Gunsmith Cats (ガンスミス キャッツ, Gansumisu Kyattsu?) is a series of manga and anime work by Kenichi Sonoda.
PLOT :
Taking place in a four year period, the story centers on two young women, 19-year old Irene "Rally" Vincent and her partner, 17-year old "Minnie" May Hopkins.
Rally and May operate the titular "Gunsmith Cats" gunshop in Chicago, Illinois. Rally also works as a bounty hunter, assisted by May, which is the impetus behind many of the stories. Rally characterizes bounty hunting as her "hobby" though it is in fact her main source of income.
Rally is an expert combat shooter and markswoman with just about every firearm in existence, as well as an expert driver. May is an explosives expert, knowing the inner workings of and many uses of all manner of explosive devices.
MAIN CHARACTERS :
Irene "Rally" Vincent
A gunshop owner by trade, Rally dabbles in bounty hunting to pay the bills. Her father was an Olympic-level marksman who taught Rally about firearms while running a gun store called Gunsmith Cat in Chicago. Her mother, who had wanted Rally to be a violinist, opposed everything to do with guns and eventually was murdered at the store by robbers when trying to file divorce papers on her husband. After her father disappeared to search for her mother's murderers, Rally took over the store as her own venture, and recruited Minnie May as an assistant. Upon making May a partner, the shop became known as "Gunsmith Cats".
A bit reserved when it comes to men, Rally feels most comfortable when discussing firearms. While all her IDs state that she is 21 (the age necessary to sell firearms) her actual age is 19. Her weapon of choice is a first version CZ-75. Rally drives a blue 1967 model Shelby Mustang Cobra GT500 with white racing stripes, which she cherishes until its destruction in Gunsmith Cats Burst, when it is replaced by a heavily-modified Mustang II Cobra. When quarreling with Rally, Minnie May implied that guns and cars were sex substitutes for the virginal Rally; there is arguably an erotic undertone to her fondness for guns and cars.
Rally's father is Indian and her mother was English. As a result, she has dark blue eyes, dusky skin, and dark hair. She is highly skilled in hand-to-hand combat, with great speed and physical agility, and is an expert but reckless driver. Although she does not always respect the letter of the law, she has a strong moral sense of right and wrong and is reluctant to kill unless absolutely necessary. An excellent marksman, she often targets her opponents' trigger fingers or crucial components of their guns in combat rather than going for a lethal shot. As a result, she has sometimes been hunted by criminals angry at their mutilation at her hands.
Rally also usually carries a .25 Duo (made by the same company as the CZ-75) with the trigger guard removed, mounted on a spring-loaded frame strapped to her arm for quick access in a tight spot. When her CZ-75 has been unavailable, she relies on a SIG P210, another very high quality weapon, and sometimes carries a back-up gun in an ankle holster. She keeps a precision rifle and shotgun in the trunk of her Shelby; these have included a Walther WA2000 and a SIG 550 Sniper variant. Her first gun, given to her by her father, was a AR-7, a small .22LR rifle that can be disassembled and the components stored inside the buttstock; she uses this from time to time. Other guns Rally owns and cherishes are a 1960 Colt .25 pocket model, a Beretta 84F, a Walther P38, a Parabellum P'08 (Luger), a Colt Lawman Mk.3 and a Browning Hi-Power. She has occasionally used other weapons, including a Glock 19 and an RG14 "Saturday night special" revolver when she was completely devoid of other weapons, and she is an expert shot with any firearm she has been shown using.
It is not clear from the Japanese whether Rally's name is intended to be "Irene" or "Eileen" but the official English translation uses Irene. In several European editions of the manga, most notably in the Italian one, it is "Aileen". Since L's and R's are mostly interchangeable in Japanese to English translations, the main character's name is often translated as Rally Vincent, and this has become the standard. However, at the 1993 Anime America convention Kenichi Sonoda, when asked a question about the character, started his answer with "It's Larry, not Rally." This is further backed up in the manga where in one scene she is receiving a fax from Becky (about Riff-Raff), and the note scrawled on it addresses her as Larry.
"Minnie" May Hopkins
A self-styled "bomb specialist", May learned the trade from her boyfriend, Ken Takizawa. While only 17 (in the original English release, her age was raised to 18 since she is depicted performing explicit sexual acts; it was changed back in the Dark Horse revised edition), she is considerably more knowledgeable and mature than the average 17-year old girl. She ran away from home at 13 for undisclosed reasons and was found and cared for by Ken.
When Ken had to go underground for several years, she worked as a prostitute at a brothel in Chinatown - even advancing into teaching other newcomers - before leaving and joining up with Rally to run the gun shop. Her time in the brothel is still a very touchy subject for her, though, and she prefers not to bring it up again, though she is quite proud of the skills she acquired there.
When action is called for, May carries a wide range of explosive weapons with her. She typically uses a self-modified grenade called a "May Special," a grenade with no materials to cause shrapnel. Perhaps even more impressive is her talent for disguises and acting; she has fooled Ken into thinking she was a boy for several months, blushed and wept on command, imitated the police chief's voice on the phone so well she fools one of his officers, and impersonated a child star well enough to fool an entire film crew.
May is tiny and young-appearing for her age, having taken growth-stunting herbal drugs in an effort to stay attractive to Ken (this plot element was modified in the first English translation to a condition that she is taking drugs in an attempt to correct). She can pass for a child of ten or twelve and often takes advantage of this. She is very cute - "like Minnie Mouse", hence her nickname - with blonde hair and blue-green eyes.
She is generally cheerful and possesses a great "joie de vivre". She does have a temper though, particularly if someone comes down hard on her lover and mentor Ken Takizawa, or if it is suggested that she may not be mature enough to handle a particular assignment.
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