text: In 1999, the Kargil War between India and Pakistan became the first direct conflict between two declared nuclear powers. As the war progressed, the first hint of the possible use of a nuclear weapon was on 31 May, when Pakistani foreign secretary Shamshad Ahmad made a statement warning that an escalation of the limited conflict could lead Pakistan to use "any weapon" in its arsenal. This was immediately interpreted as an obvious threat of a nuclear retaliation by Pakistan in the event of an extended war. The leader of Pakistan's senate noted that ""the purpose of developing weapons becomes meaningless if they are not used when they are needed"." Some experts believe that following nuclear tests in 1998, Pakistani military was emboldened by its nuclear deterrent cover to markedly increase coercion against India.


title: Indian Ballistic Missile Defence Programme

text: Development of an anti-ballistic missile system began in late 1999, suggesting that India initiated the programme in light of Pakistan's eschewing of a nuclear No first use policy and heightened tensions during the Kargil War including a possibility of full-scale nuclear war. Development accelerated after Washington vetoed a bid by India to acquire the Israeli Arrow-2 interceptor in 2002.


text: Phase-I of the system will enable interception of missiles up to a 2,000-km range, which will be extended to 5,000-km range in Phase-II.


text: Development of the anti-ballistic missile system began in 1999. Around 40 public and private companies were involved in the development of the systems. They include Ordnance Factory Board, Bharat Electronics Limited and Bharat Dynamics among others.


text: Defence Research and Development Laboratory (DRDL) developed the mission control software for the AAD missile. Research Centre Imarat (RCI) developed navigation, electromechanical actuation systems and the active radar seeker. Advanced Systems Laboratory (ASL) provided the motors, jet vanes and structures for the AAD and PAD. High Energy Materials Research Laboratory (HEMRL) supplied the propellants for the missile. Research Centre Imarat and Programme Air Defence (PGAD) at Hyderabad are spearheading the Indian Ballistic Missile Defence Programme.


text: Two new anti ballistic missiles that can intercept IRBMs are being developed. These high speed missiles (AD-1 and AD-2) are being developed to intercept ballistic missiles with a range of around . The test trials of these two systems were expected to take place in 2011. The new missile will be similar to the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) missile deployed by US. These missiles will travel at hypersonic speeds and will require radars with scan capability of over to successfully intercept the target.


text: On 6 May 2012, Dr. V. K. Saraswat while confirming the completion of Phase-I added that Phase-II would be completed by 2016 to protect against missiles having range up to 5,000 km.


text: India is also planning to develop a laser based weapon system as part of its defence to intercept and destroy missiles soon after they are launched towards the country. DRDO's Air Defence Programme Director V. K. Saraswat says its ideal to destroy a ballistic missile carrying nuclear or conventional warheads in its boost phase. Saraswat further added that it will take another 10–15 years for the premier defence research institute to make it usable on the ground.


text: The DRDO Floating Test Range is expected to assist in the development of the Phase 2. This vessel INS "Anvesh" (A41) was set to undergo sea trials in September 2021. The first successful flight of AD-1 missile was carried out on 2 November 2022. It was designed for endo-atmospheric and low exo-atmospheric interception against missile and, airborne early warning and control aircraft. Propelled by two-stage solid rocket motor and equipped with advanced control system, navigation and guidance algorithm in AD-1 increased the kill altitude bracket. Initially under Phase 2 program, AD-1 was designed to neutralize medium-range ballistic missile at 1,000-3,000 km range, whereas AD-2 was for intercepting intermediate-range ballistic missile at 3,000-5,500 km range. But according to Samir V. Kamat, AD-1 can now intercept incoming missile fired from a distance of 5,000 km.


text: The two-tiered BMD System consists of the PAD, which will intercept missiles at exo-atmospheric altitudes of and the AAD missile for interception at endo-atmospheric altitudes of up to . The deployed system would consist of many launch vehicles, radars, Launch Control Centres (LCC) and the Mission Control Centre (MCC). All these are geographically distributed and connected by a secure communication network.


text: The MCC is the software intensive component of the ballistic missile defence system. It receives information from various sources such as radars and satellites which is then processed by ten computers which run simultaneously. The MCC is connected to all other elements of the defence through a WAN. MCC performs target classification, target assignment and kill assessment. It also acts as a decision support system for the commander. It can also decide the number of interceptors required for the target for an assured kill probability. After performing all these functions, the MCC assigns the target to the LCC of a launch battery. The LCC starts computing the time to launch the interceptor based upon information received from a radar based on the speed, altitude and flight path of the target. LCC prepares the missile for launch in real time and carries out ground guidance computation.


text: After the interceptor is launched, it is provided target information from the radar through a datalink. When the interceptors close onto the target missile, it activates the radar seeker to search for the target missile and guides itself to intercept the target. Multiple PAD and AAD interceptors can be launched against a target for high kill probability.


text: The Prithvi Air Defence (PAD) is an anti-ballistic missile developed to intercept incoming ballistic missiles outside the atmosphere (exo-atmospheric). Based on the Prithvi missile, PAD is a two-stage missile with a maximum interception altitude of . The first stage is a Solid fuelled motor while the second stage is Liquid fuelled. It has manoeuvre thrusters which can generate a lateral acceleration of more than 5 "g"s at altitude. Guidance is provided by an internal navigation system with mid-course updates from LRTR and active radar homing in the terminal phase. PAD has capability to engage the class of ballistic missiles at a speed of Mach 5. PAD is fast enough to hit medium-range ballistic missiles and intermediate-range ballistic missiles.


text: LRTR is the target acquisition and fire control radar for the PAD missile. It is an active phased array radar having capability to track 200 targets at a range of . The PAD missile has also been called "Pradyumna".


text: Further development led to the improvement of the interception range from . The improved missile will utilise a gimbaled directional warhead, a technology also used by Israel, the US and Russia. This technology allows for a smaller warhead to destroy the target missile.


text: The second stage of the PAD uses liquid rocket propellant, which corrodes fuel tanks when stored for long, the PAD could not be on standby 24/7. Instead, it would need to be filled up during a period of crisis in anticipation of trouble. This is less than optimal for a weapon intended to defend against an attack at any moment.


text: The PADE (Prithvi Air Defence Exercise) was conducted in November 2006 in which a PAD missile successfully intercepted a modified Prithvi-II Missile at an altitude of . The Prithvi-II ballistic missile was modified successfully to mimic the trajectory of M-11 missiles.


text: DRDO plans to test the anti-ballistic shield against missiles with a range of . The test will be conducted with a modified Prithvi missile launched from a naval ship and the anti-ballistic missile launched from Wheeler Island. The interception of the target missile will take place at approximately altitude.


text: On 6 March 2009 the DRDO carried out a second successful test of the PAD interceptor missile. The target used was ship launched Dhanush missile which followed the trajectory of a missile with range of a . The target was tracked by Swordfish (LRTR) radar and destroyed by the PAD at altitude.


text: On 6 March 2011 DRDO successfully test-fired interceptor missile from Advanced Air Defence (AAD) which destroyed a 'hostile' target ballistic missile, a modified Prithvi, at an altitude of 16 km over the Bay of Bengal. Advanced Air Defence (AAD) missile positioned at Wheeler Island, about 70 km across sea from Chandipur, received signals from tracking radars installed along the coastline and travelled through the sky at a speed of 4.5 Mach to destroy it.


text: Advanced Air Defence (AAD) is an anti-ballistic missile designed to intercept incoming ballistic missiles in the endo-atmosphere at an altitude of . AAD is a single-stage, solid-fuelled missile with siliconised carbon jet vanes. Guidance is similar to that of PAD with indigenous radio frequency seeker. It supports inertial navigation system (INS), mid-course updates from ground-based radar and active radar homing in the terminal phase. It is tall, weighs around and a diameter of less than .On 6 December 2007, AAD successfully intercepted a modified Prithvi-II missile acting as an incoming ballistic missile enemy target. The endo-atmospheric interception was carried out at an altitude of . The interceptor and all the elements performed in a copy book fashion validating the endo-atmospheric layer of the defence system. The launch was also shown through a video link at a control room of DRDO Bhawan, at Delhi.


text: The sequence of events of the test was as follows. At 11 am the Prithvi (missile) lifted off from Launch Complex III at the Integrated Test Range (ITR) at Chandipur, Odisha. Radars at Konark, Paradip detected the missile and were continuously tracking it. The target information was sent to MCC for further processing. MCC classified the target, calculated the trajectory of the missile and assigned the target to a AAD battery located on Abdul Kalam Island (Wheeler Island), across the sea from Chandipur. The AAD was launched when the Prithvi reached an apogee of . The AAD with the help of midcourse updates and its terminal seeker manoeuvres itself towards the target. AAD makes a direct hit at an altitude of and at a speed of Mach 4. Radars detected formation of a large number of tracks, signifying that the target had broken into multiple pieces. The thermal cameras located on Wheeler Island also picked up the direct hit through thermal images.


