXING - NOVEMBER 2018

I meant to have this up this past Sunday, but the Thanksgiving holiday weekend kept me busy, so here it is in an unprecedented midweek Unboxing!

Everything is digital this month, thanks to Amazon/Comixology Black Friday/Cyber Monday sales. First, from DC, I grabbed BATMAN AND ROBIN ADVENTURES vol. 3, NEW TEEN TITANS vol. 9 (which picks up where the Omnibuses I reviewed a few years back ended), TALES OF THE BATMAN: GERRY CONWAY vol. 2, and WONDER WOMAN: EARTH ONE vol. 1 and vol. 2. (Yes, I've gone out of my way to note more than once how much I dislike a lot of Grant Morrison's writing. I bought these books strictly for the artwork!)

Courtesy of Dark Horse, I grabbed USAGI YOJIMBO/TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES: THE COMPLETE COLLECTION, which I somehow missed during the last Dark Horse sale, when I stocked up on Usagi books.

From Random House, of all publishers, I grabbed PELLUCIDAR: AT THE EARTH'S CORE, a comic I must assume was originally published at some point by DC, considering it's by Dennis O'Neil and Michael William Kaluta.

And from Marvel, I picked up WEREWOLF BY NIGHT: THE COMPLETE COLLECTION vol. 3. (This was actually part of a Halloween sale last month, but it missed the cutoff for the October Unboxing.)

That's it for November, for Black Friday, and for Cyber Monday. Next month we'll be back to physical volumes for a couple of books to close out the year!

THE UNBOXING - JUNE 2018

No new books this month; just a brief Digital Unboxing. Last month, Comixology ran a big sale on "Young Readers" material from Dark Horse, and around the same time there was a Dark Horse 50% off coupon as well -- so, at the recommendation of several posts on the Marvel Masterworks Message Board, I doubled the sales up and purchased eight volumes of the USAGI YOJIMBO SAGA -- which is every volume in that series printed to date, covering more than 150 issues, plus some specials and the like. I've had mild interest in Stan Sakai's samurai rabbit epic for several years, and now I finally own a massive chunk of it -- though when I'll actually settle down to read this stuff is anybody's guess.

(Also, I've learned that there was an earlier USAGI YOJIMBO series which lasted thirty-eight issues and whose reprint rights currently lie with Fantagraphics rather than Dark Horse -- so whenever I finally get to USAGI, it will certainly not be until after there's a Fantagraphics sale allowing me to pick up the eight volumes covering that series as well.)

CONAN AND THE JEWELS OF GWAHLUR

Script and Art: P. Craig Russell
Colors: Lovern Kindzierski | Letters: Galan Showman
Based on the story “The Jewels of Gwahlur” by Conan creator Robert E. Howard.

As noted when I "digitally unboxed" it a few months back, I picked up 2005's CONAN AND THE JEWELS OF GWAHLUR in a Dark Horse Conan sale simply because the cover jumped out at me and the story sounded interesting. Plus, despite his long and distinguished career in comics, I'm pretty sure I had never read any sequential work by P. Craig Russell, and I wanted to rectify that. I've seen pinups by him and I've seen him ink other pencilers here and there, but when it comes to pure, unvarnished Russell as plotter, scripter, penciler, and inker, this story marks my first exposure.

(I mean, yeah, technically he's adapting an original work by Robert E. Howard, but you know what I mean.)

The story finds Conan, working as he often does in the capacity of a mercenary, as a general in the kingdom of Keshan. But his true purpose in the backwater nation is to steal its legendary treasure, a cache of jewels called the Teeth of Gwahlur. However Conan finds himself up against a rival in this quest, the sinister Thutmekri. When Thutmekri tells Keshan's king that peace with neighboring Zimbabwei could be achieved with some of the Teeth provided as a show of good faith, Conan realizes the villain's true plan, to get the king to reveal the location of the sacred jewels, and then steal them.

Conan takes advantage of Thutmekri's plot when the king sends his priests to the isolated and long-deserted city-temple of Alkmeenon, where they are to commune with its oracle, Yelaya, and, if necessary, bring back the Teeth of Gwahlur. Now knowing where the Teeth are hidden, Conan sets out ahead of the priests and reaches Alkmeenon before them.

THE BLACK BEETLE IN: KARA BÖCEK

A Mystery Tale by Francesco Francavilla
Letters by Nate Piekos of Blambot

When I looked at Francesco Francavilla’s first “Black Beetle” adventure, NO WAY OUT, near the end of the year, I admitted that perhaps I was missing something. The story had received rave reviews from both the comics press and comics professionals, but I found it kind of an unnecessarily confusing and somehow simultaneously simplistic mystery. The artwork was gorgeous, but the story didn’t grab me, much as I wanted it to.

