Iron Fist is a comic series published by Marvel Comics, running from 1975 to 1977, written by Chris Claremont and with art by John Byrne, following on from the events of Marvel Premiere.
Daniel Rand is the Iron Fist, the living weapon who can with focus make his hands into a thing like unto iron. Having left the hidden city of K'un-Lun to confront his father's killer, Danny seeks to make a new life for himself with his friend Colleen Wing. But the Iron Fist finds this strange new world has many enemies.
The series was cancelled due to low sales at issue #15, with one of the major plotlines being concluded in Marvel Team-Up. And then the idea was struck upon of merging Iron Fist with another low-selling series, Power Man, with the team-up resolving another plotline from this series.
Iron Fist provides examples of:
- Aerith and Bob: Amidst names like "Yu-Ti" and "Lei Kung", there's also Danny's friend... Miranda. As it turns out, there's a darn good reason for that; She's Danny's paternal half-sister.
- Amazon Brigade: Slightly shady attorney Jeryn Hogarth has a cadre of bodyguards who are all attractive young women who fill out a jumpsuit. They're briefly taken prisoner by Sabretooth, but Colleen springs them.
- Awesomeness by Analysis: In order to defeat Shao-Lao the Undying, aside from the skill not to die at the fangs of an angry, immortal dragon, challengers must figure out Shao-Lao's weakness, which the elders of K'un-Lun don't tell. Danny did so, and survived to wield the power of the Iron Fist.
- Bad Boss: Sabretooth. Two of his goons are reluctant to report back empty-handed while searching for Danny and Colleen, because the last two who did got disembowled.
- Betrayal by Inaction: As Master Khan points out, Yu-Ti knew what time K'un-Lun would rematerialize in the world, and was surveying Wendell via magic, so he could've had his men intervene and rescue him, his wife and kid at any time, but only did so once Danny's parents were dead. Yu-Ti doesn't bother denying this.
- Big Bad: Master Khan, who starts as the Greater-Scope Villain in Premiere. After him, Danny has no overarching Big Bad.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Princess Azir of Halwan initially seems like a regular damsel of the week, but when her bodyguard attacks Iron Fist for besmirching his honor, she screams at him that if they were back home she'd already have his corpse hanging from the wall as a warning to others.
- Brainwashed and Crazy: A Claremont staple, and it happens to Colleen Wing courtesy of Master Khan. Danny has to use the power of the Iron Fist to free her.
- Bruce Wayne Held Hostage: A meeting with the Meachums goes wrong when the Arc Villain and his goons break into the office and threaten to kill everyone. Danny is unable to act without giving away his identity to Joyce. This matter is sort-of resolved when Danny is thrown out the window (he figures if anyone asks how he survived, he'll say Spidey saved him).
- The Cameo:
- After fighting off Chaka Khan's goons, a crowd shot has Peter Parker trying to get photos, much to the irritation of one Mary-Jane Watson, who points out they're supposed to be on a date.
- One issue has one from Daredevil and his then-girlfriend, followed by ones from Cyclops and Jean Grey of the X-Men (Jean was Misty's roommmate at the time).
- Character Development: In Marvel Premiere, before Claremont takes over, Danny is cold and stern, and does not use contractions. Afterwards, this changes, and Danny starts easing up.
- Corrupt Corporate Executive: Harold and his brother Ward Meachum. From murdering his corporate partner to involvement with street gangs, it creates a lot of headaches for Danny, and then Joyce.
- Covers Always Lie: Issue #9's cover has Colleen in the outfit she wears while brainwashed by Master Khan, which she doesn't wear in the issue itself.
- Creator Cameo: Danny saves some guys named Chris and John from Chaka Khan's goons mugging them. In gratitude, John — who is apparently some kind of artist — draws a picture of their insignia.
- Curb-Stomp Battle: Iron Fist vs. Khumbala Bey, round 2. One's a living weapon, the other is a fat elder man gone to seed who wasn't terribly impressive to begin with. Danny hands Khumbala his behind, his opponent not landing a single hit.
- Dead Guy on Display: The fate of Gamal Hassan, an underling of Master Khan's who failed him, and is used as bait to lure Danny to where Master Khan wants him.
- Does This Remind You of Anything?: K'un-Lun is a hidden city where grows a tree that grants immortality via special apples, which Danny passes up on acknowledgement he may never return. Hmm...
- Dramatic Irony: Readers learn Danny's dead best friend Miranda is his half-sister in issue #7 via Yu-Ti's internal monologue, but Danny remains oblivious. For now...
