Planetary is an American comic book limited series created by writer Warren Ellis and artist John Cassaday published by the Wildstorm imprint of DC Comics. Describing themselves as "Archaeologists of the Impossible", Planetary is an organization determined to discover the world's secret history.
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Elijah Snow is initially presented as a vagrant missing many memories of his past. Snow is recruited as an investigator for the Planetary field team by Jakita Wagner. Possessing the ability of cold manipulation, Snow assists the Planetary team. Snow's memories eventually return and he realizes that he is in fact a Century Baby (all born on January 1, 1900, and in addition to rapidly decreased aging often possessing special abilities) and Planetary's founder, the mysterious "Fourth Man". Taking control of Planetary, Snow decides to eliminate the Four, the group responsible for his memory loss.
During Elijah Snow's absence, metahuman Jakita Wagner is the field leader for the Planetary team. Eventually revealed to be the daughter of Lord Blackstock (another Century Baby) and a scientist in the hidden African city of Opak-Re, the infant was abandoned due to the forbidden union. Having loved her mother, Snow arranges for the infant's adoption by a German couple. When fellow member Ambrose Chase is apparently killed, Wagner decides to find the missing Snow.
The Drummer is the information gathering specialist of the Planetary field team. The Drummer was initially one of several children who were orphaned and kidnapped by the Four, due to the children's ability to communicate with and control electronic systems, and also gain information directly from their surroundings. When the Planetary field team attempted to free the captive children, all but the Drummer were killed. The Drummer was then adopted by Snow and recruited into Planetary.
Ambrose Chase was a Planetary field team member, and the son of a test subject from Science City Zero, an experimentation center created by the Four's Randall Dowling. Born with the ability to distort space and time in his immediate vicinity, Chase was recruited by Snow, and assumed leadership of the field team when Snow left Planetary. Chase was apparently killed during a routine mission, but is eventually revealed to have saved himself.
The Four are the principal antagonists of Planetary. Randall Dowling, Kim Süskind, William Leather and Jacob Greene are four astronauts who disappear during a space expedition and reappear with metahuman abilities (a reference to Marvel Comics' Fantastic Four[1]). The Four then act as a covert organization and begin to hoard the world's secrets for themselves.
The leader of the Four. The creator of Science City Zero (a project involving experimentation on political dissidents, which often resulted in mutations), Dowling uses a secret military project to launch the Four into space, and secretly brokers a bargain with an alien race to gain metahuman abilities. In return, Dowling promises the alien beings the Earth. Dowling himself has the ability to "stretch" his mind, and "pilfer" information from the mind of any subject within one hundred feet.
The daughter of a Nazi rocket scientist and Randall Dowling's lover, Süskind participated in Dowling's space expedition. Endowed with the powers of invisibility and force field generation, Süskind is Dowling's principal assassin.
Leather's mother, Miriam, was the wife of Bret Leather, a Century Baby and costumed adventurer. As Miriam was unfaithful to her husband, Leather was cheated of his birthright and did not inherit his father's abilities. Leather then joins Dowling, having been promised true power. Courtesy of the space expedition Leather participates in, he receives amplified strength, durability and energy projection.
A former World War II fighter pilot, Greene participated in Randall Dowling's space expedition and was mutated into an immensely durable but hideous being. Barely capable of speech, Greene remained in seclusion unless required by Dowling to engage in extremely hazardous missions.
An adventurer and Century Baby, Axel Brass is also a member of the Secret Society (others include the Aviator; Bret Leather; Thomas Edison, the inventor; Hark, an Asian mastermind; Jimmy, a U.S spy; and Lord Blackstock). In 1945 the Society builds a quantum computer, which appears as a manifestation of the multiverse. With the exception of Brass, the entire Society is killed preventing an invasion of creatures from the Bleed. Crippled in the battle, Brass watches over the computer for over four decades until rescued by the Planetary field team. Brass recuperates in a Planetary hospital and acts as an adviser and confidant to Elijah Snow.
Like Jakita Wagner, Anna Hark is the daughter of a Century Baby and Secret Society member (Hark). Heir to the Hark Legacy, Anna is Jim Wilder's employer and manipulates him into becoming a metahuman. Eventually convinced by Elijah Snow to ally with Planetary spread the resources previously hoarded by The Four.
A spy and sometime confidant of Snow. Revealed to be an unwilling agent of the Four, and eventually saved by Snow.
An agent of the Hark Corporation, and sent by employer Anna Hark to investigate an alien device found in the foundations of a building. On coming into contact with the device Wilder is transformed into a metahuman and learns that the device is called a "travelstone", and part of the emergency escape system of a sentient spacecraft. Learning that the vessel requires living beings to perform functions such as fuel, propulsion and navigation, Wilder locates other metahumans from an experiment called Science City Zero who serve as the components of the ship and allow it to leave Earth with its new crew. It is eventually revealed that Hark - operating in conjunction with John Stone - engineered Wilder's initial encounter with the travelstone.
Kevin Sack, also known as Lord Blackstock, is a Century Baby and the father of Jakita Wagner. An ally of both Axel Brass and Elijah Snow, Blackstock is killed attempting to fight off the Bleed invaders.