Clov
An ethernet cable girlfriend
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Welcome one and all, to the official Famiboards thread of ROM the Space Knight! Though ROM has countless fans throughout the world, I'm sure that there's some newcomers here who can't help but scratch their head and wonder; "Who is ROM, and what does he want?" Thankfully, as a ROM expert, I'm just the girl to tell you! Let's start!
ROM: The Toy
As you can see, ROM is quite a versatile toy! You can imagine him doing all sorts of things with his cool accessories, and battery operated lights! ROM the toy was created by Parker Brothers in 1979. Yes, the board game company. They made a toy! That toy was ROM! You'd figure that a toy this cool would be an immediate smash hit, but unfortunately you'd be wrong, because as a toy, ROM was a complete failure. It's widely believed that this is because children are stupid and ignorant of the world's splendour. For most toys, this would be the end! But not for ROM, because he was about to embark on a wildly successful stint as...
ROM: The Marvel Comics Hero
That's right! ROM the Space Knight had a very respectable run as a comic book franchise! Starting in December 1979, ROM's original comic series ran for 75 issues until 1986. He also made guest appearances in other comics, like Power Man and Iron Fist, and Marvel Two-in-One! Unlike the toy, in the comics ROM's story is not left up to your imagination. ROM is a man from the planet Galador, which was attacked by the evil Dire Wraiths, an alien race that combines black magic and advanced science. In order to save his world, ROM and many other Galadorians have no choice but to become Space Knights, beings with immense power and incredible weapons. There is a cost; to become a Space Knight, one must be permanently fused with a cybernetic suit of armor, losing their humanity forever.
ROM and his fellow Space Knights are successful in driving the Dire Wraiths away from Galador... but their mission is not yet over. The Dire Wraiths hide on Earth, disguising themselves as human beings... and so ROM makes it his mission to track them down, and use his powerful Neutralizer to banish them to Limbo!
Unfortunately, few understand what ROM is doing. Nobody on Earth is aware of the threat of the Dire Wraiths, so to most people, it looks like ROM is merely disintegrating people at random! This leads to many misunderstandings with Earth's mightiest heroes...
ROM as a comic was a smash hit under Marvel! But all great things must come to and end, and so too did ROM in the year of 1986. The toy was long discontinued, and through the horror of corporate acquisitions, Parker Bros ended up being bought by Hasbro in 1991. In Hasbro's ignorance, ROM was forgotten, and faded out of humanity's collective memory... until one day...
ROM: The Return
In the humble year of 2016, ROM somehow returned. Comics publisher IDW acquired the rights for ROM, and thrust him into the modern era of comics as part of a massive crossover event called Revolution. Revolution was a somewhat ill-conceived idea by IDW, to create a shared comics universe for Hasbro characters. The crossover consisted of their long-running Transformers comics, G.I Joe, ROM, Micronauts, Action Man, and M.A.S.K. They would later add the Visionaries to this universe to disasterous results, but that's a story for another time.
ROM was so popular, that IDW even did a "ROM Cover Month". For that month, their comics recieved a variant cover featuring ROM himself! Below is my favorite, from the series "Transformers: Till All Are One". Windblade and Chromia are giving ROM a makeover!
On top of Revolution, ROM would recieve a new solo comic series lasting 14 issues, with follow-up crossover ROM and the Micronauts lasting for 5 issues in 2017, and a 3 issue prequel called ROM: Dire Wraiths in 2020. But greatest of all the IDW ROM comics was his fantastic 5 issue miniseries ROM Vs Transformers: Shining Armor!
This crossover introduces the new character Stardrive, a Cybertronian Knight! But she is shunned by her fellow Knights of the Solstar Order for her robotic nature, and she herself remains unaware of her Cybertronian origin. But a chance encounter with Bumblebee and Ultra Magnus changes all that... meanwhile, Starscream is cooking up a scheme with some Dire Wraiths. When it all comes to a head, Stardrive must make a choice...
The events in this series would later impact IDW's literally world ending finale to their original Transformers universe, Transformers: Unicron. After that, IDW rebooted their Transformers comics, and the shared Hasbro universe came to an end. With the release of ROM: Dire Wraiths, ROMs time in the comics spotlight would end soon after. And so, for a time, ROM was forgotten once more... until...
ROM's Miraculous Return to Marvel
As of this year, ROM is back! In reprint form! Marvel reacquired the rights to reprint their old ROM comics, and for the first time ever, the original 1979-1986 series is being made available in hardcover omnibuses. An exciting and unexpected development for ROM fans everywhere! The first is available now, collecting ROM issues 1-29, as well as Power Man and Iron Fist issue 73. It seems like there will be at least three of these, the second of which is coming later this year!
But what about the future of ROM? Will he ever get a new comic series of his own? Maybe! Feeling an unending jealousy towards IDW's idea, Marvel recently did a ROM cover month of their own, featuring lesser characters like Spiderman and Iron Man.
These covers also have to point out that they are the "ROM Variant" specifically, because Marvel's readership is notoriously dim.
And that's about it! The whole ROM story, in one convenient post! And now... it's your turn! Feel free to share your favorite ROM moments and images below! Get posting, fellow Space Knights!
