Kimura (character)

Kimura is a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. She first appeared in New X-Men #31 as the main antagonist of Laura Kinney/X-23.

Publication history
The character was created by writers Craig Kyle and Christopher Yost as well as artist Mike Choi. Her first appearance was in New X-Men #31 (Dec. 2006). She was introduced as the villainous handler of X-23. The name Kimura (木村) is a common Japanese surname, and means "tree village".

Origin
Kimura was born to an abusive alcoholic father and a negligent mother. Her school life was similar, as she was abused and tormented by her peers. Through unspecified means and at some point in time, Kimura's grandmother was her caregiver. At once, her grandmother tried to heal the emotional damage inflicted upon Kimura through nurturing, love, and understanding. But by that point in time, the emotional scars were permanent and her grandmother's attempts to reach her were futile. After her grandmother's fatal heart attack, Kimura took off, eventually coming into contact with the Facility. She then underwent some unspecified procedures that granted her physical invulnerability, density control, and reconstruction. She then exacted revenge against those in her past who had wronged her. During her time at the Facility, Kimura eventually assumed the same abusive role as the people who victimized her in the past, particularly to Laura Kinney.

The Facility
As an agent of the Facility, Kimura became X-23's handler. She abused X-23, finding any excuse to bully, regardless of whether X-23 failed or not. After X-23 escaped the Facility, Kimura made it her duty to track down X-23, bring back to the Facility, and kill anyone X-23 had come in contact with.

She eventually tracks X-23 to San Francisco, where Laura lives with Aunt Debbie and cousin Megan. During a raid on Debbie's house, Kimura breaks X-23's neck. She then uses adamantium handcuffs to handcuff herself to Laura and her downstairs to Debbie and Megan, where she threatens and begins to put her finger through Megan's heart. Laura recovers from these injuries, cuts off her own hand, and handcuffs Kimura to a pipe. Laura tells Megan and Debbie to get her duffel bag and take what's absolutely needed and have 3 minutes to leave the house. Laura reattaches her own hand while Kimura says that everyone Laura loves will die and that she will be the one who kills them. Laura cuts open a gas pipe and turns on the light, causing an explosion.

Encounter with the New X-Men
Eventually tracking X-23 to the Xavier Institute for Higher Learning, Kimura proceeds to lure her target out in the open so that she can capture, but it turns out that Kimura is actually after Mercury whom she easily captures. She and X-23 fight but she injures Laura and gets away with Mercury.

When she arrives back at the Facility, she watches as they perform experiments on Mercury and eventually unleash their new creation Predator X upon the mutant Mammomax much to her pleasure. X-23 and Hellion set out to rescue Mercury and track Kimura to the Facility and confront her. Hellion manages to subdue her and Laura tells Hellion to kill her but refuses, using telekinesis to fire her into the air and miles away.

Kimura eventually makes her way back to the Xavier Institute for Higher Learning and makes another attempt to kill X-23. Emma Frost detects her and telepathically subdues her, revealing Kimura's history of child abuse and neglect at the hands of her parents and peers. Frost tells Kimura that she is nothing but a bully who harms others like Laura despite knowing how painful it is to make up for her own abusive childhood. Frost then mind-wipes her, making her forget about her grandmother—the only influential and positive person in her life—creating "a deep void that will cause [her] pain for a lifetime." Frost then implants telepathic instructions in Kimura's mind to make her hunt down the Facility's leaders, particularly Professor Harkins, who oversaw Mercury's experimentation. After going through 6 months of getting her brain rewired to stop Frost's psychic command, Kimura begins selling clones of Predator X for the Facility. She later encounters Wolverine and The Punisher during a transaction with Madame Hydra. The two manage to stop her, though she eventually escapes.

X-Force
Kimura returns after H.A.M.M.E.R. captures X-23 and brings back to the Facility. Her brutality only seems to have increased as she cuts off Laura's arm with a small chainsaw for "being a bad girl" but X-23 then uses the trigger scent to her advantage and escapes with Agent Alisande Morales's help. X-23 manages to escape, causing Kimura to be enraged. Kimura threatens to find Laura's aunt and cousin Megan to kill in retaliation.

All-New Wolverine
Kimura is seen in All-New Wolverine, being responsible for helping the four sisters (X-23's clones) escape Alchemax. She made a deal with Bellona (the white-haired X-23 clone) to exchange the nanites within Bellona's body, killing her, for her help escaping and destroying Alchemax's genetics division. She is killed by X-23 by being pinned down and drowned in water.

Characterization
Kimura's main characteristic is her sadism towards others. As a character she has been presented in the comics as the one character X-23 has never been able to truly defeat.

Powers and abilities
Kimura has indestructible skin, strong enough to withstand anything from grenade blasts to adamantium blades. She is also highly skilled in armed and unarmed combat. These abilities were given to her sometime after joining the Facility.

Reception
Kimura has been widely identified as Laura Kinney's archenemy. Several publications, such as Screen Rant, Comic Book Resources, GamesRadar+ and PopMatters, have compared Kimura to Sabretooth, the archnemesis of Wolverine. Not all reactions of Kimura as X-23's biggest foe has been well received, Eric Nierstedt of ComicsVerse felt that the retroactive addition of Kimura to X-23s history seemed "like a lame attempt to give Laura an archenemy", also expressing that the character was annoying and couldn't match the previous villain Zander Rice. Jessie Schedeen of IGN has stated that the rivalry between the two characters defined X-23 in her early days. Andy Kubai of Screen Rant has stated believing that the character would make an excellent adversary for X-23 in a film. Drew Kopp Comic Book Resources described Kimura as "a dark reflection of the person that Laura could have become if she allowed her desire for vengeance to consume her".