Rom Spaceknight Annual #1 mini review

The IDW Annual for ROM came out around the time issue #7 or #8 of the regular IDW ROM series was released, but I deliberately waited to read it until I had read issue #12 of the regular series so that the annual didn't feel like an early release cash grab even though that is exactly what it was. I received the standard cover for the Annual #1 that is pictured above, and my first impression was that there was going to be a great love story told about ROM and his wife or fiance before the war with the Wraiths began. I was optimistic going in to the story, but was left appalled and completely disappointed with how ROM's origin story was handled (don't worry, I got over it :) ).

Where to begin? Well, first off, ROM's homeworld is called Elonia, as first mentioned in issue #2 of the regular series. Elonia is described in a very utopian way and we are immediately introduced to ROM's family. It turns out that ROM came from a family with two mothers, and he was a Geology student that hung out with his best friends Livia and Fy-laa. Within the first two pages of the story I was already having a bad feeling about where it was going. With the remote possibility that an alien civilization practices same sex marriages/families like humans do, and then with an additional layer of remote possibility that ROM, greatest spaceknight of all, comes from a same sex couple family, I just can't help but feel that same sex marriage propaganda was being shoehorned, unnecessarily, into ROM's origin story.

Christos Gage's art style is typically very good, but looking past the same sex couple family message, how he drew ROM's mothers in the story is baffling to me as you can see in the example screenshot below.

Is that supposed to be a woman? My initial reaction was like...

Why does ROM's 'mother' look like a man, but another woman like Livia has actual feminine characteristics?  I feel like transgender or gender binary propaganda was also being shoehorned into a ROM story.

Moving along. ROM's motivation to join the Solstar Order as a result of his family dying was a bit questionable. How does an alien millenial geology student all of a sudden decide to join the military and take the fight to the Dire Wraiths after a very lackadaisical reaction to his family dying? And, what is the motivation for Livia and Fy-laa to do the same? Well ROM, Livia and Fy-laa do join the Solstar Order, and we get a very brief montage of training that reminded me a bit of the recruits training in the Starship Troopers movie. We even get this lovely shower scene . . .

ROM and Livia are in a relationship, and Livia is written as an over sexed tease to ROM. I get the sense that the writers of this story are showing indirectly a fantasy of theirs for what their ideal woman would be. A woman who always wants to have sex but displays many feminist characteristics including a butch hairstyle.

When the three titular recruits are shown to have completed their training, they are now expertly skilled Solstar Order soldiers(???) because we are just told that they are. In addition, their attitudes towards the Solstar Order leadership before and after training is very whiny with a sprinkle of hesitancy to follow orders. How ROM somehow becomes a Spaceknight that is rigid in his duty to follow the Solstar Order rules later on is not even hinted at in this annual. More things to make me go, hmmm.

So at this point in the Annual, there has been no mention of Spaceknights nor the shiny body armor that I was looking forward to seeing ROM finally don for the first time. This leads to another problem I had with this origin story for ROM. The iconic Spaceknight armor only exists in the Solstar Order due to a chance situation where during a mission, ROM and his amazing friends accidentally come in contact with Ore-13. When the Ore-13 comes in contact with their skin, body armor just randomly constructs around their body. The iconic look for ROM's Spaceknight armor, the light up eyes, etc. just randomly forms from the Ore-13. I feel that is lazy or poor writing to give a magical reason for the iconic designs of Spaceknight armor with no practical reasoning at all.

The reader then gets to see ROM and his amazing friends fight some Dire Wraiths for a few pages using their new, magically formed Spaceknight armor. The Solstar Order welcomes the discovery of the new magically formed armor and the Solstar Order Spaceknights are born. ROM and his amazing friends have no idea if the armor will ever come off again, but darn it, they are somehow motivated to dedicate the rest of their lives to fighting the Dire Wraiths. Thank you magical Ore-13, they couldn't have done it without you.

After all was read and done with this annual, I was so disappointed that I decided that I would take on the daunting task of rewriting this origin story. I will post the pages of my rewritten ROM origin story in three separate blog posts. Stay tuned, and please comment with your thoughts on the ROM series so far and what variant covers you got or liked the most.

