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New Firestorm Costume & FURY OF FIRESTORM #0 Solicitation!

Lots of big news, Match-heads! First up, yesterday the solicitation was released for The Fury of Firestorm: The Nuclear Men #0 shipping in September! Firestorm gets a Zero Month issue! I’m totally jazzed! With the recent wave of cancellations, it’s a relief to see Firestorm will continue publishing.

In addition to getting a zero issue, it appears Firestorm has a new look! Check the cover below by Yildiray Cinar, Marlo Alquiza, and Hi-Fi! Click the image to enlarge!

Fury of Firestorm: The Nuclear Man #0 cover by Yildiray Cinar & Marlo Alquiza

Here is the solicitation featuring Joe Harris, Yildiray Cinar, Marlo Alquiza, and Hi-Fi!

The Fury of Firestorm: The Nulcear Men #0
Written by Joe Harris
Art and cover by Yildiray Cinar and Marlo Alquiza
On sale September 26 | 32 pg, FC, $2.99 US | RATED T

  • Jason Rusch and Ronnie Raymond try to return to civilian life after losing the power of the Firestorm Protocols…but when danger threatens them, will they be able to survive?
  • Is this the end of Firestorm?

Wow! How about that! The cover and solicitation suggests perhaps a merged Firestorm (similar to the classic costume). However, over on Facebook, writer Joe Harris warned, “All is not as it, well, seems… sorta.” I guess we’ll have to wait until September to find out! I can’t wait!

My thanks to the following Match-heads for sending news about Fury of Firestorm #0: Luke Jaconetti, Brandon Leonard, Shawn Foster, and Babos John.

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15 Comments

  1. liquidcross says:

    Not bad! Though I’m really getting sick of the TRON lines that are permeating so many modern costume designs. (It’s orders of magnitude worse at Marvel.)

  2. Luke says:

    I like it! Very much a modern and sleek update of the original costume. For some reason I really dig the circles on the shoulders. I also appreciate the Kirby Krackle in his fire hair.

  3. Martin Stein RIP says:

    I like it too.

    I’ve been following Shaggggggggggggggggggggggggg’s lead in not saying too much to dis the current template for the Nuclear Men that Ethan has created. There’s a lot to like, and as I’ve said repeatedly, I think it took guts to go so far off the beaten path with the concept. It certainly makes more sense than, say, the Elemental run which (I’m sorry, Shagggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg) was clearly an effort by John Ostrander to superimpose some other book onto an existing DC property. I’ve been trying to be supportive because I realize that the last thing we need for more Firestorm in the DC Universe is one more failed Firestorm book.

    That said….

    I really, really hope that with an integrated yellow-red costume that look much more like the classic look, and with the #0 numbering, this means a return to a more traditional approach to the character. I really, really hope this is the case. No Fury. No international Firestorms (it’s a fun storyline, but it’s a storyline that I would like to see with an arc and a conclusion). Just one true Firestorm, two people (three at the most) who make it up, and the classic look. Back to basics for reals this time.

    The reason I come to this conclusion is because when the F&W podcast replayed the Gerry Conway interview, I found his viewpoint— very diplomatically stated— very compelling. The original formula works best. A hothead in the driver seat, and a voice of reason as the disembodied mentor figure.

    I’ve never understood the need to mess with this formula. With Dan Jolley/Chris Cross, they took the merger idea and made it into something that made Firestorm weaker rather than stronger, having him merge with random crack addicts and derelicts. The “mentor” figure in his head had nothing to offer.

    A switching-back-and-forth between Jason and Ronnie makes more sense— you have a certain amount of contrast— but you still have the problem that neither one of them is entirely the voice of reason. This one I like okay, but not as much as Conway’s original vision.

    One thing I think could be cool is if Martin Stein survives as some sort of artificial intelligence or something. That way Stein doesn’t have to be a living person anymore, but Ronnie/Jason/whoever always has access to his intelligence when they’re Firestorm. That could be very interesting in my view. Call it a long-shot prediction. That could be the modern-day twist on Conway’s original concept and yet doesn’t violate DC’s “dead equals dead” mandate that seems to be in force.

    Anyhow, in conclusion, once more, because I know the powers-that-be do read this sometimes, please do consider using the #0 to bring about a return to a more traditional approach to this classic character. Something commensurate with the costume: just modernized enough, but still with the fundamental roots in place.

  4. I’m the biggest fan of the original suit – I think it’s one of the best designs in comics EVER…
    ..But this is a really cool update.
    Groovy, I says..

  5. Keith Samra says:

    Very nice indeed. Im liking the inks over Yildiray’s pencils. Looks very classic and updated at the same time! I would like DC Direct to make an action figure of this! With clear plastic-y, fire looking head and fore-arms… And a floaty Jason head… With Slipknot build-a-figure parts… Or a Slipknot mail away offer!

  6. Leenovak16 says:

    RIP Puffy Sleeves!

    I am really, really encouraged by this cover. If Joe Harris can somehow get this book back to being based on the “classic” Firestorm, I’d be ecstatic. Go back to the base core of what Firestorm is, and give it a little bit of a marketing push and I think you’d see a bit of a sales bump. Nothing approaching Batman/JLA levels of course, but a respectable little boost to keep it off the chopping block for the foreseeable future.

    I wasn’t collecting comics during the entire Jason Rusch series, and while I don’t have anything specifically against the character, he just doesn’t do much of anything for me. I am sure he has his fans, and that’s great, but in my own little perfect world, Jason becomes a new hero, something Firestorm-ish, but a different character. Different name, costume, etc….and goes off and joins the Teen Titans. Something where his fans can still follow his adventures, but get the Firestorm book back to the Raymond/Stein formula that worked so well for so long before people felt the need to “improve” on it.

