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 |  The Fourth Man's identity has been revealed! It happened in Issue #12. Some people's theories were close, some were way off the mark. And indeed, even the answer leaves more questions. Right up until the day the mystery was explained I received theories -- enough to fill the page below, a second page, and even this new, just-added THIRD page of Fourth Man theories. In case you haven't read Issue #12 yet, there are no spoilers on these three pages, just theories. And if you HAVE read it, here's what I and everyone else thought before we found out.... Everybody loves a good mystery. In all likelihood, two days after I put this page up, a new issue of Planetary will come out that reveals the answer. Then again, maybe the mystery will go on for a little bit longer. Regardless, I'm going to give it a shot. Incidentally, if whoever The Fourth Man turns out to be is someone we haven't seen before, my theories aren't likely to be particularly successful. I'm fairly confident it's not going to be someone from another Wildstorm book, for example, who turns out to be the incredibly wealthy head of Planetary. I'm ruling out real-world figures, too. So for the sake of this page, I'm assuming the mystery is in fact solvable by the reader. If it's not, well, at least I put together a reasonably attractive page here. WHAT WE KNOW ABOUT THE FOURTH MAN: Um, not a lot, actually. There are only a few things we can say with any degree of certainty: Not a lot to go on here. We can draw some conclusions from it -- but very little that is definite. Now, on to the theories! Theory 1: The Fourth Man is a Woman. There have been a couple of hints along those lines. Doc Brass suggests it to Snow in Issue #5, and then, in Issue #9, The Fourth Man introduces himself to Ambrose Chase, who says, "But you're..." before being interrupted. There are plenty of ways to finish the sentence, including "a robot," "a gorilla," or other such possibilities, plausible or implausible. "A woman" seems like a logical finisher...unless we're merely supposed to think that. Maybe it's too obvious. Maybe...well, that way lies madness. Assuming, for the sake of discussion, that Chase was going to say "a woman," our options are relatively limited. There haven't been a ton of female characters in the nine issues of the series thus far. Jakita Wagner. The diner waitress (Issue #1). Michelle, from Planetary's Hong Kong office (Issue #3). Anna Hark, head of the Hark Corporation. Kim Suskind, physicist, and member of the Four (Issue #6). Allison (Issue #8). David Paine's girlfriend (Preview)...or their daughter? The invader who attacked Brass and his team (related in Issue #1). Logic and respect for Warren Ellis dictates I rule out the diner waitress. Michelle is probably exactly as she seems. Allison is no longer among the living. I'm going to cautiously rule out David Paine's girlfriend. Seems unlikely. Their daughter...well. It would establish a nice kind of symmetry, but beyond that wouldn't make a lot of sense. The alternate reality invader? Nope. Could she have survived? Sure. But would she then spend her life amassing great personal wealth, go into hiding, and form Planetary? All signs point to no. Jakita? Chase's dying words to her would imply that she isn't leading a double life. And then there were two. Impossible? No. But there are several arguments against it. Could she really be the fairly charming character who chats with Ambrose, in flashback, in Issue #9? Would Chase have taken a bullet for her? And is Planetary truly so negative a book that all roads of power point to the same soulless harpy? I can't believe that. There's an obvious link here, though. Maybe, just maybe The Fourth Man is a member of The Four. And maybe it's her.... Theory 2: The Fourth Man is a Member of Doc Brass's Team. Theory 3: The Fourth Man is Someone Else Entirely. A team of Russian cosmonauts went into outer space at the same time as The Four, on the same flight path. And were never heard from again. What happened to them? We already know that Chase's father survived Science City Zero. Did someone else? Is The Fourth Man the previous third man, Ambrose Chase? The theories at right cover all the angles on this possibility. Our perception of "The Snowflake" is that it describes a multitude of universes, all contributing to the whole. Could The Fourth Man be someone from an alternate reality? Moreover, could it be someone, perhaps, who is familiar to us? "I like white suits." Could The Fourth Man be an alternate reality Elijah Snow? | MORE FAN THEORIES! Since posting the theories below, I've received many more theories -- enough to fill a second page. Follow this link to check them out: Anna Hark, Jenny Sparks...even Warren Ellis himself? PREVIOUS FAN THEORIES: The overwhelming favorite below is a character I was careless enough not to even mention initially: Ambrose Chase himself. A sampling: How about Ambrose Chase? With time distortion abilities, it is quite possible (through some means) that it is either a future or past version of the character. In the story, the Fourth Man introduces himself to Ambrose Chase, who says, "But you're..." before being interrupted. It is entirely possible that he was going to say "me" (meaning Ambrose). Evidence to support this could be that because of his time distortion abilities, he could travel back in time and buy stock in IBM, Amazon.com, etc... thus acquiring the funds to support Planetary. What if Ambrose Chase was about to say....."But you're....me?!?" The dialogue that follows is a sort of a wry response from his inquisitor: "Yes. I noticed that too.....ha." Just a thought, but Ambrose Chase CAN warp reality. What IS reality but space and time? He goes on to say: "Things are going to change very soon, Ambrose. And they're going to change hard." Future Chase (the 4th Man) would know what would happen to past Chase and the world around him. Maybe when he was originally shot, he bent reality and spirited himself to the future. Maybe he then saw how things turned