Rorschach #3 by Tom King and Jorge Fornés reveals the dark origin of the antihero’s sidekick in his Watchmen sequel series, the Kid.
WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Rorschach #3 by Tom King, Jorge Fornés, and Dave Stewart, on sale now.
In Rorschach #1, the Black Label series introduced a new character to the Watchmen mythos: Laura Cummings, aka The Kid. Laura appeared to be the sidekick of the mysterious new Rorschach, and she helped him attempt to assassinate presidential candidate Turley. Unfortunately, like Rorschach, Laura was also killed during their attack, and it’s now up to the investigator to figure out who both of these masked people were, and why they tried to kill Turley.
Now, in the latest issue of the series, the investigator dives deeper into this mystery after he finds Laura Cummings’ journal. As he sits in a diner, he goes through the book, and he learns all about the new character. Here, Laura’s origin is revealed, and it proves to be an incredibly dark story that comes as a direct result of the events of the original Watchmen by Alan Moore, Dave Gibbons, and John Higgins.
The events of Rorschach are set in the present day, and take place 35 years after Watchmen. Laura is a young woman, which means she grew up in a world that believed it had been attacked by a giant alien squid that killed thousands of people in 1985. Of course, we the readers know that the alien squid and its psychic attack was manufactured by Adrian Veidt, aka Ozymandias, but the public doesn’t know that. As far as everyone is concerned, the alien squids do exist, and their attack on the world has shaped life moving forward.
The origin of Laura Cummings is a result of this belief in the extraterrestrial. Her father was a veteran who believed, beyond a doubt, that the aliens were real and that it was only a matter of time before they came back to attack again. For that reason, he started training his daughter, teaching her to shoot with all kinds of weapons at a very young age. Then, he set up a small militia, where he trained others who thought as he did — that the squids would attack again. Laura’s father taught his followers how to fight, how to kill, and how to build bombs, and he fed their anti-alien beliefs like a drill sergeant. And Laura, well she was not only a member of this militia — she was its best trainee, even though she was just a kid.