In 1994 DC Comics published Zero Hour, a five issue mini-series designed to not only serve as a major summer crossover but also fix some of the continuity problems that had emerged since the end of Crisis on Infinite Earths. Zero Hour was written and pencilled by Dan Jurgens (who later went on to write and draw Firestorm in The New 52), and represented the dawn of an exciting new era for DC. To kick off this new age, DC followed Zero Hour in August & September 1994 with “Zero Month.” As the name suggests all of the main DC books published an issue numbered zero, though each had a different approach to the idea. Some books featured a new origin. Some contained tweaks to the existing origin. Some contained brand new versions of old characters. Some were intended to launch new ongoing series. All of them served as a jumping on point for new and old readers alike.

To celebrate this new era, some of us in the comic book fan community have banded together today from remote galaxies. We’re celebrating our characters appearances in Zero Month along with some promotional material!

Not a lot of Firestorm in Zero Month, but he would eventually go on to be a member of the Justice League splinter group, Extreme Justice. Below you’ll find a blurb promoting Extreme Justice found in Wizard Magazine Zero Hour Special, which was published around the time of Zero Hour. Click to enlarge!

In typical fashion for Booster Gold and Blue Beetle, they showed up late to the party. While Zero Month was spread across August & September 1994, this zero issue didn’t hit stands until mid-November. Below you’ll find the cover to Extreme Justice #0, featuring a distinct lack of metallic silver ink that the other zero issues received as cover enhancements. Also note Firestorm didn’t make the cover, though Ronnie Raymond (or “Ron” as he was called at the time) does appear on the inside.

That art is soooooo ’90s and only became more “extreme” as the series went continued. For further Firestorm-related posts involving Extreme Justice, check out these links:

• How Ronnie Beat Cancer and Got His Powers Back
• Getting the Wonder Twins Drunk
• Hi, My Name is Ronnie Raymond and I’m an Alcoholic
• Unhappy Valentine’s Day to Firehawk and Booster Gold
• Unhappy Valentine’s Day to Plastique and Captain Atom
• Firestorm Original Artwork Celebration

It’s Zero Hour for These Sites!

As mentioned, several websites have teamed-up today to reflect upon Zero Month! While we’re featuring Extreme Justice, you should visit these other sites to see how they spotlight their own favorite heroes today. Visit them now, visit them later, and visit them often!

• The Fortress of Baileytude
• Aquaman Shrine
• Legion of Super-Bloggers
• Pop Culture Affidavit
• Speed Force
• Corps Conjecture
• Being Carter Hall

Support Firestorm! Fan the flame!

This year I’m thankful for all the Firestorm-related activity! The Flash TV series is jam-packed with Firestorm foes and soon the Nuclear Man himself! Firestorm is featuring prominently in The New 52: Futures End! We’re seeing new action figures and merchandise with ole flame-top! And much more that I’m sure is slipping my mind right now. It’s a great time to be a Match-head!

What comic book related things are you thankful for this year?

Happy Thanksgiving! Support Firestorm! Fan the flame!

Super-Team Family proudly presents Firestorm and The Avengers in “’Storm Warning”!

No, you didn’t miss another Kurt Busiek classic crossover featuring the Nuclear Man and Marvel’s big screen stars. This fictitious meeting is the work of a gentleman named Ross who runs Super-Team Family: The Lost Issues! That site is dedicated to the greatest team-ups that never happened. He started with Brave and the Bold fake covers starring Batman, transitioned into Marvel Two-in-One fake covers starring the Thing, and is now doing Super-Team Family featuring a wide variety of team-ups. Today’s entry features a Tom Grummett Firestorm from The Power Company paired with (I believe) a Mark Bagley rendition of the Avengers from Avengers Assemble! Like it? Well, below are several previous Firestorm appearances on The Lost Issues blog:

• Firestorm and The Thing
• Firestorm and Spider-man
• Firestorm and Power Man & Iron Fist
• Firestorm and The Mighty Thor
• Firestorm and Iceman
• Firestorm vs The Hulk
• Firestorm and Nova
• Firestorm and Iron Man
• Firestorm and The Vision
• Firestorm and The Human Torch & Toro

Be sure to check out Ross’ work on Super-Team Family: The Lost Issues! There are some really impressive gems in there!

Support Firestorm (and Super-Team Family)! Fan the flame!

Support Firestorm! Fan the flame!

While Firestorm’s ongoing series was cancelled this year, I am thankful he’s still being used in the Justice League title. I choose to focus on the brighter side of life!

