Rom's Russian adventure continues!As the Gremlin explains, the Dire Wraiths have taken over the Soviet government (is that supposed to explain the Cold War... or Glasnost?), and he's re-integrated Rom into his armor to help him lay siege to a secret Wraith base. It's all about being a patriot and not a slave to the State. Especially when the State has been taken over by alien wizards. There's a lesson about Bush's Patriot Act in there somewhere if someone smart enough could figure it out.
But before the Spaceknights get down to destroying the Wraith base, they've got some business to attend to: The burial of Rom's flesh clone. Do you know what it does to someone to have to bury himself for the second time?*
Nothing good! (*Rom buried half his human bits with Terminator's body after he got killed by Galactus, and now this.)So anyway, the Gremlin's mission.
Panel posted for no other reason than to showcase Akin & Garvey's gorgeous inking. Sal Buscema has never looked better.IS the Gremlin right about Wraiths having infiltrated the Kremlin though?
We may never know. All Communists have shadows like that. It's their vampire blood.The Wraithssians have a counterplan, of course. They're sending the misguided Soviet Super-Soldiers to intercept our heroes.
Right away, we get a fight not unlike Juggernaut-the Blob in its raw primal power: Which is stronger? Starshine's light or Darkstar's darkness? They completely lose control of their powers as the respective forces usually at their command go berserk. I guess they never COULD stand each other.
When light is about to win (as it usually does in nature), Vanguard interferes, drawing Rom's ire. YOU DON'T HURT BRANDY!
The fight is largely a stalemate until Major Ursus reconnoiters the base and returns wounded with the truth. The facility is a factory for Hellhouds. Albino Hellhounds.
Siberian Husky Albino Hellhounds! You gotta come back next week for the next chapter - it'll make you go AROOOOOO.Bonus Cool Akin & Garvey Inking
Great wax job.
Comments
Galadorian tech is like the poor man's Power Cosmic, as shown in this isue. The Gremlin knew about a secret Wraith Base, so Brandy used the Living Light to read his thoughts, then transformed herself, Rom and the Gremlin into light waves and travelled instantaneously to the base. That's a pretty impressive display.
And there's nothing "poor" about the Spaceknight power cosmic. For a rookie, Starshine has it going ON!
How many other civilizations are capable of moving entire galaxies? I meant to post something here at the Blog of Geekery when you reviewed Rom #27, so as long as I'm on the subject, I'll just state it here and now.
Galactus gets major props from many quarters for moving the Golden Galaxy through space in issue #27 (for example, check out his Wiki entry), but if its such a grandiose feat, Mentus/the Prime Director should also be acknowledged as having been able to perform acts on a cosmic scale.
I tend to think that the Prime Director's Golden Globe of Power from issue #13 was some sort of cosmic containment unit (a non-cube cosmic cube.) His extremely long life, autonomous dark side (Mentus), and the way he transcended his human form after death all seem to indicate that the Prime Director was no ordinary man.
The fact that Galactus ATE him seems to undermines this conclusion, but hey, when he transcended his physical form, the PD become a being of pure id, and suicide is consistent with the actions of a hypothetical being of pure id, unconstrained by the superego (a being rule by instictual drives and impulses [including Thanatos], demanding immediate satisfaction, much like the Skrull Emperor who wielded the cosmic cube that became the Shaper of Worlds); so even as he shucked his human form, perhaps, with Galactus's help, he sloughed off his energy form, too.
I fully expect Galactus to one day fart out the PD.
Finally, if the Golden Globe of Power is indeed a non-cube cube, then the series finale makes more sense; and more importantly, the possibility of dispensing with the consequences of the horrible Spaceknights limited series would be within easy reach of the writer (Rom is to Patrick Duffy as Spaceknights limited series is to Dallas.)