Retro Trade Review: Iron Fist Epic Collection: The Fury Of Iron Fist By Claremont, Byrne & Others For Marvel Comics!

Contains Marvel Premiere #15-25, Iron Fist #1-15, and Marvel Team-Up #63-64 (May 1974 – December 1977)

Written by Roy Thomas (Marvel Premiere #15), Len Wein (MP #16), Doug Moench (MP #17-19), Tony Isabella (MP #20-22), Chris Claremont (MP #23-25, Iron Fist #1-15, Marvel Team-Up #63-64)

Co-plotted by Roy Thomas (Marvel Premiere #16)

Pencilled by Gil Kane (Marvel Premiere #15), Larry Hama (MP #16-19), Arvell Jones (MP #20-22), Pat Broderick (MP #23-24), John Byrne (MP #25, Iron Fist #1-15, Marvel Team-Up #63-64)

Inked by Dick Giordano (Marvel Premiere #15-19), Dan Green (MP #20, Iron Fist #14-15), Vince Colletta (MP #21, 24), Aubrey Bradford (MP #22), Bob McLeod (MP #23), Al McWilliams (MP #25, IF #1), Frank Chiarmonte (IF #2-7, 9), Dan Adkins (IF #8, 10-13), Dave Hunt (Marvel Team-Up #63-64)

Coloured by Glynis Wein (Marvel Premiere #15-16), Petra Goldberg (MP #17-18), Jan Brunner (MP #19), John Drake (MP #20), Stan Goldberg (MP #21), George Roussos (MP #22), Michele Wolfman (MP #23, 25, Iron Fist #2), Phil Rachelson (MP #24, IF #5-6), Janice Cohen (IF #1, 4, 14), Don Warfield (IF #3, 11-12), Bonnie Wilford (IF #7-10), Marie Severin (IF #13), Bruce Patterson (IF #15), Dave Hunt (Marvel Team-Up #63-64)

Spoilers from forty-six to forty-nine years ago

When I started writing these columns, I was driven by a sense of nostalgia for the comics that I read and loved as a kid, a teen, and a young adult, and wanted to revisit and reexamine them from a grown up and contemporary perspective. As I kept reading, I felt an urge to complete runs that I’d never gotten around to completing. That led to me wanting to read series I’d always meant to get around to, and that has led me to some other, stranger, discoveries.

When I was young, I always thought that Power Man and Iron Fist were cool, but didn’t read their series. I had no clue about blaxploitation cinema, or kung fu films, with the exception of the Karate Kid movies. It was only as I grew into adulthood that I realized what I’d been missing out on, and became curious. Somewhere along the way, I discovered that Iron Fist’s adventures were told by Chris Claremont and John Byrne, two of the biggest names of my childhood reading and development as a comics fan. How did I not know about this?

I’m still stunned that this is not more widely discussed. I looked into getting the issues, but I don’t want to spend that kind of money, so I figured that for the first time, I’d preorder and pay retail (well, discounted retail, thanks to my pull-file) for one of Marvel’s Epic trades. This handsome book contains all of Iron Fist’s appearances from his first in Marvel Premiere #15, through his own series, to a final two-parter in Marvel Team-Up. After this, Danny Rand moved into Luke Cage’s book, which then changed its name to Power Man and Iron Fist.

Most of what I know about Danny came from the excellent Ed Brubaker, Matt Fraction, and David Aja series, and that is the other thing that spurred me to learn more about him. I recognize that there’s something awkward about a rich white man becoming the martial arts champion of a hidden Asian village, and am curious to see how that was handled in the 70s (I’m guessing not well).

I’m going into this pretty blind, so I’m looking forward to seeing how this character was presented from the beginning. Join me.

This book features the following characters:

Villains:

Harold Meachum (Marvel Premiere #15, 17-18)
Shu-Hu, The One (Marvel Premiere #15)
Scythe (Marvel Premiere #16)
Ninja (Marvel Premiere #17-22)
Triple-Iron (Marvel Premiere #17-18)
Joy Meachum (Marvel Premiere #18-21, Iron Fist #4, 8-9)
Ward Meachum (Marvel Premiere #19-21, Iron Fist #4, 8-9, 13)
Cult of Kara-Kai (Marvel Premiere #19-22)
Batroc (Marvel Premiere #20-21)
Shaya (Cult of Kara-Kai; Marvel Premiere #21-22)
Ushas (Cult of Kara-Kai; Marvel Premiere #21-22)
Master Khan (Marvel Premiere #22, 24, Iron Fist #2, 5-7)
The Warhawk (Marvel Premiere #23)
Major Gamal Hassan (Marvel Premiere #24, Iron Fist #1-2)
Beyd (Marvel Premiere #24, Iron Fist #1)
Ballox (Monstroid; Marvel Premiere #24)
Khumbala Bey (Marvel Premiere #25, Iron Fist #7)
Angar the Screamer (Marvel Premiere #25, Iron Fist #1, 5-7)
The Steel Serpent (Davos; Iron Fist #1, 4, 8-9, 13-15, Marvel Team-Up #63-64)
Tucos (Iron Fist #2)
Merrin (Iron Fist #2)
Kemal (Iron Fist #2)
Sssesthugar (H’ylthri; Iron Fist #2)
The Ravager/Radion (Henri Sorel; Iron Fist #3-4)
Walker’s Mob (Iron Fist #5)
Rakim (Iron Fist #5)
Scimitar (Iron Fist #5)
The Golden Tigers (#8-10)
Chen-Wu (Golden Tigers; #8-9)
Cynthia Wu (Golden Tigers Female Auxiliary; #8)
Chaka (Robert Hao, Golden Tigers; #8-10)
Teng (Golden Tigers; #8)
Kwai Chang (Golden Tigers; #8)
The Wrecker (The Wrecking Crew; Iron Fist #11-12)
Thunderball (The Wrecking Crew; Iron Fist #11-12)
Bulldozer (The Wrecking Crew; Iron Fist #11-12)
Piledriver (The Wrecking Crew; Iron Fist #11-12)
Boomerang (Iron Fist #13)
Sabretooth (Iron Fist #14)
John Bushmaster (Iron Fist #15, Marvel Team-Up #63

Guest Stars

Chris Claremont (Marvel Premiere #24, Iron Fist #15)
Iron Man (Tony Stark; Iron Fist #1)
John Byrne (Iron Fist #8, 15)
Daredevil (Matt Murdock; Iron Fist #11)
Heather Glenn (Matt Murdock’s girlfriend; Iron Fist #11)
Phoenix (Jean Grey, X-Men; Iron Fist #11, 15)
Cyclops (Scott Summers, X-Men; Iron Fist #11, 15)
Captain America (Steve Rogers, Avengers; Iron Fist #12)
Edwin Jarvis (Avengers; Iron Fist #12)
Wolverine (Logan, X-Men; Iron Fist #15)
Nightcrawler (Kurt Wagner, X-Men; Iron Fist #15)
Colossus (Piotr Rasputin, X-Men; Iron Fist #15)
Storm (Ororo Munroe, X-Men; Iron Fist #15)
Moira MacTaggert (Iron Fist #15)
Banshee (Sean Cassidy, X-Men; Iron Fist #15)
Charles Xavier (X-Men; Iron Fist #15)
Lilandra (Shi’ar Majestrix, Iron Fist #15)
Spider-Man (Peter Parker; Marvel Team-Up #63-64)

Supporting Characters:

Yu-Ti (Marvel Premiere #15-22, Iron Fist #6-7, Marvel Team-Up #64)
Lung-Wang (Dragon-Kings; Marvel Premiere #15-17)
Wendell Rand (Marvel Premiere #15, 17-18)
Heather Rand (Marvel Premiere #15, 17-18)
Lei Kung, the Thunderer (Marvel Premiere #16-18, 22-23, Iron Fist #6, Marvel Team-Up #64)
Shou-Lao, the Undying (Marvel Premiere #16, Marvel Team-Up #64)
Colleen Wing (Marvel Premiere #19-25, Iron Fist #1-2, 5-8, 10-11, 14, Marvel Team-Up #64)
Professor Lee Wing (Marvel Premiere #19-23, 25, Iron Fist #2)
Misty Knight (Marvel Premiere #21, Iron Fist #1-13, 15, Marvel Team-Up #63-64)
Lieutenant Rafael Scarfe (NYPD; Marvel Premiere #23-25, Iron Fist #1-2, 8, 10, 15)
Princess Azir (Marvel Premiere #24-25)
Miranda Ran’d’Kai (Iron Fist #2)
Conal D’Hu-Tsien (Iron Fist #2)
Alan Cavenaugh (Iron Fist #5-6, 9, 11, 13, 15)
Jeryn Hogarth (Iron Fist #6-9, 14)
Bill Hao (Iron Fist #8-10, 15)
Blake Towers (D.A.; Iron Fist #15)

Let’s see what happened in the comics, with some commentary as I go:

This book starts with Marvel Premiere #15, Iron Fist’s first appearance. Our hero stands ready to fight four men in karate gis, watched by Yu-Ti and the four Lung-Wang, the Dragon-Kings, who all wear masks. We learn that Yu-Ti is the August Personage in Jade, whatever that means, and that Iron Fist is fighting a challenge called the Challenge of Many. After a few pages of fighting, he’s defeated them and turns to Yu-Ti, telling him he’s ready for the Challenge of the One. Yu-Ti wants him to contemplate his life before the next challenge, and this provides a good place for a flashback. He thinks back to ten years before, when he was nine years before and was trekking in the mountains with his parents – Wendell and Heather Rand, and his father’s business partner Harold Meachum. We learn that Iron Fists name is Danny, and that his father was searching for a mystical city on K’un-Lun Mountain. As they continued their journey, Danny slipped on the ice and pulled his mother with him down a ledge. Wendel also fell, but managed to grip the side of the ledge he was on. Harold, instead of throwing down a rope, took this opportunity to do what he’d planned all along. He stomped on Wendell’s hand and left him to fall down the mountain to his death. Heather threw rocks at Meachum, who declared his love for Heather and offered to help her. Heather rejected him, so Meachum turned and walked away, leaving them to their fates. Heather and Danny prepared to climb. Danny is ready for the Challenge of the One. A door opens and a large man called Shu-Hu enters the room and attacks Danny. Shu-Hu is a difficult opponent, and has Danny on the ropes. The Dragon-Kings speculate that Danny is too weak for this trial, and suggest he should have been left to die in the mountains. Danny keeps getting knocked around, and starts to think more about what happened with his mother. They made their way off the ledge, and started to travel, lost, through the mountains. They caught the attention of a pack of wolves, who started to follow them. Heather and Danny found a wooden bridge, and she immediately knew it meant her husband was right. That’s when the wolves started to chase them. Heather and Danny ran onto the bridge, but Heather realized they wouldn’t make it across in time. She turned back to fight the wolves, leaving Danny to go on his own. Danny turned back to help his mother, but some men grabbed him and fired crossbows at the wolves. It was too late to save Heather, but Danny was welcomed to K’un-Lun. Danny draws strength from this memory and turns on Shu-Hu, who fires a knife out of his hand that catches Danny in the shoulder. He pulls it out and hears his mother’s voice. He fires a series of kicks and punches into Shu-Hu’s head and then gathers all of his energy into his right fist, making it a ‘thing of iron’. He punches Shu-Hu hard enough to knock his head off, revealing that he was a robot all along. Danny turns to Yu-Ti and the others, claiming what is his. Yu-Ti tells him he has the right to choose between eternal life and death.

