I first read Iron Fist in the seventh grade. My mom drove me to New World Comics every week to spend my allowance, and sometimes twice a week on special occasions. In this instance, she had just taken me to the doctor and I was feeling rotten. I don’t remember what I had or what was wrong or why I had to go back to school for the afternoon instead of home, but before she dropped me off, she let me buy a comic book.

Because it was her money being spent that day instead of mine, I decided to do something risky and tread untested waters by buying an issue of POWER MAN AND IRON FIST. While I suffered through science class, I had the issue wrapped in a brown bag sitting atop my notebook. I couldn’t wait to get home and read it. For those couple of miserable hours, it was my security blanket, back when 60 cents could still buy you a half hour’s worth of escape.

And I needed it. I was a big nerd. Nearly a quarter of a century later, I’m no longer that person, but the nerd left in me can greatly appreciate ESSENTIAL IRON FIST: VOL. 1, collecting 31 issues of the minor Marvel hero’s first appearances.

Iron Fist was born in issue 15 of MARVEL PREMIERE in 1974, taking advantage of the kung-fu craze then sweeping the nation, but placing it within the Safe White Guy masses. Young Daniel Rand accompanies his parents on a business trip to Asia, which ends in tragedy when the elder Rand’s ruthless partner Meachum offs his father and wolves rip apart his mother. Daniel, however, is saved by a mystical cult in a fabled city and is taught the ways of the dragon. Ten years later, he vows to put his newly acquired martial arts skills to seeking revenge on Meachum – a plot that comprises the first several issues.

By the time his 11-issue stint in MARVEL PREMIERE ended and segued directly into his own title, the formula already had been set: Iron Fist battles a different villain – a robot, a flipped-out Vietnam Vet or even a goateed French kickboxer: “Zere ees no need for any introduction, mon ami. For nowhere in zis world are zere ears zat ‘ave not heard of zee skill and sheer powair of … BATROC ZEE LEAPER!” And they fight and fight until near the end, when Iron Fist draws all his power into his hand so it glows and smolders until “it becomes unto a thing of iron” and then he deals a deadly blow. You wonder why he doesn’t just do it outright.

Later issues deviate a little, like when Fisty takes on the four-man Wrecking Crew. They’re on a mission to kill Thor, and persuade Iron Fist to infiltrate the Avengers Mansion and slay all the superheroes. Soon our hero is sneaking in through a window and trading blows with Captain America. For a superhero, he sure doesn’t get along with fellow do-gooders, as other issues have him sparring against Iron Man and the X-Men; only alongside Spider-Man – in a two-parter from MARVEL TEAM-UP – does he make nice.

Of course, Iron Fist is forever linked with Luke Cage, the African-American Hero for Hire, with whom he starred in POWER MAN & IRON FIST, but even that relationship started off rocky, as the first three issues of that long-running title here show. Chris Claremont, who scripted all but the first eight issues in this volume, does an excellent job of threading a storyline throughout this entire run, while also making the issues be able to stand alone. However, I could do without the annoying, overwrought, omniscient narrator, constantly spitting out needless exposition: “You are Iron Fist – and the odors that assault your tender nostrils this night fill you with a growing feeling of revulsion.”

IRON FIST is so packed with action – some pages require literally a dozen panels to fit it all in – and with interesting characters like the Daughters of the Dragon, that you can’t help but have a two-fisted, tough-talkin’, high-kickin’ good time. –Rod Lott

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