Feel like there should be more Deathstorms on that cover.

Today, we finally get to a book I'd been wanting for some time, just on the strength of the cover alone! From 2006, Firestorm #21, "Building a Better Firestorm, Book One: The Chalk Circle" Written by Stuart Moore, pencils by Jamal Igle and Eddy Barrows, inks by Rob Stull.

And we once again trot out the "crossover debris" tag, since this was an Infinite Crisis tie-in, as well as a callback to the original Crisis on Infinite Earths, as the issue opens with a flashback to Ronnie Raymond and Professor Stein's days as Firestorm. Jason Rusch was the current Firestorm, and had just gotten asskicked in Infinite Crisis #4, and his best friend Mick, as the other half of the Firestorm matrix, had died. Jason is saved by longtime floating head Professor Stein, who had been a "wandering galactic elemental" for the last several years. Stein asks about Ronnie, and offers to rebuild Jason's body, but doesn't seem broken up about Mick's death or Ronnie's: it's sad, but it was all just atoms, in the final analysis. (I couldn't tell you what had happened to Ronnie, and he's back since? I'm not up on Firestorm's current status, either.)

Back on earth, as various Crisis-related and opportunistic-crime events rage on the news, it's interrupted for Alvin Rusch, Jason's dad; by Air Wave and Donna Troy, broadcasting him a message from space with bad news. (I'm pretty sure Air Wave would be killed shortly; I don't think he got out of Infinite Crisis #4 either.) Meanwhile, Professor Stein explains a bit about the Firestorm Matrix, and Jason asks if he misses being human: no, since he got to see and do so much, even if there was loss. Jason has a brief vision of his friends and family, then Stein mentions the battle was going badly without him, and he would have to rebuild Jason's body and Firestorm--that might be a key point, but Jason interrupts: he couldn't do it alone. He asks Stein to help him, and he says no at first, but acquiesces, warning Jason that there had been days he and Ronnie "despised" each other...

I don't have a huge attachment to Firestorm, although I think I read his original series from around #65, for maybe a year or so. And I have a fond memory of getting the DC Universe Classics figure...that was completely wrong; I thought I bought him at K-Mart, and my records say nope! I also thought he was from the first series with Metamorpho, also no. Um, he's still a neat figure? Although I wish I'd got the later, I want to say DC Icons one, with swappable face plates for either Jason or Ronnie. Also wrong, it was the "Total Heroes Ultra" version. Ugh, how many times can I be wrong in a single post? Well, this issue would predate Deathstorm, so there's no way he'd be on the cover...that's it, I'm going back to bed.