Rom, Spaceknight

Comics 101 recently did a three parter (one two three) on Rom, a comic which I read in elementary school. Rom was an alien humanoid who had much of his flesh replaced with robotic parts in order to fight the Dire Wraiths, an alien species which often took the form of human beings. Rom dispatched the monsters to an alternate dimension called Limbo with his Neutralizer.

I read the very end of the run of Rom, in which he returns to his home planet in search of his lost humanity - literally the flesh which was surgically removed from him. Rom's a bit of a unique cyborg character to my mind. Unlike most half robot heroes and villains,* Rom hated the loss of his humanity which granted him power and longed to be restored to his powerless state. But he still fought the good fight without succombing to angst. So think later-seasons Buffy without the suck.

*Doctor Who had two great dehumanized cyborg villains, the Daleks and the Cybermen.