IRON FIST: MORE OF HIS 1970s STORIES

This weekend’s light-hearted, escapist superhero post here on Balladeer’s Blog continues from my 2021 look at the earliest Iron Fist martial arts stories.

MARVEL PREMIERE Vol 1 #25 (Oct 1975)

Title: Morning of the Mindstorm

Villains: Angar the Screamer and Khumbala Bey

Synopsis: This issue picks up right after Iron Fist (Danny Rand) stopped the Skrull robot called the Monstroid before it could kill Princess Azir from Marvel’s fictional Arabic nation Halwan. Lt. Rafael Scarfe and the rest of Azir’s New York City police bodyguards are grateful, but the princess’s hulking Halwan bodyguard Khumbala Bey feels shamed and attacks Iron Fist.

Soon, Azir stops the fight and returns to the Halwan consulate in New York City. Next, Iron Fist learns that Colleen Wing has been abducted by minions of his archenemy Master Khan, who is secretly running a plot in Halwan. On Master Khan’s orders, Daredevil and the Black Widow’s old foe Angar attacks our hero with his Mindstorms. Iron Fist defeats the villain.

IRON FIST Vol 1 #1 (Nov 1975)

Title: A Duel of Iron

Villain: Master Khan

NOTE: Iron Fist has graduated from Marvel Premiere to his own series beginning with this issue.

Synopsis: Iron Fist and his African American love interest, bionic-armed Misty Knight, are both searching for Colleen Wing. For the first time we readers are told that the business run by Colleen and Misty is called Knightwing Restorations.

Clues lead them to Master Khan agents working for Stark International at the company’s Long Island headquarters. When Iron Fist and Misty covertly enter the premises, Iron Man attacks them since they are intruders.

Iron Fist and Iron Man fight it out while Misty learns that the men who took Colleen are trying to transport her to Halwan. Iron Man, Iron Fist and Misty Knight part on good terms after the misunderstanding.   

IRON FIST Vol 1 #2 (Dec 1975)

Title: Valley of the Damned

Villains: The H’ylthri

Synopsis: While Misty Knight and Police Lt. Scarfe work their contacts to get a lead on Colleen’s abductors, Iron Fist, as Danny Rand, visits Colleen’s father Professor Lee Wing at the hospital. Lee is still recovering from being injured when Master Khan’s men took his daughter.

Most of the story is a flashback to when Iron Fist learned he had a half-sister named Miranda Rand back in the enchanted city of K’un Lun, which appears on Earth only one day every ten years. Miranda was an outlaw for having learned kung-fu, which Yu-Ti, the August Personage of Jade, has forbidden to women in K’un Lun. She and Iron Fist fought the H’ylthri, a hostile race of plant beings who share K’un Lun’s pocket dimension.   

IRON FIST Vol 1 #3 (Feb 1976)

Title: The City’s Not for Burning

Villain: Ravager

Synopsis: Danny Rand and Misty Knight arrive at London’s Heathrow Airport since Misty’s informants indicated that London was one of the stops Colleen Wing’s abductors made on the way to Halwan. An atomic powered villain called Ravager destroys the jet after landing as a terrorist action to demand the British government provide him with more fissionable materials. 

Danny becomes Iron Fist and battles Ravager, who escapes. Misty and other injured passengers are hospitalized. Witnessing their suffering at the hospital, Danny wants Ravager to pay. He again dons his costume and finds the villain at London’s General Post Office Tower. From her hospital bed, Misty watches news coverage of the mammoth battle between Iron Fist and Ravage, which ends in a colossal explosion.

IRON FIST Vol 1 #4 (Apr 1976)

Title: The Rampage of Radion

Villain: Radion (Ravager)

Synopsis: With Ravager’s armor now destroyed, it is revealed he is really Radion, the former foe of Thor and the Thing. He escapes, leaving Iron Fist behind, suffering from radiation poisoning. Writer Chris Claremont suddenly has the power of the Iron Fist be capable of healing radiation poisoning so our hero is okay.

In New York City, Joy Meachum and her villainous uncle Ward Meachum watch the news coverage of the Iron Fist vs Ravager fight. With them is their new hireling from K’un Lun – Lei Kung the Thunderer’s son Steel Serpent II (Davos). In London, our hero tracks down Radion and during their fight knocks him into a radiation machine that cures him of his atomic powers. 

