Five Fingers of Death

Back to work this week- a few ideas for post arising but probably likely to appear on a weekly basis until the Tattie Holidays...

It's nearly forty-one years since Iron Fist, the Living Weapon made his debut in the UK Avengers weekly.
Roy Thomas and Gil Kane presented the grim and brutal origins of Danny Rand in a story that drew upon Lost Horizon. Thomas also dedicated the first story to his friend Bill Everett, who created Amazing-Man in 1939. This mist-shrouded superman from Tibet was also the inspiration for Peter Cannon, Thunderbolt (and of course, Thomas created Will Everett aka Amazing Man- another green and yellow clad hero- at DC in the early 80s.)

 The second person monologue and super-hero trappings differentiated the IF strip from Master of Kung Fu but subsequent stories were written by Doug Moench, who later steered Shang-Chi into cinematic pastiche and parody, to critical acclaim.
More famously perhaps, the Claremont/Byrne team in the mid-70s, just prior to their X-Men collaboration, transplanted Danny Rand into Chris's familiar fictional world, with its blend of sci-fi, disaster movies and warrior women.

 When I was a kid, I wanted to see Colleen Wing, in that blue dress above, in the Avengers. Take that, Bendis. My own early-80s character, Kickback, was based on Ms. Wing's orange gi, above.

Iron Fist has been a member of the Avengers while I've been living and working up here- who hasn't?- but wasn't always able to sustain a monthly title for very long.
The work of creators Matt Fraction, Ed Brubaker and David Aja on the incredibly stylish cinematic and drily humorous Hawkeye series led me to this collection, earlier in the summer.

"The Last Iron Fist" Story sees the return of the malignant Steel Serpent while HYDRA mounts an assualt on K'un-Lun. Then, "The 7 Capital Cities of Heaven" depicts a martial arts tournament between the champions of the mystical cities and a revolution in K'un-Lun. We learn that the Iron Fist persona has served a number of heroes in the Far East over the centuries.

The most mysterious of the Immortal Weapons of the celestial cities is the Prince of Orphans, John Aman aka Amazing-Man, pictured here in his early- 90s revival at Malibu Comics:

Danny's immediate predecessor, the adventurer and rogue Orson Randall stars in his own pulp quest for justice "The Green Mist of Death" in this volume in which he clashes with Aman. There's also a cameo by Marvel's own Monster of Frankenstein.

The book ends on a brilliant cliff-hanger - on his birthday, Danny discovers that all the Iron Fist champions die at thirty-three...



Iron Fist is coming to Netflix some time after 2016. The question of how to make the series different from Arrow niggles at me. Arrow has already cornered the market in mystical warriors from  lost cities ( greetings from sunny Nanda Parbat!) But if  you like the revived pulp heroes of the 70s such as Doc Savage or the kung fu characters of the 70s, including Nightwing Restorations and the later Heroes for Hire, this is a smart, interesting read. A slightly comical Bronze Age hero becomes cool enough to be a potential tv hit. If only it could happen to the Legion's Karate Kid.

Coming soon: the Fox, the Bat and the Hornet.
Check out my Materioptikon Wordpress blog shortly for a post on Bat Lash and The Wild, Wild West.

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