Rom, Spaceknight Revisited

Two-hundred years ago, the evil Dire Wraiths threatened the peace-loving planet, Galador. In their homeworld's darkest hour, a thousand brave, young Galadorians sacrificed humanity itself to become Cyborg Warriors, a last desperate line of defense. Though hopelessly outnumbered, these Spaceknights triumphed and pursued the remnants of the Wraith horde across the universe. Now, alone in the Enemy's mightiest stronghold, on a backward planet called Earth, one Galadorian Warrior faces his most awesome challenge.

Stan Lee Presents: The Greatest of the Spaceknights--ROM!

These are the words used to introduce the reader to Rom in the early issues of Rom, Spaceknight. They're still as good an introduction as any, but if you want more detail, visit the Comic Book section. The Rom character is based on an electronic action figure produced by Parker Brothers in 1979. Although the toy did not sell well, the Rom, Spaceknight comic book survived for 75 issues (over six years).

Welcome Annihilators #1 readers! I have created a special Quick Start page for you.

This site is divided into the following sections:

Spoiler Warning: There are numerous "spoilers" throughout this site for the Rom, Spaceknight and Spaceknights comic book series. If you have not read the series and wish to be surprised, I suggest you limit your surfing primarily to the Action Figure and Other Media sections. This is your only warning!

What's New

RSS
Feed

27 Mar 2013: Where have I been? Just busy. I seem to have failed to mention that child #4 was born between the June 2011 and April 2012 updates. As mentioned before, Rom himself is tweeting current Rom news, and doing a better job than I am. It appears the box of his tweets stopped working, but now -- as you can see -- there's a new one. This one comes directly from Twitter itself, so hopefully it won't disappear. I encourage you to watch it for the latest Rom news while I go chase kids.

30 Apr 2012: The last five years (or so), I've built up a queue of items to share with Rom fans. There's different reasons, including procrastination, that I haven't gotten to each one yet. In some cases, the reason is there wasn't an appropriate place on the site for it. Now that I have a blog, however, I can put it all there! And so, I've actually begun doing so. Some items will, of course, be incorporated back here. But in the meantime, I highly suggest you watch my blog. New items should be posted every Monday for a while.

17 Jun 2011: If you're a Rom fan, you'll want to read Jim Shooter telling the tale of how he made the jump from toy to comics.

1 Apr 2011: Bad day for an update, but I promise the following is not a Aprils' Fool Day prank. On his blog, David H. has pointed out a new Dire Wraith cameo in Uncanny X-Men #236. It has now been added to the Checklist. In other business, the upcoming Avengers #12.1 will feature "a Spaceknight". What that means is unknown as in addition to the Galadorian Spaceknights, there is now also a so-far-unseen Initiative team based in Chicago by that name as well.

2 Mar 2011: Annihilators #1 shipped today! Without giving away too many spoilers, it features not only the Spaceknight Ikon, as seen in Thanos Imperative: Devastation, but also Galador.

7 Jan 2011: Rom completists should pick up this week's Thanos Imperative: Devastation. It sets up Annihilators, a four-issue limited series coming in March that will feature the Dire Wraiths and latest generation of Spaceknights. Oh, and also the Silver Surfer, Quasar, Ronan, Gladiator, and Beta Ray Bill.

25 Aug 2010: Perhaps you've read the unused proposals for Rom's return. Well, we now have an interview with Benny R. Powell about his. It also includes previously unseen Rom redesigns by artist Jim Calafiore.

24 Jul 2010: It seems CBR's report was in error. Bendis did not say that Rom would be appearing in Avengers, but rather that the Spaceknights would. My apologies for reporting the news with only a single "reliable" source.

22 Jul 2010: Sorry to be out of touch for a while. I hope you've been reading Rom's tweets in the meantime. If you're not reading Darkstar and the Winter Guard, you should go to your comic shop now and pick up the first two issues. The final issue, #3, comes out next month. But in even bigger news, at today's Mondo Marvel Panel at Comic-Con, Comic Book Resources reports that Bendis said, "you will see [Rom] Space Knight show up in a future Avengers story." Finally, three new entries for the Checklist: Fantastic Four #578-579 and Mephisto vs. ... #1.

2 Apr 2010: Two new Checklist entries. First, Kenny Hobbs' tip-off on the Spider-Woman motion comic finally pays off with the mention of Dire Wraiths and Spaceknights appearing in Spider-Woman #7, released two weeks ago. Second, this week has an odd lot of Dire Wraiths appearing as part of the Universal Inhumans in Fantastic Four #577. (When did female Wraiths get breasts?) Thanks to AdamLovesSteve and ~P~ for the tips.