text: Due to two successful interceptor missile tests carried out by India, the scientists have said that the AAD missile could be modified into a new extended range (up to ) surface-to-air missile that could be possibly named as 'Ashwin'.


text: On 26 July 2010, AAD was successfully test-fired from the Integrated Test Range (ITR) at Wheeler Island off the Odisha's east coast.


text: On 6 March 2011, India launched its indigenously developed interceptor missile from the Odisha coast. India successfully test-fired its interceptor missile which destroyed a 'hostile' target ballistic missile, a modified Prithvi, at an altitude of 16 km over the Bay of Bengal. The interceptor, Advanced Air Defence (AAD) missile positioned at Wheeler Island, about 70 km across sea from Chandipur, received signals from tracking radars installed along the coastline and travelled through the sky at a speed of 5 Mach to destroy it. As the trial was aimed at achieving the desired result with precision, the interceptor missile had its own mobile launcher, secure data link for interception, independent tracking and homing capabilities and sophisticated radars.


text: ""It was a fantastic launch. The trial, conducted from two launch sites of ITR off Orissa coast for developing a full fledged multi-layer Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) system, was fully successful"", he said. On 10 February 2012, AAD was again successfully test-fired from Wheeler Island off the state coast near Dhamra in Bhadrak district, about 170 km from Bhubaneswar.


text: On 23 November 2012, India again successfully testfired its home-made supersonic Advanced Air Defence (AAD) interceptor missile from a defence base off the coast of the eastern state of Odisha. ""The test-firing was part of India's efforts to create a missile defence shield against incoming enemy missiles. The AAD interceptor missile, which was fired from the Wheeler Island off the Odishan coast, successfully destroyed mid-air an incoming ballistic missile launched from the Integrated Test Range in Chandipur, about 70 km from the Wheeler Island.""


text: On 6 April 2015 an improved AAD was tested. The missile was launched from a canister for the first time and the composite rocket motor fired successfully. The missile had improvements over the previous version in terms of bigger warhead, improved maneuverability and reduced mis-distance. As the missile was in the air one of the sub systems malfunctioned making it veer away from the flight path resulting in the failure of the mission. Another test is supposed to take place within 30–45 days after detecting and resolving the problem.


text: On 22 November 2015 an upgraded version of AAD (Advanced Air Defence) was successfully tested. The anti-ballistic missile took off at 9.40 a.m. from the A.P.J. Abdul Kalam (Wheeler) Island soon after it received the command to waylay and destroy an incoming electronically simulated target missile. Conditions similar to the launch of a target missile from Balasore were simulated electronically and upon receiving its coordinates, the interceptor missile, travelling at supersonic speed, engaged and destroyed the "virtual target" in mid-flight.


text: On 15 May 2016, DRDO officially reported that AAD intercepted and destroyed a Prithvi ballistic missile fired from a ship.


text: On 28 December 2017, DRDO successfully carried out AAD missile test in which an incoming modified Prithvi ballistic missile was intercepted and destroyed with a direct hit.


text: On 3 August 2018, a successful test was carried out from Abdul Kalam Island where one of multiple incoming targets simulating 1,500 km class ballistic missiles was destroyed.


text: In 2009, reports emerged of a new exo-atmospheric interceptor missile named the Prithvi Defence Vehicle (PDV) interceptor missile. The DRDO is developing a new Prithvi interceptor missile codenamed PDV. It will be a two-stage missile and both the stages will be powered by solid propellants. It will have an innovative system for controlling the vehicle at an altitude of more than 180 km. The PDV is intended to replace the existing PAD in the PAD/AAD combination. It will have an IIR seeker for its kill vehicle as well. The PDV will replace the PAD with a far more capable missile and will complete the Phase 1 of the BMD system, allowing it to be operational by 2013. Whereupon Phase 2 development will take over for protection against missiles of the range class. The first test flight of the missile was expected in 2010. The PDV is designed to take out the target missile at altitudes above .


text: On 27 April 2014 first PDV was successfully test conducted by DRDO. On 11 February 2017, DRDO successfully conducted second test for PDV missile. The third test was conducted on 12 February 2019.


text: In March 2019, India conducted an ASAT test. India officially confirmed that this missile was a Ballistic Missile Defence interceptor. PDV Mk.2 is a 13 m tall, 18.87 tons, three stage missile. Solid rocket motors with flexible nozzles constituted the first two stages, with the Kill Vehicle being the third stage. According to a report published on the official DRDO website, the missile has the capability to shoot down targets moving at 10 km per second in orbits as high as 1,200 km.


text: It has been suggested that this missile may have the capability of exo-atmospheric interception of Intercontinental ballistic missiles. A report published on the official DRDO website suggests the same. On DefExpo 2020, DRDO confirmed that PDV Mk.2 is ready for limited series production. The solid rocket booster used is a derivative of the technology first developed for Sagarika missile.


text: Swordfish is the target acquisition and fire control radar for the BMD system. The Long Range Tracking Radar (LRTR) currently has a range of to and can spot objects as small as a cricket ball. The DRDO plans to upgrade the capacity of Swordfish to 1,500 km by 2017.


text: The 1,500 km range upgraded variant called Super Swordfish or Very Long Range Tracking Radar (VLRTR) was raised in 2017 for Indian Ballistic Missile Defence Programme and is now operational.


text: According to scientist V K Saraswat of DRDO the missiles will work in tandem to ensure a hit probability of 99.8 percent. On 6 May 2012, Dr V K Saraswat confirmed that Phase-I is complete and can be deployed to protect two Indian cities at a short notice. He also added that Phase-I is comparable to PAC-3 system.


text: New Delhi, the national capital, and Mumbai were selected for the ballistic missile defence shield. After successful implementation in Delhi and Mumbai, the system will be used to cover other major cities in the country. This shield can destroy incoming ballistic missiles launched from as far as away. When the Phase II is completed and PDV is developed, the two anti-ballistic missiles can intercept targets from up to both at exo and endo-atmospheric (inside the atmosphere) regions.


text: In August 2017, the government cleared the allocation of 850 hectares of land in Alwar district and 350 hectares in Pali district of Rajasthan for setting up radars to track missiles to the DRDO.


text: Defending against an attack by a cruise missile on the other hand is similar to tackling low-flying manned aircraft and hence most methods of aircraft defence can be used for a cruise missile defence system.


text: In order to ward off the threats of nuke-tipped cruise missile attack India has a new missile defence programme which will be focused solely on intercepting cruise missiles. The technological breakthrough has been created with an Advanced Air Defence missile (AAD).


text: DRDO Chief, Dr V K Saraswat stated in an Interview ""Our studies have indicated that this AAD will be able to handle a cruise missile intercept"".


text: Furthermore, India is acquiring airborne radars like EL/W-2090 AWACS to ensure detection of cruise missiles in order to stay on top of the threat.


text: Barak-8 is a long-range anti-air and anti-missile naval defence system developed jointly by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) and the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) of India. The Indian Army inducted a variant of Barak 8 missile to meet its requirement for a medium-range surface-to-air air defence missile. The naval version of this missile has the capability to intercept incoming enemy cruise missiles and combat jets targeting its warships at sea. It would also be inducted into the Indian Air Force, followed by the Army. India has a joint venture for this missile with Israel. Recently developed, India's Akash missile defence system also has the capability to ""neutralise aerial targets like fighter jets, cruise missiles and air-to-surface missiles"".


text: XRSAM (eXtra-long Range Surface to Air Missile) is an Indian long-range mobile surface to air missile defence system under development by Defence Research and Development Organization (DRDO). The missile system will have a range of 250 km against fighter jets, 350 km against cruise missiles, sea skimming anti-ship missiles, AWACS and mid air refuelers and will be capable of bringing down ballistic missiles and stealth fighters in the terminal stage. The naval version of the missile might be also developed to supplement the LR-SAM missile in the Indian Navy.


text: On 17 November 2010, in an interview Rafael's Vice President Lova Drori confirmed that the David's Sling system has been offered to the Indian Armed Forces.


text: ""That is an important potential area for our future cooperation"", Carter said while on his visit to India in July 2012.


title: Cold Case (film)

text: Cold Case is a 2021 Indian Malayalam-language crime thriller directed by Tanu Balak and written by Sreenath V. Nath, that stars Prithviraj Sukumaran in the lead role and also features Aditi Balan, Pooja Mohanraj, Anil Nedumangad, Lakshmi Priyaa Chandramouli, Anand and Rajesh Hebbar in supporting roles. The plot follows two parallel investigations of a paranormal murder case by IPS officer M. Sathyajith (Prithviraj) and investigative journalist Medha Padmaja (Aditi), who eventually cross paths.


title: Cold Case (film)

text: The film marks the directorial debut of cinematographer Tanu Balak. With a formal announcement made in September 2020, the principal shooting of the film began on 31 October, and was completed on 7 December 2020. It was filmed mostly in Trivandrum around 36 days. Prakash Alex composed the film score while Gireesh Gangadharan and Jomon T. John jointley handled the cinematography, and Shameer Muhammed edited the film. "Cold Case" was released on 30 June 2021 on Amazon Prime Video, bypassing theatrical release due to COVID-19-related cinema closures.