MASTER OF KUNG FU ANNUAL Vol 1 #1 (April 1976)

Title: The Fortress of Sahra Sharn

Villain: Quan-St’ar

Synopsis: While searching for clues about Colleen, Iron Fist meets Shang-Chi in London, where they walk the streets and discuss each other’s origin stories. They wind up getting attacked on Lambeth Bridge by over two dozen martial artists of all races. Our heroes get teleported by their attackers’ boss, the black sorcerer Quan-St’ar, to his interdimensional kingdom call Sahra-Sharn. 

Just as K’un-Lun embodies noble aspirations and is sought out by Earth people who share its ideals and desire to live there, so is Sahra-Sharn sought out by malevolent Earth people who desire to live in the depraved and vile city.

Quan-St’ar wanted the current wielder of the Iron Fist out of the way while he led Sahra-Sharn’s evil denizens in a war to destroy K’un Lun. Iron Fist and Shang-Chi escape imprisonment, thwart Quan-St’ar’s plans and are returned to Earth.

IRON FIST Vol 1 #5 (Jun 1976)

Title: When Slays the Scimitar

Villain: Scimitar

Synopsis: In London’s Golladay Mews, Iron Fist meets with an informant who supposedly knows how Colleen Wing’s abductors got her from England to the reclusive, land-locked north African nation of Halwan. It turns out to be a trap set by Master Khan’s newest supervillain minion, Scimitar. That villain and his men attack Iron Fist.

After an extended running fight through London’s streets and train system, our hero defeats Scimitar and his thugs. Meanwhile, in Halwan, Master Khan and Angar have at last broken Colleen’s willpower and turned her into a tool for assassinating Iron Fist.

IRON FIST Vol 1 #6 (Aug 1976)

Title: Death-Match

Villains: Master Khan and Angar the Screamer

Synopsis: Iron Fist and Misty Knight now know the exact location of Master Khan’s palace in Halwan where he is holding Colleen.

NOTE: Despite the cover’s misleading wording, Iron Fist and Colleen Wing have been close like a brother and sister, not romantically. 

Knightwing Restorations’ biggest client, billionaire Jeryn Hogarth (making his first ever appearance), has the all-female crew of his private jet drop Iron Fist off high above the site.

Iron Fist hang-glides down to the palace and surreptitiously fights his way from the roof down to where Colleen is being held. She tries to kill him per Master Khan’s plans. During the battle, Yu-Ti, the August Personage of Jade, watches via the Great Gem in K’un Lun.

At length, to avoid having to kill Colleen, Iron Fist uses his power to meld his and Colleen’s minds together, freeing her from Master Khan’s control and setting up a mental rapport between the two from then on. (Writer Chris Claremont would eventually do a similar “psychic rapport” between Cyclops and Phoenix in The X-Men.) No sooner is the mind-link established than Master Khan and Angar race in to kill Iron Fist and Colleen.

IRON FIST Vol 1 #7 (September 1976)

Title: Iron Fist Must Die

Villains: Master Khan, Angar and Khumbala Bey

Synopsis: Iron Fist and Colleen Wing fight Angar as well as Master Khan’s Halwanese soldiers.

Khumbala Bey, now working for Master Khan, attacks Iron Fist while Colleen and Angar clash. Colleen uses her samurai sword to cripple Angar for life and Iron Fist takes down Khumbala Bey.

That leaves Master Khan, who uses his ancient sorcery against our hero’s martial arts powers. At length, the villain tries to talk Iron Fist into joining forces with him against K’un Lun’s ruler Yu-Ti, whom Khan reveals to Danny could have saved his mother from the wolves that killed her but chose not to.

The villain opens up two-way communication with Yu-Ti, who is still watching from K’un Lun. Iron Fist pleads with Yu-Ti to deny Khan’s accusation but his silence says it all.

Despite that shocking revelation, Iron Fist continues fighting Master Khan, destroying the portal he wanted to use to return to K’un Lun. A side effect of that destruction causes Master Khan to be sucked away to an unknown dimension.

Epilogue: Danny and Colleen come to terms with their awkward, newfound knowledge of each other’s most intimate thoughts due to the temporary mind-meld and leave Halwan.

DEADLY HANDS OF KUNG FU Vol 1 #29 (October 1976)

Title: To Slay the Savior

Villains: The Cadre of Salvation

Synopsis: In London, Iron Fist and Shang-Chi are separately lured to a subterranean installation that was used by Shang-Chi’s evil father Fu Manchu years earlier. NOTE: In the 1970s, Marvel created Shang-Chi as the rebellious son of Fu Manchu to star in their licensed Sax Rohmer comic book series.