29 Mar 2010: First, three new Checklist entries. First, Gordon Smuder told me of what we will unofficially call a Rom the Spaceduck action figure in Howard the Duck (magazine) #6 and ~P~ provided a scan upon my request. Second, metaldragon of the Marvel Chronology Project forums mentioned a footnote about Rom in Defenders #142 and Kelly Davis reminded me of it via e-mail before I posted it. Lastly, Michael, also of the MCP forums, mentioned a similar footnote in Thor #354.

Then, shortly after providing the above scan, ~P~ e-mailed me to point out that the Dire Wraiths will have an entry in the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe A to Z Update #2, coming in June.

16 Mar 2010: Rom is now using Twitter and actually has been for a while. As you can see with the new tweets box to the right, he doesn't tweet often. Guess there's not a lot for a retired Spaceknight to tweet about.

21 Jan 2010: Rush Montgomery spotted an issue of Rom in the movie Fanboys. You can find a still on the Other Media page.

28 Oct 2009: Kenny Hobbs let me know that the fifth and final episode of the Spider-Woman motion comic (currently available exclusively via iTunes) brings up Dire Wraiths and Spaceknights at the end. The heroine's new comic book series is based on the motion comic, so keep an eye on it for further developments.

17 Sep 2009: In his latest blog entry, Marvel Excutive Editor Tom Brevoort answers reader questions. One reader asked about policy on "previously licensed character weirdness," mentioning Rom as one example. Brevoort publically confirmed what I'd found out previously. Namely that, "in the case of Rom, for example, all of the new stuff that was created for that series by Marvel, including the Dire Wraiths and most of the other Spaceknights, we can still use-but we can't touch Rom himself in any way."

10 Aug 2009: I've been sitting on three additions to the Checklist for a while now. First, we have a cameo of Rom's helmet as a mask in X-Thieves #11 back in 1988. I'd forgotten all about this one until I re-read the series some months ago. Then we have not one but two by Fred Hembeck. The first is a less cartoony look then you might think in the crowd scene that is the splash page for Hembeck 1980. The other is from an episode of Dateline: @#$!. Both reprinted in The Nearly Complete Essential Hembeck Archives Omnibus. Oh, and I remembered to add Wizard #215, mentioned last update.

5 Aug 2009: The latest issue of Wizard (#215) features a story on Bill Mantlo and includes an original drawing by Greg Horn that includes his take on Rom. For more details, see the Rom Blog. Thanks to Jerry Whitworth for the tip.

24 May 2009: Back in 2000, thanks to Usenet, we posted a bit of information of a circa 1998 proposal for a return of Rom by Benny R. Powell and Jim Calafiore. Well, right now you can find a page of Calafiore's art of the redesigned Rom on eBay! Frankly, I'm not sure Rom's the same with fingers, but I'll let you judge it for yourselves.

11 Apr 2009: I discovered a song not just mentioning Rom, but named "Rom, Spaceknight" while surfing the Internet yesterday. It was released by a band called HB3 in 2007. More information on the Other Media page.

[Dark Reign Files cover] 24 Mar 2009: It turns out the Dire Wraiths got an entry in last month's Dark Reign Files, another Handbook-style one-shot from Marvel. (Thanks to ~P~ for the tip.) Could this mean the imminent return of the Wraiths? Well, I share my opinion in the latest Rom blog post.

6 Feb 2009: In today's Chicago Tribue is a 3/4 page article comparing new White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel to Rom the Spaceknight. If you don't live in a place where you can get your hands on a copy – especially considering that you won't see this until the day after, at earliest –, you can find see a scan of it at the blog of a fellow named Jason. Thanks to ~P~ for the tip.

26 Jan 2009: I inquired about the Rom article on FarePlay blog. The response was that the article was going to tax their research department, particularly with the "Best Action Features Ever" article in the same issue. The Rom article will probably be in a future issue, "but it may be several months."

22 Jan 2009: Back Issue #32 shipped this week. Behind the Spider-Mobile cover, you'll find 13 pages dedicated to Rom, plus two more on Bill Mantlo. Support your local comic book by buying it from them if possible. If not, you can order it direct from TwoMorrows Publishing. ToyFare #139 has also shipped, but there's not a trace of the promised Rom article to be found.

What's Old