title: Cold Case (film)

text: Medha, a journalist leaves her news office while talking to her mother-in-law who is at an ashram. While driving home, A.C.P. M. Sathyajith is called in to investigate a murder, as a result of a skull being found in a bag from a river. Forensic analysis reveals that the murder  was committed over a year ago and the skull belongs to a female aged 25–30 years. The identity of the deceased is then sought. The dental implants on the skull, indicate that the victim was a female named Eva Maria, who was from a wealthy family and that her father had left her a fortune before his death. The police investigate her location and traces her family. Her stepmother tells him that she had married a North Indian and remained estranged from them for a while and that during the Easter of 2019, her father met her and possibly patched up things between them. The police also learn that all the land that Eva had inherited was quietly sold to an outsider.


title: Cold Case (film)

text: On the other hand, Eva's spirit tries to contact Medha, a journalist currently seeking help for her daughter's custody case from Advocate Haritha, who is also a friend of Medha, as Eva's spirit needs Medha's help. Medha takes the help of an occult researcher, Zara Zacchai, who tells her the name of the soul as Eva Maria and Medha with the help of Advocate Haritha (who was Eva's lawyer for her divorce case) and Asif, a colleague starts her own investigation in parallel, unaware that the Police are investigating the case.


title: Cold Case (film)

text: Sathyajith later meets Eva's ex-husband and finds out that he was deep in debt because of his divorce proceeding as he had to return 2.5 Crore that he had earlier borrowed from Eva to start his own production house. This debt was settled by his now father-in-law who is the owner of the media house where Medha works. Sathyajith traces Eva's last known location to a working women's hostel and through multiple witnesses concludes that she was last seen in September 2019 which is the period of her death. However, her phone was active till April 2020 and her Facebook account showed pictures posted in Varanasi till April 2020. He then traces a list of tourists who due to the lockdown were brought to the home state by a special government bus service. He finds Eva's name in that list and concludes that an imposter was posting pictures and sending messages to her friends so that no one reports her missing. Meanwhile, the dental advisor who helped them with the dental implants on the skull, tells him that sometime back they had recovered a human hand in Tamil Nadu and this possibly could link to this case. On analysis, it is found that the hand belonged to Eva and had strands of hair that might belong to the murderer.


title: Cold Case (film)

text: During the investigation, Sathyajith learns that Medha is also in search of the truth. While they are discussing each other's findings, Sathyajith gets a phone call from his uncle who had seen the impersonator for Eva while returning from Varanasi. All the pieces of the puzzle fit into the place and Sathyajith detects that the killer is none other than Advocate Haritha. Haritha was neck-deep in debt when she was handling Eva's case. Her father died when a real estate project was mid-way in construction and she fears if the project is not delivered within a month's period she may be arrested. One day she takes Eva home on the pretext of talking her out of her grief and strangles her to death. Haritha then dismembers Eva's body, stores it in the fridge, and later scatters the pieces. She then creates fake documents assuming Eva's identity and sells off Eva's inheritance and restores her father's business, She takes Eva's phone to Varanasi and posts the pictures on Facebook, after which she throws Eva's phone into the river. She later boards a special government bus service for the trip back to Kerala.


title: Cold Case (film)

text: Now alerted, Haritha goes to Medha's home to clean up the evidence. While she was there alone, she sees the same refrigerator that she had used to store Eva's remains and then, Haritha is killed when the refrigerator explodes. In the final scenes, we see Medha saying she was right about her beliefs that the refrigerator was possessed with Eva's soul. Sathyajith tells her that there would always be a conflict between faith and logic, as a police officer he can only rely on logic and terms this incident as an extraordinary accident. Later at Medha's ancestral house, her dead sister's picture breaks into pieces after Medha plays her radio.


title: Cold Case (film)

text: In September 2020, Prithviraj Sukumaran was reported to play the lead in an investigative thriller film produced by Anto Joseph, and cinematographer Tanu Balak was assigned to helm the project, making his directorial debut. Sreenath V. Nath scripted the film's story and screenplay, which is based on real-life incidents, although being stated by the makers as a fictional project and the team added that the film does not have action sequences. Cinematographer Jomon T. John, was the first crew member to be announced as part of the technical department, as the rest of the cast and crew were yet to be revealed. Aditi Balan was assigned as the female protagonist, whose character was based on journalism. Another cinematographer, Girish Gangadharan, joined the team, as did music composer, Prakash Alex, and editor, Shameer Muhammed.


title: Cold Case (film)

text: Balak added that, Prithviraj's portions were set mostly indoors and the film has mostly few scenes with crowds, which is set in Trivandrum. The film was launched on 31 October 2020, without Prithviraj as the actor was quarantined for a week, after being recovered from COVID-19. He later joined the shoot on 13 November. Stills from the film featuring Prithviraj in a khaki uniform was positively received by fans and the character name was further revealed as ACP M. Sathyajith. The first schedule of the film completed on 24 November 2020 and second schedule started subsequently. The second schedule was completed on 7 December 2020, by which production has been wrapped within a duration of 36 days.


title: Cold Case (film)

text: The film's soundtrack and score is composed by Prakash Alex and lyrics written by Sreenath V Nath. The music album features one song "Eeran Mukil" sung by K. S. Harisankar, which was released on 25 June 2021.


title: Cold Case (film)

text: The film was initially planned for a direct-to-digital release in December 2020, was later delayed due to post-production difficulties. In the process, the producers later planned for a theatrical release, since theatres were allowed to operate with 50% occupancy, and fixed the date as 4 March 2021. But the film was postponed indefinitely, and producers reinstated the decision to release on over-the-top media service as the functioning of theatres were affected due to the second wave of COVID-19. Anto Joseph officially announced the plans of digital release, with the streaming rights of "Cold Case" and the Fahadh Faasil-starrer "Malik", were sold to Amazon Prime Video.


title: Cold Case (film)

text: On 16 June 2021, the makers announced the release date as 30 June 2021, with the teaser of the film being unveiled on the same day. The trailer was later unveiled on 18 June 2021. "Cold Case" released worldwide on Amazon Prime Video on the midnight 29 June, ahead of the original release, and was made available from streaming in 240 countries.


title: Cold Case (film)

text: "The Times of India"-based critic Anna Mathews gave a rating of 3 out of 5 saying "the film has an innovative story track, with the investigative thriller running on two very different propositions, but in a parallel narrative". Sowmya Rajendran of "The News Minute" wrote that the screenplay in the first half is "intriguing", but criticised the writing as it had "failed to live up to the ambition of the script" with "the plot becomes less convincing as the film progresses". She rated 3 out of 5 in her review. S. R. Praveen of "The Hindu" called the film as an "underwhelming horror-thriller that squanders the promising premise that it had". He further called "The script is rather weak not just in using the thriller elements, but in the dialogue department too. Quite a few of the sequences have the characters, especially the police officers, stating the obvious to each other. This is compounded by the not so great dubbing for some characters."


title: Cold Case (film)

text: Haricharan Pudipeddi of "Hindustan Times" called that the film "did take the road less taken with the identity of the murderer", but "the experiment needed a bit more work for the role was poorly written". Manoj Kumar R of "The Indian Express" gave 1-star rating out of 5 and pointed that the film has "a very conventional premise of a dead person seeking justice from beyond the grave or, in this case, out of a rickety fridge". Giving 2.5 out of 5 stars, Anna M. M. Vetticad of "Firstpost" called that the film is "wisely controlled when it dips into paranormal horror clichés such as sudden loud sounds, ominous music and abrupt movement" and called the film as a "reasonably engaging thriller, but it had the potential to be so much more". Critic Ramya Palisetty of "India Today" gave 3 out of 5 saying "the film has the right ingredients to keep you on the edge of the seat, but the lazily-written second half tests your patience".


title: Cold Case (film)

text: Roktim Rajpal of "Deccan Herald" rated 1.5 out of 5 and called "the film fails to make an impact due to the lousy execution". Gauthaman Bhaskaran of "News18" called the film as an "extremely amateurish attempt" with a "shoddily-written script that completely wastes Prithviraj's potential, which transformed him into a robotic-run-of the mill man". Meera Jacob, for the news magazine "The Week", gave 3 out of 5 rating and called "the movie does hold the attention of the viewer, particularly during the first half. However, moving toward the climax, it seemed to have been a bit of a let-down ["sic"]... he mixing of genre holds an optimistic future when executed properly." Sajin Srijith of "Cinema Express" gave 2 out of 5 rating, and said "The film's eagerness to get to the final twist comes at the cost of not-so engaging storytelling". Sangita Nambiar of "The Quint", gave 2.5 out of 5 stars rating, calling it as "a paranormal thriller meets police procedural, is a better-than-many watch but definitely not the best or one of the best, it is a watchable thriller, just have reasonably low expectations from it". Nirmal Narayanan of "International Business Times" wrote "Cold Case is not an impeccable crime thriller. It is just that average film that can be watched when you get some free time for Prithviraj Sukumaran and Aditi Balan".


title: Cold Case (film)

text: Arjun Menon of "Pinkvilla" gave 3 stars out of 5 calling the film as "an old fashioned crime thriller that is designed to evoke the feel of a horror flick and murder mystery simultaneously which does offer a fairly neat premise with little fuzz and great precision in storytelling". Giving 3 out of 5, "Sify" called the film as an "okayish thriller", with "an almost predictable track and cliched moments". "Behindwoods" rated 2.5 out of 5 saying "Cold Case is technically lekker, a watchable thriller". A critic from "123Telugu" rated 2.5 out of 5 stars and stated "the film is a poorly articulated whodunnit mystery that fails to hold the attention of the viewers all the way through, despite its interesting set-up". "Moviecrow" rated 2.75 out of 5 and called that "the film remains engaging with some good moments and thrills but that's about it. It never really has you play the guessing game nor is there a payoff."