In the labyrinthine tunnels leading to the subterranean facility Iron Fist and Shang separately fight their way through multiple opponents. At length they reach the underground base and learn they proved their abilities. The pair are offered positions as agents for the Cadre of Salvation.

That organization is led by Blevins, a former operative of Sir Denis Nayland-Smith, Fu Manchu’s secret agent adversary. Blevins and his organization believe that the western world has grown soft toward the menace of Communist China and Asian adversaries like Fu Manchu, the Mandarin, the Yellow Claw, etc.   

Our heroes refuse to join the jingoistic Cadre of Salvation and are forced to fight each other to spare the life of a hostage. Iron Fist and Shang-Chi fake the fighting long enough to turn the tables, defeat all of Blevins’ troops and stop their agents who were sent to blow up the Parliament Building.

IRON FIST Vol 1 #8 (Oct 1976)

Title: Like Tigers in the Night

Villains: The Golden Tigers

Synopsis: Months have passed. Iron Fist, Misty and Colleen are back in New York City, where billionaire lawyer Jeryn Hogarth is representing Danny Rand in his efforts to take his half of Rand-Meachum, which he inherited from his father. (The Meachums do not know Danny is Iron Fist.)

As Iron Fist, Danny gets drawn into a war with the Golden Tigers, a masked Asian gang of male and female martial artists who want control of Chinatown’s criminal activity. By comic book coincidence, the Golden Tigers show up during a meeting between Danny, Misty and Jeryn on one side and Joy Meachum, Ward Meachum and their lawyers on the other. The gang holds the tycoons hostage. 

IRON FIST Vol 1 #9 (Nov 1976)

Title: The Dragon Dies at Dawn

Villains: The Golden Tigers

Synopsis: It turns out the Golden Tigers want the ransom to make up for criminal proceeds that they say Ward Meachum double-crossed them out of. This increases Joy Meachum’s suspicions of her Uncle Ward’s sleaziness. Danny Rand pretends to get defeated by one of the Golden Tigers but really slips away to become Iron Fist.

Our hero drives them off, and that night tracks them down and fights them again. The Golden Tigers leader Robert Hao (secretly the brother of District Attorney Bill Hao) injects Iron Fist with a slow-acting poison and makes the hero fight his way through the gang to reach the cure. 

IRON FIST Vol 1 #10 (Dec 1976)

Title: Kung Fu Killer

Villains: The Golden Tigers

Synopsis: Robert Hao, the Golden Tigers’ leader, has framed Iron Fist for killing his brother Bill, one of the DAs. Lieutenant Rafael Scarfe finds Bill alive but injured, then has him hospitalized while letting the public think he is dead so Scarfe can compile evidence against the overconfident Golden Tigers.

Meanwhile, Iron Fist, Misty Knight and Colleen Wing have been clashing with that gang throughout Chinatown. Ultimately, the Golden Tigers are defeated, Lieutenant Scarfe has enough for convictions of the gang and Iron Fist is cleared, since Bill Hao has been alive this whole time. 

DEADLY HANDS OF KUNG FU Vol 1 #31 (December 1976)

Title: Dark Waters of Death

Villains: Stryke and the Corporation

Synopsis: Shang-Chi visits Iron Fist in New York City, where Danny Rand plans to entertain Shang for a few days. The pair drop by Knightwing Restorations’ office where they find Misty Knight working late. Iron Fist and Shang-Chi thus get caught up in a mission to stop a massive drug shipment from being brought into NYC by the Corporation (a lesser version of Hydra, the Maggia and A.I.M.).

This was a crossover story among several of Marvel’s then-current kung fu heroes as the White Tiger and Jack of Hearts help Iron Fist, Shang-Chi, Misty Knight and Blackbyrd in raiding the ship. The Corporation and their supervillain mercenary Stryke were defeated and the enormous cargo of narcotics was destroyed when the vessel exploded.

IRON FIST Vol 1 #11 (Feb 1977)

Title: A Fine Day’s Dying

Villains: The Wrecking Crew (The Wrecker, Thunderball, Piledriver and Bulldozer)

Synopsis: Danny Rand and Misty Knight visit Professor Lee Wing, who has been hospitalized for memory loss and other issues with aging. They meet Misty’s roommate Jean Grey (Phoenix) who is being sent home with Scott Summers (Cyclops) after at last recovering from her own injuries in X-Men #100-101.

