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ROM (the original series)---explain the love, please

With all the adoration ROM gets--not only here in CGSland but on other sites and from other comic fans/pundits whom I respect--I decided to cobble together a collection of the original Marvel series and read it. Seemed a no-brainer that I would love it, or at least enjoy it (I started collecting in 1984, but read sporadically before then, and this is my "golden age"). But, I have to say, 15 issues into the series, I am just not feeling it at all. The writing by Mantlo is killing me, which I find ironic as I'm also doing a re-read of my Incredible Hulk run beginning at #300, with Mantlo writing, and though the prose is a bit purple, it is completely working, for me, with the Hulk.

So, I'm curious--have any fans of the series read it recently, and would they say it holds up? Or is the adulation for the series a combination of nostalgia and the relative scarcity of the book, since there are no collections? Or, am I wrong and it's not just for me?

Weigh in. Let me know what it is that makes you hold this series in such high regard. I am seriously interested in your opinions and would like to know why you love it so much.

-chris

Comments

  • hauberkhauberk Posts: 1,511
    I'm roughly 10 issues into the reread. I think that for me, it was a combination of the entirely new mythology interaction with so many aspects of the Marvel universe, and in some cases actually impacting the Marvel universe. The Torpedo suit, which is first seen in ROM, later ends up with another wearer that was a member of the New Warriors, for instance.

    Also, the variety of Space Knight design and weaponry was awesome.
  • nweathingtonnweathington Posts: 6,748
    hauberk said:

    The Torpedo suit, which is first seen in ROM...

    The first Daredevil comic I owned featured the Torpedo and his evil doppleganger, and predated ROM #1 by three years.
    image

    But to answer the question, the only thing I ever loved about Rom were the Michael Golden covers. The stories were typical late ’70s/early ’80s Marvel comics—decent, but nothing really special. Which explains why the only two or three issues I bought all had Michael Golden covers.
  • TorchsongTorchsong Posts: 2,794
    I attended the IDW panel (one of 'em anyhow) at SDCC this year, and the gist was basically get ready for a LOT of ROM in the coming years. So I'd say yeah, it's a cash in on nostalgia for the old series and toy. To be fair, I've enjoyed IDW's Micronauts run and enjoyed the FCBD issue of Rom I read, so maybe they're branching into their own territory with the new series?
  • hauberkhauberk Posts: 1,511
    edited August 2016

    hauberk said:

    The Torpedo suit, which is first seen in ROM...

    The first Daredevil comic I owned featured the Torpedo and his evil doppleganger, and predated ROM #1 by three years.
    image

    But to answer the question, the only thing I ever loved about Rom were the Michael Golden covers. The stories were typical late ’70s/early ’80s Marvel comics—decent, but nothing really special. Which explains why the only two or three issues I bought all had Michael Golden covers.
    Hmmm.. perhaps it was just an upgrade to the visor? I haven't gotten that far into my reread so I'm working off of 35ish year old memories.

    Looked up Torpedo and ROM and found this:
    After the Rocketeers were defeated, Rom felt the Torpedo could keep watch of Clairton while he returned to Galador. Upon returning, Rom again left Clairton to the Torpedo's care while he traveled the world in search of Dire Wraiths. Before he left, he modified the Torpedo's visor to allow him to see through Wraith disguises
    My bad.
  • hauberkhauberk Posts: 1,511
    Torchsong said:

    I attended the IDW panel (one of 'em anyhow) at SDCC this year, and the gist was basically get ready for a LOT of ROM in the coming years. So I'd say yeah, it's a cash in on nostalgia for the old series and toy. To be fair, I've enjoyed IDW's Micronauts run and enjoyed the FCBD issue of Rom I read, so maybe they're branching into their own territory with the new series?

    Yeah, I'm in a similar boat with the new stuff. I'm not sure if I'll be sticking with it post Revolution. If it goes cross-over crazy, I'm out.
  • nweathingtonnweathington Posts: 6,748
    edited August 2016
    hauberk said:

    Looked up Torpedo and ROM and found this:

    After the Rocketeers were defeated, Rom felt the Torpedo could keep watch of Clairton while he returned to Galador. Upon returning, Rom again left Clairton to the Torpedo's care while he traveled the world in search of Dire Wraiths. Before he left, he modified the Torpedo's visor to allow him to see through Wraith disguises
    I just thought it was funny that you brought up Torpedo. I actually kind of liked him as a character, but he was pretty lame. It was no surprise Marvel let Mantlo use him in Rom—the guy had nothing else going on.
  • shroud68shroud68 Posts: 457
    edited August 2016
    @ChrisBeckett

    I certainly enjoyed Rom tremendously during it's original run. I vividly remember the house ads leading up to Rom #1. You cannot discount that effect as IIRC it was a bit of a build up and I remember seeking it out. I know I did not get #1 but I certainly picked many issues off the spinner rack at 7-11 and stationary stores every time I saw it, up until the later run when I discovered Comic shops and Westfield Comics and was able to buy it consistently.

