Rom #5
Published and © by Marvel and Rom © Parker Brothers, April 1980
Title: “A House Is Not a Home!”
Synopsis: Rom and two human allies take refuge in a deserted house – a house possessed by an other-dimensional terror!
Writer: Bill Mantlo
Artist: Sal Buscema
Review: OK, this is one odd outing. The issue starts off with more sci-fi slow burn, as Rom and two human allies – Brandy Clark and her fiancée, Steve Jackson – flee Dire Wraith agents. Writer Bill Mantlo is clearly setting up a love triangle between the humans and Rom, which adds a nice touch of humanity to the heroic-but-otherwise-cold spaceknight. The trio randomly takes refuge in an isolated, deserted house … that happens to be possessed by an other-dimensional creature… who happens to know the Dire Wraiths. Even Little Me couldn’t suspend that much disbelief!
Grade: C
Second opinion: “Who but Bill Mantlo would revive a villain consisting of an alien who likes to disguise himself as a haunted house?” — Kim Thompson, The Comics Journal #54, March 1980
Cool factor: Umm, no.
Notable: Flashback appearance featuring Doctor Strange. … The “Space Notes” letters page include a short biographical feature titled “He Writes the Spaceknight: Bill Mantlo.”
Character quotable: “I feel like a child in his arms! Safe! Secure! He’s so strong, and he sounds so … so noble!” – Brandy Clark, partaking in some internal monologue about a certain someone (hint: it’s not her fiancé!)
Editor’s note: This review was originally published by Sequential Reaction (Vol. 1) on Jan. 25, 2016.