    I loved Ethan Van Sciver’s enthusiasm for the book, and maybe his fundamental changes to the character would have worked better had Gail Simone not been shoehorned into the creative team, seemingly against her will. I like his idea of the rogue firestorms, though I wish they weren’t quite so common. I even liked the idea of the “Fury” entity and was willing to give that a fair chance until one word, “Sweetcheeks”. Ugh, why Gail, why?

    Anyway, Martin Stein RIP summed things up better than I could, so I’ll stop rambling. I really hope Harris and Cinar and company can turn the book around, this cover is certainly a step in the right direction. Good luck!

  7. Martin Stein RIP says:

    Actually, Lee, you summed up one thing better than I could— you zeroed in right on where the Fury concept lost me too— with the word “sweetcheeks.” The problem is that that word is so foreign to anyone who’s ever been associated with Firestorm that it takes away the solvability of what Fury is. It can’t be Prof. Stein because he would never use that word. And I don’t really “get” how it could be anything else (or would really care).

    Still, I would like to see what’s-her-name’s (Jason’s girlfriend) vision when she touched Fury addressed. I don’t like dangling bits of storyline like that.

  8. Leenovak16 says:

    I just wanted to mention one more thing I noticed, and it may be absolutely nothing, but it struck me as odd. If you look at all the other solicitations for the zero issues of established series, they all seem to focus on past events. If it’s okay with Shag to link this, the solicits can be found here:

    http://www.newsarama.com/comics/dc-comics-september-2012-solicitations.html

    With the exception of Firestorm, it seems like all the others deal with either retelling origins of a character or explaining some other pivotal past event in the lives of a main player in the book. Then you have Firestorm, which seems to me to be the only one where the “0” issue is actually focusing on present time events. Is there any specific reason for this? Probably not. But given the costume change to a more classically inspired version, I wonder if someone at DC editorial didn’t realize that the new take on Firestorm wasn’t working out and then decided to take advantage of the sales boost from the novelty of the zero issue and tell the creative team to treat the zero issue as less of a glimpse into the past and more of a “jumping on point – version 2″. Taking the book in a more traditional Firestorm direction, and hopefully keeping any new readers who may have been looking for that classic Firestorm 12 issues ago, and decided to give the book one more try based on the outstanding zero cover.

    Or, I’m just reading way too much into it. :)

  9. brandon leonard says:

    Hey all, I noticed something that I feel should be brought up. Remember promotional art for the justice league with blue characters on the left and red on the right? If not here it is again.
    http://665880566.r.lightningbase-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/jla-590×474.jpg
    Now up until this solicitation none of the current firestorms have resembled this firestorm shown, and the closest match seems to be the “zero issue firestorm”.
    Could it be that dc has had these plans for firestorm all along? Why put firestorm Under the justice league banner titles unless he would one day make the team or cross paths with them? If he wasn’t going to he would have been better suited for the Teen Banner.
    And DC released the FCBD issue which is setting up the trinity war, which has the remaining characters shown on the promo image. So if all these characters are going to be a big part of year two of the New 52, i can only imagine the amazing things that firestorm will be used for.
    Also way back when the image was released i Tweeted to Geoff Johns about firestorm and he responded saying that there where plans for firestorm with the Justice League
    Shagg-I cant find the post maybe you have it still?
    Anyways food for thought!

  10. brandon leonard says:

    http://firestormfan.com/2011/06/27/new-justice-league/
    turns out it was on the site a few months ago! Here you can see Geoffs response

  11. tigner says:

    my input for the Firestorm JLA thing….if it is a times past story…that Firestorm could possibly be the first Firestorm, Martin Stein. before the protocols were given to other nations or the rogue firestorms. (you’ll have to forgive me…i dropped this abomination of a book at issue 6 so i don’t know if a history of events has been laid out yet)

    secondly, on Firestorm issue 0, i firmly believe this is not the direction that Ethan planned….it may contain parts of his original plans, but i believe they made the merged Firestorm as part of a editorial change.

  12. Charlemagne says:

    Wonders if this danger in the solicit is finally the new Killer Frost coming in to play. I would love for this to finally be DC’s attempt to move Firestorm in a direction that most resembles the classic take. This is how is should have been all along (if that is what they are indeed doing).

  13. Martin Stein RIP says:

    It does raise a question, doesn’t it? So who is this Firestorm? If it’s not Ronnie or Jason (…well, it’s obviously not Jason….) then who? I like the idea of Martin Stein, the first and most complete Firestorm protocol.

    I don’t know if I could get behind someone completely, utterly, entirely new, either. I have Firestorm-New-Identity-Fatique (or FNIF, as it’s called in the DSM-IV).

    Of course, the solicit only presents Ronnie and Jason removed from the Firestorm protocols as a *starting point* for the story. Maybe it’s Ronnie-and-Jason-switching-off after all?

  14. Leenovak16 says:

    Didn’t Pozhar say something earlier in the series about knowing or working with Professor Stein? I don’t have the issues in front of me right now to check. But I can definitely see the face of this Firestorm as being Mikhail’s. A Mikhail/Stein Firestorm?

    I could get behind that. I really like the Mikhail character.

  15. Martin Stein RIP says:

    That could be badass. Two intellectual giants, but with widely divergent views of morality. That could be fiery indeed.

    I know this is pushing it… but I noticed that there are seven circles in Firestorm’s new uniform (the four on the chest, two on the shoulders and one in the headpiece). I wonder if this is a visual reference to the seven circles of hell and Dante’s Inferno. Firestorm looks very “infernal” in his new costume.

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