    I also enjoyed the consistency of the book. Bill Mantlo and Sal Buscema must have been the major creators and stayed on through most of it, I really cant picture any other artist's version other than Ditko's ( which i hated) The over arching story of the Dire Wraiths was intriguing but for me the sell was the interaction with the Marvel Universe. I first met the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, Soviet Super Soldiers and other characters like that. Namor, Alpha Flight, Power Man and Iron Fist, everybody starred in this book. Also the covers were great. Some great guest artists did covers and the design of some of them were so much better than the standard fare of the time.

    In reference to why it is so beloved; that is a slippery slope. Reading it now, yes it's a tough sell but is not much of what we liked 35 years ago aging poorly? Maybe some "classics" age well, in my opinion The New Teen Titans holds up pretty well through the Judas Contractand some of the Claremont/Byrne Uncanny run but on a whole something like Rom never had aspirations beyond a sci-fi/superhero hybrid that fit in, if not seamlessly, certainly sucsessfully with the Marvel Universe at the time.

    On a different note, this is why I had zero interest in a new Marvel-less Rom. Not my Rom if I cant expect some B list hero pop in.

    I have a complete run which I complied through E-Bay, including the Annuals and Marvel Two in One appearance and some Marvel Premieres with The Torpedo. My original issues I bound up in the relevant collections, Rom versus Terrax in my Galactus bind, Rome and Alpha Flght in my Alpha Flight bind, so and so on. The inter-connectedness of the Marvel Universe being my first love as I said before. I do not re-read the run, just the hits which I guess most of us do.

    I would never recommend Rom to any one unfamiliar with Bronze Age. It is an example of the best and worst of the era. I chose to fondly remember the broad strokes.
  • bralinatorbralinator Posts: 5,967
    shroud68 said:


    I would never recommend Rom to any one unfamiliar with Bronze Age. It is an example of the best and worst of the era. I chose to fondly remember the broad strokes.

    Very well stated @shroud68 and I am very fond of bronze-age ROM as well.

    Not too enthusiastic about the IDW revival.

  • Thank you, @shroud68. Your detailed response makes sense. I appreciate you taking the time.
  • Steve Ditko inked by P. Craig Russel.

    YOU HEARD ME!
  • Steve Ditko inked by P. Craig Russel.

    YOU HEARD ME!

    I'm intrigued.
  • Oh, man. No offense to Tom Palmer, who's a fine artist, but his inking always overpowers the penciler so much, it's disappointing.

    but those Ditko/Russell pages are lovely.
  • Oh, man. No offense to Tom Palmer, who's a fine artist, but his inking always overpowers the penciler so much, it's disappointing.

    but those Ditko/Russell pages are lovely.
    Keep in mind that Ditko was basically doing layouts only on Rom, which is why the credits read the way they do. I’ve seen some of his pencils from this time period, and they are quite stiff (even for Ditko) with very little of the blacks indicated. Palmer’s job was to overpower the pencils. And so was Russell’s. The difference being that Russell’s finishes are much more in line with what Ditko would do than Palmer’s are. But trust me, you’re seeing more P. Craig Russell there than you are Ditko.
  • Thanks, @nweathington.

    I've actually been thinking about Tom Palmer recently, since I've been reading the final Dark Horse omnibus collection of the Marvel Star Wars run (issue 86-ish to 107), and I just read a story with pencils by Tony Salmons and Inks by Palmer, and the result was the same as I saw in the link above. Which certainly had all the character likenesses on point, but which had no Salmons that I could see.
  • Thanks, @nweathington.

    I've actually been thinking about Tom Palmer recently, since I've been reading the final Dark Horse omnibus collection of the Marvel Star Wars run (issue 86-ish to 107), and I just read a story with pencils by Tony Salmons and Inks by Palmer, and the result was the same as I saw in the link above. Which certainly had all the character likenesses on point, but which had no Salmons that I could see.

    Sure, Palmer did that over almost everyone. But again, Salmons only did layouts for that issue, with Palmer doing finishes, so it was what everyone, including Salmons I'm sure, was expecting. But I think the differences between Ditko’s posing and storytelling and Salmon’s posing and storytelling make for a very different look, even with Palmer’s finishes applied to both.
  • Oh, man. No offense to Tom Palmer, who's a fine artist, but his inking always overpowers the penciler so much, it's disappointing.

    but those Ditko/Russell pages are lovely.
    Yeah, Palmer was someone who always made work look like his. And in the 80's, a lot of pencillers were just handing in glorified layouts (I'm looking at YOU John Buscema).

