Monday, November 21, 2011

Rom's Spaceknights to Benefit Bill Mantlo Petition

I just created a group on Facebook with the working title of Rom's Spaceknights to Benefit Bill Mantlo.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/141453282624884/

As per the description in the Mandate:
"The purpose of this group is to encourage Marvel Comics and Hasbro Toys to team up and allow a Rom related benefit book or books to help fund care for Bill Mantlo, who suffered brain damage due to a hit and run driver in 1992. This can be an all-new book or a collection of Bill Mantlo's Rom comics, which have never been reprinted due to the license reverting back to Parker Brothers/Hasbro. With the exception of a couple backup stories, Mantlo wrote all 75 issues or Rom and all four Annuals, so it would be fitting for Rom to come to the rescue of the man who loved him the most.

Please note that this is strictly a petition and I am not asking for money myself.  I would imagine that if this came to fruition, Marvel, as publisher of the book(s) would handle the money matters."
 
Okay, the series had its faults.  It could be over melodramatic at times, for example.  And yet it was clearly a title that Mantlo had great passion for, and was a better comic than one would have expected a toy-based series to be.  And while with GI Joe and Transformers the toys and comics complemented each other, Parker abandoned the toy pretty quickly, so the comic succeeded on its own merits.  And while he didn't come up with Rom himself, nearly every other aspect of the mythos, including most of Rom's own back story came from Mantlo.

Now one could argue that Mantlo, who was skateboarding at the time he was hit, should have been wearing a helmet, but I doubt he expected to be hit by a car, something that could have happened to a pedestrian just as easy.  While I do think a helmet would have been well advised regardless, I think it's safe to say he's more than paid for this error in judgement.

Here in Canada Mantlo's care, while not perfect, would have probably been allowed him a greater degree of recovery than he now enjoys.  But once the insurance money ran out, Mantlo was largely left to the care of his family, who only have so much money of their own.

What I'm asking people to do is join the group and get others to join the group.  If a book or books happen it's a win for Marvel and Hasbro due to the positive publicity, it's a win for the readers who get either new stories or a collection of older material (or both), and it's a win for Bill Mantlo, who needs all the money he can get for his care

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