I now wonder if part of the problem was in the story’s length. NO WAY OUT was an adventure told in five full-length issues, and I didn’t really warm up to it. KARA BÖCEK, on the other hand, was serialized in DARK HORSE PRESENTS as a series of five six-page installments, for a total run-time of (carry the one...) thirty pages! Basically a single comic’s worth of material. And I find this story to be far more exciting, fast-paced, and all around appealing than NO WAY OUT.

(I should note again, as I did at the time, that NO WAY OUT featured a prologue chapter, unrelated to the main story, which featured the Black Beetle fighting Nazis at the Colt City museum, and that I found that prologue way more engaging than the subsequent storyline, so I really think I’m on to something with this idea that the Black Beetle works best in shorter, tighter-paced adventures.)

SPRINGTIME GRAB BAG

It's that time of year again, where I look at a few random items from the "to read" pile in what has become known (at least to me) as the Springtime Grab Bag!

All of the upcoming reviews will be digital books purchased in various Comixology sales. First, we'll look a couple pulp-influenced offerings from Dark Horse: THE BLACK BEETLE IN: KARA BOCEK by Francisco Francavilla, and CONAN AND THE JEWELS OF GWAHLUR by P. Craig Russell.

After that, we'll jump over to Image for a mini-series I've wanted to check out for quite some time, but just never got around to, MADAME MIRAGE by Paul Dini and Kenneth Rocafort. And then we'll wrap things up with a visit to IDW for a look at their BATMAN/TMNT ADVENTURES mini-series, a crossover between the definitive animated incarnation of Batman and one of the many animated incarnations of the Turtles.

With the Black Beetle, Conan, and Batman and the Turtles, I have some idea of what to expect, but I really don't know what Madame Mirage has to offer, so this should be an interesting few weeks. I hope you'll stick around to see how it all unfolds!

GUNSMITH CATS PART 8

“MISTY’S RUN” | “‘KEY’” | “SECRET” | “NUMERAL MATTERS” | “CRISIS”
“ON THE RUN” | “PRINT … OUT” | “BIRTHDAY”
Presented by Kenichi Sonoda
Translation: Dana Lewis & Toren Smith | Lettering and Retouch: Studio Cutie

And now we move into the final GUNSMITH CATS story arc, a relatively straightforward affair in which Misty gets kidnapped, along with some cargo being ferried by Bean, and Bean’s client. Rally and Bean team up to rescue Misty in an adventure involving a counterfeiter and a family of criminals out to steal his equipment. We get some fun moments involving Rally, May, Becky, Bean, and Misty (Ken sits this one out), and the overall story feels a bit like a palate cleanser following the larger epic of the final conflict with Goldie.

And then it’s on to chapter 75, the very last installment of the serialized manga, celebrating Rally’s twenty-first birthday. Sonoda delivers callbacks to the earliest segments of his story as Rally brings in Gray’s son and then visits the grave of the girl she failed to save (and whose death I complained about) in one of the very first chapters. Soon after, her friends throw her a surprise party, and besides the obvious attendees (May, Ken, Becky, Misty, and Roy), we also see Jeena and her friends from the “Kidnapped” storyline.

It’s a nice little note to close things out, as Rally — after briefly doubting her career — reaffirms herself as a bounty hunter. Oh, and May and Ken have married offscreen as well, which is another bow to tie on the story. Creepy as their relationship is, Sonoda at least sells them as a couple in love, so it’s nice to see them get a happy ending.

GUNSMITH CATS PART 7

“GOLDIE RETURNS” | “PROMOTION” | “BREAKTHROUGH” | “Mr. V” | “FATHER”
“IRON WOMAN” | “THE PREVIOUS NIGHT” | “SUICIDE” | “FATHER’S 12-GUAGE”
“HESITATION” | “SMOKIN’ HIGH” | “NOW, I’M BACK” | “GUNS & DOSES” | “WILD WOMEN”
Presented by Kenichi Sonoda
Translation: Dana Lewis & Toren Smith | Lettering and Retouch: Studio Cutie

This arc would probably be considered the climax of the original run of GUNSMITH CATS. While there is one more shorter storyline following, which we’ll look at next week to wrap things up, this is where previously laid threads come together to provide something of an ending for a few of our characters.

The arc begins with Goldie’s return to Chicago, as she promptly demonstrates the suggestive power of her new, improved Kerasine by brainwashing high-ranking men in four feuding mob families to work together for a supermarket heist that ultimately lands Roy in the hospital. Shortly thereafter, Goldie gets herself arrested in a drug deal and immediately jumps bail, ensuring that Rally will soon be on her tail. It seems she’s decided Rally is the worthiest opponent she’s ever faced, and wants to challenge her skills.

