Captain Atom & Fury of Firestorm (USA)

[Azrael]

Preview: The Fury of Firestorm: The Nuclear Men #12

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[Azrael]

Unlike so many of DC Comics' titles this month, "The Fury of Firestorm: the Nuclear Men" #12 ends on a note that seems well suited to the upcoming zero issue month. While "Firestorm" #0 is slated to reveal some of the past for the Nuclear Men, their present gets a tidy bow put on it as Jason Rusch and Ronnie Raymond manage to reconnect and stave off an attack from Pozhar.

Sure, some threads are left untucked and dangly, but from where else should continuity and character growth stem? Pozhar plays his hand, the international Firestorms get played and Ronnie and Jason let their bromance blossom. Around all of that, fight sequences pound in loud and spectacular, not giving the reader too much distraction beyond the nuclear powered slugfests that erupt across the pages, soaking up Hi-Fi's raucous coloring and offering readers plenty of opportunities to pick sides, cheer for characters and study all the different ways things could go wrong for someone bearing the Firestorm Protocols. This issue doesn't do much else to establish new storylines, choosing instead to focus on the characters, their struggles and the outcomes of those struggles.

Some of Joe Harris's dialog gets weird and overly flowery, such as "Pozhar's clinging to me like a dying star." I have no idea what that even means. It's pretty and poetic and fitting in a metaphoric way as Harris and Yildiray Cinar wind down their run, but how many readers can even imagine being clung to like a dying star, never mind the fact that this nugget is shared by Ronnie, the "big dumb jock" of this series.

With Yildiray Cinar receiving an assist from Daniel Hdr, the art is up and down, in and out and generally speaking, all over the place. "The Fury of Firestorm: the Nuclear Men" #12 opens with a flourish, but stumbles as it nears the conclusion, just like Candace Zither does in the waning pages of this chapter. The best art in the issue is appropriately placed at the grandest moments of the fights, celebrating the frightening absurdity of nuclear-powered beings being the life out of one another.

As issues of "The Fury of Firestorm: the Nuclear Men" go, this one is far from my favorite and far from the most memorable. It is, however, the one issue that does the most to advance the long-range story of Jason Rusch and Ronnie Raymond. With Harris and Cinar wrapping up their run, I find myself wondering where this series could have gone had they continued. In some ways, this feels like the end of the series, but knowing there is a zero issue coming up and Dan Jurgens comes on board a month after gives me hope there's still a lot of energy left in this nuclear solution.

2.5/5

CBR

[Azrael]

[Azrael]

THE FURY OF FIRESTORM: THE NUCLEAR MEN #15
Written by DAN JURGENS
Art and cover by DAN JURGENS and RAY McCARTHY
On sale JANUARY 2 • 32 pg, FC, $2.99 US • RATED T
• Firestorm vs. Captain Atom!
• Two of the most powerful heroes in the universe go head to head, and things are going to EXPLODE!
• Don't miss this issue's shocking conclusion as the first hints of a disturbing new force in the DCU are seen!

[Azrael]

Preview: Captain Atom #0

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[Azrael]

[Azrael]

J.T. Krul, Freddie Williams II and Jose Villarrubia's "Captain Atom" #0 wraps up the three creators' 13-issue "Captain Atom" series by backtracking to tell the title character's origin. Unfortunately, there's almost nothing here that wasn't already told to us in "Captain Atom" #1-12.

Krul's "Captain Atom" had already shown us a lot of glimpses of the transformation of the character, so seeing Nathaniel Adam volunteering for the project that rewrote his entire being lacks any sort of punch. It probably doesn't help that pre-Atom, Nathaniel Adam is a rather boring person. We never get any sense of a strong personality (or a personality at all); considering that he spends a lot of "Captain Atom" #1-12 worrying that he's losing his humanity, the fact that we see none of it on display in "Captain Atom" #0 feels unintentionally funny.

As for the rewriting of Captain Atom himself, the character's interpretation was forever altered after the publication of "Watchmen" and "Captain Atom" #0 liberally cribs from that playbook, even down to his slow rebuilding of his body over time. This doesn't feel like anything new; the previous twelve issues were all over the map but they'd at least felt a bit more original.

On the other hand, Williams and Villarrubia turn in one final issue of inspired insanity. I love the icy blue hues that Villarrubia uses to illustrate Williams unraveling lines; it feels like a strange cross between Frank Miller's current style and Rick Leonardi's superhero work. It's big and expressive, but often full of lots of little lines and details carefully etched onto the page. Even if you aren't reading the words, it's a neat book to look at; all the little shadows and loops on things like Doctor Megala's wheelchair or the eye-popping colors and swirls of Megala's M Theory demonstration are enough to justify the price of admission here.

It's too bad after last month's issue that "Captain Atom" #0 is wrapping up the series with such a whimper. The series was all over the place but it was at least going somewhere, and I wouldn't have been surprised if this issue had acted as an epilogue as well as prologue, perhaps with some sort of ouroboros effect that would have fit in well with what Krul had written. Still, the book looks great, if nothing else, but I think stopping one issue earlier would have been a slightly more dramatic final note.

2/5

CBR

[Azrael]

Preview: The Fury of Firestorm: The Nuclear Men #0

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[Red Lantern 00075]

Letto lo 0 di Firestorm, una delusione totale.

[Ikki di Phoenix]

Ma Capitan Atom non si era detto che chiudeva? Come mai hanno fatto ugualmente il numero 0?

[Azrael]

Ma Capitan Atom non si era detto che chiudeva? Come mai hanno fatto ugualmente il numero 0?

Infatti chiude con lo 0

[Harry Pym]

Ma Capitan Atom non si era detto che chiudeva? Come mai hanno fatto ugualmente il numero 0?

Infatti chiude con lo 0

Insieme a Voodoo

[Azrael]

THE FURY OF FIRESTORM: THE NUCLEAR MEN #16
Written by DAN JURGENS
Art and cover by DAN JURGENS and RAY McCARTHY
On sale JANUARY 30 • 32 pg, FC, $2.99 US • RATED T
• Firestorm is Public Enemy #1!
• Ronnie and Jason weren't exactly getting along before their super-powered alias became a fugitive, so this won't help matters at all!
• And to make things much worse, Firestorm has been targeted by N.O.W.H.E.R.E.!

[Azrael]

Preview: The Fury of Firestorm: The Nuclear Men #13

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[Lyer]

Sono strano io, lo so, ma avrei preferito che chiudesse Firestorm piuttosto che Cap..meglio nessuna delle due, ma dovendo scegliere... come sono gli ultimi numeri di Firestorm?? Almeno meritano?