The Firestorms of Many Nations

[icon_uk]

An article, and some pretty new art from "The Fury of Firestorm, the Nuclear Men" is up at Newsarama, as the new writing team of Tony Harris and Ethan Van Sciver take over creative duties from the departing Gail Simone. It's well worth a read.

One of the more interesting ideas from this series is that the Firestorm Protocols are a genuinely international setup, much like the nuclear arms race, with countries developing their own Firestorm derived agents (Not sure if "heroes" is always going to be the appropriate term).

First up, after the American Firestorms we've met, is Pozhar, the Russian Firestorm...




Not sure if Pozhar is going to be a collective entity, or perhaps able to fission like the old Firestorm villain Multiplex, but he apparently developed the Firestorm Protocols with Martin Stein.

Pre DCnU, Pozhar was the name of a Russian superbeing, who was given fire based powers as a result of exposure during the Chernobyl disaster. He fought Firestorm and ended up becoming part of the Firestorm matrix, eventually becoming the sole personality

Not sure who the British Firestorm will be, or what name, but I'm guessing this is him down in front (judging by the colour scheme)



The lady is the DCnU Firehawk, who is the French Firestorm. Firehawk also has a long history in the Firestorm mythos pre-DCnU but this will presumably be a rather different take on the character.

I really like her appearance in this next cover, which also appears to spoil a couple of new member of the JLI.



And finally, meet Rakshasa, the Firestorm of India (One wonders how THAT will play out into the local international situation)





This is the cover to the latest issue, which shows a depowered Ronnie Raymond at the mercy of what appear to be a bunch of EVIL Firestorms... (There's a part of me that hopes they're called "The Radicals")

Comments

[thanekos]

Oh, nice.

I can't help but think all these Firestorms are why the first few issues's foes seemed like a best-of of Firestorm villains: the Hyena team, the lady who caught the cold, and Mr. Carmichael who really shouldn't think..

[daningram.insanejournal.com]

...why is every character a franchise now?

[icon_uk]

Firestorm seems a reasonable one to go down this route with, given the immediate parallels to the atomic arms race.

Plus it leads to interestng plot potential down the line, since India has a Firestorm, does Pakistan? What happens when a rogue nation gets a Firestorm.

[jlbarnett]

because if it works it makes sense to duplicate it. Both in universe and out of.

I'm hoping Booster Gold starts a Booster Corp soon.

[biod]

Time Cops: Agents of Awesome!

[icon_uk]

Chuck Dixon's original plan was for Ted Kord to franchise the Blue Beetle identity and for Tim Drake to take on the name after his split with Batman.

[kamino_neko]

(Not sure if "heroes" is always going to be the appropriate term).

Almost certainly not - even ignoring the rogue Firestorms (like the Quraci suicide-bomb from month before last, or (presumably) the lot on that cover (haven't read the issue, yet)), Pozhar is pushing it a bit (his heart seems to be in the right place, but his methods are uncomfortable), heck, even Jason and Ronnie going down a bad route, with their current setup.

Rakshasa's an interesting name choice for the Indian Firestorm, especially since the manifestation of her powers make her look more like a devi...

[turtlefu]

Rakshasa seems to suggest that she will not be a good guy, which is too bad.
But I like the idea of a new mainstream Indian hero.
Also, what is with mainstream Indian heroes having sun or fire-based powers? I don't think there is any special reason for India to be fire-based, other than "It can get hot there in the more desert-y areas"

Also, BOO new Firehawk!

[skemono]

I don't think I'd take the name "Rakshasa" too literally to imply anything other than "whoever named the character thought the word sounded cool". I mean, for one, I'm pretty sure that "rakshasa" is male, not female, so if we're basing information for the character solely off the name....

Also, which other Indian superheroes are you thinking of? I'm genuinely curious, 'cause I can't think of any off the top of my head.

[pyrotwilight]

Well Solstice had light powers and Maya (character in Justice League Europe had fire powers. Given the small amount of Indian superheroes as a whole I guess it might seem odd? Though I don't really think there's enough for a trend to exist.

[turtlefu]

Other than Solstice, there is also the X-Men Thunderbird. So, three, but considering there are probably a total of 4 or 5 Indian superheroes, I would say its significant.

[turtlefu]

True, a female Rakshasa is a Rakshasi.
Though considering she looks like Kali, I think this is just one big example of DID NOT DO THE RESEARCH.

[sun_man]

Love how DC totally ruined the Firestorm character. You know how to make a character lame? Create 100 other identical characters with matching powersetts.

[jlbarnett]

that's how they made GL awesome

[pyrotwilight]

While voicing displeasure is more than welcome try to not use terms like lame which are ableist and not condoned on SD.

[icon_uk]

Or alternately it's a rather clever way of ensuring that your hero, who is seems to be OVERpowered, has a steady stream of protagonists/antagonists who are on the same basic power level as he is, without having to come up with more and more elaborate origins.

[pyrotwilight]

Rakshasa seems neat and fun to see given how few Indian superheroes there tend to be.

[biod]

This is some really good design work. Like, really good. "I want that Rakshasa cover as a poster on my wall" good. I suppose I should expect the best from Van Sciver. I hope the story lives up to it.
Also: Yay, Firehawk's back! And French! Hurray for actually undoing some of the crap from the old DCU.

[quatoria]

Yeah, the aura she's manifesting is an excellent touch, and a bit more subtle than the usual route of just flat out giving the Indian hero extra arms. I really dig how it ended up looking.

[espanolbot]

On the one hand, yay for the increase in international superpeople, I worried that they might have decided to reduce the numbers down after Robinson and Morrison created more prior to the reboot, with only a few of the Batman Inc members and people the Shade is bumping into in his own series knocking about somewhere.

On the other hand, wow the power balance is really out of whack, considering who was revealled to be a superperson from Pakistan this week.

I am interested as to how close to the current administrations the Firestorms will go though. Will the Russian one be procured by the Russian mafia at some point or be used to reoccupy former Soviet territories, like with the attempted occupation of Georgia a few years ago? Will the French one be used to enforce some of the kind of racist policies their government has introduced in recent years, like the eviction of Roma from the country? And will the British one be rented out to arms companies and the like due to whatever underhand deal the administration may have going on at present?

Probably not, but if they could have Superman going to Iran to stop the government there from shooting people, they should be able to deal with other current issues as well.

[cyberxigbar]

...this might be the first time that I've ever been interested in picking up a Firestorm title. I wonder which hero will go international next, though (intended or not). Considering that he was already a government-created hero, I vote Captain Atom.

[jlbarnett]

you can't have a bunch of Dr. Manhattens. I don't even expect to see Major Force or Bombshell this time around

[lieut_kettch]

So it looks like that every nation with a nuclear arsenal also has a Firestorm. I'm betting the Israeli, Chinese and Pakistani Firestorms will be making an appearance soon. And maybe the hidden Iranian and North Korean Firestorms.

[kamino_neko]

It's been explicitly stated (in issue 3) that everyone with a nuclear program has a Firestorm (or is supposed to), and we've already seen the Chinese one (only one panel, but we saw him, way back in issue 1, as well as the French, British, Russian, and (current) American Firestorms).

And since Isreal does not officially acknowledge their nuclear arsenal, they wouldn't openly have a Firestorm, either. If for no other reason because that would be tantamount to admitting to having nukes.

North Korea, contrarily, is not only open, but quite vocal about their nuclear capability (which is actually fairly minor)...likewise, if they have a Firestorm there's no way they're keeping him a secret. (Unless they've botched the process, like the Americans did the first time around.)

Iran, I have no doubt, will be similarly open about having the bomb if their program ever yields anything, and, again, likewise, if they've acquired a rogue Firestorm, they'll be no quieter about it than Qurac has been. Of course, since Qurac is usually DC's stand-in for Iran, I'm not sure they'll bother acknowledging Iran at all for these purposes, just putting all of it on Qurac.

[pyrrhocorax]

Not sure if want Rakshasa? I mean, Indian superheros are good, but I find the Indian=blue skin and extra arms trend a bit uncomfortable. You don't make all characters from Christian dominated countries have halos and robes, do you?