Iron Fist: The Worst Marvel-Netflix Series

Warning: SPOILERS for Iron Fist ahead

Marvel’s Iron Fist has finally arrived on Netflix, introducing the final Marvel hero poised to become a part of the upcoming team-up series The Defenders, and Marvel finds itself in a rare position of having to defend its newest series from a medley of unflattering reviews and reactions. Many fans have argued since Iron Fist‘s began production that comic book canon should have been eschewed and an Asian-American actor should have been cast as its titular hero Danny Rand instead of former Game of Thrones‘ actor Finn Jones, to avoid dragging the source material’s outdated tropes into the 21st century. The reviews for the first six episodes critics were allowed to see early were even more damning: a 17% Rotten rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and a sweeping consensus that Iron Fist is just not a good show, ironically packing the weakest punch of Marvel’s Netflix series.

Is Iron Fist really the worst of the Marvel shows found on Netflix thus far? Perhaps it was unfair to make such a declaration based on 6 out of 13 hours of the series without fully understanding the full scope of the story and witnessing what surprises the latter half of the season had in store. With that in mind, binging the complete series is the only way to properly absorb Iron Fist and gauge its worthiness, especially judged against its predecessors – Daredevil, Jessica Jones and Luke Cage.

Iron Fist centers around Danny Rand, a billionaire who was presumed killed in a plane crash in the Himalayas. Fifteen years later, Danny returns to New York City to claim his place in his family’s company, Rand Enterprises, which is now run by his childhood friends Ward Meachum (Tom Pelphrey) and Joy Meachum (Jessica Stroup). Danny must prove his identity as the heir to the Rand corporation, and explain where he’s been – not an easy task, since it’s a pretty strange story.

Following the plane crash, Danny was taken in by a cabal of warrior monks to live in an other-dimensional monastery named K’un-Lun, where he was trained in martial arts. Danny eventually claimed the mantle of the Immortal Iron Fist, becoming the Living Weapon charged with protecting K’un-Lun, but he abandoned his duties and returned to New York. As the series progresses, Danny encounters the machinations of the Hand, the ancient enemy of K’un-Lun, in New York City. Danny makes new friends, like Claire Temple (Rosario Dawson), and gains a partner and a lover in Colleen Wing (Jessica Henwick) – a martial arts teacher harboring a secret.