The Fury of Firestorm #0

Firestorm #0 begins with Jason explaining to himself (or the reader (or his secret diary that his dad had better never find because of all the doodles of Ronnie Raymond with hearts around his head)) what science is. I actually think Rob Liefeld was much better at the elementary school report Narration Boxes. Did you hear that, Rob Liefeld? I just fucking complimented you! Sort of.

Do panties really get twisted? That sounds awfully uncomfortable. PS Jason Rusch wears panties.

This origin story takes place a full month after Jason and Ronnie walked off into the sunset in Issue #12. That makes this comic semi-unique (can I say semi-unique? Less unique than completely unique but not so unique as to actually be unique at all?) in that it's one of the few that take place in the present as opposed to flashbacking to the past. Or backpacking to Europe.

Jason and Ronnie are the only official Firestorms left after Zithertech killed the rest of them. Other Firestorms do remain. Like Pozhar and any of the Rogue Firestorms since their protocols were developed by Martin Stein and not Zithertech. At least I think they were. Well, whoever designed Pozhar's protocol developed them all because the Rogue Firestorm technology was stolen from Pozhar's lab. So they're basically Pozhar's bastard children. But Ronnie and Jason also seem to have lost their power after their encounter with Scorn. But have they forgotten their love?

Jason continues to try to bring the power back out and finally while fucking around with his science experiment, he creates some balloons out of the air. It's the first time he's used the power in a month and he rushes off to tell Ronnie the good news. Maybe they can merge again! He finds Ronnie at football practice.

You hope, Jason. Those locker rooms can get pretty homoerotic.

But now that everything is back to normal, the pressures of high school and fitting in and being macho are once again weighing on Ronnie. He can't have his family or friends or fans see him as he really is. So he breaks up with Jason.

Say it ain't so, Ronnie Raymond!

Ronnie heads off to face off against Wally Cleaver and Lumpy Rutherford at the big football game. Jason sits in the bleachers pining away for what they've lost. And then Helix suddenly appears. Remember Helix? He was the retarded, patriotic Firestorm that Fury killed many issues ago. He was my favorite character and I was super sad when he died. But now he's back to help Ronnie work through his identity crisis.

Don't deny your true self, Ronnie. You're only hurting Ronnie Raymond.

Jason runs out onto the field to protect his man. He grabs Ronnie by the wrist and Ronnie transforms into Firestorm! But Jason disappears. The two of them have merged like the Ronnie/Martin days of old. Now Jason is a disembodied intangible head hovering over Ronnie and helping him out. But Ronnie still cannot transmute things. That can only be done if Jason takes control of Ronnie's body. Which he does. And they defeat Helix together. Merged. As one.

The passion of merging sends their nuclear power out of control. Ronnie flies them into space where they explode in a fireball of ecstatic power.

I'll be at a wedding on Saturday and I get a surprise wedding today!

And so the new New 52 origin of Firestorm basically turns Firestorm back into the original Super Friends' Firestorm. And Ronnie and Jason finally realize that they should probably discuss their relationship.

I wish Ronnie's mom were here to see this.

The Fury of Firestorm: The Nuclear Men #0 Rating: Romantic.