"Being His Own Iron Fist"
"BEING HIS OWN IRON FIST"
Unlike many fans of the Marvel Netflix (aka Defenders) franchise, I actually enjoyed its fourth series, "IRON FIST" very much. Especially Season One. I managed to enjoy the series up until the moment when Danny Rand decided that his girlfriend and martial artist, Colleen Wing, should become the new Iron Fist. After that . . . oh dear God.
Following the end of Season One, M. Raven Metzner replaced series creator Scott Buck as the series' new show runner. One of his decisions was to end the second season with Danny convincing Colleen to become the new Iron Fist once they are able to take away the abilities associated with the title from his former best friend-turned-nemesis, Davos. Personally, I found this decision rather mind boggling. I had wanted to see Danny finally embark upon a journey in which he would develop into being the Iron Fist . . . "HIS WAY".
From what I had gathered from flashbacks during Season Two, members of the Order of the Crane Mother had never expected Danny to win the position of becoming the Iron Fist. He was "the outsider" and not a favored son like his friend Davos. Once Danny became the Iron Fist, his K'un-Lun masters gave him a list of rules on what he was supposed to do in his new role. That included remaining outside the walls of the K'un-Lun city to prevent leaders of the Hand (a ninja clan) from returning to the city. But his masters never taught Danny everything about the Iron Fist's powers. The Crane Mother Order masters had even failed to inform Danny that the Hand could use the Iron Fist to regain entry into K'un-Lun. Davos thought he should have been the Iron Fist, due to being the son of two K'un-Lun masters. When he failed to achieve this position, he followed Danny to New York City in order to convince the latter to return. Like the K'un-Lun inhabitants, Davos constantly lectured Danny about what the duties of the Iron Fist entailed. He also believed that Danny was never ruthless enough to use the Fist to eliminate criminals. Stick, leader of an offshoot organization of the Crane Mother Order called the Chaste (along with being Matt Murdock and Elektra Natchios' former mentor), merely repeated the Iron Fist's duties to Danny in "THE DEFENDERS". Even Matt aka Daredevil, wanted Danny to use the Iron Fist role to continue his activities as a vigilante.
Danny spent all of Season One, all of "THE DEFENDERS" episodes and a good deal of Season Two parroting what he was taught about the Iron Fist to others. Despite all of this, he seemed hellbent upon being the Iron Fist his way . . . and that included leaving K'un-Lun. Danny seemed like a person who preached one thing, tried to practice what he had preached and ended up doing things his own way. He seemed to be in some kind of conundrum. The only person who had given him any good advice was Elektra Natchios in "THE DEFENDERS". She had more or less suggested that he toss aside the Crane Mother Order's mantra about how to be the Iron Fist and do it his way. Danny made the mistake of ignoring her suggestion, due to her role with the Hand and him being her prisoner at the time.
Now, Metzner could have allowed Danny to come to this realization in Season Two. Being a vigilante like Daredevil did NOT give him any sense of satisfaction. But instead of allowing Danny to continue his development as the Iron Fist, Metzner thought it would be a great idea to allow Colleen, a former acolyte of the Hand (she had been unaware of its evil history), to become the new Iron Fist. He set this up by first allowing Davos to take the Iron Fist ability from Danny with the help of Joyce Meachum (who stupidly wanted revenge for what went down between him, her brother Ward Meachum and her father Harold Meachum in Season One) and a former special ops soldier with dissociative identity disorder named Mary Walker. While Danny, Colleen and New York Police detective Mercedes "Misty" Knight plotted to regain the powers of the Fist; Danny decided that he was unworthy of the role and that Colleen would be a better choice to wield the Fist. By having Danny ensure that Colleen would become "the Iron Fist", Metzner ruined the momentum for his further development.
Why was it important that Colleen become the Iron Fist? Danny thought she would be a better vigilante than him. Okay . . . but this reason did not justify Metzner's decision to make her an Iron Fist. Colleen Wing had already been established by Marvel Comics as an iconic vigilante. Even "IRON FIST" had established her as a decent vigilante. There was no need for her to replace Danny as the Iron Fist. After becoming the Iron Fist, Colleen learned from Danny that one of her ancestors had been a previous Iron Fist. So this is Metzner's excuse? Privilege? Davos thought he should have been the Iron Fist, because of his privilege and his K'un-Lun ancestry. The Season Two narrative had proven him wrong. And now viewers were supposed to accept Colleen as the new Iron Fist because . . . wait for this . . . her ancestor had been a previous Iron Fist? I do not recall ancestry being the sole reason a certain candidate could be considered for the Iron Fist position. Otherwise, the Crane Mother Order would have never considered Danny Rand as a potential candidate in the first place. Metzner and his writers handed over the role of Iron Fist to Colleen in an act that I would describe as another form of privilege. In the end, the writers contradicted themselves in this stupid and unnecessary plot twist. Why did they do this? Because "IRON FIST" and the Danny Rand character was unpopular with viewers. And why? Because "IRON FIST" had the bad luck to premiere on Netflix four months after the controversial MCU movie, "DOCTOR STRANGE" and receive backlash from the whole casting controversy regarding "the Ancient One" role.
In a racist move, the filmmakers for "DOCTOR STRANGE" had transformed an Asian man into a Celtic white woman and made vague excuses for this decision. I believe "IRON FIST" became a scapegoat for the MCU's stupidity, because the main character - a white man - had spent fifteen years in the Himalayas and learned martial arts. There was an outcry that the lead for "IRON FIST" should have been portrayed by a person of color. Mind you, no one had bothered to demand that a person of color portray either Matt Murdock, Jessica Jones or Frank Castle. And no one had bothered to demand or suggest that Luke Cage become a woman. Yet, because Danny had spent fifteen years in Asia and "IRON FIST" was released four months after the controversial "DOCTOR STRANGE", many had demanded his character should have been portrayed by a non-white actor, preferably Asian.
And you know what? It got worse. The series' last episode, (2.10) "A Duel of Iron", ended with Colleen Wing patrolling the streets of Manhattan's Chinatown as the new Iron Fist. As for Danny, he and Ward Meachum traveled to Asia in order to search for one Orson Randall, the black market seller who had earlier provided Davos and Joyce with the corpse of a former Iron Fist. By the end of the episode's last reel, they were still searching for Randall. But Danny found his guns, which were infused with the chi of the Iron Fist. The episode's last scene featured Danny using them in a Japanese bar. Many have claimed that the guns had the Iron Fist chi, but Danny had remained powerless. This is impossible. Danny's hands would have incinerated if he had not already possessed the Iron Fist chi. Which means he was once again, the Immortal Iron Fist.
In the end, M. Raven Metzner's decision to allow Colleen to become an Iron Fist contradicted the narrative's reason why Davos should not have taken the Iron Fist powers from Danny. Neither Davos or Colleen really had earned the role in the first place. What made Metzner's decision for Colleen to become an Iron Fist even more irrelevant is that Danny ended up regaining the power of the Iron Fist in the series' last scene. So . . . making Colleen Wing the new Iron Fist? Why in the hell did Metzner bothered? Why not simply allow Danny to develop as the Iron Fist in his own terms in the first place?