blog into mystery

We’re back for another go at the final issues of one of my childhood favorites, Rom the Spaceknight.  In previous posts I’ve added some scans showing important moments in each story and highlighting Steve Ditko’s wonderful artwork.  I won’t be doing that this time around, and there’s one main reason for that – Bob Layton, the inker in this ish.  I mean no offense to him – I’ve enjoyed much of his work, but in this instance his inks totally overwhelm Ditko’s pencils, and since Rom and his cohorts don’t make appearances in this issue, I’m even less inclined to put in that extra effort.

So I’m being a lazy slug on this one.  Sorry.

As you may notice from the cover, this is one of the innumerable Secret Wars II cross-overs that plagued Marvel back in the day.  And yes, we’re treated in this issue to a huge slab of the Beyonder in all his jheri curled glory.  He shows up at a mountain cabin where three characters are hanging out.  We have the omnipresent Rick Jones, who’s suffering from cancer he developed while trying to absorb gamma rays to become a hero like his pal Bruce Banner.  Brandy Clark is Rom’s human love and a one-time Spaceknight named Starshine.  Rounding out the trio is Cindy Adams, a young girl whose parents were apparently killed by Dire Wraiths.

The Beyonder, in his desire to understand humanity – or whatever the hell it was that motivated him – grants Rick and Brandy their deepest desires.  He turns Brandy back into a Spaceknight so that she can be at Rom’s side among the stars, and he makes Rick into a super-hero, so that he can fight for truth and justice and all that good stuff.  Rick’s hero look is sort of nifty – an amalgam of the Hulk and Captain Marvel, two of Rick’s foremost super-powered acquaintances. 

Cindy, of course, wants her parents back.  And lo and behold, the Beyonder informs her that they’re not really dead.  Their souls were taken by a Wraith, a Wraith that Rom banished to Limbo.  The Beyonder sends Brandy and Rick to Limbo to go get their spirits, and in short order they succeed in yanking them out of the Wraith in question.   They bring back two big pink pearls that represent Cindy’s parents, and the Beyonder reanimates them.  Bring on the happy music.

This cues up a mind-numbingly boring conversation between the Beyonder and Rick about the nature of desire and getting what you wished for.  It turns out Rick doesn’t really want the responsibility of being a full-fledged hero, and Brandy doesn’t want to be a Spaceknight.  Rick just wants to be a regular cancer-free guy; Brandy just wants to be with Rom.  The Beyonder makes it so.  Rick walks off a healthy, normal man.  Brandy is de-armored and teleported across the galaxy (we’ll learn later she’s headed to Galador).  Cindy goes off with her parents.  The Beyonder leaves to plague other Marvel titles with his presence.

There we go.

As much as I love this run of issues as a whole, this particular one leaves me a bit cold.  Between Ditko’s overwhelmed art, the Beyonder’s unwelcome presence, and the lack of the Spaceknight Squadron, it’s definitely the weak link in the chain.  But next time we’re in for some fun – Rom and his pals get to face off with a little thing known as the Shi’ar Empire.  The action’s so big, a double-sized annual is barely able to contain it.  Until then…

Welcome back to our trip through the final issues of the Rom as written by Bill Mantlo and pencilled by the great Steve Ditko (with inks this time from P. Craig Russell, whose work melds nicely with Ditko’s).  In issue #71, we pick up right where we left off, and I mean right where we left off.  Our Spaceknights, Rom, Seeker, and Scanner, are walking away from their disgraced and broken former comrade, Unam the Unseen.

Unam pleads with his former friends not to leave him, to not despise him.  Rom tells him that they do not hate him, that they are merely shamed and disappointed in his actions.  Then Unam relates to Rom his reasons for doing what he did – how his deeds were rooted in fear and his inability to dispatch Wraiths to Limbo like Rom so easily does.  I thought that Ditko did his usual elegant and emotive work with the following sequence, as Unam’s plight touches Rom’s cold cyborg soul:

It’s no surprise that Ditko, who was so masterful in conveying emotions in a faceless, fully masked character like Spider-Man, is able to work similar magic with expressionless characters like the Spaceknights.  Indeed, the bottom three panels, laid out in the regular even dimensions that he used so often on that classic Spider-Man run, are extremely effective.

So Unam is back in.  While not condoning what Unam has done, Rom understands what drove him to it, and off our heroes go, flying away side by side.  (Which begs the question – why did Unam feel that he was trapped with the Wraiths if he could fly away at any time?  I missed that plot hole when I was a kid, but let’s not let a quibble get in the way of the story.)

We’re diverted to Earth, where we encounter a sort of hodgepodge family of characters touched by Rom and the Wraith’s time on Earth: Rick Jones (yes, that Rick Jones), who was an ally of Rom and is suffering from cancer, Brandy Clark, Rom’s human love who spent time as a Spaceknight named Starshine, and Cindy Adams, a young girl whose parents were apparently killed by the Wraiths.  More on them next time, when they encounter a certain jheri curled omnipotent guy.