Grade: 

 

Rom Spaceknight Issue #12 mini review

I received the standard cover for issue #12, and I really like this standard cover the most compared to all of the other available variants. This issue picks up from the cliffhanger ending that issue #11 ended on, and the situation that ROM and Livia are in is reminiscent of a 1950's monster B movie. That is a positive for me even though it might seem to come out of left field to this generation of comic readers who are not old enough to appreciate the nostalgia of old monster B movies.

The Dire Wraiths now appear in previously unseen forms in this issue that are very different from how they appeared in the Marvel comic series. ROM faces a version of the Dire Wraiths that looks very similar to the one the knights encountered in issue #10, but ROM doesn't seem to recognize seeing this version of Dire Wraith again. A plot hole occurs, in my opinion, when ROM is rendered helpless but is left alone instead of the Dire Wraith trying to kill him while he's helpless. I understand that you can't have the hero of the series be taken out so easily, but why would a Wraith leave a helpless threat alone to fight another day when there is an opportunity to eliminate the threat? Things that make you go hmmm.

The main ROM storyline ends on a cliffhanger where Livia appears to have died . . . again. If my count is correct, this will be the third time in the IDW ROM series where Livia dies or appears to be dead. Will Livia live to see another day this time? Check back next issue.

Lastly, there is the second part to an ongoing backup story that involves ROM and Fy-laa included in issue #12. What is nice about this backup story is that it is written by Sal Buscema. The backup story has interesting moments but is a little bland when compared to the regular ROM storyline.

Please comment with your thoughts on the ROM series so far and what variant covers you got or liked the most.

Grade: B-
 

Rom Spaceknight Issue #11 mini review

I received the standard cover for issue #11, and I have lost any expectation of receiving a non standard cover going forward since it looks as though I am the only one with ROM on a pull list at my LCS. I am happy to say that issue #11 is a big improvement quality wise when compared with my disappointment over issue #10. In fact, issue #10 can be completely ignored and no one would be any wiser with the way issue #11 picks up with the storyline.

ROM and Livia are seen partnered up at Orphion's request at the beginning of the issue, and despite ROM starting to pine over Livia like a teenager (a 200+ year old teenager at that), ROM and Livia are able to seek out some wraiths using some intelligent strategy. Darby and Ruan also follow up with what was discussed last issue by persuing something that will give the human race an advantage over the wraiths.

We see Camilla Byers again this issue and a new revelation about her is shown that I don't want to spoil, but it is significant. Actually, there are a few significant plot twists overall that occur in this issue that prove to be very interesting and again, I will not spoil them for you. One of those plot twists is a big cliff hanger that I didn't see coming.

Something new beginning with issue #11 is the introduction of a short backup story that involves ROM in the past before his arrival on earth. We learn about a previous adventure ROM had with another spaceknight Fy-laa, and that short story also ends on a cliff hanger of it's own.

With the story getting back on track based on story quality, some major plot twists being revealed, and two cliff hangers, this issue is worth picking up. Please comment with your thoughts on the ROM series so far and what variant covers you got or liked the most.

Grade: B
 

Rom Spaceknight Issue #10 mini review

I received the above regular cover for issue #10, and while the artwork on the cover is OK, it has nothing to do with the story contained in this issue. This issue starts off with ROM taking Livia and Orphion to a strip mall in San Luis Obispo, CA because obviously, if you want to prove the worth of sparing humanity to hardened space warriors, you take them to an open mall in California (end sarcasm). This issue contains a lot of dialog with sprinkles of "progressive" preaching, and it proved to be a bit annoying to me.

Livia and Orphion mention more than once the futility of religion and that there is no God, and the human race is weaker because they put their trust in a religion that none of the visiting space knights buy into. To compound the lesson that this particular issue wants to teach us, the Dire Wraiths believe in a Deity of their own and do not fear death in pursuing their cause as result. To sum up the message, the 'Good' guys don't believe in a religion or in a God but the 'Bad' guys do. Also, if you didn't know already, you will learn that humans are diverse and maybe even 'enlightened' (???).

