Written by: Jason Aaron
Art by: Andrea Sorrentino, Justin Ponsor, Erik Arciniega, and VC’s Cory Petit
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: January 23, 2019

It’s time to jump back to 1,000,000 BC again and this time we catch up with Iron Fist. Yep, the Avengers take another somewhat break and while I’m a fan of finishing what you started, this whole BC Avengers thing feels like a train that left the station a while ago.

We start off being introduced to Fan Fei who is not in a good situation…she is in chains for teaching Kung Fu to Cavemen. While that sounds funny just reading that, nothing here is that funny, or fun…or unfortunately, necessary.

For one, this is a pretty standard Iron Fist origin. Yea, the names have changed but the song remains the same. We see her meet the challenge of Shou-Lao and because of that is exiled from K’un-Lun. Then she deals with Mephisto and has a long, drawn-out fight with Gorgilla and the Power Stone. After all of that, instead of accepting her place back in the K’un-Lun, she decides to walk the land like Kane from Kung Fu and join up with the other BC Avengers.

The biggest problem I have with all this is it feels 7 issues too late. We’ve dealt with the Dark Celestials back in the first arc of this book and until I see that I need to start caring about this, I just don’t. In a book that has had problems getting traction lately, this detour back to BC was not welcome and really threw me off. All that said, my biggest problem was that everything here was just a chore to get through. The narration, characters and even the action was a snooze fest and I had a really hard time staying invested throughout.

I usually love Sorrentino’s art, but this looked rushed and just wasn’t nearly as good as I usually expect. No interesting panel layouts and the who thing had a sparse feeling that didn’t seem right.

Final Thoughts:

Going back to 1,000,000 BC at this point in the run felt seven issues too late. We get an Iron Fist origin that was a chore to get through and didn’t feel important at all. In a book that has been struggling to stay focused, this trip backwards didn’t help.

4.0/10