  • Oh, man. No offense to Tom Palmer, who's a fine artist, but his inking always overpowers the penciler so much, it's disappointing.

    but those Ditko/Russell pages are lovely.
    Yeah, Palmer was someone who always made work look like his. And in the 80's, a lot of pencillers were just handing in glorified layouts (I'm looking at YOU John Buscema).

    But to be fair to the pencilers, it was most often a case of the editors asking them to do layouts or breakdowns so they could get two or three books a month out of them instead of one or two.
  • Oh, man. No offense to Tom Palmer, who's a fine artist, but his inking always overpowers the penciler so much, it's disappointing.

    but those Ditko/Russell pages are lovely.
    Yeah, Palmer was someone who always made work look like his. And in the 80's, a lot of pencillers were just handing in glorified layouts (I'm looking at YOU John Buscema).

    But to be fair to the pencilers, it was most often a case of the editors asking them to do layouts or breakdowns so they could get two or three books a month out of them instead of one or two.
    And many of them had a certain number of pages they had to turn out in their contracts.

  • Oh, man. No offense to Tom Palmer, who's a fine artist, but his inking always overpowers the penciler so much, it's disappointing.

    but those Ditko/Russell pages are lovely.
    Yeah, Palmer was someone who always made work look like his. And in the 80's, a lot of pencillers were just handing in glorified layouts (I'm looking at YOU John Buscema).

    But to be fair to the pencilers, it was most often a case of the editors asking them to do layouts or breakdowns so they could get two or three books a month out of them instead of one or two.
    And many of them had a certain number of pages they had to turn out in their contracts.
    Exactly.
  • bralinatorbralinator Posts: 5,967

    Oh, man. No offense to Tom Palmer, who's a fine artist, but his inking always overpowers the penciler so much, it's disappointing.

    but those Ditko/Russell pages are lovely.
    Yeah, Palmer was someone who always made work look like his. And in the 80's, a lot of pencillers were just handing in glorified layouts (I'm looking at YOU John Buscema).

    But to be fair to the pencilers, it was most often a case of the editors asking them to do layouts or breakdowns so they could get two or three books a month out of them instead of one or two.
    And to be fair to Buscema, he and Thomas, and Chan launched a third Conan title, King Conan in 1980 (along with CtB, and SSoC) and he continued working on other high-profile projects such as the second Superman and Spiderman team-up, Epic magazine, movie adaptations, Bront, etc.

    When he finally ended his Conan run in the mid-80's (after 14 years) he returned to superhero comics as a penciller on the Avengers in 1985 with #255, with Palmer on inks for 45 issues, and the Fantastic Four for several issues, and on many one-shots and adaptations. It's no wonder with so much volume and variety of work Buscema produced and the unfinished nature of doing mainly layouts, that much of his 80's work has been considered by some to be less inspired than his previous work, which was top notch and highly regarded.

    I understand that there was a lot streamlining and simplicity with a shift of focus to storytelling, moving mostly to layouts in the mid to late 80's. Thankfully, he finally returned to form with the Silver Surfer graphic novel, 'Judgment Day', inked by himself and done entirely with full-page panels and when he launched the ongoing Wolverine - which finally marked a return for Buscema to doing finished pencils regularly .

  • Oh, man. No offense to Tom Palmer, who's a fine artist, but his inking always overpowers the penciler so much, it's disappointing.

    but those Ditko/Russell pages are lovely.
    Yeah, Palmer was someone who always made work look like his. And in the 80's, a lot of pencillers were just handing in glorified layouts (I'm looking at YOU John Buscema).

    But to be fair to the pencilers, it was most often a case of the editors asking them to do layouts or breakdowns so they could get two or three books a month out of them instead of one or two.
    ...Thankfully, [Buscema] finally returned to form with the Silver Surfer graphic novel, 'Judgment Day', inked by himself and done entirely with full-page panels and when he launched the ongoing Wolverine - which finally marked a return for Buscema to doing finished pencils regularly .

    Those two books were fantastic. I loved Buscema's (and Claremont's) take on Wolverine in those early issues.

  • Oh, man. No offense to Tom Palmer, who's a fine artist, but his inking always overpowers the penciler so much, it's disappointing.

    but those Ditko/Russell pages are lovely.
    Yeah, Palmer was someone who always made work look like his. And in the 80's, a lot of pencillers were just handing in glorified layouts (I'm looking at YOU John Buscema).

    I understand that there was a lot streamlining and simplicity with a shift of focus to storytelling, moving mostly to layouts in the mid to late 80's. Thankfully, he finally returned to form with the Silver Surfer graphic novel, 'Judgment Day', inked by himself and done entirely with full-page panels and when he launched the ongoing Wolverine - which finally marked a return for Buscema to doing finished pencils regularly .

    He returned to form any time he didn't have to draw super-heroes, and his Savage Sword of Conan work was always top notch. He much preferred that work, and gave the black and white mags his full effort.
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