This leads to a fun sequence as Rally and the whole gang pursue every lead in town in their search for Goldie. Eventually they learn she’s holed up in the mansion of a local mafia don, and soon infiltrate the place — but a wrench is thrown into the plan when Rally is confronted by Goldie’s bodyguard and top enforcer, Mister V… who turns out to be Rally’s long-missing father.

GUNSMITH CATS PART 6

“KIDNAP” | “MR. SMART” | “LONG NIGHT” | “MIDNIGHT PLUS FOUR” | “FIFTY CALIBER”
“JEENA” | “BLOODY RALLY” | “9mm VS. 40mm” | “FAMILY” | “SWEET HOME”
Presented by Kenichi Sonoda
Translation: Dana Lewis & Toren Smith | Lettering and Retouch: Studio Cutie

As I noted last week, we’re in my favorite stretch of GUNSMITH CATS, as Kenichi Sonoda sets aside his overarching plotline, drops the mob politics and creepy sex stuff, and simply gives us a couple of fun, one-and-done story arcs. And while I like last week’s story quite a bit as the first half of GUNSMITH CATS’ highest point, this storyline is easily my bar-none favorite portion of the saga.

We begin with Rally and May on a stakeout — TV kids’ personality Mister Smart, already estranged from his family over child abuse charges, is wanted for skipping out on a parking ticket. Things begin to escalate quickly, though, when Smart apparently kidnaps his daughter Jeena and a high-speed chase ensues involving Smart, Rally, and a Hummer driven by Riff-Raff and occupied by armed men named Sharko and Borgnine.

The plot thickens when Borgnine plants a bomb on Jeena which must receive a periodic reset code, lest it explode, killing her. This ensures Smart’s participation in Borgnine’s plot to steal a large sum of drug money from the local syndicate. Of course the plan goes sour when Rally shows up, leading to an eventual showdown at the home of Mister Smart’s ex, once he realizes “Borgnine” is actually the woman's divorce attorney (with whom she’d had an affair prior to the separation and who she used to trump up the false child abuse charges against her ex-husband) in disguise.

GUNSMITH CATS PART 5

“ROLLING BEAN” | “SEEPER” | “V26” | “HOT MOTOR” | “WHITE OUT”
“MISSING WASHINGTON” | “N.Y. HIT” | “CROSSFIRE” | “GAME SET”
Presented by Kenichi Sonoda
Translation: Dana Lewis & Toren Smith | Lettering and Retouch: Studio Cutie

The early installments set up the characters and world of GUNSMITH CATS and provide an overarching storyline/antagonist via Gray. The next chunk of story introduces Goldie, who will go on, in the final set of chapters, to be the major villain of the entire saga. But it’s this run of material, which we’ll look at over this week and next, which I consider to be the peak of Kenichi Sonoda’s story.

It begins when Rally learns that Bean Bandit has agreed to travel to New York, pick up some drugs, and ferry them back to Chicago. Bean is given half of a dollar bill, with his New York contact having the other half to match up for confirmation of the driver’s identity. Rally, who has adopted a zero-tolerance policy on drugs since her run-ins with Goldie, challenges Bean—if she can prevent him from picking up his shipment, he will never run drugs again.

Bean agrees to Rally’s terms and initially, she attempts to steal his half of the bill by tailing him to his garage/apartment and sneaking in with Misty’s help, but the plan takes a turn when Bean departs unexpectedly and Rally is forced to stow away in his car.

GUNSMITH CATS PART 4

“MINNIE-MAY” | “INJECTION” | “BAD TRIP” | “PSYCHADELIC” | “ROY”
“HAMMER RELEASE” | “POISON OF THE SCORPION” | “LOST GAME” | “COOL DOWN”
Presented by Kenichi Sonoda
Translation: Dana Lewis & Toren Smith | Lettering and Retouch: Studio Cutie

The next segment of GUNSMITH CATS opens with a one-off chapter exploring the secret origin of Minne-May Hopkins as she flashes back to her earliest meeting with Ken while on the way to a date with him — and, almost impossibly, yet another layer of weirdness is added to their relationship when we find that May initially posed as a young boy when she first encountered Ken, and that he took her on as an apprentice without knowing her true gender. Then, after she finally revealed herself to him as a thirteen year-old girl, they started to knock boots.

So… ick.

Following this chapter, it’s a solid eight installments devoted to the war with Goldie. The drug queen lures Rally into a trap and has her injected with her organization’s new drug, Kerasine — a potent narcotic mixing the worst aspects of heroin, angel dust, and LSD, with the added bonus that anyone high on the stuff becomes susceptible to post-hypnotic suggestions. Goldie then captures Rally, along with Misty, who’d joined her on a stakeout, and proceeds to brainwash our heroine to serve her. To test the hold of her suggestion, Goldie dispatches Rally to assassinate Roy.