It’s going to be a small week for reviews because I sort of got distracted, apparently, and didn’t read many new comics. I’m going to be on vacation next week, and I think I was just ticking off these days to get through them. Anyway, here’s Fury of Firestorm,

Comic Book of the Week goes to The Fury of Firestorm #6 for an excellent finish to its first story arc! Can’t wait to see where we go next.

Meanwhile, I’m wrapping up Star Wars: Zero Company. It was a fun play, but far shorter than I was hoping for. I may do a second play through just to pad out my time. I’m still excited for the Wolverine game in the week ahead, even if the internet seems to be reveling in its okay-to-good reviews. I expect to still have fun with it, though it might also be shorter than I was hoping for. We’ll see!

Comic Reviews: The Fury of Firestorm #6.

The Fury of Firestorm #6
Writer: Jeff Lemire
Artist: Rafael De Latorre
Colorist: Marcelo Maiolo
Letterer: Lucas Gattoni

The first storyline comes to an exciting conclusion while kicking off the next story. I think this series got more than doubled to 15 issues, which is great news!

Lorraine and Professor Stein have entered the Matrix’s protective shell, and Martin hits it with his device. They are then sucked into the retro mind palace the Matrix has been using to contain Ronnie, and even though they get sucked into the ruse, their presence helps snap Ronnie out of it and they all escape into the Matrix itself. Firehawk tries to fight the Matrix, but it’s not until Ronnie agrees to join again with Professor Stein that they take back control. But Ronnie recognizes how dangerous Firestorm is and he flies into the sun.

But then something new/old rears its head.

Comic Rating: 9/10 – Great.

Excellent finale to the first storyline! There’s a lot of emotion built into what happens in this issue, all successfully developed over the first five. You can really feel it hit home when Ronnie has to confront Professor Stein and then work with him after all to save the day. Excellent way to wrap this up and you can feel every moment on the characters. The self-sacrifice was also an awesome way to end the issue, something so big that I didn’t see it coming. It fits for everything we’ve seen so far. Lemire did a great job wrapping up that retro mind prison in a fun way. I personally expected a bit more of a fight with the Matrix, but this also definitely works. I just think this was a very well-crafted finale that tied up all the loose ends, while delivering the emotional punch we’d been building toward all series long.

The artwork is excellent as well. It’s a classic comic book style, and De Latorre then goes above and beyond in recreating the classic, full-color style of the Golden Age. There’s not much he can do to make the classic Firestorm costume look cool, but the man does what he can.

And overall, I’d like to say that these six issues have done so much to elevate all of the characters in the Firestorm world for me. I couldn’t give two craps about Firestorm before this. He was a dorky looking characters who has never mattered. But hot damn, I want to see so much more of him after this! Some people might call this series a character assassination of Professor Martin Stein, but I couldn’t care less about that. He’s really cool as this asshole who ended up doing some good with his bad ideas. I’d love to read an ongoing series where Ronnie and Stein have to work together despite the new animosity. And Firehawk is cool as hell! I thought she looked cool when I first encountered the character way back in Identity Crisis, I think, but now I know about her for real and would love to see more of her in action.

This series has done so so much to boost Firestorm as a whole thing.

TL;DR: The first storyline wraps up in all the exciting and emotional ways one could hope for, that the series has been building toward from the beginning. Such a great Firestorm revival overall.

The comics I review in my Hench-Sized reviews are just the usual comics I grab from Comixology any given week, along with a few impulse buys I might try on a whim. So if there are any comics or series you’d like me to review each week, let me know in the comments.

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