Before long, Iron Fist is clashing with the reassembled Wrecking Crew, old foes of the Defenders. He manages to survive his first encounter with them, but in the rematch they take Misty Knight hostage and demand that Iron Fist break into Avengers Mansion and disable the security systems so they can slip in and kill the Wrecker’s old foe Thor before attacking the Defenders.

IRON FIST Vol 1 #12 (Apr 1977)

Title: Assault on Avengers Mansion

Villains: The Wrecking Crew

Synopsis: Iron Fist’s skill lets him enter Avengers Mansion without setting off the alarms. His presence startles Jarvis, who falls down, which convinces Captain America, the sole Avenger in the mansion that night because he’s on monitor duty, that Iron Fist attacked the butler.

Captain America and Iron Fist fight until the latter convinces Cap about why he’s there. The pair then lie in wait for the Wrecking Crew, letting them and their hostage Misty Knight into the mansion as if Iron Fist has kept to their deal.

Misty is released, then Cap and Iron Fist lock the villains in the Avengers’ training room set for Thor’s level of training. Between the Thor-level weapons systems and our two heroes, the Wrecking Crew are defeated and turned over to the authorities.

MARVEL TWO-IN-ONE Vol 1 #25 (March 1977)

Title: A Tale of Two Countries

Villains: General Chonga and his troops

Synopsis: Kaiwann, an Asian Pacific island off the coast of Manchuria, is home to two separate nations, just like the Caribbean island of Hispaniola is home to both Haiti and the Dominican Republic.

Those two nations – whose names we are never told – have been at war for centuries, but recently a political marriage has been arranged between the young and beautiful Queen Sen of one country and the elderly Gracious One, ruler of the other country. General Chonga, wanting Queen Sen for himself, launched a coup and abducted the queen.

Prince Dragon, the handsome young prince who had been betrothed to Queen Sen until the political marriage was decided upon, recruits martial arts superhero Iron Fist and the famed fighter the Thing to rescue Queen Sen from Chonga and his army.

The heroes – accompanied by Prince Dragon’s warrior S’Kari – defeat Chonga’s forces in and around the Temple at the Ridge of Four Hells (volcanoes) on Kaiwann. The princess is rescued, the coup put down and, despite their love for one another, Queen Sen and Prince Dragon still let her political marriage to the elderly Gracious One go through in order to bring peace to the island after centuries of warfare.

NOTE: Believe it or not, Marvel has never used Kaiwann in any story ever again as of this writing. If anything, you’d think they’d have used Prince Dragon’s martial arts superhero, the blind swordsman S’Kari (left), as a character in some of their Kung Fu publications in the 1970s.

Considering how Japan’s fictional Zatoichi the blind swordsman has appeared in literally hundreds of stories since the 1960s I’m betting S’Kari, with his “other-senses” of some kind, could have become as popular as Iron Fist or Shang-Chi. 

IRON FIST Vol 1 #13 (Jun 1977)

Title: Target: Iron Fist

Villain: Boomerang

Synopsis: Misty informs Danny that she is going undercover on a Knightwing Restorations case involving Caribbean drug kingpin John Bushmaster.

Soon, Danny must become Iron Fist to save a ship full of passengers from the Hulk’s old foe Boomerang. The villain has been hired to kill former IRA man Alan Cavenaugh, one of the passengers.

Elsewhere, Steel Serpent (at right) has completed his deal with Joy Meachum to prove to her that her uncle Ward is involved in illegal pursuits. He roughs up Ward’s bodyguards and tells him he’s quitting. He plans to take on Iron Fist next. Back with Iron Fist, he outfights Boomerang and turns him in.

Ward Meachum replaces his hireling Steel Serpent with a Canadian mutant called Sabretooth. NOTE: Yes, the final panel of this issue marks Sabretooth’s VERY FIRST appearance even though he would be retconned into an old foe of Wolverine years later. 

IRON FIST Vol 1 #14 (Aug 1976)

Title: Snowfire

Villains: Sabretooth and Steel Serpent

Synopsis: Steel Serpent attacks Iron Fist one night and tries to steal the power of the Iron Fist from him. Realizing he underestimated Danny, he withdraws, determined to strike another day. Colleen Wing calls our hero to Canada for help recovering billionaire Jeryn Hogarth, who was kidnapped by Sabretooth and other Ward Meachum thugs.

Iron Fist and Colleen clash with the villains and learn they kidnapped Hogarth – Colleen and Misty’s employer – to lure Iron Fist across the border so Sabretooth could kill him. Naturally the duo defeat all the bad guys and turn them over to the Canadian authorities.     

