The Fury of Firestorm #1 Review

Summary

In Istanbul a family gets killed as a group try to locate the last known magnetic bottle, they already have three.

At a High School Jason Rusch watches star quarterback Ronnie Raymond play football before he has to interview him in the locker room, it doesn’t go well. Another scientist gets killed as the group continue their search as the Magnetic bottle can create a firestorm.

Next day at High School Jason gets attacked by Ronnie over the article he wrote on him. The school gets attacked by the terrorists. Jason activates the magnetic bottle and him and Ronnie become two versions of Firestorm. Ronnie attacks Jason and the female terrorist seems to have also been changed and empowered by the transformation. As the two continue to fight they merge into a single being, the hulking Fury.

The Good

Villains-These terrorists are viscous and murderous psycho’s hell bent on serving their master. With one of them altered on a molecular level by the Magnetic bottle our heroes have their first super villain tied directly into their empowerment and origin.

High School- Pitting our titular heroes against each other in the most basic sense works well in the high school setting; Jock and Nerd; polar opposites who hate each other instinctively.  It also left allot of room to develop these characters and draw parallels in up bringing, history and social economic backgrounds.

Cover- Ethan Van Sciver’s cover art is gorgeous and grotesque at the same time. Jason and Ronnie look awesome and their combination form of Fury looks like a zombified version of Firestorm and thanks to Ethan’s style you get a very foreboding, sickly, rotting feeling from the image. I like!

Art- Yildiray does a good job of capturing the drama of high school life and the drama of being a teenager. Where the art really shines though is when the pyrotechnics start. I’m expecting good things from this artist as his style meshes well with the action.

Action- While the issue was mostly slow paced when Jason and Ronnie become Firestorm or in this case the “Firestorms” we get a good tussle and some explosions.

Characterization– Jason is still a brain but not nearly as awkward as he was in Firestorm #1. Ronnie is still a hot head and they still hate each other (chuckle).

Race relations- The issue marked a very poignant question between our two heroes that of Race and its place in sports and socially. After Jason points out that even though the student body is 45% black the football team has never had a black quarterback. It also brings Ronnie to the realization he has no black friends and he asks his mom. It’s an interesting question, after all our friendships happen naturally right? As in the color of one’s skin is of no consequence, right? Just because there are people of another race around us doesn’t mean we will talk to or gravitate towards them? Why is that? Is it a deep seated racial phobia? This and many more questions pop up in this comic. Very Relevant to young readers!

The Bad

Retcon– Not a fan of this retelling of Jason and Ronnie’s Firestorm powers and history. Gone is everything that was canon in the Firestorm series which saw Jason as the titular character. That never happened from the look of things! Jason has also had his age reversed to high school days 🙁

Another problem with the new direction, brightest day promised a universal breakdown if these guys couldn’t get their act together as a team that is now moot. Very disappointing since Brightest day just wrapped up and was moving both characters into a new phase of heroics. They were becoming mainstays of DC’s universal class heroes…now they are back to being amateurs 🙁

Also Jason’s characterization moved from being a shy introverted abuse victim to coming out of his shell and growing in confidence. Here Jason and his dad are so civil I’m not sure if that history has been altered or what???

The Ugly

3.5/5