Iron Fist’s second story has a different creative team. Thomas co-plotted, but Len Wein got the writer credit, and Larry Hama, who would go on to be a legendary writer, drew the issue (and it looked great). Iron Fist is in New York, and as he walks through the city in his regular Iron Fist outfit, he draws some stares. He hears a strange noise that draws him down an alleyway, where he finds four men waiting for him. They have a poster that says there is a $10 000 price on his head, and they attack him with knives and pipes. Danny fights well, but one gets a lucky blow in on his head. This has him remembering his first day in K’un-Lun, when he was first brought before Yu-Ti. The August Personage of Jade (not in) offered him anything he wanted, and he claimed he wanted revenge. He was introduced to Lei Kung, the Thunderer, who would train him. Lei Kung showed him the crown of Fu-Hsi, a viper that wore a crown and hung out wrapped around a wooden pole. Danny present hears training with Lei Kung, until he was able to grab the crown off the snake’s head. After perfecting the training, Danny felt it wasn’t enough. Danny fights off the four men, who run from him. He stands and thinks some more about his training, and how he hardened his hands. Yu-Ti suggested that Danny challenge Shou-Lao, the undying dragon. He fought the dragon, and his instinct told him to wrap himself around the scar from which the dragon’s heart had been taken. This branded Danny with the dragon symbol on his chest, but it weakened the dragon so it passed out. Danny entered the dragon’s cave, and found its heart on an altar of sorts. He put his hands into its “glowing molten essence” again and again until his hands started to shine. Danny realizes someone is approaching him in the alleyway. The man carries a kusari-gama, and introduces himself as Scythe. They begin to fight, with Scythe throwing the heavy ball attached to a chain that makes up half of his weapon. He manages to wrap the chain around Danny’s neck, and as he chokes, he remembers his Challenge of the Many, and his Challenge of the One, and how those challenges earned him a choice between eternal life and death. Yu-Ti took him to a tree in K’un-Lun, and reminded him that the mystical city only appears in the regular world one day every ten years. Danny had the choice to eat the fruit of the Tree of Immortality, or to leave. He wanted to stay, but he still wanted vengeance for his family. Weirdly, Yu-Ti revealed that Wendell Rand was his brother, and Danny decided to leave. Scythe is about to stab him with the knife end of his weapon, but Danny fights back. Scythe’s chain is still around his neck, and he pulls him into a wooden wall. Danny knocks the wall down, and then focuses his chi, so his hand starts to glow. He breaks Scythe’s blade, and then asks him who sent him after him. Scythe reveals he was hired by someone named Meachum, and Danny starts walking towards the office building Scythe indicated.
Danny approaches the office tower with the Meachum Industries sign over the door, and enters the elevator, selecting the top floor. He thinks back to the day that Harold Meachum caused his father’s death, and then, when the elevator arrives, starts walking down the empty hall towards the door with Meachum’s name on it. His first step triggers some knives that come out of the walls, but he breaks them before they can hurt him. Next, four machine guns come out of the floor, but he breaks them too. He opens the door to Meachum’s office, but only finds a stairwell. He tosses in a piece of machine gun, triggering some energy beams. He punches through the wall, taking out their controls. He starts to climb the stairs, but when he sees a camera, he jumps the rest of the way, avoiding another trap. In the next hallway, three men pull guns out and start shooting at him, but he takes them down. A sprinkler douses him in corrosive acid, and when he opens the next door, it leads outside to a twenty-one story drop. He climbs to the next level of the building and breaks through a window. We see someone dressed in purple ninja attire, but Danny just registers this man’s movement before the floor drops out from under him. He’s able to just avoid falling down a long shaft (which should just lead to the floor he just left, really). This reminds him of his father again. A door opens and a hungry wolf comes at him. Danny kills the wolf, and enters a private elevator. It fills with gas, but he breaks through the ceiling, and then manages to avoid it colliding with another elevator and crushing him by punching his way through the door to the next floor. A janitor mopping the floor pulls a sword out of his mop handle and comes at Danny, but he defeats him easily. Danny approaches the door, noticing the camera above it. Suddenly, that purple-clad ninja tosses a shuriken at the camera, knocking its laser beam from hitting Danny (the ninja is gone when he turns around). In this room, which is covered in circuitry, there sits a guy in a strange outfit covered in wires, holding a three-pieced nunchuk. He says that he’s going to kill Danny.

This guy, called Triple-Iron, is pretty tall. He says that the only way he can be free is to kill Iron Fist, and he attacks him. Danny fights back, but Triple-Iron is pretty quick, and his nunchucks are electrified. Danny figures out that he’s getting power from the circuits in the floor. That purple ninja shows up again and tosses a shuriken towards Danny that reveals a hidden door. It leads to a control room, and Danny starts pulling apart the generator that powers Triple-Iron. He hits him with some electrical wires, shorting him out and knocking him unconscious. Danny walks through a door that opens for him, and is finally face to face with Harold Meachum. He approaches the older man, and is shocked to see that he is in a wheelchair and has had his legs amputated above the knees. Danny asks him how he knew he was coming, and Meachum explains that after he killed Wendell and had his love rejected by Heather, he wandered for days in the mountains, and finally collapsed. When he woke up, he’d been taken to a small village in Katmandu Valley, where an older man and his daughter cared for him. They spoke English, and explained that his legs were so badly frostbitten, they had to amputate. Meachum explained that while he was there, a monk came to visit who told the family (I’m not sure why they all spoke in English) that he’d been to K’un-Lun and saw an American child training with Lei Kung (it’s weird that Danny started his training on the same day that he arrived there, since that’s the only day the monk could have been there). He told the family that there was already speculation that the child could challenge Shou-Lao (this seems ridiculous). This is how Meachum knew that Danny would come for him in ten years, so he built his weird traps. Danny no longer wants to kill Meachum, especially once he realizes that’s what Meachum wants him to do. He walks away, and Meachum pulls out a pistol. He fires, but the shot goes wide and grazes Danny’s head, because that purple ninja guy tossed a shuriken into his hand. As Danny recovers from the graze, the ninja runs his sword through Meachum and disappears. As Danny looks at the dead man, his daughter walks into the room and accuses Danny of lying when he says he didn’t kill him. The woman (who I think is Joy?) vows to get Danny for killing her father as he walks away.
Iron Fist leaves the scene of Harold Meachum’s death, remembering what Yu-Ti told him about vengeance being a double-edged sword. When he walks outside, a woman is waiting for him in the rain, and calls him Iron Fist. Joy Meachum (this is confirmed to be her name) calls her Uncle Ward, telling him that her father has been killed. Ward has instructions for what should happen if he dies. The woman outside hails a cab and gives Danny a jacket to wear (it’s notable that his costume, which was shredded before, is back to normal now). Once they’re in a cab, she introduces herself as Colleen Wing, and says that her father sent her, knowing that he’d be there. Her father is a professor at Columbia University, but she doesn’t know if he knew Danny’s father. They arrive at her brownstone, and as they approach the door, Danny notices two men holding umbrellas, despite the fact that it’s stopped raining. They pull daggers from their umbrellas and throw them, but Danny blocks them both. The assassins disappear, and Colleen hasn’t even noticed them. She brings him into the house, where he meets Professor Wing. The Professor reveals that he knows Danny rejected immortality to be here, and that he just fought off two assassins. He goes on to explain that nine years before, at an excavation in Northern India, he found an ancient and well-preserved book. This has made him the target of the Cult of Kara-Kai, who want the book because it holds the secret of how to destroy K’un-Lun. He talks about how he traveled alone through the Himalayas with the book, and came across the same monk that spoke to Harold Meachum, but he’d been trapped in a landslide and was dying. He told the same story of how Danny was adopted by K’un-Lun, and had the potential to become the Iron Fist. The monk died, and Wing spent the next nine years studying. Danny wants to make sure Joy knows he didn’t kill her father, and Wing suggests that he call her. He hands him the phone book. Danny calls the Meachum building, and gets Joy on the phone. It’s weird that she’s standing next to her dead father, and agrees to meet with him at the arcade on 42nd street. Professor Wing explains that arcade has been closed for a while, and he knows the Meachums own it. Wing gives Danny a subway token. We see Joy call her Uncle Ward, who plans a trap. Danny enters the arcade and punches a cardboard figure. He turns and sees four men armed with double daggers and kyoketsu-shogi. They fight, and the men manage to ensnare both of Danny’s arms with their hooks and wires. We see that there are more fighters waiting in another room, but the Ninja guy shows up, dressed more in black and blue this time, and takes them out. Danny manages to free himself from the original four fighters, and is ready to keep fighting, but sees the Ninja. He asks who he is, but the Ninja doesn’t talk; instead, he wipes blood off his sword on a newspaper and then tosses it to Danny – it is the Daily News, and the headline accuses Iron Fist of murder (it’s only been two hours or so since the murder, and this newspaper was lying around in a closed arcade, but it’s all good).

