There's a good chance you've seen this already but I feel like opening up this blog post with this awesome Sabra commission piece by Brazilian artist Adrianna Melo. This one is a version I colored in photoshop but you can see the original here
And you may have seen this awesome one to, it's by Greek artist Kapandais Nikolaos. Yep, the same guy who's work I featured in the previous blog posting. The guy's got a knack for great fan art for both Sabra and ROM.
On a fun side note, here I am in The Old City of Israel's capital of Jerusalem (2017) near The Jaffa gate with my copy of Incredible Hulk 256 which was the first full appearance of Sabra.
Speaking of which, issue 256 has been much in the spotlight for many months now but fans of Sabra and supporters of Israel in general should also the final panels of Incredible HULK 255 of some interest to. Kinda funny to actually. The Hulk wants to get away from fighting and have some peace of mind so he ends up stowing away on a ship bound for The Middle East, Oy Vey.
Now I just learned about these Captain America New World Order production photos of Shira Hass as Sabra like only a week ago even though they surfaced online at the tail end of March. But I think I may know why. Unlike September of last year when the Sabra MCU debut was first announced it appears as if the voices of the leftist antisemitic cry babies on social media was pretty muted this time around. I don't know if I should or shouldn't be surprised about that. Nice to see Liv Tyler reprising her role as Betty Ross. She was really good in what was a criminally under rated HULK film. It's too bad Ed Norton didn't continue to play The Hulk he's an all around great actor and I fucken hate that leftist antisemitic piece of shit mark ruffalo.
Not seeing Sabra in anything resembling her classic blue and white costume on the big screen certainly comes as no surprise. That aside, I do still have some reservations about the MCU's live action interpretation of the Sabra character given that the comic book version is older and much larger in stature then actress Shira Hass. But hey ya know what? The positive take away still is that the MCU is on track with getting it's first Israeli character next year. And that's despite all those antisemitic losers out there with their threats of boycotts, online propaganda and even public vandalism. If any of you are reading this I want you to know just how truly pitiful and pathetic you all are. You idiots have a big BDS fail waiting for you in 2024.
Where as the online antisemitism was fairly toned down with the most recent Captain America movie update I'm disappointed to see this "Not my Captain America" sort of sentiment still being pretty pervasive on social media. And this goes especially for those who are still saying that after having seen the Falcon & Winter Soldier Disney plus mini-series. That series did such a great job of analyzing what does Captain America represent as both a symbol and aspirational idea. And ofcourse, how that relates to racial matters both past and present. So I'm gonna call it out for what it is if even now you still just can't handle the idea of Sam Wilson as Captain America. In most cases when it comes to Americans, the hang up has it's roots in racism (subtle as it may be) rather you can admit it to yourself or not. Yes. many of you will scoff at this statement. But it absolutely does in every bit the same way that pathological Israel bashing has it's roots in antisemitism.
I love Marvel Comics of the 1980s, but by today's standards they were a bit socially problematic here and there. It's time for Sam Wilson to ascend to something far beyond what amounts to a supporting side kick type character he's certainly earned it by now. This is an excellent analysis video of the sociopolitical aspects of The Falcon Winter Soldier mini-series it's worth fifteen minutes of your life. Check it out . . .
May 9th update: In more news of pop culture hate mongering, what the Hell is going on with all this online hate these days? Star Wars fans having a difference of opinion about various aspects of the franchise is nothing new. Those differences and the resulting debates have been literally going on for decades. But in recent years it seemed like we could all pretty much unite under the common understanding that The Mandalorian was fucken awesome. Well apparently as of the conclusion of season 3 that's no longer the case. I cannot believe all the idiotic belly aching on social media I've been seeing since the season finale. An epic finale at that. I mean seriously, how was season 3 so different from 1 or 2 in terms of quality!? What a sad state of galactic affairs.
May 15th update: Since the theme of this posting seems to be all about unhappy people (cry babies actually) with the decision makers of their favorite pop culture media entertainment I figured I might as well include this to. This fan letter came from Marvel Age Magazine 34 (1986). But in this case, the anger is entirely justified.
The source material for this piece which I put together in Adobe photoshop comes from two other artists. The Torpedo was a line art character study from Eric Jansen. All I had to do to that one was basically add some color to it. ROM is a cropped version of an original piece from Greek artist Kapandais Nikolaos. All I did to that one is add some grey tones to make him contrast from the background a bit more.
Here's a brand new awesome fan art piece of ROM blitzing a pack of Black Nebula Hellhounds by Kapandais Nikolaos. And this time this one is all him. By the time they realize just what the Hell hit them they'll be on a one way trip to Limbo.
