Posted in: Comics, Recent Updates | Tagged: Comics, entertainment, eric canete, image comics, Jon Tsuei, RunLoveKill

Why Can't A Girl Be As Tough As Clint Eastwood? Reading Runlovekill #1

I rarely get the satisfaction of meeting a truly bitter, totally hard-ass hero in a comic. I can hear the audible protests to that in the ether, even as I type it. Sure, comics love to aspire to this type of character and go to great lengths to provide us with the loveable gangster, the youthful apocalypse survivor wise beyond their years, the aged cop ready to take down some killers. But what I'm talking about takes so much character development that it seems like comics rarely aspire to go so far. Films occasionally do and do so well, but the biggest danger is that the focus on action in a big budget film can take away from the characterization. That seems to be why older films with smaller budgets have done this so well, like the classic Clint Eastwood starring roles in The Man with No Name and The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. There's something so rock-solid about the grim depths of his immovable personality there that it delights you, but if you look at it hard enough it might scare you too.

And Runlovekill is a particular promised land of a comic because not only do we get one of those anti-heroes in type, but she's female. This is a rarity beyond measure. In fact, I'm not sure I've encountered a female hero of this type with so much potential before in comics. A satisfying example from another genre is The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo in the original prose form, and perhaps in the TV mini-series.  Now, we're only in the first issue this week so we'll have to see how things go, but Issue #1 makes for an excellent set-up in character. We hear central character Rain's thoughts in her native and oppressed city, we see something of the life she's leading, and we see glimpses of what seems to be her past escaping from a prison with such intense action scenes that the "Run" of the comic's title proves to be entirely justified in the first issue alone.

The artwork on this comic is profoundly interesting and detailed–we experience huge sweeps and vistas as well as excruciatingly close-up examinations of particular points in space and time. Artist Eric Canete appears to be flexing his muscles in a display of his entire range in such a honed way that he's made the comic a stand out among new releases with the first issue alone. Colors and design by Leonardo Olea are also worthy of note: the colors are a hint of noir with popping elements like red, purple, and gold that work very well in keeping things lively. If this were entirely a "shadowy" styled book, as it easily could have been, it might have been a little too heavy on the Blade Runner associations, but as it is, the visual tone and feel of the book remain distinctive.

To get back to Rain, who has been "on the run" in the past, and appears to be walking into an even bigger situation than she's ever faced before, she is a genuinely intriguing character who easily carries this comic forward. To achieve that in a single introductory issue is a rare thing as well, so congratulations should go to co-writers Jon Tsuei and Eric Canete.

To point out a few reasons why Rain sets up the story so well in the first issue: we learn elements about her past and life, but not in heavy, strict chronological order or great detail. This keeps the reader active, piecing together their knowledge of her. Secondly, she moves in a visually riveting way like an acrobat in her "running" approach to life, making "watching" her an entertaining thing. Lastly, she's brutally honest in her own thoughts about her lack of feeling and the necessity driving her, and we get to hear those thoughts in a privileged way. We, as readers, are not encouraged to find her cute or appealing as an underdog in a sympathetic way. Instead, we are given what we need to believe in her reality without undue attempts to win our affections. Those traits are the compelling start to a strong story following Rain, and there's plenty of mystery still to decipher in upcoming issues of Runlovekill.

Hannah Means-Shannon is EIC at Bleeding Cool and @hannahmenzies on Twitter

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