| SYNOPSIS: 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. Or do they? 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 (must be the '60s haircut) Elijah Snow, who turns Bride into a 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 Russia 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 (Issue #6). Stone reacquaints Snow with a memory of his 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 reminiscient 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." REVIEW: Considering the subject matter of the series, it's hard to believe it took this long for a good-old-fashioned espionage homage. I'm going to go with Madame Hydra/Viper and H.Y.D.R.A. ("cut off one arm and another head will take its place," or something like that...) as the source material for Bride and her men, 'cause John Stone and S.T.O.R.M. are certainly Nick Fury and S.H.I.E.L.D. (Oh no wait, that's Fury getting his brains blown out in panel one. Hmmm...) Anyway, The old high-tech-weapon-under-a-false-fingernail has been seen in Nick Fury comics, James Bond movies, and even as far back as the immortal Incredible Hulk #1, thanks to Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. Those who remember their classic Strange Tales/Nick Fury tales (followed by the classic Steranko run, of course), will will get a kick out of the thrilling 1969 sequence -- as did I.  The present-day encounter between Stone and Snow is fun for far different reasons, just because "heart-to-heart conversations in a remote bar" never get tired, in my opinion. (Even though it's essentially the second such conversation in the past seven issues -- see Issue #5.) And the snippets of Snow's past are tantalizing. The Nautilus? Sherlock Holmes? Hell, Indiana Jones? And what are those wolf creatures? And of course, hovering over it all, is the spectre of The Four, the evil Randall Dowling, and just maybe the identity of The Fourth Man! And even though we don't get the "Answers" until next issue, it seems pretty likely that the man himself appears in this very issue. And at any rate, we only have to wait until #12 comes out. Fine by me. Hoping (and expecting) we'll see more of Mr. Stone...
| |  Random Thoughts: Two months. That's how long I have from when I write these words until my Fourth Man pages become obsolete. Ah well.... Cassaday's panel sequencing gets better every issue. The encounter between Bride and Stone is a classic. The Last Shot was Last Seen, if memory serves, in Stormwatch #46. Final guesses for the Fourth Man, anyone? Randall Dowling is certainly looking like a fine candidate. The thing that sticks in my mind is Stone's observation that The Four could kill Snow, and Planetary, quite easily if they wanted to. So why don't they? Somehow Planetary must serve The Four's purposes, which offers a disturbing possibility that whoever the same individual is running both organizations -- Randall Dowling himself. Or at the very least, that there is a hard connection between the two groups, and we've seen Dowling and Anna Hark together once already, at City Zero. Stone casually mentions a 1931 Planetary guide, the second recent mention of such a thing. (Dowling makes mention of one to Leather in the previous issue.) My first and last guess as to the author of these guides: Elijah Snow. RATING: I was considering stopping the ratings -- too many 9/10s -- but at this point it's less work to keep rating these things than to go back and remove all the other ratings. Until I do so, you get ratings. 9/10. |