With Marvel Premiere #20, the creative team shifted, with Tony Isabella writing, and Arvell Jones penciling. It opens with Danny fighting another four assassins from the Cult of Kara-Kai. He defeats them, and the Professor thanks him from his window. Danny, Colleen, and the Professor talk about the Professor leaving so the Cult can’t keep finding him. Colleen talks about leaving her business in her friend Misty’s hands to help him move, but the Professor refuses. He says that the cult has made almost four dozen attempts on his life, and that he’s going to keep working on translating the book, as he’s been doing for nine years. Colleen accuses him of being selfish, using the example that while Danny is helping him fight the Cult, he doesn’t have time to clear his own name. Danny tells them he’s leaving to go speak with Joy. Colleen wants him to find the Ninja instead, but Danny insists, and the Professor convinces Colleen to let him go. Danny heads to the Meachum building, sneaks past guards and workers, and makes his way to Joy’s office. He surprises her, and she gets very angry. She promises to spend her fortune to get even with Danny, but he tries to explain that he’s innocent of her father’s death. She notices that her phone is glowing, which she knows means that her uncle is aware he’s there, so she tries to get Danny talking. Ward enters the room, and tells Joy to get to shelter. Batroc, the French master of savate (spelled ‘savete’ here) attacks, kicking Danny in the face. Danny starts to fight back, and we get a sixteen-panel page of them fighting. Danny prepares his iron fist, and punches Batroc across the room. Danny gives him the option of ending the fight, but Batroc calls in his Brigade, which is made up of about two dozen fighters. Danny is quickly surrounded, but takes down a number of Batroc’s men. Suddenly, he notices that the Ninja has joined the fight, but unlike Danny, he’s killing their enemies. Ward Meachum sees the tide turning, so he flees. Batroc starts to fight the Ninja, while Danny uses the iron fist to take down the rest of the Brigade. Danny turns to the Ninja, demanding answers, but instead of speaking, a cloud of smoke teleports them both outside somewhere. Danny asks his questions, but instead of answering, the Ninja teleports away again. We see him appear in front of an open book on a lectern. The Ninja lifts the book and appears to rub his face against it; he disappears and is replaced by Professor Wing.
Batroc demands that Ward Meachum pay him the full amount they’d agreed upon, citing the fact that he has lost some of his men in this battle, but Ward claims that since Iron Fist didn’t die, and because Batroc is wanted in the United States, that he’s not going to pay him. Batroc leaves, suggesting he might come back fighting on Iron Fist’s side. Joy worries that Iron Fist will return and kill her uncle, and we see from Ward’s thoughts that he knows Danny didn’t kill Harold, and that he has his own plans. Danny returns to the Wings’ house, but finds there’s been a fight there. The main room has seven dead Kara-Kai assassins lying around, and there is no trace of the Wings. Danny hears someone yell, and is attacked by Misty Knight. He’s surprised by how good a fighter she is, and realizing that fighting her is slowing him down, he knocks her out with a nerve pinch. Suddenly he sees a shuriken fly through his chest, and sees a floating apparition of the Ninja in the air. It points him towards the door, and leads him through the subways to a secret underground temple to Kali. There, chained to a massive statue of the Hindu goddess are the Wings. Danny is attacked by more of the cultists, and starts to fight them. He’s interrupted by two women who proclaim themselves living goddesses. Shaya refers to herself as ‘the shade’, and calls Ushas ‘the favored of the sun’. They want to know why Iron Fist is standing against them, but he makes it clear that he sees the Wings as his friends. The sisters explain that they wanted the book, the Sacred Volume of Kali back. Professor Wing reminds Danny that the book could destroy K’un-Lun, and that urges him to strike. Shaya opens up her cloak of darkness, plunging the temple into blackness. All Danny can see are Usha’s nunchakus, which glow. He tries to fight her but she sends him flying. He fights the cultists in the dark, until he ends up near Professor Wing. The older man guides him to him and Colleen, and Danny uses the iron fist to break them both free. This somehow upsets the massive statue of Kali, and it starts to topple. Danny leads the Wings away, as Ushas uses the full power of the sun to destroy the statue. At the same time, Shaya has to close her cloak, restoring everyone’s vision. Danny fights the cultists again, and notices that Colleen takes a few out herself (he also immediately rethinks the sexist views he learned in K’un-Lun about women and fighting). One of the cultists holds a knife to the Professor’s throat, threatening to kill him. The Professor turns into the Ninja in front of them, and starts killing the cultists. One of the cultists attempts to escape with the book, but the Ninja throws a shuriken at him, killing him. The book falls into a brazier of fire. This causes the Professor and the Ninja to separate, but to the Ninja’s surprise, he remains material. He says that the dragon-lords imprisoned him in the book, and by protecting it, he realizes he was keeping himself imprisoned. He claims that K’un-Lun owes him a debt, and says he’ll collect it by killing Iron Fist. He smacks him with his sword, and then stands over him, preparing to kill him.

The Ninja attacks Danny again, and they fight, while some of the Kara-Kai cultists also try to attack Danny. The Ninja kills them, and turns back to Danny just as a bunch of police officers enter the underground temple. The cultists attack the cops while Shaya and Ushas plan to escape. Danny tells the cops he doesn’t want to fight them, but they accuse him of murdering Harold Meachum. Colleen Wing tries to argue that Danny is innocent. The Ninja admits that he killed Meachum, explaining that he didn’t want Iron Fist killed because he needed him for his plans for K’un-Lun, but now he wants to kill him himself. The Ninja teleports himself and Danny away, into a weird pocket dimension without gravity. Danny struggles to fight in this environment, and the Ninja gets the better of him, hitting him hard and then leaves him floating. The Ninja starts to narrate his own story. We learn that he was a great samurai in Japan, although he was exiled by his peers for being cruel. He came across someone named Master Khan, an old wizard who taught him mystical stuff. He was given a book called The Book of Many Things, which is how he learned of K’un-Lun, including another way of entering the city that only appears every ten years. He snuck into the city, and was caught by Lei Kung. Yu-Ti imprisoned him in the book for centuries. Eventually a thief took the book out of the city, and it ended up in the possession of the Kara-Kai folk, who kept it in their temple, which was eventually buried until Professor Wing found it. The Ninja developed the ability to possess and transform people, which is how he kept the Professor safe from cultist assassins. The Ninja is surprised when his story is interrupted by Iron Fist, who used the break the Ninja’s talking provided to recover from his fight. He rips off his tattered shirt and starts to fight the Ninja, until after many traded blows, Danny summons his Iron Fist and punches the Ninja, who made his sword glow red. When they hit each other, there is an explosion, and Danny finds himself back in the temple. Professor Wing tells him that he’s fine now, and tells him that he’s cleared of Meachum’s murder, although the cops still want to talk to him. The cops round up the last of the cultists. Colleen is surprised that Danny’s not more happy to be free of his murder accusation, and Danny explains that he feels like he’s wasted half his life planning vengeance. He’s also sad that the Ninja is dead, since he knew how to get into K’un-Lun, and now Danny will have to wait a decade to return home. The Wings suggest that Danny take time getting to know Danny Rand, so he takes off his mask and looks serious.
With Marvel Premiere twenty-three, the legendary Chris Claremont came on the title, in the same month that he started writing X-Men. He’s joined by Pat Broderick, who I didn’t know was working this early (this issue is from 1975). Danny is walking in the park with Colleen, who is now being drawn as a lot more Asian, with darker hair. They talk about how Danny doesn’t know what he’s going to do with his life, when they see someone get shot by a sniper. We see that the shooter, who is not identified yet, is not seeing reality as he continues to shoot people in the park, but is seeing everyone as Vietnamese civilians. A cop tries to protect a little kid from getting shot, and is killed himself. Danny runs out from behind cover to grab the kid. When the shooter fires at him, Danny can tell he’s on the seventh floor of a building nearby. Colleen follows Danny out of the park, avoiding being shot a few times. Danny argues with her in the lobby of the building they went to, and doesn’t see the shooter approach behind him (he sees them both as Vietnamese). The shooter is a guy with blue skin and a red outfit, who calls himself The Warhawk. Danny kicks him, and discovers that the guy’s skin is metal. Warhawk and Danny fight, but Warhawk is bigger and stronger, and he tosses him into Colleen and then knocks him out. When Danny comes to, Professor Wing is standing over him. He introduces him to Rafael (Rafe) Scarfe, an NYPD lieutenant, and old friend of the Professor. Rafe explains that Warhawk is a former CIA assassin that recently returned from Vietnam. He’s taken Colleen, which is causing the Professor a lot of distress. Danny promises to go get her, and remembers the time that his fellow trainees in K’un-Lun stole his mother’s locket from him. Lei Kung approved of this hazing, but instead of fighting his way through a maze, Danny decided to climb a huge wall to get to his possession. He found the climbing very difficult but persevered and was able to get his locket back. Danny’s tracked Warhawk to an abandoned pier, and looking through the skylight, can see Warhawk talking to Colleen. He believes her name is Liu and that she’s his wife. Danny drops down from the ceiling when he hits her, and they fight again. Danny does a lot better this time, until Warhawk uses his strength to toss him. Colleen kicks him, and he hits her hard. Danny uses the iron fist to punch Warhawk in the chest, which sends him flying through the wall and into the river. Colleen points out that the current is taking him to the ocean. Danny tries to reach his foe to save him, but Warhawk, knowing he’s going to be locked up, pulls his hand back. This choice upsets Danny.

