Issue(s): ROM #13
Cover Date: Dec 80
Title: "Peril, thy name is Plunderer!"
Credits:
Bill Mantlo - Writer
Sal Buscema - Penciler
Sal Buscema - Inker
Mary Jo Duffy - Editor

Review/plot:
Say what you want about Jack of Hearts, it is a long way down from him to the Plunderer, but that is the next Marvel character to appear in a ROM book.

ROM happens to wash up on shore near a cave where Parnival Plunder is hijacking pleasure yachts. The Plunderer needs wooden boats so he can smuggle (Savage Land) vibranium, which can't be moved on metal boats thanks to its metal-destroying properties.

ROM is uniquely vulnerable to the Plunderer's vibra-ray guns due to his metal body, making him the only hero to ever not win definitively against this guy.

Probably the saddest thing about all of this is that the Plunderer's crew are defeated by a few vacationers that were on one of the yachts he kidnapped.

ROM has amnesia during this story but he gets his memory back at the end. But both ROM and the Plunderer are seemingly killed in an explosion.

The only other recurring character in this issue is Reporter Ace O'Connor, who discovers something in her photos that she didn't see during ROM's attack on Project Safeguard.

The first year of ROM was tightly focused on the Dire Wraith conspiracy, but that comes to an end with last issue, which saw ROM break up the cabal at Project Safeguard and also had ROM's first guest appearance. This next begins a period where ROM has run-ins with various Marvel heroes and villains, encounters that (like this issue) are not always related to the Dire Wraiths. In some ways, the lack of focus will hurt the series, but it's made up for with tighter integration with the larger Marvel universe.

With this issue, a sporadic Saga of the Spaceknights feature begins (there will be seven installments over ten issues). This one answers the question of why ROM didn't just become human again after Galador was safe. Even though his girlfriend Ray-Na initially disapproved of him becoming a Spaceknight, now that he's done so, she thinks she "could never be truly happy, knowing you'd forsaken your duty for our love". So he agrees to go off into space to hunt down the Dire Wraiths on other planets.

Quality Rating: C-

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: I'm allowing that a little time passes while ROM gets tossed around in the ocean and eventually washes up on shore before he is discovered at the beginning of this issue. Despite the explosion at the end of this issue, ROM will show up just fine at the beginning of #14.

References:

• The Plunderer escaped from SHIELD's maximum security lock-up after being jailed in Fantastic Four #191.

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A