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Charles Pierre de Frédy, Baron de Coubertin (; born Pierre de Frédy; 1 January 1863 – 2 September 1937, also known as Pierre de Coubertin and Baron de Coubertin) was a French educator and historian, founder of the International Olympic Committee, and its second president. He is known as the father of the modern Olympic Games. He was particularly active in promoting the introduction of sport in French schools.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Born into a French aristocratic family, he became an academic and studied a broad range of topics, most notably education and history. He graduated with a degree in law and public affairs from the Paris Institute of Political Studies (Sciences Po). It was at Sciences Po that he came up with the idea of reviving the Olympic Games.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: The Pierre de Coubertin medal (also known as the Coubertin medal or the True Spirit of Sportsmanship medal) is an award given by the International Olympic Committee to athletes who demonstrate the spirit of sportsmanship in the Olympic Games.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Pierre de Frédy was born in Paris on 1 January 1863, into an aristocratic family. He was the fourth child of Baron Charles Louis de Frédy, Baron de Coubertin and Marie–Marcelle Gigault de Crisenoy. Family tradition held that the Frédy name had first arrived in France in the early 15th century, and the first recorded title of nobility granted to the family was given by Louis XI to an ancestor, also named Pierre de Frédy, in 1477 but other branches of his family tree delved even further into French history, and the annals of both sides of his family included nobles of various stations, military leaders and associates of kings and princes of France.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: His father Charles was a staunch royalist and accomplished artist whose paintings were displayed and given prizes at the Parisian salon, at least in those years when he was not absent in protest of the rise to power of Louis Napoleon. His paintings often centered on themes related to the Roman Catholic Church, classicism, and nobility, which reflected those things he thought most important. In a later semi-fictional autobiographical piece called "Le Roman d'un rallié", Coubertin describes his relationship with both his mother and his father as having been somewhat strained during his childhood and adolescence. His memoirs elaborated further, describing as a pivotal moment his disappointment upon meeting Henri, Count of Chambord, whom the elder Coubertin believed to be the rightful king.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Coubertin grew up in a time of profound change in France: defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, the Paris Commune, and the establishment of the Third Republic but while these events were the setting of his childhood, his school experiences were just as formative. In October 1874, his parents enrolled him in a new Jesuit school called "Externat de la rue de Vienne", which was still under construction for his first five years there. While many of the school's attendees were day students, Coubertin boarded at the school under the supervision of a Jesuit priest, which his parents hoped would instill him with a strong moral and religious education. There, he was among the top three students in his class, and was an officer of the school's elite academy made up of its best and brightest. This suggests that despite his rebelliousness at home, Coubertin adapted well to the strict rigors of a Jesuit education.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: As an aristocrat, Coubertin had a number of career paths from which to choose, including potentially prominent roles in the military or politics but he chose instead to pursue a career as an intellectual, studying and later writing on a broad range of topics, including education, history, literature and sociology.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: The subject which he seems to have been most deeply interested in was education, and his study focused in particular on physical education and the role of sport in schooling. In 1883, at the age of twenty, he visited England for the first time, and studied the program of physical education instituted under Thomas Arnold at the Rugby School. Coubertin credited these methods with leading to the expansion of British power during the 19th century and advocated their use in French institutions. The inclusion of physical education in the curriculum of French schools would become an ongoing pursuit and passion of Coubertin's.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Coubertin is thought to have exaggerated the importance of sport to Thomas Arnold, whom he viewed as "one of the founders of athletic chivalry". The character-reforming influence of sport with which Coubertin was so impressed is more likely to have originated in the novel "Tom Brown's School Days" (published in 1857) rather than exclusively in the ideas of Arnold himself. Nonetheless, Coubertin was an enthusiast in need of a cause and he found it in England and in Thomas Arnold. "Thomas Arnold, the leader and classic model of English educators," wrote Coubertin, "gave the precise formula for the role of athletics in education. The cause was quickly won. Playing fields sprang up all over England". He visited other English schools to see for himself. He described the results in a book, "L'Education en Angleterre", which was published in Paris in 1888. The hero of his book is Thomas Arnold, and on his second visit in 1886, Coubertin reflected on Arnold's influence in the chapel at Rugby School.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: What Coubertin saw on the playing fields of the English schools he visited was how "organised sport can create moral and social strength". Not only did organized games help to set the mind and body in equilibrium, it also prevented the time being wasted in other ways. First developed by the ancient Greeks, it was an approach to education that he felt the rest of the world had forgotten and to whose revival he was to dedicate the rest of his life.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: As a historian and a thinker on education, Coubertin romanticized ancient Greece. Thus, when he began to develop his theory of physical education, he naturally looked to the example set by the Athenian idea of the gymnasium, a training facility that simultaneously encouraged physical and intellectual development. He saw in these gymnasia what he called a triple unity between old and young, between disciplines, and between different types of people, meaning between those whose work was theoretical and those whose work was practical. Coubertin advocated for these concepts, this triple unity, to be incorporated into schools.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: While Coubertin was certainly a romantic, and while his idealized vision of ancient Greece would lead him later to the idea of reviving the Olympic Games, his advocacy for physical education was also based on practical concerns. He believed that men who received physical education would be better prepared to fight in wars, and better able to win conflicts like the Franco-Prussian War, in which France had been humiliated. He also saw sport as democratic, in that sports competition crossed class lines, although it did so without causing a mingling of classes, which he did not support.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Unfortunately for Coubertin, his efforts to incorporate more physical education into French schools failed. The failure of this endeavor, however, was closely followed by the development of a new idea, the revival of the ancient Olympic Games, the creation of a festival of international athleticism.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: He was the referee of the first-ever French championship rugby union final on 20 March 1892, between Racing Club de France and Stade Français.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Thomas Arnold, the head master of Rugby School, was an important influence on Coubertin's thoughts about education, but his meetings with William Penny Brookes also influenced his thinking about athletic competition to some extent. A trained physician, Brookes believed that the best way to prevent illness was through physical exercise. In 1850, he had initiated a local athletic competition that he referred to as "Meetings of the Olympian Class" at the Gaskell recreation ground at Much Wenlock, Shropshire. Along with the Liverpool Athletic Club, who began holding their own Olympic Festival in the 1860s, Brookes created a National Olympian Association which aimed to encourage such local competition in cities across Britain. These efforts were largely ignored by the British sporting establishment. Brookes also maintained communication with the government and sporting advocates in Greece, seeking a revival of the Olympic Games internationally under the auspices of the Greek government. There, the philanthropist cousins Evangelos and Konstantinos Zappas had used their wealth to fund Olympics within Greece, and paid for the restoration of the Panathinaiko Stadium that was later used during the 1896 Summer Olympics. The efforts of Brookes to encourage the internationalization of these games came to naught in his own lifetime before his death in 1895. However, Dr. Brookes did organize a national Olympic Games in London, at Crystal Palace, in 1866 and this was the first Olympics to resemble an Olympic Games to be held outside of Greece but while others had created Olympic contests within their countries, and broached the idea of international competition, it was Coubertin whose work would lead to the establishment of the International Olympic Committee and the organization of the first modern Olympic Games.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: In 1888, Coubertin founded the "Comité pour la Propagation des Exercises Physiques" more well known as the "Comité Jules Simon". Coubertin's earliest reference to the modern notion of Olympic Games criticizes the idea. The idea for reviving the Olympic Games as an international competition came to Coubertin in 1889, apparently independently of Brookes, and he spent the following five years organizing an international meeting of athletes and sports enthusiasts that might make it happen. In response to a newspaper appeal, Brookes wrote to Coubertin in 1890, and the two began an exchange of letters on education and sport. Although he was too old to attend the 1894 Congress, Brookes would continue to support Coubertin's efforts, most importantly by using his connections with the Greek government to seek its support in the endeavour. While Brookes' contribution to the revival of the Olympic Games was recognized in Britain at the time, Coubertin in his later writings largely neglected to mention the role the Englishman played in their development. He did mention the roles of Evangelis Zappas and his cousin Konstantinos Zappas, but drew a distinction between their founding of athletic Olympics and his own role in the creation of an international contest. However, Coubertin together with A. Mercatis, a close friend of Konstantinos, encouraged the Greek government to utilise part of Konstantinos' legacy to fund the 1896 Athens Olympic Games separately and in addition to the legacy of Evangelis Zappas that Konstantinos had been executor of. Moreover, George Averoff was invited by the Greek government to fund the second refurbishment of the Panathinaiko Stadium that had already been fully funded by Evangelis Zappas forty years earlier.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Coubertin's advocacy for the games centered on a number of ideals about sport. He believed that the early ancient Olympics encouraged competition among amateur rather than professional athletes, and saw value in that. The ancient practice of a sacred truce in association with the Games might have modern implications, giving the Olympics a role in promoting peace. This role was reinforced in Coubertin's mind by the tendency of athletic competition to promote understanding across cultures, thereby lessening the dangers of war. In addition, he saw the games as important in advocating his philosophical ideal for athletic competition: that the competition itself, the struggle to overcome one's opponent, was more important than winning. Coubertin expressed this ideal thus:


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: "L'important dans la vie ce n'est point le triomphe, mais le combat, l'essentiel ce n'est pas d'avoir vaincu mais de s'être bien battu."