Danny and Colleen are sparring, but Danny holds back, convinced he shouldn’t be fighting a woman. She taunts him, and he ends up giving her a good kick. She comes back fighting harder to prove to him that she’s capable, until he ends up flipping her and putting her in a hold that hurts. He feels bothered about fighting a woman, and storms off. At a SHIELD’s Fenris Station some men with guns break in using nerve gas to kill everyone. We learn that one man is named Hassan, and another Beyd. They are there to free a robotic looking thing called Monstroid (Ballox is its name, and it showed up in an early issue of Marvel Team-Up). They activate it and instruct it to follow Princess Azir, who is maybe from a country called Halwan, as she moves around New York, and then to kill her. Danny wanders the city and enters the park, trying to figure out if he’d be happier in K’un-Lun. He wanders into a baseball game and catches the ball. As it turns out, Rafe Scarfe is playing against a team made up of Marvel creators and editors. Chris Claremont asks Danny if he’d like to play, and he joins in (is this the first baseball game that Chris Claremont ever wrote about in a comic?). Apparently Princess Azir, who is from Halwan, is there watching the game. Danny misses an important catch, running into another infielder (Al Milgrom perhaps?) and the two of them end up laughing about it. Scarfe notices that the Monstroid is flying towards them, and the cops on his team pull out their guns. The Monstroid sees Azir and tries to blast her. It hurts a cop that tries to protect her, and is about to kill her when Iron Fist jumps in and kicks it in the head. Danny starts to fight the Monstroid, and damages one of its eyes. More cops arrive and shoot at it, and the Monstroid tosses their car. Danny hits it with a steel pipe, and then starts kicking its head, damaging its other eye. Danny focuses his powers, and uses the iron fist to punch through the Monstroid’s head. He comforts the Princess. In an apartment not that far away, a man we don’t know watches this scene, and is upset with Hassan, his servant, for the failure of the Monstroid. This guy, who is dark-skinned with a topknot, tells Hassan to find out who Iron Fist is so he can kill him.
The last issue of Marvel Premiere to feature Iron Fist, and the first to be drawn by the legendary John Byrne, opens with our hero in a garden, getting hit by Khumbala Bey, a very large man who is usually Princess Azir’s bodyguard. He’s upset that Danny saved the Princess instead of him, even though he wasn’t in the park with her when Monstroid attacked. Danny has a hard time fighting the much bigger man, who gets him in a bear hug and starts squeezing him in his ‘grip of death’. The Princess arrives with Lt. Scarfe and yells at Khumbala to stop. She makes it clear that if they were in Halwan, their country, and not America, she’d have Bey killed for this. The Princess talks to Danny, asking to see him again. Danny leaves with Scarfe, and we see that two men who work for ‘the fat man’ are staking them out and surveilling them. We see the profile of this ‘fat man’, who looks a bit like Alfred Hitchcock, and he orders these men to follow Danny without being noticed. Danny heads to the Wings’ house, and finds that it’s been ransacked again. A man with a samurai sword attacks Danny; he kicks the man and then realizes that it’s Professor Wing. The Professor seems to think he’s a monster, and it’s not until Danny tosses him to the floor that he makes it clear that the monsters are after Colleen. Danny and Scarfe leave to find Colleen, and as they arrive at her office, they see her being escorted into a police car. Scarfe tries to find out what’s going on, and Danny notices that one of the cops is going to pull his gun on him. Danny kicks that guy, and the other cop punches Scarfe; they aren’t actually cops. They get away with Colleen, and Rafe starts to chase them in his car. The fake cops almost run over some kids in the street, and when Rafe approaches the same kids, he swerves onto the sidewalk. The chase continues, with the fake cops pulling into a dead end alley. Danny and Rafe both start hallucinating, and crash the car. Danny pulls Rafe out before the car explodes, and Danny feels like he’s falling through a psychedelic tunnel. He sees his father, but his father attacks him. Next, Danny sees his own corpse, and starts screaming. A man in a fringed vest stands over him, and introduces himself as Angar the Screamer. When he screams, people see things. He does this to Danny again, appearing to turn into a dragon. Danny punches the dragon, but it’s really a car. He thinks that the brick wall is grabbing him, but then sees that it’s Lei Kung. As Lei Kung squeezes him, he brags about his ‘grip of death’, and Danny realizes that it’s Khumbala Bey that’s got him again. He uses the iron fist to get free, and knocks Bey out. Danny demands that Angar tell him where Colleen is, but Rafe stops him from hurting him. Angar disappears, but Scarfe has his ID card, which shows that he works at Stark International. Danny swears to kill the person behind all of this, which seems a bit out of character, actually.

The first issue of Iron Fist’s own book has him sneaking around the rooftop of Stark International’s New York office building. He believes that the people who kidnapped Colleen brought her here. We get a recap of the previous issue, which makes sense as I’m sure a lot of people were picking up this book for the first time and were confused. We see an extended scene where Danny and Lt. Scarfe interrogated Angar the Screamer, and Angar told them that Tony Stark is behind everything that’s happened. They want access to the resources in Halwan, and after Iron Fist saved the Princess, they kidnapped Colleen as a punishment. Angar screamed, making our heroes hallucinate, and then disappeared. Danny moves through an empty stairwell in the Stark building, until he’s kicked in the face by someone. It seems that Misty Knight is also creeping around the building. She’s also looking for Colleen, and shares (for the first time) that they work together at Nightwing Restorations, Ltd., which I guess is mostly a missing persons detective thing? Misty got a call from the chief of security, asking her to meet, but he’s late. They hear a shotgun blast, and find Misty’s contact, Donald Cauley, lying dead. The card Danny got from Angar turns out to be a computer access card, so they enter the room that houses Stark’s Delphi system. This gets noticed by Tony Stark, who was sleeping, and he pulls out his Iron Man armor to go deal with the intruders, who he believes just killed Cauley. At the airport, we realize that Hassan, the terrorist we saw before, is the man who has Colleen Wing. He brings her to a pilot, but Colleen kicks Beyd, the other kidnapper, and flees into the airport. She runs into a man, and rips his jacket, thinking he’s with the kidnappers. She sees something that shocks her, and he knocks her out because she saw it. Hassan and the others catch up, and he hands her over; they posture for a bit but nothing comes of it (this guy’s reference to ‘white slavers’ comes off very odd in this day and age). The man makes a call to Ward Meachum, offering to help him get Iron Fist, and we see that like Danny, he has a snake tattoo or burn on his chest. The plane takes off for Halwan with Colleen onboard. Danny searches the Stark building for the person who shot Cauley, and is approached by Iron Man. This is the era where Iron Man had a nose on his helmet, and it’s distracting! They start to fight, and Danny has a hard time, especially given that Iron Man uses an image inducer to try to confuse him. While they fight, Misty digs through the Stark computers, not noticing that Cauley is reaching for a gun behind her. The fight keeps going, and Misty hears a shotgun cock behind her. Danny and Iron Man stop fighting when they see balls of flame bursting from the computer center. Danny gets angry, and starts taking it out on Iron Man. He summons the iron fist and sends him through a burning wall. It looks like he’s taken Iron Man out, but he emerges from the rubble around him just fine. He uses his repulsors on Danny, slamming him into a wall, and then grabs him by the neck. He’s about to punch him out when Misty arrives and stoops him. They are surprised to see her alive, and she shows them that Cauley is not dead. In fact, he faked his death and tried to kill Misty. She explains that he works for some guy in Halwan who has planted sleeper agents in Stark International. He set up Misty, hoping to kill her and maybe Iron Fist too. Iron Man apologizes for fighting Danny, but also says he’s too busy to help with the next part of this story; he does wish him luck though.
Danny sits with Lee Wing in the hospital, trying to pass some of his chi to him. Danny remembers an earlier failure of his, and his mind takes him back to K’un-Lun. Not long before the Test of The Many and The One that opened this book (but long enough that he had a shaved head, and his hair had grown back for the challenges), he was confronted by a guy named Tucos who felt he didn’t deserve to become an immortal. Danny smacked him, and was then confronted by someone named Merrin, who believed he should have been the one to confront Shou-Lao. Merrin had some guys with him, and they attacked Danny. There were enough of them that they started to stomp on Danny, until a mysterious figure in a mask joined the fight and kicked Merrin in the face. This figure fought one of Merrin’s goons, but had her mask pulled off, revealing she was a blonde girl (in case anyone wasn’t sure, her cleavage managed to get exposed too). Danny called her Miranda, but he was as shocked as the others to see her skills. Another person, a man Danny called Conal (such a Claremontian name) joined the fight too, and soon all of Merrin’s guys were defeated. Danny continued to be upset that Conal, who was clearly his friend, had taught Miranda how to fight (there is no discussion of the fact that none of these K’un-Lun inhabitants look the least bit Asian, and Miranda is clearly a white woman). Conal and Miranda were arrested by order of Yü-Ti (the umlauts are back), and we learn that Miranda’s last name was Ran’d’Kai, but no one mentions how strange that is. Hassan takes Colleen, who appears drugged, to Halwan, where he takes her to his Master. The Master can tell that Colleen is faking being ‘conditioned’, and the Master tells Hassan he failed him, and then kills him. In his speech to Hassan, we learn that the Master is hoping that Iron Fist will follow them to Halwan so he can kill him. Danny stood outside the gates of K’un-Lun, practicing blending into the rocks when he saw Conal come over the wall. He told Danny he was going to leave the Valley of K’un-Lun instead of accepting his punishment. We learn that leaving the valley is deadly, but since the council wanted to mindwipe Conal, he figured he’d rather die. He talked to Danny about his love for Miranda, who is also supposed to be mindwiped. Danny said he wanted to stop Conal, and Miranda jumped from a rock to knock him down. Misty Knight talks to Professor Wing’s doctor and learns that he is in bad psychological shape. They look in, and see that Danny is still sitting with him, which he’s been doing for more than a day and a half now. Scarfe joins them with news that he has information on Colleen and the ‘Masterlord’ that has her. He has an informant in the Master’s operation who wants to exchange information for protection, and wants to meet in London. Scarfe thinks it’s a set-up, but figures that Misty wants to go anyway. We learn that Misty was once Scarfe’s partner on the force, and when she grabs a concrete ledge with her right arm, we see her crush it. Danny suddenly found himself a prisoner of the H’ylthri, large plant-based alien creatures who live around the Valley of K’un-Lun. The leader, Sssesthugar, talks to Danny, and in a flashback-within-a-flashback, we see that Danny followed Conal and Miranda through the mists around K’un-Lun into a plant-filled place, and sniffed a flower that knocked him out. Sssesthugar explained that the flower should have killed him, that his people hated the people of K’un-Lun, who they saw as invaders, and he showed Danny that he had his friends captured in pod plant things. Danny fought him, and Sssesthugar brought up Danny’s plans to kill Harold Meachum as proof that mankind is bad. Danny was losing his fight, but heard Miranda calling his name, asking him for help, and calling him ‘brother’. Danny was left alone, and found his way back to K’un-Lun, having seen Miranda die. In the present, Misty asks Danny to come to London with her.

