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"Cold World": It's 1969, and a woman in white, Bride, and her best men have S.T.O.R.M. operative John Stone at their mercy. Flipping up a fake fingernail reveals a secret device which enables the coldly efficient agent to escape certain death, eliminate Bride'

Quote1 They're The Four. They could just kill you. They could just kill Planetary. Hell, they could kill half America before lunch if they felt like it. And get away with it. Quote2
John Stone

Planetary #11 is an issue of the series Planetary (Volume 1) with a cover date of September, 2000.

Synopsis for "Cold World"

It's 1969, and a woman in white, Bride, and her best men have S.T.O.R.M. operative John Stone at their mercy. Flipping up a fake fingernail reveals a secret device which enables the coldly efficient agent to escape certain death, eliminate Bride's squad of killers, and smash her operation. Still, he might not have survived the final showdown with Bride if not for the sudden appearance on the scene of a somewhat younger-looking Elijah Snow, who turns Bride into an all-too-fragile snow sculpture to avenge the death of an old girlfriend.

Thirty-one years later it's Snow who needs help, so the two men meet again in a remote bar in Kazakhstan frequented by individuals who, ironically enough, spend their final days on Earth attempting to cheat death. Over a beer, Snow tells Stone -- relatively unchanged himself over the past three decades -- about some serious gaps in his memory, a fact proved when he reveals, to the agent's surprise, that he didn't know who William Leather was when he encountered him a few months previously.

Stone reacquaints Snow with a memory of him being on the Nautilus, hiding from Leather, while Stone himself was trying to destroy it many years before. This memory opens the floodgates of Snow's brain to a broad mosaic of images from his past: a dark-haired woman who loved him, a pipe-smoking individual reminiscent of Sherlock Holmes; and (perhaps) The Four's Randall Dowling, who apparently doctored Snow's memories as "a game." Discovering these pieces of the puzzle, and perceiving there is much more beneath the surface, strengthens Snow's resolve to uncover the whole truth. Moreover, as he tells Stone, one critical piece of information has come of it all: "I know who the Fourth Man is."

Appearing in "Cold World"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

  • John Stone (First appearance) (Flashback and main story)

Antagonists:

Other Characters:

  • Sherlock Holmes (First appearance) (Flashback only)
  • Anaykah (Flashback only)

Locations:

  • The Last Shot

Items:

Vehicles:

  • Nautilus (Flashback only)

Notes

  • This issue is collected in Planetary Vol. 2: The Fourth Man.
  • The bar, "The Last Shot", that John Stone and Elijah Snow goes to is the same bar that was first seen in StormWatch #46.

Trivia

  • John Stone is based on popular fictional spies such as Nick Fury and James Bond. S.T.O.R.M., a precursor of StormWatch, is a nodding reference to the Marvel Comics organization S.H.I.E.L.D.. Stone's nemesis The Bride is possibly an analogue to the Marvel Comics villain Madame Hydra.
  • The S.T.O.R.M. agent that was fatally shot by The Bride bears a strong similarity to Nick Fury, as indicated by the cigar, eyepatch, and stubble.


See Also


Links and References

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