Kick-Ass 2 Prelude: Hit Girl Review - Mark Millar And John Romita Jr
Hit Girl was easily the most popular, most talked about, character when Kick Ass came out and more so when the film adaptation was released, even though the series was supposed to be about Kick Ass. We all loved seeing this little girl subvert our expectations and become this foul-mouthed ninja assassin superhero butchering every bad guy in her way. So it made sense for Mark Millar and John Romita Jr. to acknowledge this popularity (theres even this panel where Kick Ass says but youre my sidekick! to which Hit Girl scoffs Please. They may as well call you Hit Girl) and give Hit Girl aka Mindy Macready her own series. And is it good? You bet your (kick) ass!
The publication of this book is odd - its set directly after the events of Kick Ass and before Kick Ass 2 but it came out nearly a year after Kick Ass 2 last summer. Here we catch up with Hit Girl after the first book, newly reunited with her long-lost mother, who has become a nervous and emotional wreck. Together with Marcus, her fathers former partner in the police and now-stepfather, their fledgling family start anew - except for Mindy, a normal life is out of the question. Revenge is on her mind and Hit Girl has got a sh*t list with all kinds of mobsters names on it - the same mobsters who killed her dad. And while shes dodging her parents attention to sneak out at night and be Hit Girl, even while shes training up the inept Kick Ass, shes embarking on an even more unusual mission than shes used to - learning to fit in at high school.
With Hit Girl as the focus we get to see the high school experience from her angle which is very different from Daves. There are mean girls galore who really live up to their name as Mindy tries to Clark Kent her way into the crowd. And she really tries by suppressing her remarkable abilities and pretend to give a damn about Selena Gomez and Twilight, even putting on all sorts of makeup despite being only 12. Not being a girl I cant comment on whether or not the mean girls in the book are a reflection of reality and thats how girls treated other girls they disliked or theyve gone through Millars brain and come out even crazier as a result but some of the scenes are damn harsh. Happily, Mindy realises the best way to be is to be yourself, which for her is to be Hit Girl. Delicious revenge ensues...
And the vengeance continues outside of the schoolground as well as she heads off alone (Kick Ass appearances in this book are brief - this is Hit Girls book after all!) to deal with the gangsters who killed her dad. These are scenes weve seen before where Hit Girl unloads and displays her mad skills but its still a guilty pleasure to watch the righteous carnage unfold on the page, and its as gruesome as readers of the other two Kick Ass books would expect. It does get really over the top at times - the insane level of violence, especially in issue #5, is what Millars known for so if youre a fan youll expect this but if youre new to Mark Millar, expect the pages to drip blood.
One of the complaints for readers of Kick Ass 2 was the jump Red Mist had made from that persona to his new one, the Motherf**ker. Well, we get to see just what happened to him in between through some really funny sequences. After a buffoonish failure of a first attempt at villainy, Red Mist decides to leave the country (at his uncles insistence). Here Millar decides to make fun of the kinds of hero sets off to the East to train and returns all-powerful scenarios weve seen in movies all these years by having Red MIst do things like find a blue flower in the Himalayas (a la Batman Begins) or do all kinds of physical exercises for monks (a la Kill Bill or any martial arts movie ever). The monks by the way are brilliant - they pretend to be mystical like Red Mist expects them to be, while milking him for all the cash they can get. Theyre not looking for enlightenment, theyre looking for a better car!
But while these scenes are great, is it essential to read this before picking up Kick Ass 2? No, not really. Aside from some stuff with Mindys parents and Red Mists transformation (which only really takes place over a couple of pages at the end of this book), all of which couldve been explained in a few pages at the start of Kick Ass 2, you can go straight from Kick Ass to its sequel without missing much. That said, if youre a fan of this series you would be a fool to miss this. Its too enjoyable a book to overlook. Hit Girl doing what she does - is there anything more entertaining? And the action in this book is fantastic - if youre wondering what the movie will be like this summer, pick up this book for a preview. This book and Kick Ass 2 combined make the movie sequel so expect a helluva lot more from Hit Girl in the upcoming movie. And a lot of graphic, gory violence.
If youre looking for an exciting, funny, and extremely violent comic book from two masters of their crafts, Hit Girl should be top of your list. Its a really fun read with so many great moments featuring one of the best characters in comics ever created. Whatre you waiting for? Game on, c**ksuckers!
Hit Girl by Mark Millar and John Romita Jr. is out now in hardback