The flight that Danny and Misty are on is struck by “blue-white fire” as it lands, causing it to crash and burst into flame. Misty punches through a window while Danny tries to help the other passengers leave, but the fuel leaking out of the plane catches fire, and so Misty is only able to rescue a single child. Danny has to change into his Iron Fist costume because of the flames (I don’t understand it either), and immediately runs into the blue armored figure who took the plane down. His name is Ravager, and he says that he won’t let Danny stop him, and starts firing at him. Danny throws some wreckage at him and uses it as a feint, getting close enough to use his martial arts on him. Ravager hits him with some metal, and then Misty jumps on the villain’ back and pins his arms behind him, which takes more strength than she should have. Ravager knocks her off, then blasts her again. Danny punches him from behind and flips him. Ravager stuns Danny and tosses him, then grabs a container of something and flees. Danny goes to help Misty, aided by the child she rescued, and sees that Misty’s right arm is robotic, and that she’s badly injured. The police arrive, so Danny uses his ninja skills to disappear. He changes into his civilian clothes and goes to the hospital where Misty is taken. He sees the child being wheeled to surgery, and talks to her. A doctor talks to Danny, saying that Misty will need to stay in hospital for a few weeks, and that he doesn’t know how to fix her arm. Danny goes to see Misty, who does not appear too injured, but is now missing her arm. Misty wants Danny to continue the search for Colleen, but Danny thinks he needs to stop the Ravager first. They argue about this, and Danny leaves. He sits around the hospital trying to decide his next move, and learns that the child died in surgery. He vows to stop the Ravager, and just misses some Scotland Yard detectives canvassing the crowd at the hospital for information on Iron Fist. Danny returns to the airport and using a lesson he learned from Lei Kung, figures out how to ‘see’ the radioactive residue left by Ravager’s feet. He follows him through London, tracking him to the General Post Office Tower. He gets in and climbs the stairs, but still figures out what floor the Ravager is on. He surprises the villain, and they fight again, with Danny making good use of his martial arts. He disables the Ravager’s wrist blasters, which angers him, and he comments that they serve as a safety valve for his energies. Danny punches him with the iron fist, shattering his chest-plate. The Ravager takes off the rest of his armor, and being a being of energy, says he’s now Radion, the Atomic Man. Misty watches on the TV in her hospital bed as the news broadcasts an explosion in the tower.
Radion is shocked to see that Danny has survived his attack, but Danny is not able to do much against such a powerful being. There’s another explosion, which John Cheever reports over the BBC. In New York, Joy and Ward Meachum watch the broadcast with the guy we saw with a tattoo like Danny’s a few issues back (who we know to be Davos, even though he hasn’t been named yet). They are happy to see that Iron Fist is probably dead, but Davos doesn’t believe it’s possible, and gets mad, punching a wall. Danny is trapped in some rubble, and imagines he hears Yu-Ti telling him to use the power of Shao-Lao to heal himself. He tries channeling his chi into his first, and then reversing it through his body. While this fixes his injuries, it causes him tremendous pain. As he climbs out from the wreckage, he sees a video diary playing and pauses to watch it. It shows him the thoughts of Henri Sorel, director of Project Damocles. Sorel was working on a cure for radiation poisoning, and was approached by representatives of Ward Meachum (this is too much of a coincidence, I’m sorry), who wanted his research, and beat him up to force him to give it to them. He was doused in chemicals, which turned him into Radion. He created the Ravager armor to control his powers, but it impacted his mind. He’d developed a device that would hopefully cure him, and Danny realizes that he’s the one who stopped him from using it. At the hospital, Misty Knight feels that she needs to go help Danny, but collapses. Weirdly, her doctor yells out that she’s having a bionic emergency, despite the fact that she’s not wearing her bionic arm. Radion stands on top of the postal tower, firing blasts at people on the street. Danny catches his attention, and makes him angry by calling him Sorel. Danny goads him into attacking, but finds once again that his blows do nothing to the more powerful being. He manages to get Radion, who is trying to choke him, to fall through a weakened part of the roof, and they burst through many floors, ending up in Sorel’s lab. Danny kicks Radion into the device Sorel had built, and turns it on. Radion turns back into Sorel, and is cured of his madness.

Danny is prowling around a rooftop in London, having received a tip from Hassan as to where Colleen Wing might be. Danny’d been to see Misty, who is still recovering in the hospital, and is now in this area trying to figure out this complicated world that is still new to him. He switches into his civilian clothes so he can walk around, and then notices a group of people beating up a red-haired man with serious mutton chops. Danny jumps to his aid, easily taking down the attackers at first, but getting hit in the head by a length of chain. Danny continues to take down the men, who identify themselves as Walker’s mob, until they flee. He checks on their target, who is named Alan Cavenaugh. He explains that he’s Irish, and used to be in the IRA but left after twelve people were killed in a bombing mishap. He came to London to become an artist, but is still tied to his past (Walker’s group were trying to recruit him to their IRA cell). We see that one of Master Khan’s agents, named Rakim, has been watching Danny, but doesn’t know he’s Iron Fist. Rakim is with a guy with a large sword. Danny enters the address he was told to go to, with Alan following, and realizes it was a trap. Gamal Hassan is strung up, dead, and some gunmen are waiting. Danny pushes Alan through a door into an alley that is filled with smoke. They barricade the door, and Danny changes back into his Iron Fist gear (apparently the smoke is coming from the trainyard, which I don’t really understand). He fights the gunmen that followed, and is slashed in the back by Scimitar, a large opponent. They fight for a bit, but Scimitar is able to dodge Danny’s iron fist. Danny still gets him on the ground, and then they grapple, while a train approaches. They separate, and Alan calls to Iron Fist, showing him where Scimitar is running to. Alan tries to grab him, and gets slashed for it. Danny decides not to use his iron fist, but instead uses his martial arts to knock Scimitar out. He checks on Alan, who is surprised that the hero knows his name. Danny explains that he met Danny. They talk about how Iron Fist is a superhero, and Alan says he has a proposition for Danny when they find him. In Halwan, we see that Angar the Screamer has been conditioning Colleen for months now (it didn’t seem like Danny’s been away that long). Master Khan joins Angar, questioning just how indoctrinated Colleen really is now. An Iron Fist robot enters her room, and she attacks it, kicking its head off.
Iron Fist has made it to Halwan, and makes a nighttime assault on Master Khan’s fortress. He drops from a paraglider and takes out a guard, but the noise alerts another two whom he barely stops from setting off the alarm. He sneaks through the fortress, and thinks back to a couple days prior, when after spending a month in London, his friend Alan saw him off at Heathrow. Danny boarded the private plane he was to travel on and was surprised to find Misty Knight on the plane, her arm apparently restored. When he mentioned the arm, she remembered when it was blown off when she grabbed a parcel bomb as a police officer. She was mad at Danny, but was interrupted by Jeryn Hogarth, who explained that he was Danny’s father’s lawyer, that he’d been watching him since he came to New York, and that Danny is worth a quarter of a billion dollars. One of Hogarth’s employees (they are all beautiful women) gave Danny a haircut while Hogarth explained that they knew where Colleen Wing is. As they approached the Master’s fortress, Misty gave Danny a long cylindrical package to give to Misty. They embraced, and Danny admitted to being nervous about flying on a paraglider. In the end he enjoyed it. He pauses again as he works his way through the fortress. We see that in K’un-Lun, Yu-Ti is watching Danny through his great crystal. He talks to himself, revealing that Master Khan has been testing Danny for months, and that he could help save him, but won’t. Lei Kung bursts into the room, which is forbidden, and is upset to see that the crystal is being misused, leaving K’un-Lun open to attack by the H’ylthri. The two men argue, and we learn that it was supposed to be Danny’s father who would become the city’s ruler, as Yu-Ti was the second son of Lord Tuan. Lei Kung believes that Danny should know about this. Yu-Ti pulls rank and sends the Thunderer away, then talks to a picture of the Rands, revealing that he was in love with Shakirah, who gave birth to Danny’s sister; he vows that Danny will never take the city from him. Danny finds Colleen, and while she seems happy to see him, she throws a shuriken at him that he just manages to dodge (it cuts the string holding Misty’s package to his back). The room seems to go wild around him, and he realizes that he’s in the mindstorm caused by Angar the Screamer. Colleen continues to fight him, demonstrating a lot of skill. Danny holds off her attacks and tries to talk sense to her, but she is a good fighter. He considers using the iron fist on her, but instead gets her in a chokehold and uses his chi to force a mindmeld with her. They see into each other’s souls, and both collapse weeping. Danny recovers quicker, and wonders if he’s cured her or not. He feels very drained, and that’s when Master Khan enters the room with Angar and three soldiers. They grab Danny and prepare to behead him.

