My daughter took Physics C as a first Physics course as a senior, after having taken Calc BC as a junior. Physics 1 and 2 was not offered at her school. She could have taken regular or honors Physics before the Physics C but decided against it, as the teacher in charge of Physics C was one of the best at the school and the teacher in charge of regular Physics was just not very good (per the high school grapevine that she considered fairly accurate). A lot of Physics concepts, particularly for the Mechanics part of the curriculum, were studied in her math classes over the years. She did well and really enjoyed the class. I think she could have skipped the first Physics course at college (Mechanics) but not Electromagnetism, and decided against it per her academic advisor. She’s an engineering major and the Physics series is pretty foundational. She was glad she took it as she learned a lot and had a great lab experience also which she missed in high school due to Covid.
To the OP, a lot of kids in my daughter’s year took the Physics 1 AP exam after taking honors Physics at school (and with a little self studying) so my guess is that it can be taken as a first course.