A couple months ago I was hesitant to post these pages that were part of a SABRA story pitch to Marvel Comics from writer Matt Yocum and artist Jake Bilbao because I felt they were a little too "real world" in terms of subject matter. I've recently had a change of heart. Mostly because I really just want to share this stuff with as many people as possible out there. It's really great material when it comes to the question of what could have been.
Almost certainly by late 2023 we will start to see official movie trailers turn up for Captain America New World Order. But before those trailers we will almost certainly by privy to production and "first look" type still images from the film. Some of those no doubt will include Shira Hass as Sabra. I can't help but wonder if all the leftist antisemites as well as the ones within the muslim world will freak out out again and act like a bunch of cry babies with dirty diapers as they did back in September when the Sabra character appearance in the MCU was first announced? The Sabra character was created by Bill Mantlo and Sal Buscema with creative input from Belinda Glass. Thank you all!
April 8th Update: For any Star Wars fans out there I've got something to share that I just started last night and completed this morning. The show down from the season one finale of Disney Plus's Kenobi was one of the best light saber duels ever in Star Wars. The exchange
that Kenobi and Vader had at it's conclusion was also some great writing
that was the icing on the cake. That was definitely my kinda Star Wars.
April 10th Update: We'll, just when I thought I'd seen it all when it comes to comic book/sci-fi related public art in The San Francisco Bay Area. What we have here is an amazing Miles Morales Spider-Man mural. I've been past this block in Oakland more then once in recent months so I know this mural is pretty new. It's located on 29th Avenue right before the highway 880 south bound onramp. Check it out if you're in the area.
This is not Sparta, this is Athens. Sporting my ROM t-shirt in Greece may not be quite as epic as King Leonidas and his 300 Spartans holding off thousands of invading persian scum at the Hot Gates of Thermoplyae or even the naval campaign the Athenian general Themistocles carried out against the persians in that war effort but I still think it's still kinda cool.
Left click to enlarge
And this is Israel's eternal and undivided capital Jerusalem. And that is a copy of Incredible Hulk 256 which is the first appearance of Marvel's premier Israeli superhero Sabra. Written by Bill Mantlo and penciled by Sal Buscema in 1980 which was a better time in history for comic books as IDW's Micronauts #1 and ROM "the" spaceknight 0 issue have proven to us once again. Here's a little something else from later that day in Jerusalem . . . . https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ww-PSW4afKw
A real life Sabra
Also wanted to give a big thanks to deviant artist nikoskap for doing this awesome Sabra fan art during my time in Greece. Niko lives on the island of Crete which I unfortunately didn't get a chance to visit but at least we were able to communicate electronically while in the same time zone for a change which was nice. Thanks for this great surprise which I'm honored to post here and for standing with the people of Israel. Sabra is a fictional character ofcourse but in the real world there are many brave women in Israel putting their lives on the line for The Holy Land and it's people. Military service in Israel is compulsory, 3 years for men and 2 years for women. Left click the image to magnify.
On a side note here I wanted to say something about podcasts these days. Is it just me or do they ALL suck? Some of the plane service had Wi-Fi and at one point I tried to listen to some podcasts having to do with the sort of thing we comic book sci-fi nerds are into and everyone I tired to listen to was boring as Hell. In fact it's been years since I last heard one that was any good at all. At one point I tried to give a listen to some having to do with The Suicide Squad and then one having to do with Free Comic Book Day and it was all about as much interesting as watching your computer buffering a video stream.
Well at this point the story pretty much speaks for it's self. Yeah that's a pretty nice perspective in that top panel like I said in part 1 of this blog posting series the art work in this issue is just absolutely amazing. I would love to see this artist pencil ROM, Hybrid, The Torpedo and the dire wraiths I know he would make them all look so awesome.
Left click to enlarge
And that city is Jerusalem, probably the most contested piece of real estate in the world. In the near future I should be doing some flying of my own to both Greece and Israel where hopefully I'll have a couple cool photo opportunity ideas that Bill Mantlo & Sal Buscema will get a kick out of. Ok one last thing . . .
Avengers 101 mighty facts
Here's something that I found in an Avengers special edition magazine by Wizard (1999) I picked up from a con in a dollar box a few weeks ago. I've been sitting on this because I wasn't sure if it was worth blogging about because quite frankly it's a bit ridiculous even within the fictitious comic book universe of ROM spaceknight. I've never read the original Avengers #10 but I'm pretty sure somebody came up with this concept long after that issue and indeed long after ROM #1 was published.
There's a good chance you've seen this already but I feel like opening up this blog post with this awesome Sabra commission piece by Brazilian artist Adrianna Melo. This one is a version I colored in photoshop but you can see the original here 
