Happy holidays with new sketch cards & custom figures

I found this sketch card earlier this month on ebay and thought I'd save it for the right time to post. As I said before I've never been a big Hembeck fan but I've been kinda digin these Rom sketch cards by him that have been turning up lately. Also, gotta give it up to Hembeck for Marvel Age #89 (1990) and his NOVA chronology two page spread. In the last panel there is a direct reference made to ROM #24. Ya know something is missing in a a Nova origin story if it doesn't cover the events of that issue http://marvel1980s.blogspot.com/2013/12/1990-kid-called-nova-by-fred-hembeck.html

Nova 17 volume 2 (1995)

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And moving on it's time to spread some holiday cheer with some stuff from Gary Martin Jr. that I've had for a little while. This is the first appearance of the Dire Wraith Queen Volx (Nova 17 vol. 2). Nova 17 and 18 chronicles how she managed to get to Earth as a stowaway on a Xandarian transport ship that has Richard Rider on it. After taking on the identity of one of it's pilots she is never the less discovered and the ensuing battle causes the ship to crash land on Earth and "Richy" narrowly avoids getting his brains sucked out by the timely arrival of the current Nova Prime back then. Interestingly enough that Nova series was cancelled after issue 18 as described in that editorial page. However, the cliff hanger that #18 ends on (Richy's attempted suicide) picks up in the opening pages of New Warriors 60 http://romspaceknightart.blogspot.com/2012/04/new-warriors-60-offering-moment-in-cool.html

And last up we have the latest custom figure from Chris. Now there have been customs made of Jack of Hearts but this one is truly unique because it features the costume he was sporting at the time of his epic "death" (Avengers 76 vol.3) which I actually like much more then his original. And just think, up until a few weeks ago Chris hardly knew jack about Jack http://custom777.deviantart.com/

Rom spaceknight, agent of S.H.I.E.L.D

Rom spaceknight #54

I just got done watching the premier of Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D yesterday. I gotta say I deliberately avoided all the hype around it in fear it might end up being like some "CW ish" kinda sitcom which I'm completely burnt out on especially with what a bore Arrow turned out to be. But after having seen it it's anything but! It was funny with out being campy, the action was good as were the characters (for the most part) and story line. There was no shortage of  references made to both the recent Marvel films in the last few years as well as to the actual Marvel comic book narratives related to S.H.I.E.L.D. And they even brought back agent Colson with a fairly plausible explanation. Maybe Marvel should just co-produce movies and TV shows it seems to be the only thing they're good at these days. All of which got me thinking of how well S.H.I.E.L.D was interwoven into the ROM series which is something I blogged about a while back:
http://romspaceknightart.blogspot.com/2012/05/sheild-infiltrated.html

The King of Thessely gave me a heads up about a Fred Hembeck Torpedo sketch card for sale on ebay. As you all know I'm not a huge Hembeck fan but I thought both sketch cards together in one scene look kinda cool none the less. And in general I thought it was cool that Hembeck even did a sketch card of this somewhat forgotten hero of the 80s.

One last thing here I wanted to include in this posting. You remember the Eagle Moss Publications origins one shot magazines that go with those Marvel superhero lead figurines I posted about last week right? Well the issue for the Jack of Hearts figurine has an actual two page spread about Bill Mantlo's career and even covers that dreadful day of the accident. The whole thing is way too much copy for a blog posting but it's stuff Bill Mantlo fans mostly know already. However as you see here I added the last segment of it here which I enjoyed the most.

How I see art and characterization

I know I'm probably gonna catch some shit for this but keeping things interesting around here every week doesn't come from me sugar coating my opinions and thoughts on things. That being said I've never been a real big fan of Fred Hembeck's work. A lot of the behind the scenes humor for Marvel's production staff that Hembeck's art often centered around didn't really resonate with me as a kid back in the early 80s. I'm not saying he sucks or anything and in all fairness I'm not all that crazy in general about caricature type renderings when it comes to my favorite comic book and sci-fi characters. There have been exceptions ofcourse such as in the case of the parodies done in MAD Magazine and similar type satire.Well, it so happens that this Hembeck sketch card that I found on ebay recently is also an exception. I actually like I don't know why but I think it has some charm to it. So what do you think, like it?
Here's a Torpedo redesign. I really like it but at the same time I can't help but want to see that new suite drawn in a less "cartoony" way it would have really kicked ass then.