I know that I have not mentioned many specifics that occurred in the story in issue #10 to prove my observations, but I don't feel that I need to since the story is very dialog heavy and the imagery shown in the issue seemed too insignificant to describe. We do get a brief dialog heavy update to Darby and Ruan's story arc hinting at something that may give humans an advantage over the Wraiths, and we get to visit Deepwave Headquarters in Seattle, WA where Axiom gets to participate in the dialog fest going on in this issue too.

There is one 'action' scene at the very end of the story though that I felt included a small homage to the Ghostbusters, and the one hint I will give is 'don't cross the streams.' The regular ROM series has been pretty good up until this issue, so I left this issue feeling very disappointed as you can tell. It also bothers me to see the liberal/progressive propaganda that is prevalent at Marvel (which is tanking the comics industry as a whole) starting to creep into one of my favorite comic character's series, but since I am a completionist, I will stick it out until the end.

Please comment with your thoughts on the ROM series so far and what variant covers you got or liked the most.

Grade: C-
 

Rom Spaceknight Issue #9 mini review

I received the above cover for issue #9 from my LCS, which was nice since it wasn't just the regular cover this time. This issue starts with the remainder of the fight between ROM and Orphion at the oceanic oil rig station. The Spaceknights lose focus on their main objective by squabbling with each other and a new enemy wraith called the Absence is able to get the drop on them while their focus is divided.

The Absence appears to be a formidable threat for the time being since the Spaceknights look to not be able to kill something that isn't there (hence the name 'Absence'). ROM shows why he is the titular hero that we like to follow causing Orphion to eventually change his focus to align more with ROM's.

We get a small update to Darby and Ruan, but the primary focus of this issue is on the Wraiths and the Spacenights which is refreshing. The issue ends with the hint of yet a greater wraith enemy called the Presence.

I really enjoyed the artwork by Paolo Villanelli too in this issue more than I had noticed before in previous issues. The black magic wraiths look particularly, pleasingly monsterous and the Spaceknights have a very aesthetic machine like shape to how they are drawn and I love it tremendously. The story continues to keep my interest making me want more as the issue concludes, so that has to be a good sign of great writing in my opinion.

Please comment with your thoughts on the ROM series so far and what variant covers you got or liked the most.

Grade: B+
 

Rom Spaceknight Issue #8 review

I received the above regular cover for issue #8 from my LCS. This issue immediately starts off with Orphion rushing ahead of ROM and Livia towards an oceanic oil rig station. As you can guess, if Orphion is interested in anything that is of Earth, there must be some involvement with the Dire Wraiths.

While Orphion intends to destroy the Wraiths occupying the oil rig station, he also has other plans, unknown to ROM and Livia, for using the oil rig station once the Wraiths are taken care of. ROM figures out what Orphion intends to do and a 'disagreement' ensues between ROM and Orphion. Of course, attention has been taken away from the Wraiths in the oil rig station temporarily and we are introduced to the 'Absense' as a result.

Concurrent to the Spaceknights story, we see Darby connecting with an old friend named Ruan. Ruan isn't all what Darby thinks he is and without giving away any more, an interesting twist gets introduced to the ongoing series. As short as the continuation of the story in each recent issue seems to be, the current story arc is still keeping my interest and leaves me wanting more. My only disappointment is the long publishing delay between these more recent issues, and it concerns me as a ROM fan that the ongoing series may be coming to an end.

Please comment with your thoughts on the ROM series so far and what variant covers you got or liked the most.

Grade: B+
 

Rom Spaceknight Issue #7 review

I received the above regular cover for issue #7 from my LCS. This issue picks up right where the last issue left off where ROM has convinced  Livia and Orphion, for the time being, not to destroy the earth in order to eradicate the Dire Wraith infestation. Camilla Byers also looks to be rid of her Wraith infection thanks to Orphion.

