Onslaught Reborn #1
Writer: Jeph Loeb
Artist: Rob Liefeld
$2.99

You’ve got to hand it to Marvel for revisiting this. The original 1996 “Heroes Reborn” mega-event, meant to relaunch several of Marvel’s flagship titles, was reviled by fans and all resulting changes were quickly abandoned. But there’s a sense within these pages that Rob Liefeld and Jeph Loeb want to set things right with the debacle that was “Heroes Reborn” — they’ve brought back Onslaught, tying his return to events from House of M — and for that they truly deserve to be commended. The resulting story is OK; Onslaught is after Franklin Richards (son of the Fantastic Four’s Reed and Sue), and he commandeers the bodies of Human Torch and Mr. Fantastic to get to him. It’s all been done before in other comics featuring an unstoppable bad-guy, but most surprising is the dialogue — this reads like Loeb wrote it on auto-pilot. There are some fun moments, but this isn’t essential by any stretch.
KFR Rating: C+

The Immortal Iron Fist #1
Writers: Ed Brubaker & Matt Fraction
Artists: David Aja / Travel Foreman & Derek Fridolfs (1-3)
$2.99

A suspenseful, action-packed success — if a little confusing. The fights are fast and furious from the start, and Brubaker does a nice job of recapping and reintroducing the character while moving his story forward. David Aja’s work is stunning — particularly the scenes of Iron Fist taking on an army of Hydra foot soldiers in the rain — and while his style is similar to Jae Lee’s, there’s a certain roughness to his pencils that add an extra element of danger. If the rest of the arc is this good, Iron Fist could be a real sleeper hit for Marvel.
KFR Rating: B+

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