JENNA BLUE
Written by Jason M. Burns, Artwork by Steve Gendron & Ciaran Lucas
Published by Outlaw Entertainment

JENNA BLUE is the tale of an unusual assassin who finds more than she's looking for on her latest job. While on the surface this sounds like any other story about a hired gun in a heap of trouble, the slight twist here is the gun in question doesn't exactly blend in with the rest of society due to her bright blue skin.

Jenna Blue is an assassin for hire who is very good at what she does and has a knack for eliminating the competition as well as the intended target. She manages to do both within the first issue, keeping the pages action packed, but the target turns out to be an unexpected surprise to Jenna as he is revealed post-mortem to have the same color skin as she. Pretty soon Jenna Blue is immersed in a sea of conspiracies and other killers-for-hire who have been recruited to take her out by any means necessary, all for a reason she doesn't fully understand.

Jenna has a sharp sense of dark humor and a habit of insulting/threatening everyone she meets, which is highly enjoyable if not a bit cliche. She's pretty bad-ass and a killer completely without a conscience is always fun to read. The plot is not terribly complex and the big reveals aren't too hard to figure out, but the combination of a sassy (and pissed off) blue chick armed with many weapons plus plenty of action and an alien conspiracy make for an entertaining story.

At first glance the artwork was not exactly my favorite style, but the long faces on the characters rather grew on me and shortly into the first issue it really felt like the perfect look for Jenna and her supporting cast. The coloring (or lack thereof) is the best part about the book; the mainly grayish tones more than succeeded in its purpose of causing Jenna's red lips and blue skin (and the blood of her victims) practically pop off the page.

All in all JENNA BLUE is a slightly dark and easy read coupled with outstanding visuals, and a bargain at only eight bucks for over one hundred pages of story, making it worth checking out for the assassin junkie.

Avril Brown