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: "The important thing in life is not the triumph but the struggle, the essential thing is not to have conquered but to have fought well."


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: As Coubertin prepared for his Congress, he continued to develop a philosophy of the Olympic Games. While he certainly intended the Games to be a forum for competition between amateur athletes, his conception of amateurism was complex. By 1894, the year the Congress was held, he publicly criticized the type of amateur competition embodied in English rowing contests, arguing that its specific exclusion of working-class athletes was wrong. While he believed that athletes should not be paid to be such, he did think that compensation was in order for the time when athletes were competing and would otherwise have been earning money. Following the establishment of a definition for an amateur athlete at the 1894 Congress, he would continue to argue that this definition should be amended as necessary, and as late as 1909 would argue that the Olympic movement should develop its definition of amateurism gradually.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Along with the development of an Olympic philosophy, Coubertin invested time in the creation and development of a national association to coordinate athletics in France, the Union des Sociétés Françaises de Sports Athlétiques (USFSA). In 1889, French athletics associations had grouped together for the first time and Coubertin founded a monthly magazine "La Revue Athletique", the first French periodical devoted exclusively to athletics and modelled on "The Athlete", an English journal established around 1862. Formed by seven sporting societies with approximately 800 members, by 1892 the association had expanded to 62 societies with 7,000 members.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: That November, at the annual meeting of the USFSA, Coubertin first publicly suggested the idea of reviving the Olympics. His speech met general applause, but little commitment to the Olympic ideal he was advocating for, perhaps because sporting associations and their members tended to focus on their own area of expertise and had little identity as sportspeople in a general sense.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: This disappointing result was prelude to a number of challenges he would face in organizing his international conference. In order to develop support for the conference, he began to play down its role in reviving Olympic Games and instead promoted it as a conference on amateurism in sport which, he thought, was slowly being eroded by betting and sponsorships. This led to later suggestions that participants were convinced to attend under false pretenses. Little interest was expressed by those he spoke to during trips to the United States in 1893 and London in 1894, and an attempt to involve the Germans angered French gymnasts who did not want the Germans invited at all. Despite these challenges, the USFSA continued its planning for the games, adopting in its first program for the meeting eight articles to address, only one of which had to do with the Olympics. A later program would give the Olympics a much more prominent role in the meeting.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: The congress was held on 23 June 1894 at the Sorbonne in Paris. Once there, participants divided the congress into two commissions, one on amateurism and the other on reviving the Olympics. A Greek participant, Demetrios Vikelas, was appointed to head the commission on the Olympics, and would later become the first President of the International Olympic Committee. Along with Coubertin, C. Herbert of Britain's Amateur Athletic Association and W.M. Sloane of the United States helped lead the efforts of the commission. In its report, the commission proposed that Olympic Games be held every four years and that the program for the Games be one of modern rather than ancient sports. They also set the date and location for the first modern Olympic Games, the 1896 Summer Olympics in Athens, Greece, and the second, the 1900 Summer Olympics in Paris. Coubertin had originally opposed the choice of Greece, as he had concerns about the ability of a weakened Greek state to host the competition, but was convinced by Vikelas to support the idea. The commission's proposals were accepted unanimously by the congress, and the modern Olympic movement was officially born.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: The proposals of the other commission, on amateurism, were more contentious, but this commission also set important precedents for the Olympic Games, specifically the use of heats to narrow participants and the banning of prize money in most contests.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Following the Congress, the institutions created there began to be formalized into the International Olympic Committee (IOC), with Demetrios Vikelas as its first president. The work of the IOC increasingly focused on the planning the 1896 Athens Games, and de Coubertin played a background role as Greek authorities took the lead in logistical organization of the Games in Greece itself, offering technical advice such as a sketch of a design of a velodrome to be used in cycling competitions. He also took the lead in planning the program of events, although to his disappointment, polo, football, or boxing were not included in 1896.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: The Greek organizing committee had been informed that four foreign football teams had entered, however none of them showed up in Athens, and despite Greek preparations for a football tournament it was cancelled during the Games.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: The Greek authorities were also frustrated that he could not provide an exact estimate of the number of attendees more than a year in advance. In France, Coubertin's efforts to elicit interest in the Games among athletes and the press met difficulty, largely because the participation of German athletes angered French nationalists who begrudged Germany their victory in the Franco-Prussian War. Germany also threatened not to participate after rumors spread that Coubertin had sworn to keep Germany out, but following a letter to the Kaiser denying the accusation, the German National Olympic Committee decided to attend.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Coubertin himself was frustrated by the Greeks, who increasingly ignored him in their planning and who wanted to continue to hold the Games in Athens every four years, against de Coubertin's wishes. The conflict was resolved after he suggested to the King of Greece that he hold pan-Hellenic games in between Olympiads, an idea which the King accepted, although Coubertin would receive some angry correspondence even after the compromise was reached and the King did not mention him at all during the banquet held in honor of foreign athletes during the 1896 Games.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Coubertin took over the IOC presidency when Demetrios Vikelas stepped down after the Olympics in his own country. Despite the initial success, the Olympic movement faced hard times, as the 1900 Games (in De Coubertin's own Paris) and 1904 Games were both overshadowed by World's Fairs in the same cities, and received little attention.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Further to this, the Paris Games were organized by the organizing committee of the Exposition Universelle, who disagreed with de Coubertin's ideas and subsequently fired him, nor were they called Olympics at that time, while the St. Louis Games were predominantly American.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: The 1906 Summer Olympics revived the momentum, and the Olympic Games have come to be regarded as the world's foremost sports competition. Coubertin created the modern pentathlon for the 1912 Olympics, and subsequently stepped down from his IOC presidency after the 1924 Olympics in Paris, which proved much more successful than the first attempt in that city in 1900. He was succeeded as president, in 1925, by Belgian Henri de Baillet-Latour.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Years later Coubertin came out of retirement to lend his prestige to assisting Berlin to land the 1936 games. In exchange, Germany nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize. The 1935 winner, however, was the anti-Nazi Carl von Ossietzky.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Coubertin won the gold medal for literature at the 1912 Summer Olympics for his poem "Ode to Sport". Coubertin entered his poem 'Ode to Sport' under the pseudonym of Georges Hohrod and M. Eschbach which were the names of villages close to his wife's place of birth.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Following Francisco Amoros' ideas, De Coubertin developed a new type of utilitarian sport: "les débrouillards". (the "resourceful men") from 1900.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: The first débrouillards season was organized in 1905/1906, and the program was wide: running, jumping, throwing, climbing, swimming, sword fight, boxing, shooting, walking, horse riding, rowing, cycling. (source: FFEPGV archives)


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: In 1911, Pierre de Coubertin founded the inter-religious Scouting organization aka "Éclaireurs Français" (EF) in France, which later merged to form the Éclaireuses et Éclaireurs de France.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: In 1895, Pierre de Coubertin had married Marie Rothan, the daughter of family friends. Their son Jacques (1896–1952) became ill after being in the sun too long when he was a little child. Their daughter Renée (1902–1968) suffered emotional disturbances and never married. Marie and Pierre tried to console themselves with two nephews, but they were killed at the front in World War I. Coubertin died of a heart attack in Geneva, Switzerland, on 2 September 1937 and was buried in Bois-de-Vaux Cemetery in Lausanne. Marie died in 1963.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: At the 139th IOC session, French IOC member and Olympic gold medalist Guy Drut, informed the IOC of his proposal to have de Coubertin's remain reinterred at the Panthéon in time for the 2024 Summer Olympics. Drut stated that he had support from de Coubertin's family as well as Académie Française member Érik Orsenna and had written to French President Emmanuel Macron. In response, IOC President, Thomas Bach, commented that he though it was " "wonderful proposal" and "deserves to be successful," however he doubted "the IOC could make any steps on this initiative which we appreciate considerably," yet wished him on behalf of the IOC "the best of success in getting this initiative to fruition." Drut announced that he had written to Macron "to propose the creation of a study commission for this project."