- Dressed Like a Dominatrix: For whatever reason, being brainwashed into Khan's minion has Colleen don a tight black outfit with high heels and a Cleavage Window.
- Dudley Do-Right Stops to Help: The series begins with Danny and Misty trying to rescue Colleen from Master Khan, but gets distracted first by Radion, then by helping Alan Cavenaugh, on the way.
- Energy Absorption: One of the handy abilities of the Iron Fist, which Danny had no idea about, but it works on radiation and magic.
- Equal-Opportunity Evil: Sabretooth hires both men and women for his goons, which is convenient when Danny and Colleen jump some for their outfits.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: One of Master Khan's goons has a girlfriend (or at least booty call) down in the village below the fortress. He's thinking about her when he gets jumped by Danny.
- Failed a Spot Check: Danny's so anxious looking for Master Khan he fails to notice Khumbala Bey lurking in the shadows, allowing the bigger man to clock him.
- The Final Temptation: When Danny finally comes face to face with Master Khan, he immobilizes Danny with the Crimson Bands of Cyttorak, and... offers him a way back to K'un-Lun to confront Yu-Ti about one or two little things. Danny declines. With his fist.
- Friend on the Force: Rafael Scarfe, Misty's former partner from when she was a cop, and Danny's contact with the NYPD.
- Good Scars, Evil Scars: In case Davos's talk of how he wants to destroy Iron Fist isn't enough of a clue, he's also got a nasty scar on the left side of his face.
- Hero with Bad Publicity:
- Danny starts off framed for the murder of Harold Meachum, though in fairness "a ninja appeared and killed him as I was walking away" isn't going to fly in most courts. Only the police seeing the ninja for themselves helps clear matters up.
- After Ravager and Danny fight in an airport, the British police think Danny might be in cahoots with him, and try to bring him in for questioning, "dead or alive".
- Chaka Khan frames Danny for the murder of his brother. Even when it turns out Scarfe helped fake the guy's death to thwart Chaka, some of Danny's bad rep lingers.
- Hidden Elf Village: K'un-Lun, a hidden city of immortals which only intersects with our world one day every ten years. As it goes on, there's some darker elements explored, like some of the other inhabitants of the dimension, who don't exactly like the K'un-Lun, on account of being forced out of their homes.
- How We Got Here: Another Claremont favoured story device. Several stories have Danny in mid-action, before cutting back to show the whys and hows.
- I'll Kill You!: In an attempt to break Colleen's condition, Danny uses the Iron Fist to bridge the gap between their minds. It works, but afterwards Colleen feels he violated her, and threatens to kill him.
- It's Personal: Yu-Ti may not approve of Danny's quest for vengeance, but still lets him go out into the world to find Harold Meachum because in killing Danny's father, the asshole killed his brother. (Yu-Ti may not have got on with his brother, but there's a difference between not liking him and not caring when someone shoves him off a cliff.)
- Large Ham: Joyce Meachum is usually calm and composed... unless Danny's in the room. Then she starts raving like a typical comic book villain.
- Large Ham Title: Chaka Khan - CRIME LORD OF NEW YORK! (no relation to Master Khan.)
- Laser-Guided Karma: At the end of issue #15, Jean Grey tells Wolverine since he started the fight that's wrecked her and Misty's apartment, he gets to handle all the repairwork.
- Let's You and Him Fight: That old Marvel classic, and it happens to Danny a lot.
- It's how he and Misty first meet. Danny finds the Wing household ransacked, and Misty attacks him, assuming he's with the cult who did it. Danny is unable to explain, and has to knock her out.
- Issue #2, Iron Fist versus Iron Man. Danny and Misty having snuck into a Stark Industries facility and found Misty's contact, the head of security, dead. Tony catches this on the security cameras and goes to attack. But this was what Master Khan wanted, having men inside Stark. Either Iron Fist kills Iron Man, or Iron Man kills Iron Fist, Khan gets what he wants.
- With Captain America. Having agreed to attack the Avengers for the Wrecking Crew (though obviously not really), Danny accidentally spooks Jarvis, who flees and falls down a flight of stairs. Danny saves him, but Steve saw him on the monitors, and believing all the newspaper stories about Iron Fist being a killer, attacks.
- The final issue is Danny having to fight most of the X-Men, drained of his power. He enters Misty's apartment while she's out, while Wolverine is there to steal a photo of Jean. Assuming Danny is after "his" woman, Logan attacks with intent to kill. Danny punts him out the window, the other X-Men respond, and the situation spirals out of control until Phoenix intervenes.