Danny rallies and manages to get free of the three soldiers holding him. Still, he collapses after getting pistol whipped, and is about to be beheaded by the scimitar-wielding soldier, but Colleen grabs a sword in its scabbard and shoves it into the guy’s chest. Danny and Colleen stand back to back as the rest of Khan’s men move in, and the Master chews out Angar for not doing a better job of conditioning Colleen. Khan leaves, ordering that they both be killed. Colleen is upset with Danny for his mind meld, and tells him to go after Khan while she fights the soldiers. He fights his way out of the room, while Colleen fights through the rest of them in a masterful panel by Byrne. She’s left to confront Angar. He prepares to use his scream on her, but she swipes his sword at him so quickly he doesn’t even feel it cut him, and then he collapses. On a plateau nearby, Misty practices her sharpshooting with her pistol in the predawn light. Jeryn comes to her, taking her back to his plane for breakfast. They talk about how long it’s taking Danny to return, and how she thinks she should have gone with him. She also worries that Jeryn would benefit financially if Danny were to die, and threatens him. Danny searches the fortress for Khan, but instead finds Khumbala Bey, who challenges him to a fight. Danny takes down the much bigger man in one page, and then tosses him through the wall into the chamber where Master Khan is doing some sort of mystical ritual. He attacks Danny with the Bolts of Bishru, but somehow Danny is able to channel and absorb that power. The same thing happens when Khan uses the Flames of Faltine, but the Crimson Bands of Cyttorak manage to pin Danny down. Khan then talks to Danny, revealing his hatred for the modern world. He explains how when he was young, Halwan’s king wanted to use Khan’s magic, but Khan refused, so the king killed his child. Now he asks that Danny leave him to work his vengeance, and their conflict will be over. Khan offers Danny a portal to K’un-Lun, which he opens right into Yu-Ti’s chamber, surprising the green-robed man. Khan reveals that he controlled the Ninja who killed Meachum, and suggests that Danny would be happier leaving the modern world. Danny considers this, but thinks about his new friends. Khan then offers Danny the chance for more vengeance, revealing that Yu-Ti was going to kill his father when he returned to the city, and that he kept K’un-Lun’s archers from rescuing Danny’s mother from the wolves. Because Yu-Ti won’t deny this, Danny gets angry enough to disperse the Bands of Cyttorak. Yu-Ti doesn’t deny anything, but instead of going through the portal to confront him, Danny smashes it. This creates a vortex that sucks in all the furniture in Khan’s chamber. Danny holds on to a column, and reaches for Khan, but isn’t able to grab him (he wonders if he didn’t try hard enough to save him). Later, Danny approaches Colleen, who is still pretty upset about the mind-meld situation. She doesn’t want to kill him, though, so together they start hiking to the place they are supposed to meet Misty and Jeryn.
A group of young men in matching jackets with a tiger-head patch on the backs of their jackets surround a group of out-of-towners on the platform of the Canal Street station. They identify themselves as the Golden Tigers and are going to rob these people. A cop tries to stop them, but one of the Tigers throws a shuriken at him and another knocks him down. They are about to shoot him with his own gun when Iron First arrives on the scene and quickly takes most of them down. The last one still conscious pushes Danny into the side of a train that arrives at full speed, sending him flying into a metal pillar. The Golden Tigers escape. Later, Lt. Scarfe talks to Danny about how hard it will be to catch any of them. It turns out that one of their would-be victims was artist John Byrne, who gives the police a drawing of their gang insignia. In the crowd is a young man named Bill Hao. He follows a young lady, Cynthia Wu, who is affiliated with the gang. From his thoughts, we learn that Bill’s brother, Robert, is the leader of the Golden Tigers, and Bill wants to stop him. He follows Cynthia into an abandoned warehouse, and watches as the Golden Tigers, led by the masked Chaka, plan to take control of crime in New York, first by targeting Ward Meachum and his niece Joy. Cynthia wants the girls of the gang to get involved, and Robert slaps her. Bill is discovered, but we don’t see what happens. Danny is now living in his childhood home, now that Jeryn has given him the keys, and as he wanders, he remembers his parents, leaving for K’un-Lun, and how they both died on that trip. At Joy Meachum’s apartment, Joy talks to Davos, her guest. She has been learning about her father’s shadier connections and projects and wants Davos to look into things for her, but he refuses. Joy is determined to deal with her uncle and maintain control over her business now that she’s in charge. Danny meets with Misty and Jeryn to go to a meeting with the Meachums. At the same time, a number of Golden Tigers head towards the same building. Danny notices them, as his group is met by Ward. The Golden Tigers sneak up some stairs and change into their ‘fighting costumes’, which involve short robes and tiger masks. Jeryn explains in a meeting that Danny should have control of the Rand half of the company again, but before they can discuss it further, the Golden Tigers burst into the room, and their leader, Chaka, declares that Joy must meet all of his demands or everyone in the room will die.

Issue nine opens a while after the end of issue eight. Iron Fist is running through New York’s Chinatown, and doesn’t look well. One of the Golden Tigers drops from a fire escape and lands on him. Danny manages to take him down, but feeling dizzy and ill, collapses to the ground. A flashback shows us what happened in the Meachum conference room. Recognizing he couldn’t stop the Golden Tigers without revealing his identity, but not wanting Chaka to start the killing with Misty, Danny lunged at the man and tried to pin his arm. Chaka threw him out the window, and he managed to grab a railing and get back into the building. He changed into Iron Fist and returned to the room, taking out a guard. He smashed in, disrupting Chaka’s plans. Joy wanted Davos to fight him, but Davos (who I guess Danny doesn’t know, since they were just in the same room together?) chose to get Joy to safety instead. Misty pulled out a small pistol and was hit in the head by Chaka’s triple irons. Danny attacked Chaka, but was electrocuted by his irons. In the alley, Danny starts to recover, and sees a police car approaching. He tries to wave it down, and the car, driven by a pair of Golden Tigers, speeds up and tries to hit him. He fights the two men in the car, and worries that because of how weak he is, he might kill someone by mistake. We return to the point where Danny woke up from Chaka’s attack, and found himself tied to a chair. Chaka injected him with a nerve toxin, and told him that he’d have to find him somewhere in Chinatown within the next hour in order to get the antidote from him. He gave Danny a head start, and revealed in a monologue that there is no antidote, he just wants to be seen as the man who defeated Iron Fist in combat. Next he entered another room where his brother Bill is tied up. Chaka starts to hypnotize Bill so he can use him in his plans. In an interlude set in London, Alan Cavenaugh gets a job on a tramp steamer headed for New York. He doesn’t know he’s being watched by two men who intend to kill him and Iron Fist once he gets to New York. Danny continues to stagger through Chinatown, where the locals will not help him. He climbs a fire escape to avoid a pair of Golden Tigers, hoping to use his iron fist to heal himself like he did in London. On the roof, though, Chaka is waiting for him and attacks. They fight, and Danny notices that Chaka sounds and is fighting differently from before. He knocks him down, and realizes he can’t wait any longer to channel the iron fist through his body. It causes him pain, but it does heal him. Chaka recovers and moves to strike him. Danny strikes out, and Chaka goes flying into a brick chimney. We can see that as he falls, an arm reaches around the chimney and cracks him in the head with triple irons. Danny checks on him, noticing how close to death the man seems to be (but is confused as to why, as he pulled his punch at the last instant, and there is no evidence that the man hit his head on the bricks). Just then, a pair of cops reach the roof and tell Danny to freeze, assuming he’s killed Chaka (who we realize is Bill Hao).
A pair of cops have Iron Fist cornered in an alley. He manages to escape them, although one of them wants to shoot up an apartment building to stop him. Danny’s narration takes us back a couple of hours to his fight with Chaka, where it appeared that he’d killed Chaka. When the cops came onto the roof where that fight happened, they recognized Chaka as Bill Hao, a lawyer in the DA’s office. Danny fled, recognizing that he was set up. By morning, the paper reported that Danny had killed him, and he found himself on the run again (this feels like a familiar plot device by now). Danny thinks he’s about to be attacked, and kicks at his assailant, realizing at the last instant that it’s Misty Knight. She and Colleen Wing are out looking for him, but they both react poorly to his attack. Colleen attacks him, and Danny has to subdue her while reasoning with Misty. He tells her what’s happened, and further explains that he saw a bruise on Bill’s skull that matched the one Chaka’s triple-irons gave Misty when he hit her in the Meachum board room. Danny’s plan is to work to put all of the Golden Tigers out of business. Later that day, he takes out the meat-packing plant where they store their heroin. Over a few days, he continues to take out more of the Tigers, but hasn’t been able to flush Chaka out yet. Danny, Misty, and Colleen are hanging out at the office of Nightwing Restorations. We learn that Danny is still wanted by the police, and they talk about their next steps when Chaka comes bursting through the door. He manages to knock down both Misty and Colleen, and then turns his attention to Danny. He’s made his triple-irons more powerful since they last met, and their fight starts to trash the office, and the building as Danny tries to move him outside. Once they’re outside, the fight catches the attention of some cops. Chaka starts to choke Danny with his irons, but he uses the iron fist to destroy the weapon. Danny gets the upper hand, and starts beating on Chaka as Lt. Scarfe arrives on the scene. Danny insists that Chaka tell the cops the truth about Bill’s death, but Chaka refuses. It doesn’t much matter though, because Bill turns up, still badly injured. It turns out that Bill was able to turn away from Chaka’s strike, saving his life. Scarfe decided to leak that Bill was dead to see what would happen, and to use Iron Fist as bait. As the cops lock Chaka up, Bill talks about how another gang will take over soon anyway.

