Cloak n' Dagger 11 Vol. 2 and the lost SABRA pages

Before we get to the Sabra stuff, have a look at this. A mere coincidence? I think not.

So just earlier today I came across something of a wonderful mystery involving Cloak n' Dagger issue 11 (Volume 2) from 1985. What you see here are two unpublished pages (9 and 15) for a story called O Little Town of Bethlehem in which Cloak n' Dagger get caught up in a West Bank weapons smuggling operation. The published story featured a non super powered female semi protagonist named Beth Stein who is on a personal vendetta to avenge the death of her daughter by terrorists.

There's no mention of Israel or of "palestinians" but it's very obvious that Beth is an Israeli and that the terrorists she's pursuing are palestinians. I always thought that was a bit odd when I first read Cloak n' Dagger 11 as a back issue a few years ago especially considering that Marvel had published stories with Middle East politics in the background in the early 80s with out any drama for first appearance issues (Incredible HULK series ofcourse) of Sabra and The Arabian Knight. And now it would appear as if at some point in this issue's production that it was intended to have Sabra (aka Ruth Bat Seraph) as the semi protagonist instead of this Beth Stein character.

I wish I had more answers about what the Hell went on behind the scenes at the time between original writer Bill Mantlo, penciler June Brigman and editor Carl Potts. I dunno maybe it had something to do with it already having been established that the Sabra character's background involved the murder of her son (presumably only offspring) to palestinian terrorists and that this revenge story line about a murdered daughter would then not make much sense for Sabra? I suspect the reasoning was more political in nature but really who knows? 

All I can say for now is that I'm grateful for these two pages that were uncovered even though I have no idea if they're are any more out there from the unpublished Sabra version of Cloak n' Dagger 11. Interestingly enough in the 90s and early 2000s we would see Sabra make appearances in The Hulk, New Warriors, X-Men and Union Jack that took fairly deep dives into hot topics such as The Holocaust and Israel's conflict with the palestinians. And here we are in 2024 with the ongoing MCU Sabra drama for Captain America Brave New World in this post October 7th world with this shit hamas war still ongoing. 

Cloak & Dagger 11 as it was published read online  https://www.zipcomic.com/cloak-and-dagger-1985-issue-11

No ceasefire without the speedy return of all hostages still in gaza. Fuck hamas and all their useful idiot supporters!

 

September 9th Update: All I can say is damn! Not you to James Earl Jones! Another part of my childhood and so much more gone, but never forgotten. Rest in peace.

November 13th Update: Here's one I didn't see coming, at only 69 we lost Tony Todd a few days ago. Todd had a long film and TV career spanning decades but my favorite work from Todd was his countless appearances on Star Trek and when it came to his movie work there was the excellent Night of The Living Dead remake, Platoon and The Rock. I also want to make an honorary mention of yet another recent loss just prior to Todd of another Star Trek DS9 actor, James Darren. Darren played the reoccurring beloved holodeck character Vic Fontaine and you may remember him also from back in the day on T.J. Hooker.

 

The Greatest of The Spaceknights enters the war on terror

I recently decided to make some new corner boxes out already existing fan art of mine. Sabra comes from a sketch card posted here two postings ago. Added some color to a sketch card of ROM from the previous posting so that's where that one came from. And Misty Knight is from some fan art I did a few years back. 

I've actually been thinking of doing something like this for years now. I even had this idea in my head of portraying a ROM vs islamic terror scene like this using the cover art of ROM 3 as a template. Obviously recent events in The Middle East has given me the final motivation to get this done even though I ultimately decided to go with a less challenging composition then the Frank Miller cover art from ROM Spaceknight #3.

Shogun Warriors 13 was one of the very first comics I ever which at the time I used to have to nag my parents to buy for me. A few years ago I stumbled across a copy of issue 12 in a dollar box so I figured what the Hell let's check it out. And I was treated to yet another pleasant surprise when discovered one of the most rare ROM spaceknight house ads on the letters page. 

And look here, we also have another rare ROM house ad in the letters page of Micronuats 18.

https://bayareatelegraph.com/2023/11/16/pro

Pick the ROM issue Spidey!