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Pierre was the last person to possess his family name. In the words of his biographer John MacAloon, "The last of his lineage, Pierre de Coubertin was the only member of it whose fame would outlive him."


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: A number of scholars have criticized Coubertin's legacy. David C. Young believes that Coubertin's assertion that ancient Olympic athletes were amateurs was incorrect. The issue is the subject of scholarly debate. Young and others argue that the athletes of the ancient Games were professional, while opponents led by Pleket argue that the earliest Olympic athletes were in fact amateur, and that the Games only became professionalized after about 480 BC. Coubertin agreed with this latter view, and saw this professionalization as undercutting the morality of the competition.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Further, Young asserts that the effort to limit international competition to amateur athletes, which Coubertin was a part of, was in fact part of efforts to give the upper classes greater control over athletic competition, removing such control from the working classes. Coubertin may have played a role in such a movement, but his defenders argue that he did so unconscious of any class repercussions.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: However, it is clear that his romanticized vision of the ancient Olympic Games was fundamentally different from that described in the historical record. For example, Coubertin's idea that participation is more important than winning ("L'important c'est de participer") is at odds with the ideals of the Greeks.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Coubertin's assertion that the games were the impetus for peace was also an exaggeration; the peace which he spoke of only existed to allow athletes to travel safely to Olympia, and neither prevented the outbreak of wars nor ended ongoing ones.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Scholars have critiqued the idea that athletic competition might lead to greater understanding between cultures and, therefore, to peace. Christopher Hill claims that modern participants in the Olympic movement may defend this particular belief, "in a spirit similar to that in which the Church of England remains attached to the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion, which a Priest in that Church must sign." In other words, that they may not wholly believe it but hold to it for historical reasons.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Questions have also been raised about the veracity of Coubertin's account of his role in the planning of the 1896 Athens Games. Reportedly, Coubertin played little role in planning, despite entreaties by Vikelas. Young suggests that the story about Coubertin's having sketched the velodrome were untrue, and that he had in fact given an interview in which he suggested he did not want Germans to participate. Coubertin later denied this.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: Coubertin also spoke against women's sports and the Women's World Games: "Impractical, uninteresting, unaesthetic, and we are not afraid to add: incorrect, such would be in our opinion this female half-Olympiad".


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: The traditional Olympic motto "Citius, Altius, Fortius" (Faster, Higher, Stronger) was proposed by Coubertin in 1894, and was official from 1924 until modified to the current "Citius, Altius, Fortius – Communiter" (Faster, Higher, Stronger – Together) in 2021. The traditional motto was coined by Henri Didon OP, a friend of Coubertin, for a Paris youth gathering of 1891.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: The Pierre de Coubertin medal (also known as the Coubertin medal or the True Spirit of Sportsmanship medal) is an award given by the International Olympic Committee to those athletes that demonstrate the spirit of sportsmanship in the Olympic Games. This medal is considered by many athletes and spectators to be the highest award that an Olympic athlete can receive, even greater than a gold medal. The International Olympic Committee considers it as its highest honor.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: A minor planet, 2190 Coubertin, was discovered in 1976 by Soviet astronomer Nikolai Stepanovich Chernykh and is named in his honour.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: The street where the Olympic Stadium in Montreal is located (which hosted the 1976 Summer Olympic Games) was named after Pierre de Coubertin, giving the stadium the address 4549 Pierre de Coubertin Avenue. It is the only Olympic stadium in the world that lies on a street named after Coubertin. There are also two schools in Montreal named after Pierre de Coubertin.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: In 2007, he was inducted into the World Rugby Hall of Fame for his services to the sport of rugby union.


title: Pierre de Coubertin

text: This is a listing of Pierre de Coubertin's books. In addition to these, he wrote numerous articles for journals and magazines:


title: Wasp (character)

text: The Wasp (Janet van Dyne) is a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Created by Stan Lee, Ernie Hart, and Jack Kirby, the character first appeared in "Tales to Astonish" #44 (June 1963).


title: Wasp (character)

text: Janet van Dyne is usually depicted as having the ability to shrink to a height of several centimeters, fly by means of insectoid wings, and fire bioelectric energy blasts. She is a founding member of the Avengers as well as a longtime leader of the team.


title: Wasp (character)

text: The character appears in the Marvel Cinematic Universe film "Ant-Man" (2015) in a cameo role, while Michelle Pfeiffer portrays Janet van Dyne in the films "Ant-Man and the Wasp" (2018) and "" (2019), and the upcoming "" (2023).


title: Wasp (character)

text: Janet van Dyne debuted in "Tales to Astonish" #44 (plotted by Stan Lee, scripted by H. E. Huntley, and drawn by Jack Kirby, June 1963) as Henry "Hank" Pym's partner, becoming the Wasp to avenge the death of her father, scientist Vernon van Dyne. She co-starred in "Tales to Astonish" from issue #44 to issue #69 (1963–65). She was also the star of her own backup feature in issues #51–58 (1964).


title: Wasp (character)

text: She was a founding member of the Avengers, appearing in the first issue and giving the team its name. It is with the Avengers that Janet became most well known. At first she was the weak link of the team, but later on became one of the smartest and craftiest of its members. Though she takes leaves of absence throughout the series, she is one of the longest active members and has acted as leader of the team for longer than anybody besides Captain America.


title: Wasp (character)

text: During her absences from the core "Avengers" book, Janet appeared in various other publications, including appearing as a main character in "Marvel Feature" issues #6–10 (1972–73). She has also made sporadic guest appearances in various other books, such as "Captain America", "Iron Man", and "Fantastic Four".


title: Wasp (character)

text: Janet became the leader of the Avengers in "The Avengers" #217 (1982), a position she held until #278 (1987), with the exception of a brief period where she handed leadership off to the Vision. She then appeared in issue #32 of "West Coast Avengers" (May 1988), becoming a full-time member in issue #42.


title: Wasp (character)

text: She made occasional appearances in "Avengers" vol. 3, returning as an active member of the team in issue #27 (2000) before resuming leadership duties. She and Captain America became co-leaders of the team starting in issue #38.


title: Wasp (character)

text: After the events of "Avengers Disassembled", Janet appeared in the limited series "Beyond!" before rejoining the Avengers in "The Mighty Avengers" #1 (2007). She was presumed dead during the events of "Secret Invasion" in 2008. Wasp returned in the "Avengers" "End Times" storyline that ran from issue #31 (December 2012) to issue #34 (January 2013). She then appeared as a member of the Avengers Unity Squad in "Uncanny Avengers" and as an Agent of Wakanda in the Fresh Start title of the Avengers. Janet also returned as a romantic interest to Tony Stark in 2018, and leaved the female led role of the Iron Man comic book two years later, in 2020.


title: Wasp (character)

text: In his 1970s run on "The Avengers", artist George Pérez revamped the character's costume a number of times, having a significant impact on the character's development:


title: Wasp (character)

text: It became a joke. In the case of the Wasp, I noticed that she has so many costumes that eventually I said "Why not?" I think I was on the book long enough what was once just a little bit of idiosyncrasy about the character became fully part of the character's persona.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Janet van Dyne was born in Cresskill, New Jersey, the socialite daughter of wealthy scientist Vernon van Dyne. When her father is killed by an alien entity unleashed during one of his experiments, Janet turns to his associate Dr. Hank Pym for aid and convinces him to help her. To avenge her father's death, she undergoes a biochemical procedure that grants her the ability to grow wings upon shrinking under four feet tall and uses a supply of "Pym particles" by which to change her size. Together, she and Ant-Man defeat the alien and avenge her father. Janet decides to remain as Wasp and be Hank's partner as she has fallen in love with him, though Hank initially rejects her feelings due to the similarities between her and his murdered first wife.


title: Wasp (character)

text: During her time as Hank's partner, she took part in numerous conflicts with villains who included the Porcupine, Egghead, and Whirlwind (then known as the Human Top). Though initially without any offensive powers, Janet proves to be resourceful, using her ability to communicate with insects to fight, as well as using a pin to poke people as a weapon. Later, she uses a miniature air gun, the original wasp's sting.


title: Wasp (character)

text: After the initial confrontation with Loki that brought together the founding Avengers, it is Janet and Hank who propose forming a team of superheroes. Janet suggests the name for the team and becomes a founding member. Never lacking confidence or bravery and by nature an outgoing personality, Janet is always in the thick of battles with villains, who include Norse gods and aliens, despite being the most underpowered member of the team. Janet frequently comments on the attractiveness of her male colleagues, especially Thor, to provoke jealousy from Hank and get him to commit to a relationship. Early on in her Avengers career, she is seriously wounded by a stray bullet in battle against Count Nefaria, and nearly dies from a collapsed lung. She leaves the team several issues later. When she returns in "The Avengers" #26, her shrinking powers have progressed to the point where she no longer needs Pym particle capsules to change her size.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Though Janet hopes on several occasions that her long-term boyfriend Hank will propose, their relationship does not move forward to that point until something more dramatic happens. The new vigilante Yellowjacket breaks into the Avengers mansion, demands to be admitted as a member of the team, claims to have killed Hank Pym, and then kidnaps Janet. Not believing that Yellowjacket was Hank's killer, she attempts to find where Yellowjacket is holding Hank, but instead determines that Yellowjacket is her boyfriend. Before revealing this, and during the period in which Yellowjacket still believes himself to have killed Hank, Janet marries Hank, though the wedding is disrupted by an attack from the Circus of Crime. During the fight, it is revealed that Yellowjacket is Pym.


