August General in Iron
42 years ago - Fang Zhifu is born in Chongqing, China.
28 years ago - 14-year-old Fang attends Party School.
24 years ago - 18-year-old Fang begins attending an elite military academy in China.
22 years ago - 20-year-old Fang joins the Chinese Special Forces.
19 years ago - 23-year-old Fang is selected to lead China's elite Xeno-team response unit.
14 years ago - 28-year-old Fang is the lone survivor of the Qinghai Incident; a Durlan ship landing in China. He is saved from a flesh-melting pathogen by an experimental mutogenic countermeasure. He is recruited as China's new Super-Functionary, August Captain in Iron
13 years ago - 29-year-old Fang & Gu Lao are dispatched to stop the terracotta automatons from the tomb of Quin Shi Huang from attacking Bejing. He first meets Hu Li Jing, forming their unique bond.
10 years ago - 32-year-old Fang first encounters the outlaw Yao Fei.
8 years ago - 34-year-old Fang is a founding member of China's Great Ten. He is promoted to General.
5 years ago - 37-year-old Fang represents China in the Global Guardians, rejecting the affections of Dorah Leigh.
4 years ago - 38-year-old Fang is pulled from the Global Guardians after the attack of Warmaker One.
The Great Ten represent one of my all-time favorite Grant Morrison creations. They did more than just build a new team of original Superheroes (Or Super-Functionaries, in this case), but they built a whole history around them, giving each character a truly unique story and sense of place, and structured it all around the history and politics and culture of a very real-world take on China and all its complexity. It's an incredible piece of worldbuilding, and while it's tragic that they don't have that many appearances, it's also very understandable, because they are such an intricately woven tapestry, I can see why it would be difficult for other writers to pick them up.
Fang Zhifu's StoryAugust General In Iron is the field leader of the Great Ten, clearly their member who is the most loyal to the Chinese Government they serve. He is a great military mind, operating entirely out of Sun Tzu's the Art of War. His powers are perhaps the least extreme of all of the Great Ten; mutated during the Durlan ship landing that jumpstarted Chinese weapons technology, his body grows chitinous metallic plating and makes him much stronger and more durable, but other than that he's essentially just a very capable soldier. What really makes him a cool character is that he is clearly an embodiment of a military mindset.
Interestingly, when DC first reset after the New 52, August General in Iron was the only character to actually appear right away. He was a member of the new Justice League International series. It actually does make sense that, if there is going to be an international superhero team of some kind China would include a member of the Great 10 at first, so we chose to do the same with our original lineup for the Global Guardians and have Fang Zhifu be a founding member. Despite the fact that the Great 10 have so few appearances, Fang has nonetheless clearly been the face of their team, making him a sort of 'Captain America for China' character, and I think he fills that role really well. |
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