I asked the dude who posted this on twitter where this came from but he never responded so unfortunately I can't tell you if this is some sort of fan art or if it came out any publication.

So today I bought a brand new Marvel comic for first time in almost years. Marvel's treatment of the ROM spaceknight legacy has prompted me toward a personal boycott of new comics to say nothing of the cover prices these days. But I finally made an exception for this one shot issue of Magneto & The Mutant Force which has Sabra among the cast of characters. I'd say it's been around 3 years since she last made an appearance in any Marvel title so I had to check this out.

In this alternate reality there are no Avengers and Sabra is part of a mutant rebellion led by a paraplegic Magneto against the government which Squadron Supreme are agents of.  It would have been nice had there been a bit more of her in the issue but over all I thought it was ok. Been out of the loop for quite a while when it comes to all things going on in the published Marvel Universe so I'm sure there's some context to the story I'm missing here.

And here we have the latest commission piece from our pal Sal. Unfortunately I don't have any details about about who it was for or how much whoever paid for it which I think we all are curious about. I think this is the best commission form Sal in quite a while.

Bill Mantlo benefit art auction left overs in Portland

Shitty art work from past benefit auctions

Just got back from a weekend get away in Portland and paid a brief visit to Floating World Comics while I was there. They had some of these 11 X 17 glossy prints on a pretty thick paper stock of some of the art work from the past benefit auctions. Sadly none of them was of any of the good art that came out of those auctions. Most of the art work that came from those auctions were really amateurish and down right bizarre much of the time. Too bad, a high quality print of some of the better art work would have been a nice thing to take home with me. Those prints were only going for around $5 and there's no sales tax in Oregon.

So moving on to more satisfying matters. Just before I left for Portland I got a copy of Excalibur 121 in the mail which I bought on ebay. I think you can all guess why I wanted that issue and it came just in time to give me something to read on the plane even though Oakland to Portland is a fairly short flight. Some of the highlights is the opening sequence with the debriefing of Sabra by her superiors over a mission she under took with Excalibur.

When the story back tracks to the before mentioned mission we find out that Sabra doesn't play well with others here. Even when it came to fellow mutants she has a common heritage with (Kitty Pride ofcourse) things got of to a rough start. But toward the end of the mission Sabra gets a lesson in the value of team work which in turn may help explain her having been more of a team player (especially with Storm) in what would be the pages of future X-Men issues back then.

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Astonishing Tales 2009 One Shot starring Sabra part 3 of 3

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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.

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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.

Astonishing Tales 2009 One Shot starring Sabra part 2 of 3

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So obviously if you were thinking of Samson & Delilah toward the end of the last posting you were right. Samson, who's great strength comes from his long hair is betrayed by Delilah who cuts his hair while he's sleeping. To further debilitate him he is also blinded and eventually put on display by being chained to the pillars of a temple. Thinking he is helpless his enemies party around him and mock him in the process but with his last bit of remaining strength he manages to pull down the pillars he is chained to quite literally crashing the party. Ofcourse this kills Samson but at least he takes his enemies with him.

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I also like the whole concept of Sabra being saved by the Israeli army as opposed to her being sprung by some other superheroes or something like that. It underscores the whole point of her story to Yael about how every body in the security apparatus (from the Israeli Defense Force to Mossad*) of the tiny country of Israel have each others back.

*Mossad, the Israeli secret service that Sabra operates under.

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Next up, the conclusion.

Astonishing Tales 2009 One Shot starring Sabra part 1 of 3

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Over the past few years there's been a handful of obscure random single issues I've been on the look out for. In recent months I've been able to get my hands on just about all of them from discount back issue boxes except for this one. Couldn't find it online either as far as hard copies go but a friend of mine who had a marvel.com account was able to hook me up with a digital copy so now at least I was able to read the entire story as opposed to just some of the random clip art found here and there all over the web. I really wanted to make this story available in a more complete format for any Sabra fans out there so I'm going to make this 3 part posting series.
First off, as you can see the art work is nothing short of amazing thanks to Brazilian artist Adriana Melo. But aside from that it's very interesting about who the writer is. Matt Yocum was actually a US Air Force liaison to the Israeli Air Force and has spent quite a bit of time in Israel over the years. And obviously he's also a writer and a big comic book fan. In a nut shell, the story takes place at a diplomatic function in Jerusalem in which Sabra runs into her old friend Ronit who in turns introduces Sabra to her daughter Yael. As an important side note in the story it turns out Sabra and Ronit's fathers served in the Israeli air force back in the day. Notice how in the flash back panel Sabra is featured in her original costume (but with her early 90s hair style)? As you can see from the clip art above Yael is having some anxieties about her impending military service for which Sabra proceeds to give her a pep talk of sorts.