Iron Fist uses the city to exercise, leaping around some buildings and catching the attention of Matt Murdock and his girlfriend Heather Glenn, who thinks he might be Daredevil. Danny arrives at the hospital where Professor Wing has been kept since falling victim to Angar. He changes between panels, and meets Misty. She hasn’t seen Colleen yet, and is there to visit another person as well – her roommate Jean Grey, who is being taken out of the hospital in a wheelchair by Scott Summers. Jean says she’s going to stay at the Xavier mansion for a couple of weeks before coming home to their apartment. Scott shakes Danny’s hand, and then Danny goes looking for Colleen. He finds her, and she’s very upset that her father doesn’t know her anymore. Colleen takes off, and Danny and Misty go for a walk together through Riverfront Park, which is above the FDR Drive. It shakes, and the Wrecking Crew (The Wrecker, Bulldozer, Piledriver, and Thunderball) emerge from below. We are given a quick recap of how the Wrecker was defeated by Doctor Strange, had his crowbar returned to him by the Puppet Master, was defeated by the Fantastic Four, and then put together his team so they could go kill Thor. Thunderball attacks the cops who respond, and Pildriver randomly hits Danny. Danny uses his martial arts to flip over Bulldozer, catching the Wrecker’s attention. Misty helps clear people out of the hospital, but Bulldozer follows her. She manages to hurt him with her bionic arm (when is that getting explained?), but Piledriver grabs her. Danny rushes in, now in his Iron Fist gear, and manages to use the Crew’s attacks against them for a bit. When Thunderball tries to hit him with his ball, Danny punches it with the iron fist, causing an explosion. In an interlude, we see that Alan Cavenaugh, still on his ship to New York, is having nightmares from his days as an IRA bomber. Elsewhere on the ship are two men who plan to kill him and Iron Fist once they reach New York. Thunderball recovers from the explosion, and Wrecker comes after Danny. He channels the iron fist, and grabs the crowbar. Its magic is stronger than Danny’s and he goes flying. Misty is distracted, and Thunderball uses this as a chance to grab her, wrapping her in a chain. As Danny recovers, Wrecker threatens to kill Misty. Danny offers a compromise – he’ll use his skills to sneak into Avengers Mansion, let the Wrecking Crew in, and then let them kill Thor. Misty argues, but Wrecker decides to go along with this, insisting that Danny kill any Avenger he finds. Danny leaves, hoping he can get in touch with Iron Man for help (I guess it’s not a surprise that he has no intention of killing any Avengers, and is using this as a tactic).
Captain America is on monitor duty in Avengers Mansion, wondering why there have been no further news reports about the Wrecking Crew. He also wonders if Iron Fist was working with them, given that he has a bad rep now. Meanwhile, Danny is creeping on the roof of the Mansion. He slips into the building and startles Jarvis, who runs from him. Cap digs further into Iron Fist’s appearances in the newspapers, but doesn’t see the retraction clearing him from Bill Hao’s death. As Jarvis runs, he trips on the carpet, and Danny leaps to cushion his fall down the stairs, although he’s still knocked out. Cap finds Danny standing over his friend, and despite Danny trying to explain, they end up fighting. Danny is surprised by Cap’s strength, and as they fight, Danny remembers that he’s trying to save Misty Knight from the Wrecking Crew. He’s used his iron fist a lot, but he summons it again to try to stop Cap, but his shield absorbs the blow. Danny decides that the best thing he can do to get Cap to listen to him is to stop fighting. A generator starts to fall from the ceiling, and Danny decides to not evade it, forcing Cap to jump in and save him. Now Cap is ready to listen to him. The Wrecking Crew hang out in a sewer with Misty, waiting for Danny’s signal, which finally comes. Danny lets them through the front door of the Mansion, and takes them to where he killed Captain America. They don’t notice that Danny’s lured them into the Avengers’ Danger Room, and Danny hits Thunderball, getting him to let go of Misty. He shoves her out of the room as it seals, and they realize that Cap was playing possum. A fight starts, but so do the Danger Room’s machines, which are set at ‘Thor level’. The Wrecking Crew try to fight the two heroes while evading the room’s traps. Cap manages to punch the Wrecker in the jaw, sending him into a trap that keeps him bouncing around the room. He falls in front of Danny, who uses the iron fist to knock him out. By the time Misty uses her bionic arm to get into the room, Cap and Danny have taken down all of the villains. Cap apologizes to Danny for being rash, and Danny and Misty head out, deciding they want to go get dinner together (there are hints that Danny is developing feelings for her).

Iron Fist arrives at the harbor, having received a telegram from his friend Alan Cavenaugh. Misty is with him, and tells him that the DA wants her to go undercover and infiltrate the mob for him, but she’s unsure what to do. Suddenly they are blinded by some bright lights, and attacked by Boomerang, who explains he’s been hired to kill Danny. At the same time, the two IRA guys that were on the boat with Alan start shooting at Misty. Danny struggles, as he’s taken by surprise by some of Boomerang’s trick boomerangs, and ends up falling into the harbor, where the water is just above freezing in temperature. Elsewhere, at Ward Meachum’s manor, Meachum has workers fortifying his home. It doesn’t do much good though, as Davos breaks in and starts taking out Meachum’s men. Davos catches him and gives him a choice – he can give up Meachum Industries and disappear, or he can die. Davos says his debt to Joy Meachum is paid back, and that he’s going after Iron Fist now. Danny makes it out of the water, and Misty runs to him, wrapping him in her coat. Danny wants to go find Alan and save him, but Misty, having read Alan’s file, is against it. She shares that she lost her arm because of a bomb and that she doesn’t want to help someone with Alan’s past. Danny escalates their argument, and they go their separate ways; Misty says she’s going to take the undercover assignment and that she might never see him again. Between panels, Danny gets some leads from Lt. Scarfe, and manages to find the warehouse where Alan is being held. The IRA guys are about to kill him when Danny drops through the skylight and stops them. He fights Boomerang again, but the night has taken a toll on him. Boomerang moves the fight outside, where his bootjets give him an advantage. He throws the boomerang from the front of his mask at Danny, and it grows in size, picking Danny up in a magnetic field and flying him out over the harbor. Danny figures out how to maneuver it, sending it back towards the warehouse, where it explodes after he drops off of it. Danny ends up back in the water, where he is able to locate and rescue Alan. They get picked up by a boat, and Alan is grateful to Danny for his help.
Issue fourteen opens with Danny and Colleen somewhere in the Canadian Rockies getting shot at by pursuers on snowmobiles. Colleen gets hit, and they both fall down a hill. The pursuers decide that the cold weather will finish them off and leave them behind. Colleen is mostly fine, the bullet just creased her skull, but she passes out and Danny has to carry her. As he does, he remembers the day before, as he patrolled New York and was distracted thinking about Misty. He was attacked from behind by the person we know as Davos, but whom he didn’t recognize. He could feel Davos draining his energy before calling him by his full name – Daniel Rand-K’ai – and departing. Danny and Colleen reach a weather station that has been stripped bare – it doesn’t even have insulation – and Danny coaches Colleen into a meditation that will help them preserve their body heat. We learn that Colleen summoned Danny to Calgary because she needed backup to protect Jeryn Hogarth. They talked about Misty and got some cold weather gear before heading by helicopter to Hogarth’s chalet (he is a little too rich, I think). When they get there, they find numerous masked gunmen, Jeryn tied up, and the mercenary known as Sabretooth standing over him. Sabretooth explains that his employer is upset with Jeryn digging into their business. He orders his men to detain Danny and Colleen, but Danny surprises them and tries to escape. Sabretooth blocks him, but Danny decks him and they make off across the Rockies. This brings us back to the morning as two of Sabretooth’s men arrive to check the weather station. Danny and Colleen get the drop on them, and soon head off wearing their uniforms. They see a large aircraft is at Jeryn’s, getting loaded up (it’s familiar to Danny, but he’s not sure from where). We learn from watching Sabretooth that someone has been stealing from Rand-Meachum, and that Jeryn will learn who it is. Sabretooth begins to suspect Danny, whose identity is hidden, when Colleen manages to free the other women who work for Jeryn (he’s got a Charlie’s Angels thing going, I guess), and they start shooting up the compound. Sabretooth rips at Danny’s disguise, revealing him as Iron Fist. They start to fight as the women destroy Sabretooth’s chopper. Danny and Sabretooth continue to fight, and Danny is lured outside, where the rising sun causes him snow blindness. He remembers one of Lei Kung’s lessons, and starts to fight using his other senses. He manages to strike Sabretooth. Danny recognizes that Sabretooth is not a trained fighter, but that his natural ferocity makes up for his other shortcomings. He’s able to take Sabretooth down, knocking him out, and then hears someone sneaking up behind him. He strikes, just missing Colleen. He learns that everything has been taken care of, and the threat is over.

Danny’s gone to protect a shipment of something for Rand-Meachum that he’d heard would be hijacked. He fights off the uniformed and masked men that tried to take the truck, and is attacked again by Davos (who is again not named, and is not known to Danny). Davos grabs Danny and drains some of his chi again, before saying he wants the Iron Fist that is owed to him. Logan, the Wolverine, stands outside the building where Misty lives with Jean Grey, thinking about his love for Jean. He notices someone sneaking into Jean’s apartment from above. We see that this is Danny, who has gone to see Misty, having forgotten that she’s been gone for months on her undercover assignment. We cut to Misty, who is hanging out on the Caribbean island of St. Emile, thinking of Danny. She remembers her meeting with DA Towers, who has had her take on the guise of Maya Korday so she can infiltrate the organization of John Bushmaster. We see that Bushmaster is in love with Maya, and that Misty is sad. Danny looks around Misty’s apartment and realizes that it’s set up for a party. Just then Wolverine (in the era where he wore the horrible Fang costume) busts through the door and attacks him. Danny fights back (it’s odd that he doesn’t notice Logan’s metal skeleton when he punches him in the jaw), and ends up tossing him out the window. Nightcrawler and Colossus are on their way to the party when they see Logan fall. Kurt catches him, and Peter tosses him back towards the apartment, where he and Kurt attack Danny, followed by Peter. Storm arrives for the party just in time to have a bowl of potato salad come flying into her face, having been knocked through the air during the fight. Moira MacTaggert is walking down the street with Banshee, and they see the lightning that is Storm’s response. Kurt keeps teleporting and hitting Danny, and then Banshee swoops in and grabs him. Moira rushes up the stairs, worrying that Jean is going to get evicted for this fight. Danny takes Sean down, but Ororo attacks him, and her winds send him into Peter’s arms. Danny realizes he may have made a mistake (I guess the X-Men weren’t as recognizable then). He starts to try to talk the X-Men down when Jean arrives, and uses her Phoenix powers to get everyone’s attention. Jean knows that Danny is Iron Fist, and calms down Logan as Scott Summers arrives. Later, we see that more people have arrived for the party (including Chris Claremont and John Byrne), and watch as Jean tries to convince her landlord not to evict her. Danny overhears that her building is owned by Rand-Meachum, and steps in. He apologizes for the damage, and she says she’s going to get Logan to fix everything. This is weird way for the last issue of Iron Fist’s series to end, and I wish these Epic Collections had the letters pages included, so I could read how this was explained to readers.
Two months after Iron Fist’s own book ended, he appeared in Marvel Team-Up #63. It opens with Danny training in his basement gym. He thinks he knows who it was that attacked him twice before, and worries that his skills have started to erode in the last few months. He wishes he could talk to Misty, who is still on her undercover assignment, or Colleen, who is out of town. He hears a knock at the door – Peter Parker is there to take photos of his house for the Daily Bugle. He hands him a scroll he found in the door, and Danny sees that the Steel Serpent has challenged him to combat. He makes an excuse to leave, and heads out. Peter realizes something is going on and decides to follow him as Spider-Man to see if he needs help. Misty is on Bushmaster’s yacht off the Jersey shore, where a party is going to be held. She hears him talking on the phone and realizes that Bushmaster is aware that an assassin is going to kill Iron Fist, which is somehow going to help him. Misty decides it’s time to break her cover and attacks Bushmaster, asking for details. She gets off the yacht and takes off on a speedboat; Bushmaster swears he’ll kill her. Spidey catches up to Danny’s cab and learns he’s entered Inwood Park. Danny is in his Iron Fist gear, and believes that he’s going to be facing Lei Kung, the Thunderer, based on his fighting style, and is really surprised to learn that the Steel Serpent is actually Lei Kung’s son, who was exiled before Danny arrived in K’un-Lun. The Steel Serpent (who we know is also known as Davos) wants to drain Danny’s chi, and they start to fight. Spider-Man sets up his automatic camera and then joins in the fight. Davos surprises Spidey with his skill and the villain swings him at Danny then tosses him against a tree. Davos ducks Danny’s punch and grabs him in a bear hug. There is a very bright light, and when it subsides, Danny’s tattoo is gone, and he’s very weak. Davos is about to kill him but is distracted by Misty’s arrival in a car. She holds a weird gun and demonstrates that it’s a beam weapon. Davos departs, but thinks to himself that he’s going to return and kill both Danny and Misty that night. Spidey watches uselessly while Misty holds Danny, who she thinks is dying.