out badly, twisted reality again and set himself up in the past to create Planetary, hire himself, etc. Sure it is paradox. Sure it begs the question that if he could do that why didn't he just set things to the wayhe feels they should be? But you know what? It would be fun! :-) Ellis is exploring ALL genres and putting a new spin on the classics. We haven'thad a good time travel story in Planetary yet, have we?....What led meto that was the end coda of the issue. The black panel that says somethingalong the lines of: "Elijah Snow has not even met Planetary..." This led me to the idea that time was an integral facet to this issue, and it was interesting that this notification came as a coda instead of an introduction. And you know...Elijah Snow wasn't the only one in Planetary history to beable to say "I like white suits".....:-) The fourth man is Ambrose Chase from the fictional reality. There were a lot of things in issue nine that led me to this wacky line. When Ambrose has the interview with The Fourth Man he appears weirded outthrough the whole thing, not just at the beginning. The idea that he wasgoing to say "But you're a woman" is entirely too obvious to me. I think he was going to say something along the lines of "But you're me!" So he didn'tget over his initial shock, it was just too weird sitting there talking tohimself. Ambrose has the ability to distort reality, or defy the laws of physics, asthe fictional guy can. This might explain the link between them that wouldallow this situation to arise in the first place. Also if the fictional guycan defy the laws of physics, why not travel back in time to build a fortuneand start Planetary? Ambrose is shown to be able to manipulate time, thefictional individual could have the same ability on a fictional (unreal,really powerful) level. This also gives him the opportunity to build theresources he needs to take on the Four Voyagers, who are responsible for hisexistence, soon after he first actually arrives in our world time-line wisefrom Planet Fiction. If you lookat the silouette of the fictional guy in the shadows when he confronts thehead scientist at the Planet Fiction project, it's not exactly a conventional silouette. It looks more as if it is meant to look like someone specifically, and it looks sort of like Ambrose Chase. Then there are the hints that the fourth man has some sort of obsession withnarratives (or fiction!). He tells Ambrose that he's "in a new story now".The Fourth Man has assembled a team of four, just like the number that cameback to our reality from Planet Fiction. He seems to have a need to havecontinuing characters. He tells Ambrose to get a white suit to wear, justlike Snow wears by choice. Seems like The Fourth Man is getting Ambrose tofill a role he already knows will eventually be taken over by Snow. It seems that this issue is meant to be unusually important, with thatlittle summary of where things stand at the end. And there certainly seemsto be a focus around Ambrose Chase, and who knows about him. And one other suspect... The Drummer. The Drummer is very sane sometimes, especially in his debriefing of Artemis to Snow. His power gives him an extended sense of perception. The only bit of evidence against Drums I think, is his existence on a hazardous field mission in #9. Otherwise he avoids danger, like in #1, #2, #6 (especially this one, because I think Artemis knows who the Fourth Man is). Drums may be a split personality. There may be two or more 'men' inside him. One of his powers could be to arrange the information in a human brain, so he could have caused Elijah's amnesia and established a cover personality for himself. Drums knew Elijah from before Artemis' founding and used him in Planetary. Elijah and Drums fought against Artemis before (50's-60's???) Jakita joined. |
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Anna Hark. founder and head of the Hark Corporation. Everything we know about her indicates she is one cold, heartless woman. Her cameo appearance in Issue #8 is chilling. Her appearance in #5 is far from encouraging. "Ruthless" is the most generous description of her one could use. The question is, is she playing both sides against the middle? As founder of the Hark Corporation, and perhaps at least part of the power behind both Artemis and The Four, could she also have founded Planetary to uncover the very things she then proceeds to exploit in her other enterprises?
Kim Suskind. All right, everything we know about this member of The Four speaks ill of her -- to be blunt, she's probably a Nazi. But then, how much do we really know about her? Very little. Maybe her trip into space gained her a soul. Or maybe she already had one, and started Planetary on the side to ultimately combat the evil she perceived within The Four. Or worse, maybe she started it as a lark, just to help further The Four's goals. Of course, her reported actions in Issue #10 would seem to dispute any theories of goodness on her behalf.
"Only I survived." That's what Brass says, and we don't doubt his truthfulness. But we can certainly doubt his accuracy; he may well be mistaken. Others may have made it out into the 1940s, to go into hiding and build a secret organization that can help "keep the world strange," as Brass says in Issue #5 -- and, interestingly, Jakita says in Issue #1. Most of these characters are little more than adaptations of other classic figures, as Ellis even admits. The Shadow, and Tarzan, for example. But what about Hark? We see the skeletal remains of his hand in Issue #1 -- and only his hand. Snow doesn't believe he's dead, and if his whole body was there, certainly Snow would have noticed it. We learn much more about Hark in #5 than we do any of the other members of Brass's team. And who better to take on the evil Hark Corporation than Anna's own father? It's hard for me to believe we've seen the last of Hark, the genius whose math was instrumental in creating the snowflake itself. If this theory is true, my money is on Hark -- "the greatest mind the Asian countries ever produced."