title: Wasp (character)

text: After another departure from the team, Janet van Dyne returns briefly and becomes a member of the original Lady Liberators, before once more leaving the team. She becomes temporarily trapped at insect size, and battles Whirlwind, Para-Man and Dr. Nemesis. She also battles Equinox alongside Spider-Man and Yellowjacket; during this time her powers are augmented to allow her to harness her body's bio-electrical current and fire blasts of energy which she calls her "wasp's stings".


title: Wasp (character)

text: During one of her breaks from active Avengers duty, Janet approaches the team with concerns about her husband having suffered a breakdown and attacked former teammates. In attempting to find a way to help Hank, she is captured by a brainwashed Hank, and used by Ultron as a template to create Jocasta. She is rescued when Jocasta alerts the Avengers to her location, and Black Panther suggests that the A.I.'s ability to reach out to them was brought about because of Janet's personality breaking through.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Janet van Dyne discovers that her husband, now paranoid, overbearing and verbally abusive, has concocted a plan to make himself look good in front of the Avengers by staging an attack that can only be stopped by the instigator. When she attempts to dissuade him, Hank strikes her; she divorces him soon after and takes a very brief break from the team.


title: Wasp (character)

text: When Janet returns to the Avengers, she proposes that the team is in need of new leadership and nominates herself for the role of Chairperson. She is elected to the position by Thor, Iron Man, and Captain America. Janet takes to the role naturally, proving to be an efficient and smart leader who is praised by Captain America for her leadership skills. She makes it a point to increase the number of women on the team and recruits She-Hulk and Captain Marvel (Monica Rambeau).


title: Wasp (character)

text: At the same time as taking on leadership of the team, Janet begins to work in earnest as a professional fashion designer. Part of her friendship with She-Hulk includes designing new clothing for her. She also renews her social life, engaging in a whirlwind romance with Tony Stark before learning that the billionaire is Iron Man. She breaks off the relationship, saying that she cannot date a colleague who is also a friend of her ex-husband. Later, she has a relationship with Paladin, though they are often apart due to their jobs.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Janet briefly hands leadership of the team off to the Vision, though he soon leaves the team and returns the position to her. The new team line-up proves difficult, and Janet clashes with Hercules taking issue with a woman leading. It is during this time that she meets the Space Phantom for the second time and defeats the villain. During the first Secret War, despite being the official leader of the Avengers gathered by the Beyonder, Janet nominates Captain America for leadership of the assembled heroes as the non-Avengers present know him better. As the conflict unfolds, Janet is briefly captured by Magneto, but she turns the situation to her advantage by pretending to be seduced; she learns Magneto's plans and then defeats him before leaving to alert the Avengers. She is shortly afterwards killed by the Wrecking Crew, but resurrected by the alien healer Zsaji.


title: Wasp (character)

text: During the "Under Siege" storyline, Janet leads the team during a time where they are attacked from all sides. She defeats Titania and the Absorbing Man, then leads a team against Baron Zemo's forces to rescue Captain America, the Black Knight, and other team members who have been captured. Shortly after the resolution of this story, she steps down from leadership once more, succeeded by Monica Rambeau in that position. After leaving the team, she battles the threat of Red Ronin by herself. She later joins the West Coast Avengers. Initially, she still acts as though the team leader, to the chagrin of other West Coast Avengers who desire that role. During this time, she resumes a romantic relationship with Hank. Although she is elected as a regular member of the Avengers West, Janet chooses to become a reserve member.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Several years later, Janet van Dyne returns to the Avengers, first at reserve status, and later as a full member of the team. During the Destiny War, the Janet of the present becomes the leader of a team of Avengers assembled from different time periods, cited as being chosen due to her "inner strength and flexibility to give the team direction without exerting too much control". After the Destiny War, Janet returns to work with the Avengers once more, taking up leadership of the team and commanding the team through a number of conflicts, including Kang the Conqueror's invasion of Earth.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Janet van Dyne once more takes up leadership of the Avengers and continues to make sure there is a strong female presence on the team. Under her leadership, the number of women on the team outnumbers the number of men for the first time in Avengers history. Though her relationship with Hank Pym remains strong for some time, she turns down his proposal of remarrying, saying she wouldn't marry him again. During the Lionheart of Avalon storyline, Janet is shown fighting the Wrecking Crew while at giant size, a power she had rarely, if ever, used prior. She is shown to be powerful enough at this size to take down a jet. She has a brief fling with fellow team member Hawkeye.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Janet van Dyne is shown as a member of the Avengers and aids them during the battle with Starro. She also gives Iron Man the idea to create a dimensional alarm and rallies other Avengers to defend the artifacts. After the final battle in the Savage Land against the Justice League, Janet ends up as an Avenger in the new merged world that the villain Krona created and is unaware of the changes. In this world she and Hank are good friends with Elongated Man and his wife Sue Dibny. When the two teams decide to team up against Krona, the Wasp fights alongside the Avengers until the battle is over.


title: Wasp (character)

text: While discussing her fling with Hawkeye, with the Scarlet Witch, a slightly tipsy Wasp confesses to a pregnancy scare and inadvertently mentions Wanda Maximoff's own children, whose unnatural existence Agatha Harkness has erased from the Witch's memory. Wasp's slip of the tongue, combined with Scarlet Witch's increasingly unstable and growing powers, cause Wanda to suffer a mental breakdown which leads to the events of "Avengers Disassembled". Janet is knocked into a coma by a rampaging She-Hulk during an attack on Avengers Mansion by the Scarlet Witch. Hank Pym watches over her in the hospital, and when she recovers, they reconcile. The two retire from the Avengers to pursue a new life together in Oxford.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Janet van Dyne is pulled into space and placed in a situation where she is expected to fight to the death with other heroes and villains. Instead of following the wishes of the Stranger—who they thought to be the Beyonder—Janet falls into the leadership position for the group, giving tactical orders in battle and calling upon her years of experience with the Avengers to handle the threats thrown at them. After tension between her and her ex-husband, Janet explains to Medusa why she can't reconcile with Hank Pym, despite an attempt to do so while in London. Upon learning that the Space Phantom has taken on the form of Spider-Man, Janet leads the group and keeps one of the team from being trapped in limbo when the Space Phantom attempts to take the person's form.


title: Wasp (character)

text: During the superhuman Civil War, Janet van Dyne is pro-registration and suggests that they push forward the fifty-state initiative to get things under control after the Thor-Clone kills Bill Foster, an event which upsets her greatly. She also becomes the host of a pro-registration reality TV show called "America's Newest Superhero".


title: Wasp (character)

text: Janet van Dyne is selected as a member of the Mighty Avengers by Carol Danvers and Tony Stark as part of the Fifty State Initiative. During its attempt to destroy humanity, she correctly determines that Ultron has taken over Iron Man's body. When alien symbiotes attack New York, Janet uses a refined growth formula given to her by Hank Pym—who is actually a Skrull impostor—which allows her to shift to giant-size without side effects. During the beginning of the fight, she is briefly turned into a symbiote monster before a cure is created by Stark.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Janet van Dyne is among the Mighty Avengers who are fighting heroes from the Skrull ship. She is later seen with the rest of the Avengers heading to New York to confront the Skrulls. While fighting the Skrulls, the true purpose of the serum that the Skrull Hank Pym has given her is revealed. After Queen Veranke is thought to be dead, the Skrull imposter presses a button that makes Janet increase in size rapidly, as well as causes her to emit lethal amounts of black-purple energy. Janet realizes that the "new" particles Pym has given her are turning her into a bio-bomb, and she tries to flee the battlefield and take as many Skrulls with her as possible when she explodes. To save both the city and heroes, Thor uses the enchanted hammer Mjolnir to create a spatial warp to seemingly disperse Janet into nothingness. Thor is devastated by the act and vows to avenge her. Upon accepting Janet's death, Hank Pym takes up his ex-wife's role as the Wasp.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Following the "Avengers vs. X-Men" storyline, it is revealed that Janet van Dyne has not died after all, but has been shunted into a Microverse by Thor's spatial warp in the same spot that she appears to have died in "Secret Invasion". Using her Avengers communication card she is able to send a signal with help from a local being called Cru-Sani. Giant-Man, Captain America, Thor and Iron Man go into the Microverse to rescue her and find her alive and fighting against an evil despot, Lord Gouzar, who has conquered the Microverse. After defeating Lord Gouzar and liberating the Microverse from his tyranny, Janet and her fellow Avengers return to their normal universe.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Following a brief hiatus, Janet returns to the team as a member of the Avengers Unity Squad. In addition to serving on the roster, she privately funds the team to avoid the problems that would come with government sponsorship. During the events of "Inhumanity", Janet returns to the Microverse to rescue a family who has been pulled there through a newly awakened Inhuman's powers. There she confronts Gouzar once more, before returning to normal space. In the Avengers Unity Squad's fight with the Horsemen of Death, the Wasp defeats both the resurrected Banshee and Sentry, using both her ability to grow to giant size as well as her ability to control insect life. After the team is defeated and the Earth destroyed, Wasp is the last surviving human and begins a romance with Havok (Alex Summers) with whom she has a daughter named Katie. Years later on Planet X, she is captured when she and Havok destroy a tachyon dam preventing time travel to their era. They are able to undo the destruction of Earth by forming an alliance with Kang and projecting their minds back into their past selves (physical time-travel still being impossible) but Kang takes their daughter to a place outside of time to 'protect' her from the changes in history, Kang subsequently attempts to use Katie as a hostage to force Havok to stop attacking him when he tries to take the Celestial power for himself, departing with Katie as his prisoner. Although Alex is left disfigured after the battle, he and Janet remain together. They are contacted by Immortus informing them that Immortus can return their daughter to them if they take action at the right time and place to conceive her, but he also warns them about the imminent threat posed by the Red Skull.