Misty and Spider-Man have taken Danny to Colleen’s apartment in Inwood, and she’s summoned a doctor through Jeryn Hogarth who claims that there doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with Danny that some rest can’t cure, even though it’s clear he’s been in a fight. As she leaves, though, she says that Iron Fist should be in a hospital. Misty talks to Danny, who she thinks is asleep, and declares her love for him. He wakes up and says he feels the same way about her. Spidey fills Colleen in on what’s happened, and Misty joins them for the end of the story, stating that Davos has stolen Danny’s chi, and that without it, he will die. The Daughters of the Dragon prepare to go hunt Davos down, but Spidey is sure he’ll come for them. We see that Davos is on a nearby roof, thinking about his past. We learn that he is the son of Lei Kung, the Thunderer, and that he was a great fighter, and was always assumed to be the one to take on the mantle of the Iron Fist one day. The arrival of Wendell Rand-K’ai gave him a rival, and when they fought to see who would get to face Shou-Lao, Wendell defeated him. Davos was angry, and went to confront the dragon on his own, but wasn’t able to hold on to him long enough to get fully branded and to receive the power of Iron Fist. He was exiled the next time K’un-Lun’s gateway to Earth opened, and he was surprised to learn that Wendell left as well, for reasons he never learned. Now that he has Danny’s power, he vows to kill him and restore his own honour. Spidey hears him yelling on the roof and attacks him. He tosses Spidey off the roof, and then comes down to the street to continue their fight. Spidey lands a good blow, but Davos summons his chi, and is about to use the iron fist on him when Misty grabs him with her bionic arm and shoves him into a wall. Colleen slashes at him with her katana, and Spidey worries they mean to kill him. He fires a web at Colleen’s sword, giving Davos the chance to hit her and run towards the park. Spidey confronts him, and they fight more, with Davos’s power seeming to grow with each blow. He corners Spidey and is about to hurt him when Iron Fist interrupts his ranting. Davos is surprised to see Danny on his feet (in truth, he’s pretty weak, again), and they start to fight. Danny notices that Davos is not using his fighting training anymore, and seems to just be lashing out. Spidey wants to intervene, but Colleen insists they let Danny recover his honour. Danny realizes that Davos is not able to contain the power of Shou-Lao. He grabs him and holds him to his chest as Davos’s power overloads. There’s a blinding flash of light, and when it subsides, only Danny is left, his chi restored. Misty runs to him and they kiss (I forget that this would have been a big deal at the time). As they walk back to Colleen’s, Spidey asks Misty where he’s met her before, and she cryptically says that he and someone in a flying bathtub once saved her from muggers (a reference to the Fantasticar?). In K’un-Lun, Lei Kung has watched his son’s demise. Yü-Ti finds him, and they comfort each other on the topic of their loneliness, and the realization that Danny Rand is not going to return to K’un-Lun.

It took me way longer to read this book than I would have liked, but life really got in the way the last few months.

This book was really good. I can’t believe I’d never read any of these comics before, and I am now in love with the Marvel Epic Collection format. The quality of the reproduction and colours is wonderful, and I like how complete the curation of issues was, with the inclusion of the two Marvel Team-Up issues wrapping up the story that didn’t fit into Iron Fist’s own series. My only complaint is the horrible recolouring done on the cover to give it a more modern sensibility (I think I like old school colouring more in general).

I knew that I would end up having problems with the portrayal of Danny, K’un-Lun, and his whole general reality, due to shifting understandings of race and colonialism, but I was still a little surprised by some of the things that I found in this book, and they should be discussed.

It was clear to me from the beginning that the various writers who first chronicled Danny had no real plan for him. When Claremont took over, he attempted to make Danny’s back story a little more cohesive, but I think he made it worse in a lot of ways (or was that Byrne? It’s always hard to tell who actually wrote what with those two, regardless of what the credits say).

So K’un-Lun is a mystical city in another dimension that only connects to Earth, in a remote region of Asia, every ten years. I’m fine with that, it’s comics. That Danny’s white father had a connection to this city was fine too. That his brother runs the place is a bit more problematic, given that most of the people who live there are portrayed as being Asian, and they’re all given East Asian-sounding names. Then we learn that K’un-Lun is actually on another planet where they’ve colonized a patch of land and are at war with the plant-based aliens who call this place home. That’s a little more problematic (and almost immediately ignored, at least until Byrne’s Namor series revisited it). It’s also strange that Danny had a sister but just thought she was a friend until the aliens made her disappear or something.

Anyway, I know that later writers worked on some of these things, and that the incredible Immortal Iron Fist series by Brubaker and Fraction clarified things around the Rand family and its history with K’un-Lun (while also making Davos Danny’s friend).

I guess that the first few writers didn’t think much about how Danny’s past would work, they just wanted to give him a credible enough origin, and establish his beef with the Meachum family. I don’t know if anyone approached this character with the idea that he would be a lasting addition to the Marvel Universe, and for a long time, he was pretty obscure.

I was left with a lasting curiosity as to Danny’s racial background. Was he part Asian, or was the K’ai part of Rand-K’ai more of an honorific? Who was his sister’s mother?

Race did play an important part in this book in a number of ways. Danny’s first major threats were an Indian cult, then he faced Master Khan and his attempts to take over a Middle Eastern country, and he later tackled an Asian street gang in New York. This is a lot more portrayal of non-white characters than we see in other Marvel books of the time (I’m leaving Shang-Chi out of the conversation on purpose). There is some real tension in reading a kung fu comic about a white hero, but I think the writers were aware of this.

Colleen Wing and her father, Lee, were not immediately recognizable as Chinese characters, despite their names, but eventually their heritage was better acknowledged. Part of that has to do with the way Byrne drew Colleen, and Claremont began to lean into her training as a fighter instead of making her just another archeologist’s daughter (this is before Raiders of the Lost Ark, right?).

And then there’s Misty Knight, a pretty important character in Marvel’s history. Misty is a strong Black woman, shown as being fiercely independent at a time when there weren’t many other characters like her out there (basically, just Storm). We don’t really get to understand how Misty ended up with a bionic arm (we know her arm was blown off, but the acquisition of the bionic one wasn’t revealed (or if it was, I forgot immediately).

Misty’s relationship with Danny was probably a much bigger deal than it reads as now. In 2023, no one would look twice at an interracial kiss in comics, except in places I like to pretend don’t exist, but I’m sure it got more notice when it was first published. Danny and Misty’s relationship felt a little forced; I always thought Claremont was setting him up with Colleen, and taking the long road to get there.

I thought it was more unlikely that Misty was roommates with Jean Grey. I thought it was cool that Claremont connected this book with his X-Men run, but like, how would they have even met? That felt unlikely and a little hard to believe, but I did enjoy the last issue of IF, with his misunderstanding with the X-Men.

Part of why I was looking forward to this run was to read more Claremont/Byrne comics. The connection between these two is so productive, and they really made some wonderful comics together. It was also interesting to see some early examples of the personal tropes that Claremont would become known for. We got a baseball game and cameos by the people creating the comics, but his narration was not quite as wordy as he got later in his career. His penchant for giving people uncommon names held up as well (I’m thinking of Conal and Jeryn here).

Byrne’s art has always appealed to me, but there is such a difference between what he was doing with the inkers here than what he was doing with Terry Austin at the same time. It’s hard to believe that Byrne was drawing both this and X-Men at the same time, so he can be forgiven if his work looks a little rushed in places.

I also enjoyed the work of the earlier contributors to this book, especially the art of Larry Hama. He had a sleekness to his work that I would have liked to see a lot more of. It’s a shame that he didn’t draw more comics, and now I’m wondering if I shouldn’t be seeking out issues of Nth Man…

Another thing that stood out to me in reading this book is how many colourists worked on these issues. There are fourteen names at the top of this column, and it reminds me how undervalued the contributions of colourists were back in the day. That is one change that I appreciate about modern comics, where the colourist can often make or break a book.

I really enjoyed reading this book. Ever since the Brubaker/Fraction/Aja series, I’ve wanted to know more about Danny’s origins, and now I feel like I have a good handle on where he came from. Reading this book makes me want to know more about this era of Marvel, where they leaned into emulating kung fu and blaxploitation movies in their comics. To that end, I’ve picked up omnibus copies of Deadly Hands of Kung Fu, which feature Iron Fist, and some trades reprinting early issues of Power Man. I want to also track down the rest of Power Man and Iron Fist (I only have the Jim Owsley issues and some randoms now). First, I’m going to tackle that that other kung fu book that Marvel launched in the 70s.

You can check out my Retro Review archives here.

Facebook X (Twitter) Reddit Email

Retro Trade Review: Iron Fist Epic Collection: The Fury Of Iron Fist By Claremont, Byrne & Others For Marvel Comics!

Keep Reading

Blu-ray Review: Redline (Special Edition)

Murtz Jaffer Interviews Big Brother Canada 10’s Moose Bendago

DC Comics & Hawkgirl #2 Spoilers: Which Hawkman / Hawkgirl Mythology Is Part Of Dawn DC?