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The story has some nice touches to it such as the Old Testament references that even non religious folks should be able to pick up easily as Sabra faces this Pacific Rim style Hydra robot.

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In the story of David and Goliath every body knows how the young King David brought down the Philistine warrior Goliath with his sling but David also decapitated him which may not be as commonly known. That's just what you did in those days after you take down a mother fucker.

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Sabra's disposition during her captivity with Hydra mirrors another Hebrew fable from the Old Testament although in Sabra's case things didn't end nearly as tragically but we'll get into that in part 2 of this blog posting mini-series.

Sabra by Dann Phillips!

http://dannphillips.deviantart.com/

Mozel Tov! Every body raise your glass Dann and I just had a baby. But in this case the "baby" came in the form of an upload yesterday on deviant art. Now the baby thing is because I had been pestering Dann for some untold months about doing something with Sabra. The thing is I can always draw something myself (previous post) if I really want to see it but every artist brings some different to a character or scene based on their style and imagination and some times it's just nice to see another artist's interpretation for a change. I hope you all enjoy this it certainly made my weekend.
Nothing new on the ROM front I hadn't really planned on any more postings in the foreseeable future and I'm trying not to think about the new series because I'm burnt out on it already. But since I posted this new Sabra fan art today to give it some more exposure I might as well pass along some other fan art to you. Speaking of strong female characters created by Bill Mantlo and Sal Buscema this is some of the best Starshine fan art out there although The Defenders cover concept doesn't make much sense to me but that aside this is pretty damn good . . .
http://michaeldooney.deviantart.com/art/Spaceknight-covers-595064323

And finally, here's a color version of that recent Acroyear vs ROM fan art piece which is over all really good although ROM's neutralizer still looks like shit. It really is the proverbial fly in the ointment as the saying goes . . .
http://mavspace.deviantart.com/art/Rom-Vs-Acroyer-591575790

March 14th update
Actually there's one more thing Ptor from The Sanctum Sanctorum gave me a heads up about a custom Torpedo that just recently sold on ebay. The seller also had this on deviant art where  he comes off as kind of an asshole but hey whatever.

Some undiscovered clip art from Universe X

Just can't seem to stay away from this blogging shit for long for one reason or another. This morning I was browsing on the internet as I frequently do for anything interesting or other wise cool that's ROM related both new and old. That's how I found this clip art of Captain America with ROM's neutralizer. Now I happen to have Universe X #3 and based on some other clip art on the internet from the series as well as clip art that was sent to me by Gary Martin Jr. (who I haven't heard from in over a fu&%$@ month now) some years ago I know that Captain America was featured in action with ROM's neutralizer in later issues. But this is the first time I've seen this clip art I actually couldn't get to the page it was on which belonged to some marvel comics site that you had to login to. But fortunately the Google preview image was pretty big so here we are.
For Valentine's Day my wife got me this really nice set of Supracolor Soft coloring pencils. They're so smooth the way they lay down color on paper even though I'm not feeling especially creative these days I should give them a proper "test drive". So maybe within the next couple weeks I might be able to update this posting with some new fan art.