You may be scratching your head at my choice of images today. Firestorm is not featured on the Thanksgiving-themed cover above, but his one-time ladylove Power Girl appears. Oh yeah, Ronnie shows up on the interior pages too. So there.

Happy Thanksgiving! Support Firestorm! Fan the flame!

Back in Green Lantern/Power Girl #1 (Oct. 2000), Felicity Raymond (formerly Felicity Smoak) was shown working for Karen Starr (Power Girl’s secret identity). Apparently Felicity’s computer skills earned her a high-ranking position in Karen’s company, Starrware.

Green Lantern/Power Girl #1 (part of the Green Lantern: Circle of Fire crossover) was written by Scott Beatty, pencilled by Pete Woods, and inked by Andrew Pepoy & John Stanisci.

As you can see in the first panel above, Felicity appears older in the comics as compared to Emily Bett Rickards performance on Arrow. This is understandable as by this point in comics Felicity had quite a bit of life experience: a former manager for a New York software company, filed a lawsuit against Firestorm for negligence, married Ed Raymond, helped raise her college-aged stepson Ronnie Raymond, and furthered her career at other companies. She was a successful woman and not one to be crossed.

For contrast in appearance, below you’ll find an image of Emily Bett Rickards as Felicity Smoak on Arrow. Who knows, maybe this Felicity Smoak will ending up working for Power Girl someday too!

My thanks to Ed “The Unique Geek” for the heads-up on this comic appearance!

Support Firestorm (and Felicity Smoak)! Fan the flame!

VOTE! Click here to vote for your favorite six entries from, “What do you like about Firestorm?”

The six individuals with the most votes will receive one of the following fantastic prizes:

• An original art page drawn by Dan Jurgens and Ray McCarthy from the recent The Fury of Firestorm: The Nuclear Man #13 (courtesy of Ray McCarthy)
• Firestorm: The Nuclear Man trade paperback signed by writer and co-creator Gerry Conway
• The Fury of Firestorm: The Nuclear Men #11 & #12 signed by inker Marlo Alquiza (courtesy of Jeremy Hobbs)
• The Fury of Firestorm: The Nuclear Men Volume 1: God Particle trade paperback
• Brightest Day Firestorm action figure (courtesy of Mail Me My Comics)
• Batman: The Brave and the Bold t-shirt featuring Firestorm (courtesy of Lil’ Russell Burbage)

My thanks to Ray McCarthy, Jeremy Hobbs, Mail Me My Comics, and Lil’ Russell Burbage for donating prizes. Also, my thanks to Speed Force, the Flash blog, for inspiring this contest!

VOTE! Click here to vote for your favorite six entries from, “What do you like about Firestorm?”

Support Firestorm! Vote for those that Fan the flame!

UPDATE: If you voted prior to 11:00pm EST on Monday, February 25, please vote again. I apologize for the inconvenience. Due to some voting inconsistencies, I had to delete the original poll. The new poll was launched just after 11:00pm on Monday. You may select up to six responses, but please don’t vote for the same response multiple times. If there is a repeat of voting inconsistencies, I will terminate the voting and select the winners myself. The new poll URL is: http://twtpoll.com/m17u99

Happy voting! May the best Match-head win!

The rules of the contest are pretty simple… Just share what you like about Firestorm, or a favorite memory involving the Nuclear Man. Write these thoughts in the comments section of this post or e-mail them directly to me by clicking here. You can discuss any era/incarnation of the character, or any series where he appeared (i.e. Fury of Firestorm, Justice League of America, Brightest Day, Super Friends cartoon, etc).  The only restriction is haters need not apply. If you’ve got a bone to pick with a particular incarnation of Firestorm, this isn’t the place. This is a celebration of Firestorm, so let’s keep it positive! The contest will run until 10pm EST on Sunday, February 17th. So be sure to get your entries in before then. One entry per person please. Once the contest closes on February 17, we’ll collect all the entries and set them up as a poll to be voted on by readers, and the top-rated five will win!

We’ve got some great prizes! Check these out:

• An original art page drawn by Dan Jurgens and Ray McCarthy from the recent The Fury of Firestorm: The Nuclear Man #13 (courtesy of Ray McCarthy)
• Firestorm: The Nuclear Man trade paperback signed by writer and co-creator Gerry Conway
• The Fury of Firestorm: The Nuclear Men #11 & #12 signed by inker Marlo Alquiza (courtesy of Jeremy Hobbs)
• The Fury of Firestorm: The Nuclear Men Volume 1: God Particle trade paperback
• Brightest Day Firestorm action figure (courtesy of Mail Me My Comics)

Yes, you read that correctly! We’re giving away an original page from Dan Jurgens and Ray McCarthy’s premier issue of Firestorm!  How cool is that?!?!?!