G.I. Joe's Grunt and Beach Head catch up to ROM, Livia, and Orphion as the latter three are still debating the worth of sparing humanity in lieu of the sure way of wiping out the Dire Wraiths on Earth by destroying it altogether. Without spoiling what comes next, let's just say that Grunt and Beach Head will not be bothering ROM by themselves any longer.

The Wraiths on the other hand have found a way to convince humans to willingly give their lives to feed the Wraiths' power. I like this new twist to show how clever, deceiving and cunning the Wraiths' have become to accomplish their master plan, and how the Wraiths' act in complete opposition to ROM's compassion for humanity. Good and evil has become more defined at this point in the series.

The issue ends on a low note for ROM where the Wraiths' may end up gaining the upper hand on ROM's technology.

Please comment with your thoughts on the ROM series so far and what variant covers you got or liked the most.

Grade: B+

Revolution toys (with ROM Spaceknight) at SDCC 2017

I am so excited to get a new ROM Spaceknight figure (along with a Dire Wraith) from San Diego Comic Con this year.

Here are screenshots of ROM and a Dire Wraith and the whole set in general:

See the following link for more info:
http://sdccblog.com/2017/07/hasbro-san-diego-comic-con-2017-exclusives/

Like I said, I am excited about this (not the $99.99 price tag), but that won't stop me from purchasing it.

Please comment with your thoughts about this and potentially other future ROM Spaceknight toys.

UPDATE:
Here is the direct link to order this set in August!
http://www.hasbrotoyshop.com/en/htsusa/exclusives/-c2984as00

UPDATE 2:
Here is a video preview courtesy of SyFy Wire:

Rom Spaceknight Issue #6 review

I received the above regular cover for issue #6 from my LCS. This issue picks up right where the last issue left off where ROM has just realized that he is not the only spaceknight on earth. We are introduced to Livia and Orphion, spaceknights of the solstar order.

This issue's story continues the exciting story arc involving the new spaceknight arriving on earth, and without spoiling too much of the story, I will say that drama ensues as ROM tries to convince the new solstar order arrivals about the value of human life. Camilla Byers goes through a significant transformation, and at the end of the issue, we learn about Livia's and Orpion's capacity for mercy.

Sprinkle in some Wraith conspiracy and some G.I. Joe action, and the issue becomes a worthwhile read in my opinion. I hope ROM's popularity is still going strong overall because I don't see much interest continuing on either at my LCS or online, except for a very few specific websites. I hope I am wrong though.

Please comment with your thoughts on the ROM series so far and what variant covers you got or liked the most.

Grade: A-

Rom Spaceknight Issue #5 review

The above cover image is the one my local comic shop set aside for me, and it wasn't the standard cover for a change. This issue starts a new story arc in the main ROM series with the Revolution mini series now having finished playing out within the ROM timeline. The first pages of the story in this issue involves some of the heavy hitters involved with ROM in the Revolution mini series reflecting on ROM being a great ally in the IDW Hasbro universe.

The new story arc starts off pretty exciting as we see some Dire Wraiths do their thing. They are later taken out, but not by the title character. Two Solstar Order Spaceknights are now on earth and appear to be more ruthless than what we have seen ROM do when it comes to the mission of eradicating the Dire Wraiths.

When the story catches up with ROM, we see him come across Camilla Byers again, but she is starting to be overcome with the Dire Wraith 'infection' she contracted in the first issue of the series. Drama ensues between her and ROM and the issue ends with ROM realizing he is not the only spaceknight fighting the Dire Wraiths on earth anymore.

This issue was fun and interesting, and it reminded me why I like ROM the best of all the characters in the Hasbro universe. I can't wait to see what comes next with two additional spaceknights now on earth. Also, I can't help but be reminded of the Marvel ROM series issue #4 where he encountered the Firefall spaceknight armor bonded to a human which was kind of like another spaceknight on earth.

Please comment with your thoughts on the ROM series so far and what variant covers you got or liked the most.

Grade: B+
 

Was ROM Spaceknight in any of the IDW Revolution One-shots?

For any of you who were reading the IDW Revolution mini series and were tempted to pick up any of the one shots that were made to tie into the series, I will give my brief recommendation for whether you should pick up any of those issues based on a ROM fan's perspective.

