(I originally read these comics in early/mid August 2016)
I planned to read the mid-'90s Heroes for Hire and Quicksilver titles together because they crossover at one point and there's quite a bit of overlap. Then I extended this to include the few Iron Fist limited series that were published before, during and after his HfH appearances. More comics were added along the way until they were rounded up to sixty issues. Quite the little reading project.
The Heroes for Hire series by John Ostrander sees Jim Hammond, the original Human Torch, head up a loose team of operatives in the wake of 'Onslaught', when most of Marvel's A-listers are missing, presumed dead. The team centres around Iron Fist as field leader, is backed by Namor's Oracle Inc. corporation, and comes to include Luke Cage, Hercules, Black Knight, Ant-Man (Scott Lang), She-Hulk and a new White Tiger, among others. Thankfully, Ostrander's jokey omniscient narration doesn't last.
Antagonism in the early issues comes courtesy of the lame Alpha Flight villain, the Master of the World. Intrigue is provided when Luke Cage seems to ally himself with the Master against his teammates. The Black Knight joins the team and his plots build upon those featured in his own earlier (somewhat crappy) one-shot comic. A troubled Hercules soon leaves for a routine, three-issue attempt at "finding himself" by Tom DeFalco and Ron Frenz. Plot threads from Ostrander's earlier Punisher series (reviewed here), are wrapped up in issues 8 and 9. Iron Fist leaves for a limited series of his own soon after. It's a decent tale by Dan Jurgens with great action art by Butch Guice, which returns Danny Rand's long-dead sister. However, it's as an agent of the H'ylthri plant people of K'un-Lun; her mission to retrieve the Scorpio Key. As for 'Fist's earlier two-issue series from 1996, there's not much to be said other than any efforts by writer James Felder are torpedoed by the eye-searingly hideous art of McFarlane-fellating mid-'90s Marvel hack Robert Brown.
The Quicksilver series begins when Exodus and his Acolytes (minor X-Men villains) attack the High Evolutionary's Citadel of Science on Mount Wundagore, in an attempt to wipe out non-pure mutants. The Evolutionary and his Knights, all of whom have been evolved from animals, are driven out and who should the Evolutionary entrust with their leadership than everybody's favourite, fleet-footed mutant, Pietro Maximoff, aka, Quicksilver. The Knights are a funny bunch, incorporating as they do a warrior tiger, a bear, a bulldog and a rat, amongst others. It's like having the Muppets or even a bunch of cereal mascots guest-starring.
Crystal the Inhuman returns from the 'Heroes Reborn' world in issue # 4, but before Pietro can rekindle things with his estranged wife the Black Knight (her ex-Avengers flame) turns up to challenge him for her affections. The series started to pick up for me with an adventure with the Inhumans from # 5 and with # 10 the series crosses over with Iron Man, Captain America and the Avengers for 'Live Kree or Die!', in which a band of renegade Kree seeks revenge for the destruction of their empire. That story references the Imperial Guard limited series which returns the Kree Supreme Intelligence after his supposed execution by the Avengers some years previously at the climax of 'Operation: Galactic Storm' (reviewed here). I had the series anyway so even though it meant skipping back eighteen months, I thought, what better time? (It turns out, any better time.) For the same reason, I tacked on the Gladiator/Supreme crossover that came out contemporaneously (for some reason big, purple bastards with blue mohawks were big in March '97), but it's a waste of paper - just one long fight scene.
The Heroes for Hire and Quicksilver series converge after this with the overlong 'Siege of Wundagore', Quicksilver long since having been taken over by HfH scribe Ostrander. The shared annual, which finally reveals the mystery of the White Tiger's origin (it's very silly), feels like the culmination of both series and so their subsequent issues feel superfluous. Heroes for Hire comes to an abrupt end as Namor pulls the plug on the team's funding.
Lingering plot threads from HfH are followed up on in the Iron Fist/Wolverine limited series, in which our heroes try to prevent the materialisation of K'un-Lun, the mystical city in which Danny was raised, on our plane of existence after his ill-considered summoning spell. However, the story throws in so many supporting heroes that Iron Fist almost gets lost in his own story.
The succeeding Iron Fist series, from 2004, starts off promisingly as Danny renounces his super-hero identity and gets involved in supernatural territory, but it's ultimately dull and drawn out. It's also drawn in a shitty manga style.
Iron Fist (1996) # 1/2, Iron Fist (1998) # 1-3, Iron Fist/Wolverine: The Return of K'un Lun (2000) # 1-4 and Iron Fist: Breathless (2004) # 106 are collected in:
Softcover:
Black Knight: Exodus (1996) is collected in:
Hardcover:
Softcover:
Marvel Fanfare (1996) # 6 and Heroes for Hire (1997) # 1-9 are collected in:
Softcover:
Heroes for Hire (1997) # 7 is collected in:
Softcover:
Heroes for Hire (1997) # 9 is collected in:
Softcover:
Heroes for Hire (1997) # 10/11 are collected in:
Softcover:
Quicksilver (1997) # 1-13, Heroes for Hire (1997) # 15/16 and Heroes for Hire & Quicksilver 1998 are collected in:
Softcover:
Iron Man (1998) # 7, Captain America (1998) # 8, Quicksilver (1997) # 10 and Avengers (1998) # 7 are collected in:
Hardcover:
Softcover:
