Bounty Hunting Is Both More and Less Fun Than You Think

Gonna be one of those kinds of weeks, huh?

Kim And Kim: This Glamorous High-Flying Rock Star Life is the first of currently three mini-series about a pair of space bounty hunters, Kim D. and Kim Q (that's her with the guitar). I've seen comparisons to Dirty Pair, in the amount of immense destruction and chaos they leave in their wake, but I tend to agree with the blurb on the back of the trade that mentions Cowboy Bebop. These two are always broke or nearly broke, and none of their plans and schemes ever seem to go how they hoped. They've each got pasts, both of which Magdalene Visaggio reveals pieces of as the story goes along, and while Kim Q. frequently irritates Kim D., they've got each other's backs.

That, and their spaceship is a beat up hunk of junk. It's basically a VW bus with wings.

The plot is them trying to make some money by going after an extremely high-profile bounty, and getting into all kinds of problems as a result. Unexpectedly, Visaggio kind of lets that thread go with an issue left, the Kims relating the story to a couple of friends and admitting they fell asleep, and everyone was gone when they woke up. So they just assume everything worked out. One of their friends, who works as an assassin, lampshades that being a mistake, but it doesn't seem to come to anything here. Actually, it's been a couple years since I read the third mini-series (Oh Shit, It's Kim and Kim!), but I can't remember there having been fallout from it yet.

I think the plot is mostly incidental, as a way to introduce parts of the Kims' backstories (Kim D. comes from a line of probate necromancers, Kim Q. is the estranged daughter of some asshole that runs a big merc crew), and highlight their characters. Kim D. is a little calmer, more practical, a bit more insecure. When she tries to use necromancy to track down a lead, she's constantly convinced she's gonna screw it up. Which she does, but that attitude can't help.

 

Kim Q. is the one who causes problems. Starts fights, spends all their money on booze, refuses to accept jobs from her father on principle, but encourages Kim to beg her mom to cover their rent. Honestly, she seems like a horrible friend, but I guess she's fun to be around, and she likes to hit things with a guitar. Can't find too many partners like that, I'm sure.

Cabrera's has a flexible, somewhat cartoonish style that fits with the high emotions and occasional weird crap the Kims encounter. Her linework is kept pretty simple. There's not a lot of needless little lines, which probably fits well with Claudia Aguirre's colors. They aren't blindingly bright, although it is a colorful book. Kim D.'s pink Kalashnikov is eye-catching, but not to the point it's distracting. The dark gloom and shadows are saved for when it actually fits the scene. But a lot of the colors are solid, not much in gradients, so lighter cross-hatching or whatever would probably get swamped anyway. 

Most of the characters' fashion senses could be easily described as "show off your abs". The men and women, Cabrera's equal opportunity on that score. It's a like a commercial for The Gap. But given it's a bunch of people living the "glamorous, rock star life", it and the colors, make perfect sense.

 

Plus, as a product of the mid-2000s comic blogowhatchamafloogle, I am obligated to be excited about any comic that has an evil scientist with a body made of famous monkeys, who makes robot gorilla henchmen.