Free Comic Book Day Street Fighter 6 # 0

 By Mark Rodriguez

Drew and I checked out Bent Wookie this year and picked up some books for Free Comic Book Day. This time, the book I was mostly after was the one related to Street Fighter 6. Let's check it out.

Juri VS Kimberly starts with Juri picking a fight with Kimberly in the back alleys of Metro City. Kimberly kicks Juri in the face and backflips away. She says she shouldn't pick on an artist because she'll be taken down in style. She asks if she can get back to her paintings. Juri says she should stop painting for a while and do everyone's eyes a favor. Juri leaps in with a kick that Kimberly manages to block.

Kimberly says she'll show off her cooking skills and tosses an exploding spray paint can at her. Juri dodges it and kicks her in the face saying it's too bland and she prefers spicier meals. Juri lands a series of kicks on Kimberly and sends her flying back. Juri says she has had enough of her shenanigans and Kimberly says she was the one that attacked her. 

Juri says she was doing a public service. She's usually not a good-samaritan but someone had to stand up against her vandalism. The ninja girl says she got permission from the bodega to paint there. Juri says she's mad about the message. 

Kimberly has been painting an image of herself with the words 'Bushinryu Rules!' but most of the letter in Bushinryu were washed out, only leaving SIN. Juri takes this to mean 'S.I.N Rules!' and says she used to work for them and they're evil losers. 

Kimberly explains that she made the painting last week but the wall was too grimy and some of it washed off. She came back with a degreaser to fix it back up. Juri recognizes the Bushinryu as being the 'little ninja club' that Guy and Zeku are in. She says they're not evil, just lame. This gets Kimberly angry and it's time for round two. Juri tells her to bring it on.

Street Detective opens with Luke training with his military unit until he's called by a policeman. The policeman introduces himself as Detective Sartori and he tells Luke he'll help investigate a theft. Luke asks if that something for the police to handle, since they were hired to maintain safety in the city and not investigate minor crimes. Sartori mentioned the Broken Window Theory where if they let petty crimes go, it leads to worse things. He says Luke can't maintain the peace if he doesn't know what going on. He also already spoken to Luke's boss and reminds him that they have to maintain a good relationship with the local police. Luke heads off angrily. 

Luke and Sartori hit the streets of Naishall a small newly-formed country in the mountains of Asia. Satori shows him a photo and tells him what they're looking for. It's a stone that part of a larger sculpture, and the full piece would be worth a lot. Sartori explains the fragment was found in a suitcase on the way out of the country, and it was most likely a sample to tempt a buyer for the full piece. 

Luke and Sartori enters a small shop. The police detective questions the shopkeeper about the photo while Luke looks around the shop. A man steps out from behind a curtain, not expecting company and makes a break for it. Sartori tells Luke to go after him. 

Luke chases the man through the busy streets and go through an alleyway. The man uses parkour to leap over a wall but Luke is able to do the same. The man climbs over a case and kicks a trash can behind him, getting out of Luke's grasp. Sartori catches up and insults Luke over letting the guy get away. Luke says it can't be helped, even for locals the slums are a maze. 

Sartori tells Luke that the art dealer confessed, the full sculpture is supposedly buried somewhere. The fragment was brought in for appraisal by some anti-government protesters. Luke decides to asks some of the local kids if they know anyone that's selling sculptures. A girl says she knows something and offers to lead the way. 

The girl leads them to a shop that sells pottery and similar things. Luke says this was just a junk shop so it was a swing and a miss. Sartori notes the fancy wristwatch the junk dealer was wearing, something he would never be able to afford. They decide to stake the place out. 

Later that night, Sartori looks at a pic of himself with his kid as Luke returns. A truck shows up and the police detective recognizes the logo. It's a contract company for the construction of an arena. The junk dealer climbs into the back of the truck and the driver happens to be the same guy that got away from Luke earlier. Luke and Sartori decide to head for the arena. 