Back to our Spaceknights.  Once again Scanner detects – you guessed it – Spaceknight signals from a nearby world, and they go to investigate.  They fend off a half-ass ambush by simple humanoids, and it’s revealed that those humanoids are led by a Spaceknight, Vola the Trapper:

But Vola isn’t a villain, and she explains the situation to Rom.  The planet, Clavius, had been besieged by Dire Wraiths, but when the Wraith homeworld was destroyed another Spaceknight arrived and teamed up with the now powerless Wraiths – Raak the Breaker.  Raak, like Unam, is corrupted by contact with his former enemies, though Raak’s reasons are not born of timidity but of his lust for power.  He wants to use the Wraiths and conquer Clavius for his own ends, but the similarities between their respective downfalls are not lost on Unam:

Vola has been aiding the Clavians in their fight for freedom.  All this gets Rom worked up into a righteous anger, and the Spaceknights along with Vola and her Clavian allies attack Raak and his minions.  They open the proverbial can of whoop-ass, including Unam, who’s bucked up when Scanner tells him “there is still something of the hero inside you.”  Finally it comes down to a mano a mano tangle between Raak and Rom.  Raak gains the upper hand, mainly because of Rom’s reluctance to harm another Spaceknight, though Raak’s powerful “microwaves” play a part – I guess that “The Breaker” isn’t an honorary title.  It seems that Rom might actually get himself fried, but in steps our Unam ex Machina:

Ah, redemption.  It’s a sweet nectar, isn’t it?

Rom, moved by Unam’s final noble act, uses his Neutralizer to banish Raak to Limbo – there he can rot for eternity with his fiendish partners.  Rom and his comrades are left to contemplate Unam’s sacrifice:

There we go.  I can’t tell you how much this story affected me as an impressionable seven-year old.  From the dynamic and rhyming “Raak is Back!” cover to the story bookended by Unam shattered first in mind and then in body, this one had it all.  And the best part is, the story only gets better from here on home.  In the next installment, we make a little diversion back to Earth and visit with some non-Spaceknight characters, one of whom makes a decision that will impact Rom’s final fate.

Back to my childhood favorite, Rom.  Previously, in issue #69, Rom rescued two of his Spaceknight comrades from the gooey insides of Ego – Scanner, a blue female Spaceknight without offensive weaponry but with highly developed, you guessed it, scanning abilities, and  Seeker, a red Spaceknight that can sprout metallic wings, fly around (though he can fly around without the wings, so…) and can fire deadly missiles.

This issue opens with out trio arriving on an alien world after Scanner detects a signal from another Spaceknight.  This particular planet is sort of a Dagobah-lite, and I really dug the way that Ditko depitcted it in this two-page spread:

I especially like the two dinosaur thingies squaring off in the upper right corner and the mean looking wolf/unicorn (wolficorn?) in the lower left.  (And please note the distinctive water-splashing effects, as highlighted back here.)  Our heroes tangle with one of the beasties – another chance for Rom to display his distaste for taking life – and soon are back on the Spaceknight scent.

They soon find an improbable sight – enslaved Dire Wraiths laboring in constructing a fortress for the titular “Hidden God.”  As Rom asks them what’s going on, lightning bolts strike out from the sky and cut down the powerless Wraiths.  The “Hidden God” speaks to the Spaceknights and tells them to enter the temple at the center of the under-construction fortress.  There they discover the Wraith master – Unam the Unseen, the Spaceknight that they were looking for.

Unam tells his tale.  During the war against the Wraiths he pursued some to this world and then, when the Wraith homeworld was destroyed and they were rendered powerless, Unam reveled in his new-found capability to utterly terrorize his enemies.  He bent them to his will, always using his one unique Spaceknight power, his invisibility, to remain hidden from view.  He’s really quite pleased with himself for all this – how he, the meekest of his comrades, became so powerful.

Rom is, shall we say, not so pleased.  He’s revolted that a Spaceknight has taken up the evil ways of the Wraiths, becoming no better than they enemies they all swore to defeat.  This rebuke sends Unam over the edge, and he summons his Wraith minions to come and attack his fellow Spaceknights.  The Wraiths surround them, but instead of attacking they beg Rom for release from their bondage.  Rom agrees to use his Neutralizer to exile them to Limbo.  At this Unam goes totally Cookoo for Cocoa Puffs and attacks Rom himself, but our hero easily dispatches him and banishes the Wraiths.  Unam is left emotionally broken, pounding the ground as Rom and his companions, saddened and disgusted by what the war has done to him, walk away:

So the issue ends, but Unam’s story is not yet finished.  For that stay tuned for next time. 