Feb. 25th Update:
Indeed you are correct Joseph (see today's comments) the clip art above as well more clip art of alternate reality Captain America blasting away with ROM's neutralizer is located in Universe X #4. But there's more, issues 10 and 11 and even a 0 and "X" issue will also give us more dire wraiths along with a ROM flash back cameo to issue #3. Plus we also find out in a editorial mention that the Universe X Galador was consumed by Galactus as opposed to ROM having tricked Galactus into trying to consume Wraith World instead as we know it. So for all of you clamoring to get a copy of Universe X #3 it looks like you'll need to dig a little deeper into your pockets get at least 4 more issues to have the full story on the ROM and dire wraith related tidbits of Universe X. A little curating birdie gave me the low down earlier this morning but more on that later. By the way I'm still intent on giving my new coloring pencil set a try with some new fan art very soon.

Feb. 28th Update: And here it is, the finished product.This isn't one of those fan art pieces I didn't thoroughly think through while doing the sketch. It just started with ROM and then I just kept adding characters with the right color scheme to their costumes I wanted to try out my new coloring pencil set on. Obviously I already had Captain America on my mind and who doesn't like Wolverine? Although with Sabra I added her because I'd been hoping to see some new fan art of her turn up some where for a while now but some times if you want to see something get done you just gotta do it yourself.

Walnut Creek California

Ya know with all this Captain America and Sabra talk I just feel like adding this photo of a billboard that just showed up here in the San Francisco Bay Area last week.

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March 3rd Update: And getting back to more ROM spaceknight and Sabra themed fan art check out this Official Marvel Universe Handbook #9 front and back cover spread redux I just happened to come across tonight. You can see the full view here . . .
http://superadaptoid.deviantart.com/art/Marvel-Universe-Old-School-118212599

P.S. As far as all this new stuff I've updated this posting with in the past week don't everybody speak up all at once now.

Wrapping up 2014 with some old school coolness and my latest fan art

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Marvel Update was a quarterly news letter brochure that Marvel Comics Group distributed only to their in-house departments, shareholders and business partners back in the 70's through the 90's. All those early ROM costume promo appearances we've seen floating around on the internet for several years now like this one
http://romspaceknightart.blogspot.com/2012/11/new-rom-1980s-cosplay-photo-found-plus.html  were originally published in that quarterly in regards to the launching of the ROM spaceknight comic book series. So in a sense, Marvel Update actually had the first appearance of ROM. Ever the collector and curator of all things ROM related the following clips seen above come from a winter and fall edition of Marvel Update which Gary Martin Jr. recently acquired.

Ya know I really miss the good ol days of illustrations done on envelope like we used to see in Wizard magazine (just like you said K.o.T). I think of it as something of a lost art form.

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Dec. 18 update: I neglected to remember that Hanukkah started at sundown yesterday. So in order to atone for my absent mindedness I decided to whip up this sketch art of Sabra taking a break from putting down jihadi terrorists and super powered menaces so she can light the menorah. More possible updates for this blog posting to come before the end of the year.


And here's that first update. This fantastic Dec. 17 ROMcentric podcast throws around those common questions about what the fuck is going on when it comes to hasbro and marvel in regards to ROM as a licensed property http://relativelygeekypodcast.blogspot.com/2014/12/qbp-040-rom-1.html

What a difference some color makes and my latest back issue find

You can see the original art work here:

 http://browse.deviantart.com/?qh=&section=&global=1&q=rom+spaceknight#/d2dnhtm

 A couple weeks ago I found Cloak & Dagger #11 vol. 2 (1986) in a back issue bin for a couple of bucks. I was interested in it because part of it takes place in Bethlehem and in essence was another story revolving around the Israel arab conflict written by Bill Mantlo and penciled by June Brigman. This would have been a great opportunity to have CnD team up with Sabra but I think Mantlo wanted to avoid controversy for this issue given Bethlehem's disputed status. Instead, a new character by the name of Beth Stein is used in the story and she never uses the name Israel for her country of origin even though it's obvious she's an Israeli counter terrorist agent out for revenge on islamic terrorists who are responsible for a bus bombing.

The drug and arms trail that CnD follow later takes them to South East Asia in which they are forced to take down a Vietnam war vet turned drug Warlord thanks to his latent mutant powers triggered by the opium he's forced local villagers to harvest.

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I have to say I enjoyed this issue more then the other Cloak & Dagger stories I've read in recent months from 80s back issue boxes. Taking CnD out of the New York City street level adventures to something more broader in scope that brings history and politics into the story telling.