NOTE: Chris Claremont was sowing seeds about Sabretooth’s connection to Wolverine by having him call people “Bub”. 

IRON FIST Vol 1 #15 (Sep 1977)

Title: Enter, the X-Men

Villains: The X-Men

Synopsis: Iron Fist visits Misty Knight and Jean Grey’s fifth-floor apartment in New York City. He enters in costume from the rooftop, unaware he’s been spotted by an X-Man across the street. Misty, Iron Fist’s romantic partner, is in the Caribbean on a mission against the supervillain Bushmaster and the apartment is set up for a party that night. Unknown to Iron Fist/ Danny Rand, Misty’s roommate Jean (Phoenix) and her boyfriend Scott (Cyclops) have stepped out for some last-minute purchases related to the party. 

On the streets outside the apartment, Wolverine, in civilian clothes, was the first partygoer to arrive because, since he is still lusting after Jean Grey at this point, he was hoping to talk to her alone before the other guests arrived. He was contemplating her and looking at a picture of her with Scott. He jealously slices off Scott’s half of the picture, leaving just Jean in the photo.

NOTE: Yes, this is the torn photo of Jean that Wolverine carries around with him for several issues of The X-Men, stealing looks at it at various times, like in their upcoming adventures in the Savage Land.

Anyway, while pondering all this and the fact that he still does not YET feel close enough to any of the X-Men to tell them that his real name is Logan, he spotted Iron Fist as just a shadowy costumed figure covertly entering the apartment via the skylight.

Assuming that it’s a supervillain or burglar he gets into his temporary new costume (the one he stole from the Shi’Ar Imperial Guard), charges across the street, and bursts through the door of Jean and Misty’s apartment, demanding to know what Iron Fist is doing in “my woman’s place.” Since Iron Fist knows that Jean is involved with Scott Summers, he mistakenly and jealously thinks that Wolverine is calling Misty Knight “his” woman. 

The two fight it out for awhile until Iron Fist manages to knock Wolverine through the balcony window and to the streets below, where the arriving Nightcrawler teleports to his rescue. Kurt has arrived with Peter (Colossus) and was discussing with him that he no longer wants to use Tony Stark’s Image Inducer to hide his real appearance. Peter was siding with Professor X’s view that Kurt should keep using it to help the X-Men keep a low profile in public.

Wolverine has Colossus serve up a Fastball Special which hurls the Canadian back up to the apartment to resume his fight with Iron Fist. Nightcrawler begins fighting Danny, too, compounding the misunderstanding.

While Iron Fist holds his own against both Wolverine and Nightcrawler, Colossus reaches the 5th floor apartment and rushes to help his teammates. He now battles Danny and we readers see that the power of the Iron Fist is strong enough to knock the incredibly strong Colossus partway through a wall, but certainly not strong enough to knock him out.

Next, Storm arrives in costume but switches to formal wear. She quickly switches back to her battle suit and attacks Iron Fist, who must dodge her lightning bolts.

Banshee and Moira MacTaggert are approaching Jean’s building now, while discussing the future of their relationship and how Moira wants to show some delicacy toward Charles Xavier’s feelings given their past together. They spot Storm’s lightning bolts and Banshee gets into costume and flies to the attack.

Banshee now tangles with Iron Fist for awhile, then teamwork between Storm and Colossus lets them capture Danny.

Colossus is holding Iron Fist motionless while Wolverine threatens him with his claws, starting to interrogate him about what’s going on, when Jean and Scott return.

Jean turns into Phoenix and uses her powers to separate the combatants and explains that Iron Fist is really Danny Rand, her roommate Misty’s boyfriend. So now ALL the X-Men and Iron Fist know each others’ secret identities.

Everyone calms down, then they clean up the place, get back into civilian clothing and go through with the party.

Charles Xavier and his romantic partner, the Shi’Ar Empress Lilandra show up as guests, too. As it gets late, Jean and Misty’s landlord shows up wanting to evict them over this second round of damage to the building. (The first was when Firelord attacked, of course.) Since Rand-Meachum owns the building, Danny, who is recognized by the landlord, steps in to ensure that Jean and Misty will not get evicted.

NOTE: This was the last issue of Iron Fist’s solo 1970s series due to low sales.

He would move right over to Power Man’s series, which would be renamed Power Man and Iron Fist and last for several more years. The subplot about Misty Knight investigating John Bushmaster (at right) would be resolved over in that series.