My thanks to Ray McCarthy, Jeremy Hobbs, and Mail Me My Comics for donating prizes. Also, my thanks to Speed Force, the Flash blog, for inspiring this contest!

Tell us why you Support Firestorm! Share why you Fan the flame!

UPDATE: Vote for your favorite six entries from the contest!

Richard was kind enough to share this awesome tattoo with us! It’s inked on the upper left-hand portion of his chest. You can see the progression of the tattoo coloring on his Facebook page (and his cool Speedball tattoo too)! Richard  mentioned that the tattoo was really painful. You gotta suffer if you love Firestorm!

Below you’ll find the source material on the cover to Extreme Justice #8 by Steve Lightle! One of my all-time favorite Firestorm covers!

To see other Firestorm tattoos we’ve previously featured, please click here.

Support Firestorm (and Firestorm tattoos)! Fan the flame (and ink)!

If you’re unfamiliar with Secret Files and Origins, these were a series of one-shot comic books and mini-series produced by DC Comics between 1997 and 2010. These books were the illegitimate love-children of DC’s Secret Origins (1986-1990) and Who’s Who (1985-1993), but with the added benefit of being about one particular group and/or time period.

Today here at FIRESTORM FAN we’re going to look at JLA Secret Files #3 (December 2000).  This particular issue was released to capitalize on the fantastic “Tower of Babel” storyline that had just concluded in JLA. This 64-page Secret Files contained a nice full-length story that tied into “Tower of Babel”, some short stories, several character studies, and a section entitled “Incarnations of the Justice League”. One of those “Incarnations” was the Satellite Years, as you can see below. Interestingly, several members that appeared in the drawing apparently didn’t merit being mentioned in the text, such as Firestorm (ouch!), the Atom, and Green Arrow. Click the image for a larger version.

“Incarnations of the JLA: The Satellite Years”
Script by Scott Beatty and art by Phil Jimenez

Firestorm also appeared on another page in this particular issue. The page below comes from the lead story, “Blame”.  On this page, Batman identified potential ways to take out various JLA members. Nice, Bruce. Real nice. And you wonder why you don’t get invited to the JLA Christmas party each year. *Sheesh*

“Blame”
Script by D. Curtis Johnson, pencils by Pablo Raimondi,
inks by David Meikis and Claude St. Aubin

Prior to this Secret Files, Firestorm had appeared in another, Guide to the DC Universe 2000 Secret Files & Origins #1 (March 2000). A few years later, Firestorm earned an entire page to himself in JLA/JSA Secret Files & Origins #1 (January 2003).

Secret Files and Origins Crossover Links  ** UPDATED **

As mentioned, several different blogs have combined forces to look at various Secret Files issues. While I’m featuring Firestorm here on my site, you should visit these other character-specific blogs to see how they spotlight their own favorite heroes in Secret Files. Visit them now, visit them later, and visit them often!

• Aquaman @ The Aquaman Shrine
• The Atom @ Power of the Atom
• Doctor Fate @ Tower of Fate
• Firestorm @ Firestorm Fan
• Green Lantern @ The Indigo Tribe
• Hawkman @ Being Carter Hall
• Martian Manhunter @ The Idol-Head of Diabolu
• Renee Montoya @ Who is the Question?
• Phantom Stranger @ I Am The Phantom Stranger
• Steel @ DC Bloodlines
• Suicide Squad @ Subject: Task Force X
• Supergirl @ Supergirl Comic Box Commentary
• Wonder Woman @ Diana Prince
• Zatanna @ Justice League Detroit

• And be sure to check out a late entry… Flash @ Speed Force

My thanks to Diabolu Frank and Anj for organizing today’s crossover event! If you’ve enjoyed this blog crossover, then you should check out some previous comic blog crossovers we’ve done. The first major blog crossover celebrated the gorgeous George Pérez/Alex Ross painting from the Crisis on Infinite Earths 1998 hardcover. The next major blog crossover was a celebration of the Super Powers Collection’s 25th Anniversary. Some subsequent major crossovers included: DC Challenge, Read This Too, Mayfairstivus, April Fool’s Day 2011, Blackest Night to Brightest Day, and Animated Anthem Day!

Support Firestorm (and these other bloggers)! Fan the flame!