The arena is built as a symbol of the founding of the country and built upon the ruins where they worshipped their fighting god. The police detective says they can't act until they confirm the structure is in there, but if they wait too long they might damage it as they dig it up. Luke and Sartori pull out their guns and sneak inside. A large man suddenly grabs Sartori and holds his own gun to his head. Luke asks if he's one of the rebels. The man says their cause is righteous and Naishall must be protected.

Luke mentions how they're selling off their own culture. The man says they sell the artifacts before other than steal them so they can fund the protection of the people of Naishall. He says their fighting god Svalhar would be pleased. The man tells Luke to drop the gun. Luke does so and he takes the split second that the man takes to watch the gun fall to hit him in the face and set the cop free. 

The floor collapses out from under Luke and Sartori and they fall. Luckily for them, the fall wasn't too high so they're alright. Luke notices the photo of Sartori and his kid and hands it back to him. They can't climb their way out so Luke shines his flashlight down a tunnel and hope it leads somewhere. 

Luke asks if his son wants to be a police man like him, and Sartori says yes. Luke also takes after his old man, who was a military man. When Luke was a kid, there was a terrorist attack and his father died trying to save everyone. When he grew up, he joined the army. He pushed through his training and became a soldier but he couldn't kill people. He decided to leave the military in the end. He says if his dad was still alive, he might have kicked him in the rear for throwing in the towel. 

As they make their way through the end of the tunnel they find the complete statue of the water goddess Varmina. Sartori says the place was a waterway and they must have shut off the water to allow construction, which allowed them to find the sculpture. Luke comments that he's quite the expert on this and the police detective explains it's secondhand knowledge that his son told him as he was interested in history and wanted go to university. He says he would have been overjoyed to see something like this. Luke notes that he said 'would have' and Sartori says his son is gone and if he was still alive, he would have been around Luke's age. 

Water starts pouring out from the pipes overhead and Sartori figures they must have opened the waterway to get rid of them. As the area floods, Sartori says he can't swim and tells Luke to go save himself. Sartori says his father would be happy to see Luke seeking his own way and to continue to move forward. Luke grabs onto Sartori.

Later on Sartori wakes up, back on land. Luke apologizes but he had to knock him since he couldn't carry him and swim while he was still struggling. The area will take a while to drain and Sartori can call back up to show up before the thieves can get to the sculpture. 

After the incident, the looting and smuggling for cultured artifacts slowed down. The water goddess relief was designated a protected site by the Naishall Government. The police continued to investigate but they were able to ever catch any of the rebels.

My Opinions- 

So this is s strange one. Most of the comic is about Luke and this story. I wouldn't say the story was bad per say, but there wasn't much in it that was 'Street Fighter'. It was just this street style detective type story that could have happened without Luke. I was expecting some Shadaloo person or even someone working for JP to be the villains, or maybe have their fighting god turn out to be Necalli, or well... anything related to the games. The only thing we got was Luke's backstory, which was already explained in the story mode of Street Fighter 5. Even then, this is the type of the story that technically could have worked without Luke...

The Juri VS Kimberly was short and sweet and pretty much shows off Juri's new SF6 look and brings in the spray-painting 80's-lovin Bushinryu ninja girl, Kimberly. We also see a bit of Juri's new personality where she basically just wanders around doing what she wants. She might not be a good guy necessarily, she's pretty much on her own side.

Not really sure what to say about this comic to be honest. I saw the first few pages of the Luke story as part of the preview and was confused, but was willing to give it the benefit of the doubt, but it barely felt Street Fighter-ish. Maybe they should have added the Juri/Kimberly story at the end to make up for this somewhat average Luke story. 

I'm wondering if this story was in the works more during Luke's reveal in Street Fighter 5, since he wasn't out yet during last year's Free Comic Book Day. Maybe it should have had been a story about how Luke decided to become the martial arts trainer in Metro City like he appears in Street Fighter 6.

Udon is working on a 4-part prequel story that deals into what's going on with Ken before we start the game. That one does look a lot more interesting.