(upbeat music)
If there's one thing you can rely on
from Netflix's Marvel shows,
it's that someone's gonna get their ass beaten
to a bloody pulp inside of a hallway,
and based on what we learned about Marvel's Iron Fist
at New York Comic-Con,
that show will uphold this proud tradition
when we meet the fourth and final Defender in March 2017.
But more so than many of the other Marvel characters
getting their own Netflix series,
people have been asking me, who is Iron Fist?
Why should they care?
Does he really have a gigantic chest tattoo?
Yes, he does.
Well, you're in luck,
because on today's episode of The Dan Cave,
I'm gonna tell you everything you need to know
about Iron Fist.
On its surface, Iron Fist may seem like yet another story
about an incredibly strong person
trying to hack out a living in New York City.
I know, right, this again?
The street level hero, though,
is a master of nearly every type of martial arts,
and though mortal, can push his body past its limits
by focusing his chi, or natural energy,
to give himself enhanced reflexes,
strength, speed, stamina and agility.
He can also use his energy to heal himself
at accelerated rates and presumably,
just by clenching everything all at once
like (grunts) please get better.
Furthermore, he can supercharge his body
by focusing all of his energy into his hand,
creating a mystical glowing fist
that can generate incredible power,
and as you may have guessed,
that's why they call him Iron Fist.
But for the sake of covering all our bases,
let's explain how and why this happened.
Created in 1974 by Roy Thomas and Gil Kane,
Iron Fist made his debut in Marvel Premiere number 15
as a direct response to the kung fu movie craze of the day.
And after all, as Carl Douglas assured us in song form,
literally everyone was kung fu fighting.
Everyone.
In fact, Roy Thomas revealed in an interview
that the first kung fu movie he saw
had something called, quote,
the Ceremony of the Iron Fist in it.
Cool, ceremony.
They then grafted these kung fu influences,
or "kung-fluences," as I like to call them,
onto an old Bill Everett character from the 1940s,
called Amazing Man, and thus, Iron Fist was born.
The classic origin's
one of tragic mountain climbing accidents,
billionaires and betrayals most foul.
Young Danny Rand, age nine, accompanied his father,
the wealthy businessman Wendell Rand,
his mother, Heather Rand,
and his father's business partner, Harold Meachum,
on an expedition to the Himalayas
to find the mystical city of K'un Lun,
or Koon Loon.
K'un Lun, I think.
K'un Lun.
I don't know, I don't know.
This is a real dilemma.
K'un Lun.
I'm the best.
Of course, and this is why I never go hiking,
the trip took a turn for the deadly
when Wendell slipped and fell off the path.
Dangling by a rope, Meachum was his only chance of survival,
which he took as the perfect time
to complete his transformation into both
Mr. Steal Yo Business, and Mr. Steal Yo Girl
by forcing Wendell to fall to his death,
and confessing his love to Heather.
Wow, dick move.
Thankfully, Heather rejected the sleezy offer,
and Meachum left her and her son to die,
which is exactly what Heather did
when a pack of hungry wolves attacked.
She sacrificed herself to save her son.
Jesus, and you thought this was gonna have a happy ending.
Alone and so very, very cold,
Danny was actually rescued by archers from K'un Lun
who took him back to the mystical city.
So, all in all, this is just like the worst
family vacation ever.
You might think you've had a worse one,
but I guarantee that you didn't,
unless your mom was torn apart by wolves,
and your dad's best friend let him die.
Now, normally a group of soldiers
absconding with a child to a hidden city
should be real cause for concern,
but the archers of K'un Lun took the newly minted orphan
to Yu-Ti, the hooded ruler of the city,
who then enrolled Danny as an apprentice
in Lei Kung the Thunderer's
Ass Kicking Academy for People Who Wanna Kick Ass.
That's not what it's actually called,
but that's basically the curriculum.
He didn't have to write persuasive essays,
so much as he had to fist buckets of sand and gravel
to make his hands stronger.
Yeah, and you thought your school sucked.
By age 19, Rand had become one of Lei Kung's
most gifted students, and actually earned an opportunity
to earn the power of the Iron Fist
by fighting and defeating the immortal dragon,
known as Shou-Lao the Undying.
Danny defeated this mystical creature
by pressing his chest to the dragon,
cutting the dragon off from its heart,
which lay in a magical flaming brazier across the room.
The encounter left Danny
with he worst thing a 19 year old can get,
a massive chest tattoo of a dragon.
Continuing this string of poor decision making,
Danny plunged his hand into the red-hot brazier,
and absorbed the power of the Iron Fist.
You know, that old chestnut.
That old, "Hey, what's in that bucket?
Is that a bucket full of molten dragon hearts
with mystical power?
Oh, cool, let's do it," chestnut.
Rather than remaining in K'un Lun as an immortal karate god,
Danny gave up eternal life to return to New York City
and avenge his parents.
You know, that old...
Wait, I already did that, sorry.
Back in New York, Danny sought revenge on Harold Meachum,
who'd actually been preparing for Rand's return
for the past decade.
Meachum welcomed Danny back by placing
a massive bounty on his head,
which led to goons like Scythe trying to murder him, yikes.
Eventually, though, Danny tracked down Meachum,
and found that he was a broken man,
a cripple who'd lost both his legs to frostbite,
because he got lost in the mountains
shortly after betraying everyone that he knew and loved.
And, rather than murder the poor, miserable bastard,
which is what Meachum really wanted,
Danny chose to let him live.
What a mature 19 year old, huh?
Of course, like anything in the Marvel Universe,
this would come back to bite Danny in the ass,
because when Meachum actually was murdered,
Danny got blamed for it,
but he eventually cleared his name
with the help of two tough as nails PIs,
the cyborg ex-cop, Misty Knight,
and the samurai, Colleen Wing.
And, those weren't the only people
Iron Fist teamed up with, either.
Over the years, he fought alongside
other martial artist heroes,
like the Sons of the Tiger,
and most famously had a partnership with Luke Cage
as the heroes for hire,
which is exactly what it sounds like.
You need a hero, you hire them.
It's like Postmates for justice.
Later, Rand also fought alongside the Avengers,
and even took over the mantle of Daredevil for a while,
while Matt Murdock was sorting out his life in prison.
(laughs) Classic Matt, right?
He's always getting up to crazy blind people stuff.
I mean, blind people be crazy.
So, what can you expect from the TV show?
Well, for starters, it's gonna be way less gritty
than Jessica Jones or Luke Cage was.
According to showrunner Scott Buck,
Iron Fist is a, quote, billionaire New York Buddhist
Monk martial arts superhero, end quote.
Which sounds like it'll make for
a lot less doom and gloom than the other Netflix shows,
but that doesn't mean there's gonna be any less ass-kicking.
We already know there's gonna be a hallway fight,
there's gonna Colleen Wing,
there's gonna be plenty of cool looking jumping punches.
But, most of all, I'd expect a straight-up adaptation
of Iron Fist's origin story,
with a few twists and turns threw in there
that may or may not lay the ground work
for the defenders, to boot.
And that, my friends, is Iron Fist in a nutshell.
But, tell me, what are your favorite Iron Fist stories?
What do you hope to see from the series?
Let me know in the comments below,
and give me an iron clad thumbs up while you're there.
Be sure to like and subscribe,
or else you might miss next week's show,
when we talk about the story of an outspoken young woman
in the English countryside, who meets a dreadlocked,
camouflaged, alien, murder-machine,
that also happens to be the man of her dreams
in Pride and Predator.
Until next time, keep on diggin'.
(spacey electronic music)