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You all remember that posting of me lambasting those preliminary designs for The Micronauts cartoon that never was right? Well just by the animation style alone I knew it would have sucked and done an all around disservice to the original Bill Mantlo series. Just like a really really bad movie sequel to a great original.

And speaking of great things that Mantlo helped inspire here's a couple of Sabra sketch cards I found recently. As you can see both are quite excellent in terms of what the respective artists were going for but as usual I'm more partial to the one that is a more accurate representation (minus the cape) of Marvel's premier mutant power house of The Promise Land.

And speaking of fan made art of all sorts we've made some other new discoveries of stuff posted in recent weeks: http://www.deviantart.com/art/ROM-Spaceknight-396822744
http://www.deviantart.com/art/ROM-399788046
 http://aaronsynn.deviantart.com/art/Salem-Uncommons-1411-394364693

Speaking of my kinda art look what just turned up from Dann Phillips again. We've seen so much new ROM fan art from this guy he must be able to do it in his sleep or something.

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More custom figures and a little art critique

Most of you remember Trapper (Vola) from the spaceknight squadron I'm sure. We first saw her along with the rest of the Squadron in ROM annual #2. It would be several years later that we would see her again as ROM found himself being reunited with his fellow spaceknights during his journey back to Galador toward toward the end of the series.

This custom figure update I'm adding needs no introduction.

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 Looks like there's a custom figure for just about every look Sabra has ever had since her first appearance about 30 years ago all the way up to her last known appearance.

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Remember how in the previous posting I was talking about how I rarely come across Rom related fan art that I all around really like and how most of what I see is often mediocre or a mixed bag? Now take a close look at this one. In particular how this scene is composed and how Rom is drawn. . . . . yeah you can tell this guy has some skills. But I don't if this guy just got lazy at a certain point in this illustration or if that's his genuine interpretation of the Hybrid character but the way his face is drawn just does not work in what is otherwise a well done drawing. It looks way too caricaturist almost like something you'd expect Fred Hembeck to draw. No offense to Hembeck, it's just not the drawing style I want to see here.
It's a pity this fan art was very close to being an all around great illustration like the Dann Phillips art work in the previous posting. And speaking of which there have been some recent new Rom fan art uncovered recently. Rather it's good or not I'll let you all decide for yourselves:
http://browse.deviantart.com/art/Spaceknight-Cometh-379360677
http://browse.deviantart.com/art/ROM-Commission-382118842
One last thing here, just to put into perspective what a good deal that Rom original by Dann Phillips was on ebay you'll pay $75 if you wan this one: http://www.ebay.com/itm/ORIGINAL-ART-AVENGERS-SKETCH-COVER-ROM-SPACEKNIGHT-BY-VAN-SCIVER-/330946867699

Joe Sinnot on Rom in Comics Scene Magazine #2 (1982)

 Some of you Rom appearance and reference aficionados will appreciate this Joe Sinnott quote and back issue price guide page I found in Comic Scene Magazine #2 published in March 1982. I found this issue in a discount bin at a comic shop way back in the day around the mid 80s. But I remembered there was something in it Rom related and rare that I wanted to see again so I recently picked it up on ebay.

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I like this early photo of Bill Mantlo. It comes from an article in Amazing Heroes magazine #60 (published in December 1984) on Bill's upcoming work at the time which was Cloak & Dagger, Rocket Raccoon, Sword of The Swashbucklers and The Derangers. The Derangers were a group of super powered individuals (Bedlam, Freakout, Breakdown, Shadow) with some serious mental problems that were supposed to be a new book title. As far as I know that never happened but The Derangers did end up being characters that battled Alpha Flight in issues 53 and 54 both written by Mantlo.

 

Just seeing this for the first time for some reason even though it's been featured in several places on the internet for a couple of years now. This is a portion of a recovered two page spread that Anthony Vukojevich that was originally done by Fred Hembeck as some sort of Fantastic Four Roast issue one shot. The original Hembeck version had Rom in it but he was left out in the published version. So thank you Anthony for putting Rom back in for your recovered rendition. Be sure to check out all the links on Anthony's page in order to see all the versions of this cover art: http://vukojevich.blogspot.com/2010/11/fred-hembeck-fantastic-four-roast-cover.html