I can remember this story having quite an impact on me as a kid.  The thought of a hero descending into evil because of a sudden change in the power equation between himself and his foes was novel for me and struck home, and Ditko’s always elegant artwork (with inker Kim DeMulder) gave a dark, grey oppression to the swamp setting.  The images of the villainous Wraiths reduced to a pitiable condition and dying in the muck were memorable:

I also really need to say a word about the writer, Bill Mantlo.  He spent a long time working on the Rom character and it shows – like Larry Hama with G.I. Joe, another licensed property, he brings depth and pathos to material that in other hands might be all too shallow.  I’ll have more kind words to say about his work in the future, but until I began writing these Rom posts I never knew about the tragic fate that befell him almost two decades ago.  It makes me very sad to know that someone who touched my young heart so wonderfully was cut down at a relatively young age.  Very sad indeed, but I’m pleased that I’m at least able to celebrate some of the man’s work.

On we go.  In the next issue we’re introduced to yet another of Rom’s old comrades, and this guy has one of the toughest sounding names of all time – Raak.  Raak the Breaker.  Until then.

I love Rom.  I’m not ashamed to admit it.  In the same magical summer of 1985 when I discovered the Easter Island statues as interpreted by Jack Kirby I was also introduced to the interstellar Spaceknight Squadron as drawn by a guy named Steve Ditko. 

It was love at first sight.

I arrived late in the game.  My first Rom comic was Rom #69, and I had no idea that the series would come to an end a mere six issues plus an annual later.  But if I was tardy in getting on board with this character, I couldn’t have joined up at a better time storyline-wise.  You see, Rom had finally defeated his archenemies, the Dire Wraiths, hideous evil sorcerors that had attacked his homeworld of Galador and whom he had pursued all the way to Earth.  Now he was on his way back to his native planet.  There was a sadness to the character because his humanity, which he had sacrificed to take on his cyborg body, had been destroyed long before.  His Spaceknight allies could hope to reclaim their flesh and bone selves, which had been carefully preserved.  Not Rom.  But still, the greatest Spaceknight of them all just wanted to get home.  I think every one of us can identify with that.

So that’s where I came in.

I can still remember where I bought this issue.  My parents and I were in vacation in Old Orchard Beach, Maine.  In between bouts of swimming in the frigid ocean we made a trip to a convenience store.  I can’t remember why I picked up this particular comic – it wasn’t in my usual Superman/Batman/Spider-Man wheelhouse.  Whatever the reasons, I bought it.  I’ve always been glad that I did.

What’s the plot of this first installment?  Rom detects signals on an alien world eminating from some of his Spaceknight colleagues.  Weak signals.  He decides to investigate and is quickly swallowed up by the planet itself.  It’s alive, you see.  We’re treated to watching Rom battle digestive enzymes and bipedal thug antibodies and using his Neutralizer to send to Limbo some powerless Dire Wraiths being digested slowly (Sarlacc Pit style, I guess) in the planetary stomach.  It’s then that he comes face to face with Ego, the Living Planet.

I learned two very important things about the Marvel Universe here, since this was my introduction to Ego.  One, planets can be living things.  Second, living planets have moustaches.  Who knew?

Ego is holding captive Seeker and Scanner, the two Spaceknights whose life-signs Rom detected earlier.  The bewhiskered living planet has been studying them since absorbing both Spaceknights and Dire Wraiths during a battle they were fighting on his surface.  After some back and forth, Ego threatens to absorb Rom, so our hero, ever-hesitant to harm other creatures, reluctantly pimp-slaps Ego with his Neutralizer.  Ego promptly gives in and ejects our Spaceknights from his insides and flies off.  And on we go to the next issue.

We’re just getting started here – the stories by Ditko and scribe Bill Mantlo that made me fall for the Rom mythos are coming in subsequent installments.  But this one hooked me with the art.  Ditko and his inker, the great-in-his-own-right P. Craig Russell, really did fantastic work together.  The opening page, with the patchwork quilt of Ego’s surface, kind of reminds me of the LSD-trips that Ditko would take Doctor Strange on – and not hurting that association is the use of the word “strange” twice in the first sentence:

Ego’s insides were a combination of Journey to the Center of the Earth and Fantastic Voyage:

And finally there was the rendering of our planetary villain – at least he didn’t have hands to twirl his moustache before Rom gave him a beating:

There we go.  One down.  I hope you liked reading this.  I certainly enjoyed talking about one of my favorite heroes who, unfortunately, is largely forgotten these days thanks to lapsed licenses.  I plan to go over each remaining issue of Rom in subsequent days and weeks (when I can get to them), right up until his final farewell in #75.  Like I said up above, I just love this last arc.  I’m going to savor walking through it.  See you next time, when we meet another Spaceknight in “The Hidden God.”