M.A.S.K. Revolution
ROM appears: NO
Recommend Buying: Only if you are a M.A.S.K. fan.








Micronauts Revolution
ROM appears: NO
Recommend Buying: Only if you are a Micronauts fan.








G.I. Joe Revolution
ROM appears: NO
Recommend Buying: MAYBE. The story contains a Dire Wraith beach invasion with the Joes fighting them off, but the story is very dull with poorly drawn art. Personally I wouldn't buy it, but if you want more Dire Wraith action you could buy it for that.

Transformers Revolution
ROM appears: NO
Recommend Buying: YES. The story shows a Dire Wraith infestation in the White House and shows the horrors of how brutal and deep the Dire Wraith infiltration has become. This one is very well written and is a must read for the Revolution mini series along with the ROM Revolution issue IMO.





Transformers: Till All Are One Revolution
ROM appears: YES, Sort Of.
Recommend Buying: Only if you are a die hard Transformers fan. Oh, and about the ROM appearance, see the only appearance he makes on the last panel on the last page in the issue in the screenshot above. My opinion, not worth buying just for ROM's appearance.

Transformers: More Than Meets The Eye Revolution
ROM appears: NO
Recommend Buying: Again, only if you are a die hard Transformers fan.








Action Man Revolution
ROM appears: NO
Recommend Buying: Only if you are an Action Man fan and if you plan to buy the Revolutionaries ongoing series. This issue explains how Action Man and Kup bond together as friends since they will be regulars in the Revolutionaries series.

ROM Spaceknight in IDW Revolution 4-5 Review

I am finally going to post my thoughts on the conclusion of IDW's Revolution mini series. The above cover variants are the ones that my local comic shop set aside for me which in actuality, they really aren't variants at all; they are the standard covers. My local comics shop, as usual, doesn't really make much of an effort to set aside the actual variants of any of IDW's series that I subscribe to in case they can make an extra buck by raising the price of the issue, but I shouldn't really complain, I am primarily interested in the stories anyway rather than the cover.

We get to see Snake Eyes sneak into Autobot city only to be discovered by the Micronauts  and eventually his cover is blown, or is it? All the main hero players other than M.A.S.K. are hastily allied, which I think contributes to the criticism that the Revolution mini series has received by other readers (for the record, I'm ok with it but I won't pretend it isn't a legitimate complaint). Speaking of M.A.S.K., we see Miles Mayhem collude with the Dire Wraiths as though there is some backstory to it that was never revealed before. I guess that is supposed to be a twist in the story, but it doesn't make a lot of sense for a team of heroes like M.A.S.K. to be so easily misled by the Dire Wraiths.

Issue 4 has what I guess is the payoff for the whole Revolution series when a large cadre of Wraiths are fighting against all the heroes involved in the mini series, and issue 4 ends with yet another surprise when Baron Karza uses Enerchange. With all the mayhem going on in Autobot city, G.I. Joe can't sit this one out and the we are shown a call to arms to build up the excitement for the concluding issue.

In issue 5, the main antagonist switches from the Giant Dire Wraith Caleb to the Dire Wraith Hybrid Baron Karza. M.A.S.K. enters the fray on the side of the Dire Wraiths but during the battle they switch to being one of the good guys. The space bridge is used to stop the Wraith Hybrid Karza, seemingly destroying the microverse, but I'm not so sure IDW would write themselves into a corner like that by robbing the Micronaut's franchise of their home universe. We shall see.

The Revolution mini series ends on a somewhat positive note with all the heroes moving on to their own respective series', much like the ending of the first Avengers movie. Was this mini series successful? I would say yes, but it wasn't perfect. I was liking the buildup but the end was a bit cliche. I am subscribing to the Revolutionaries series to see how the Hasbro combined universes continue (and because ROM will be in the first issue at least), and I will review that series here on this blog.

Please comment with your thoughts on the Revolution series and what variant covers you got or liked the most.

Issue #4 Grade: B-

Issue #5 Grade: B