- Mighty Whitey: While initially played straight, with the American-born Danny stumbling on to K'un-Lun and becoming The Chosen One, it's later deconstructed somewhat. Danny was not popular with many other K'un-Lunians for being an outsider managing to attain their highest honor.
- Mind Rape: Angar the Screamer uses his powers to shred people's minds to tiny bits, starting with Colleen's father and then Colleen herself.
- Monumental Damage: Radion is based out of the BT Tower in London. It gets trashed by his and Danny fighting.
- Mugged for Disguise: In issue #14, Danny and Colleen jump two of Sabretooth's goons, partly for the protection from the elements, but also to sneak back into his base. It works until Danny gets near Sabretooth, whose enhanced senses instantly see through the disguise.
- No One Could Survive That!: A fight between Danny and Boomerang ends with an almighty explosion that supposedly kills Boomerang and his I.R.A. backers. The police search but can't find any bodies, much to Alan's upset. Of course, Boomerang later turned out to have actually survived that.
- Pie in the Face: Well, potato salad, but the effect is much the same. Storm gets a face full of it thanks to the X-Men / Iron Fist brawl in issue 2. And then wigs out.
- Politically Incorrect Villain: Chaka Khan is a sexist pig.
- Qurac: Halwan, a generically Middle Eastern nation Iron Fist gets involved in when he stops an assassination attempt on their princess via Killer Robot.
- Rabid Cop: Danny runs afoul of one after Chaka Khan frames him for murder. The maniac has Danny at gunpoint, and then says he hopes Danny tries something so he can shoot anyway. Then when Danny does flee, he tries firing after him, with a shotgun in a residential neighbourhood. Mercifully his partner takes his gun off him and tells him to stop being a prat.
- Rogues' Gallery Transplant:
- Radion started off over in an issue of Marvel Two-in-One written by Chris Claremont.
- Boomerang, who last tussled with the Hulk, shows up helping the I.R.A. chase after Alan, meaning Danny has to fight him.
- Running Gag: Pretty much everyone knowing who Iron Fist is, even more than he does, before ever having met him.
- Shell-Shocked Veteran: Warhawk fought in 'Nam, which has left him with severe mental scars. As has being rebuilt into a cyborg killing machine.
- Sins of the Father:
- The H'ylthri are quite angry at the K'un-Lunians for seizing their home, and will kill any human who wanders into their territory.
- While Miranda is supposedly exiled for the crime of breaking K'un-Lun's strict gender laws, Yu-Ti's internal monologue makes clear revenge on her dad is also partially a motivation.
- Stay in the Kitchen: In K'un-Lun, men fight and women do not. At all. Anyone breaking this, or who hits a woman for any reason (like, for example, in a friendly spar) will either be exiled into the lands outside K'un-Lun, where death is certain, or subject to Death of Personality. Danny has some difficulty getting over this mindset once he's in the outside world.
- Tempting Fate: With Davos after him, Ward has his men barricade his hideout, with one underling assuring him it'd take a tank to get through. Davos smashes through the wall with one punch.
- Took a Level in Jerkass: Colleen, who starts out as a Nice Gal in Premiere, becomes a lot more bad-tempered after being kidnapped by Khan, though given everything she goes through, not without justification.
- Tragic Villain: Radion, the Atomic Man, was turned into a supervillain when some of Howard Meachum's goons tried to kill him, exposing him to a massive amount of radiation, which is gradually driving him mad. His actions are just an attempt to cure himself, which Danny only learns too late.
- Uncertain Doom: In issue #2, Danny flashes back to the story of his friend Miranda, who went missing in the badlands outside K'un-Lun and ran afoul of the H'ylthri. Danny's flashback ends without explicitly confirming her death, but Danny sure thinks she died. A few decades down the line, this would turn out to not be the case.
- Wham Shot:
- As Colleen's running from Khan's goons, she's stopped by a large man. In the tussle she rips open his shirt, but it's not until the next page we see what spooked her; a brand on his chest much like Danny's.
- While talking with Scarfe, Misty, up till now evidently a Badass Normal, gets tense. And then her right hand crushes some concrete. The next issue reveals why when Misty gets hurt in a fight, and it turns out her right arm is cybernetic.
- Worf Had the Flu: Thanks to Davos attacking Danny and sapping his power in issue 14, he spends it and issue 15 off his game.
