You want to know the secret of the world. It's this: save it, and it'll repay you, every second of every day. 
Appearing in "The Good Doctor"
Featured Characters:
Supporting Characters:
- Aviator (Only in flashback)
- Doc Brass (Flashback and main story)
- Edison (Only in flashback)
- Hark (Only in flashback)
- Lord Blackstock (Only in flashback)
- Operator (Only in flashback)
- The Spider (Only in flashback)
Adversaries:
- Daemonites (Only in flashback)
- Neo-Arachnid Variants (First appearance) (Only in flashback)
Other Characters:
- Anna Hark (First appearance)
- The High (Only in flashback)
- Jenny Sparks (Cameo) (On a TV or computer screen)
Locations:
- Wildstorm Universe
- Paris, France (Only in flashback)
- United States of America
- Chicago, Illinois (Only in flashback)
- New York
- Adirondack Mountains (Only in flashback)
- New York City (Only in flashback)
Items:
Vehicles:
Synopsis for "The Good Doctor"
Elijah Snow and Doctor Axel Brass have a lengthy conversation on the grounds of the Planetary hospital where the latter is recuperating after his 50-year ordeal.
Their talk quickly turns to the fascinating origin of Doc Brass, whose parents were part of a revolutionary society endeavoring to create the Superman. Creating a new kind of diet, learning system, and exercise regime, they made each generation stronger -- "and stranger" -- than the last, culminating in Brass himself.
Brass had his own plan for the future, which involved fighting great threats to mankind...and building a secret society of extraordinary men to save the world. Hark, the greatest mind the Asian countries had ever produced. Jimmy, a secret U.S. government operative. An English Lord raised by beasts. The Aviator. Edison. And the man in black. Together, encountering horrors, they said as one: "We cannot allow the world to be this way." And they did save the world...although for them, things didn't turn out so well.
Brass also tells of Hark's daughter, Anna, a ruthless woman who planned to use her father's inventions, her father's money, and patience to build her future, including the Hark Corporation which has showed up in several issues of the series thus far.
Brass's story, told in the straightforward words, dynamic images, and yellowing pages of old pulp novels, concludes, but Snow has further questions. Primarily, what is Planetary's secret agenda? Chiding him lightly ("Think who you're asking," says Brass, who had been stuck in a mountain since 1944.), Brass counsels patience: establish your questions before you go looking for answers.
Finally, reminiscing blissfully on the glories he and his fellow heroes enjoyed, he tells Snow he should have been there. "I was busy," says Snow, hanging his head.
Notes
- The flashback portions of this story are told in prose with illustrations as in the style of pulp novels.
- This issue is reprinted in:
- Planetary: All Over the World and Other Stories trade paperback (2000);
- Absolute Planetary vol. 1 hardcover (2005);
- The Planetary Omnibus hardcover (2014);
- Planetary Book One trade paperback (2017).
Trivia
- The High, as mentioned by Elijah Snow, was killed in attempting to bring down StormWatch's space platform occurred in StormWatch vol. 1 #50.
- Jenny Sparks' return "with a vengeance" refers to her foundation of The Authority. Elijah also mentions the attacks on Moscow, London, and Los Angeles which were directed by Kaizen Gamorra in the early issues of The Authority.