Hi everyone,
Time to resume this series after another busy week. Today, I'll be writing about Marvel Comics' seventeenth issue of ROM: Spaceknight. This was the beginning of a two-part epic where our hero interacted with the X-Men, one of the most popular Marvel franchises at the time. This issue's cover shows ROM lifting a child in his left hand while simultaneously trying to fend off a slicing attack from Wolverine's claws in his neutralizer-wielding right arm, as Storm, Nightcrawler, and Colossus look on. The issue's story was titled "Hybrid! and had a cover date of April 1981.
The tale began at Professor Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters when Colossus, Storm, Nightcrawler, Wolverine, and Sprite (Kitty Pryde) were roused by the piercing scream of an alert issued by Cerebro, Charles Xavier's computer system that had detected new mutant activity. Xavier explained to his team that the signal emanated from Clairton, West Virginia. The X-Men soon departed for the hangar, en route to West Virginia to determine if the new mutant was friend or foe. They left their mentor behind in his wheelchair to ponder the possibilities.
In ROM's adopted hometown, we see a town doctor arrive via snowmobile at the Marks farm. There, the doctor is surprised to see livestock carcasses rotting in the snow. Doc Stennis makes his way to the front door, finding it slightly ajar. Cautiously, he enters the front room, calling out Jacob Marks' name. He soon reaches the master bedroom and is stunned to see the prematurely aged body of Jacob's wife, Marjorie.
No sooner does the doctor retreat from the room than he hears Jacob's voice from behind him. Stennis turns to see Jacob confirms his wife's condition, noting that it was not caused by anything that science or medicine could explain. Jacob adds that the culprit was the same one who killed the livestock sitting in the yard, before he reveals himself to the doctor to be a Dire Wraith. The wraith then points to the nearby room, where Stennis can discover the reason for his house call. An eerie voice calls to the doctor, who is so revulsed by what he sees and smells that he runs out of the house in a hurry. After his departure, we learn that the eerie voice belongs to the Marks' child, who comments on Jacob's return to his human form and shames him for loving a human. Jacob Marks curses his decision, while the child laughs eerily.
Meanwhile, Clairton County coroner Silas Lane is greeted at the Clark home by Brandy's father, who leads him into the living room, where several friends and family members are waiting for him, including the silver Spaceknight. Initially, Lane is shocked to see the alien whom many had assumed to have murdered townspeople shortly after his arrival, but allows Mr. Clark and Brandy's boyfriend Steve Jackson to explain the purpose of the Galadorian's arrival on Earth. The coroner starts to understand and brings out several files that he'd taken with him to Washington, D.C., that had puzzled him, because all of them had the exact same birth date: November 9, 1945. He believed that those records in question had been altered, and that the only person on that list who was still alive was Jimmy Marks.
ROM presumed that date was when the wraiths first arrived on Earth. One of the Clarks' friends protested the assumption that Marks was a Dire Wraith, explaining that she was friends with his wife, Marjorie, and that she had helped Doc Stennis deliver the Marks' child. ROM asserted that the wraiths had infiltrated American society for decades, and was bewildered by the possibility of a wraith and a human mating and having offspring.
The Galadorian then flew off to the Marks' homestead, followed by Brandy Clark and Jackson on snowmobiles. The trio found a pair of humans waiting for them: Jacob Marks and his frail wife. Jacob freely admitted his wraith identity, and ROM summoned his energy analyzer from subspace to verify that his wife was human. Jackson and Clark led Marjorie away while ROM talked to the wraith who shed his human disguise. Their conversation continued after ROM's friends went on their way to take Mrs. Marks to the nearby hospital.
Jacob explained that he arrived on Earth in November 1940 after his spaceship crashed. Soon after his arrival, he spied on humans. Instead of attacking them, he decided to mimic one of the males. Having grown weary of constant attacks, he decided to give up his Dire Wraith persona and assimilate into the town. In a nation that had just finished its involvement in the Second World War, his arrival wasn't questioned. It was merely accepted.
Before too long, Marks had a career as a farmer, and after a decade on earth, he began courting Marjorie Seaton. They fell in love, and Marjorie gave birth to their son Jimmy fifteen years before this story was produced. Things were normal for several years, until Jimmy's wraith heritage came back to haunt him. On that fateful day, a pair of wraiths approached Marks, who saw right through his human disguise and came to visit his son, as was their right. The aliens privately opened the young boy's mind to the magic of his otherworldly heritage.
From then on, things were decidedly different in the Marks household. Young Jimmy rebelled at times, and used his newfound wraith abilities to punish the livestock and even his parents. By the time ROM arrived, the boy's evil was past the point of no return. After Jacob finished his story, the Spaceknight wandered into the house alone. He found the child alone in his bedroom, moments before the half-human half-wraith child transformed himself into a grotesque looking being that named himself Hybrid.
Hybrid attacked ROM, flinging floorboards at him as gale force winds whipped up inside the homestead. Jacobs pleaded for his son to stop, only to be have the pitchfork that was in his right hand possessed by Hybrid and hurled at his body. Jacob Marks was impaled by the weapon and died. The Spaceknight launched a physical attack against his foe, and was amazed by Hybrid's power. He summoned his neutralizer from subspace, but its beams did not send the creature to limbo. ROM increased the power until the neutralizer rays destroyed the house. ROM swore to continue the battle, but his speech now outside of the former building had been heard by Nightcrawler, Storm, Colossus, Wolverine and Sprite, who assumed that Jimmy Marks (who by then had returned to his human guise) had attacked the young mutant that Cerebro had detected.
Even though this issue's cover was a bit misleading, since the X-Men didn't confront ROM until the very last panel, the story was a good setup for their confrontation the next issue. Writer Bill Mantlo, artist Sal Buscema and company introduced a very powerful opponent, one that ROM would face multiple times over the title's run. Hybrid even had several additional appearances in the Marvel Universe long after the book was cancelled and they lost the rights to the character.
Next time, I'll write about the eighteenth issue of Marvel's ROM: Spaceknight, where we see the Spaceknight go against Earth's mightiest mutant heroes, and we learn what happens in the aftermath of ROM's first encounter with Hybrid. Until then, have a great week and don't forget to be kind to one another.
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