title: Wasp (character)

text: After the Red Skull's actions cause all heroes and villains present at his defeat to undergo a 'moral inversion', Alex attempts to argue for Janet's life as the X-Men prepare to detonate a gene bomb that will destroy all non-mutants in the blast radius, but accepts the decision nevertheless. After Carnage sacrifices himself to contain the blast, Alex attempts to take credit for it, but Janet sees through the deception. Although the inversion is undone, the two separate for good when Alex is one of three characters (the other two being Iron Man and Sabretooth) to remain in their new state.


title: Wasp (character)

text: As part of the "All-New, All-Different Marvel", Wasp confronts Wolverine (X-23) and her clones called The Sisters when they try to steal an Ant-Man suit. Wolverine explains what they are doing, so Wasp agrees to shrink down and destroys the nanites in Zelda's body. While Wasp and Wolverine made their way through Zelda's body, Captain Mooney of Alchemax Genetics shows up and shoots Zelda causing Wasp and Wolverine to exit the body. The two of them knock out Captain Mooney.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Wasp later caught up with the Uncanny Avengers and confronted Ultron Pym after helping to fend off the monsters in the subway. When Wasp asked Ultron Pym about the recent events, she figured out that Ultron is in control of Hank when Ultron guessed wrong. The rest of the Uncanny Avengers were informed of this causing Cable to pressure Hank enough for Ultron to go on the attack and reveal his true self.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Janet was called by Tony Stark to help him analyze the brain waves of Jocasta, since they were based on Janet's herself, after finding the data they went on a date and rekindled their past relationship after fending off malfunctioning robots attacking Stark Unlimited. Wasp later helps defeating The Controller after he took over the virtual reality eScape and empowered various criminals through out the city, and also directly aids Iron Man in subduing the supervillain Sudurang. During the "Ultron Agenda" arc, Wasp and Iron Man are suddenly attacked by a fusion of Vision and Wonder Man created by Ultron, who is trying to kidnap her, while Iron Man fends off the fusion, Wasp is found and captured by a brain-washed Jarvis and is taken to Ultron's base, who reveals to her he is now fused with her ex-husband Hank Pym. Ultron later has Jocasta captured as well and reveals he is planning to combine both Jan and Jocasta in the same body the same way he did with Pym, therefore creating his "Perfect wife", he is found by Iron Man and Machine Man before he activates his procedure, and cause him to have a mental breakdown through continued taunting, Ultron activates his machine but both Jan and Jocasta are saved by Iron Man who is fused with his armor in the process, Dr. Shapiro finds a way to revert Iron Man's condition but Ultron sends a miniature version on himself to infiltrate Iron Man's body who's engaged by Wasp, gaining enough time for Iron Man to expel everything from his body and return to normal. Wasp later helps fend off an enraged Ultron who's trying to kill everyone with his army of machine-fused human army, Iron Man uses his newly developed technology to separate the robotic parts from the organic ones to stop Ultron's army and scare him off. Janet tries to comfort Tony after he finds out he is actually an A.I. before he flies away.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Making use of the cellular implantation of sub-atomic Pym particles, the Wasp possesses the power to alter her physical size, causing her body's mass to be shunted to or gained from an alternate dimension known as Kosmos. She is able to shrink to a minimum of several centimeters or grow to a maximum of several hundred feet. Smaller or larger sizes are possible but the exertion puts a strain on her body. Initially, these abilities stem from use of a Pym particle gas released from special capsules, and later biochemical augmentation by Henry Pym. Over time, however, her body absorbs enough particles to cause cellular mutation due to repeated exposure to Pym particles, allowing her to alter her size at will.


title: Wasp (character)

text: At miniature size, her strength level increases as her body's mass is compacted. At giant size, her strength and endurance increase geometrically with her height, reaching superhuman levels. Despite the advantages of giant size, Janet usually prefers to remain the diminutive Wasp, calling on her growth power only in times of extreme emergency.


title: Wasp (character)

text: At miniature size, the Wasp grows a pair of translucent insect wings from her back, a result of genetic modifications provided by Hank Pym. These grant her the power of flight, at speeds up to .


title: Wasp (character)

text: The Wasp is able to harness and augment her body's natural bio-electric energy, releasing it from her hands in powerful electrical force bursts, which she calls her "stinger blasts", "stingers", or "wasp's stings". Originally, she requires special wrist devices to produce these, but again, Pym particle absorption allows her to create the ability unaided.


title: Wasp (character)

text: The Wasp's genetic modifications also grant her the ability to sprout small prehensile antennae from her temples which allowed her to telepathically communicate with and control insects. However, this is an ability she rarely uses.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Van Dyne displays several non-superhuman abilities that garner her special fame and attention, foremost of which is her fashion sense; in nearly all of her early appearances, she sports a new costume, presumably designed and manufactured on her own as she is a gifted fashion designer. She is also a skilled amateur screenwriter. The Wasp is trained in unarmed combat by Captain America and in combat using her special powers by Henry Pym. In addition, the Wasp is one of the most intuitive, if not deductive, members of the Avengers, and is an experienced leader and strategist. She effectively determines that a chemical accident has created a schizophrenic break in Henry and that the relationship between the Scarlet Witch and the Vision is the result of the infused personality of Wonder Man, and guesses Iron Man's identity of Tony Stark.


title: Wasp (character)

text: George Marston of "Newsarama" referred to the Wasp as one of the "best female superheroes," writing, Though she started as something of a sidekick to her on-again-off-again (currently off-again) paramour Hank Pym, Janet quickly became a hero in her own right, leading the Avengers several times, and often acting as the team's moral center. Wasp's arc has consistently projected upwards, quickly leaving behind any semblance of being a 'damsel in distress,' and progressing to the top levels of Marvel's heroic roster. Add to that her historical significance, and it's easy to see why she's one of the greatest female heroes ever to grace the printed page. Rob Bricken of "Gizmodo" asserted, "If Captain America epitomizes the Avengers, Janet Van Dyne is still its heart and soul. She was a founding member, has led the team through some of its most difficult moments, and has the unequivocal respect of gods, robots, and the most powerful beings in the cosmos. Marvel actually put it best when it said if the Avengers were asked to rank themselves, The Wasp would likely be #1." "IGN" stated, "Superhero comics were still lacking for strong female characters in the mid '60s. The Wasp was one of the ladies at the forefront of the feminist superhero movement. At first merely a bubbly sidekick to her husband, Giant-Man, Wasp quickly grew and built a career of her own. She remained one of the core Avengers members for much of the franchise's history, and her extensive wardrobe rivals even the likes of Wolverine's."


title: Wasp (character)

text: After the apparent death of Janet van Dyne, her ex-husband Hank Pym became the second Wasp and joined the Mighty Avengers as their leader. After founding the Avengers Academy, Pym returned to wear his Giant-Man suit, and helped the Avengers to rescue Janet from the Microverse.


title: Wasp (character)

text: It was revealed that Hank Pym had a daughter named Nadia through Maria Trovaya who was abducted and supposedly killed by foreign agents. This caused Nadia to be raised in the Red Room until the day she obtained a Pym Particle sample that enabled her to escape. Upon heading to where her father lived, Nadia learned about what happened to Hank and used some parts of her father's costume and some materials laying around where she created a new version of the Wasp suit. Upon becoming the third Wasp, Nadia plans to obtain the admiration of her father's allies. After earning the trusts of the Avengers after stabilizing Vision, Edwin Jarvis took Nadia on a road trip to meet her extended family. Nadia meets Janet and spends the day with her. They save the president and then have a moment together. It soon becomes apparent that Nadia was out of touch with reality, believing that everything could be fixed by her science skills because "she was good". However, despite learning the harsh truth of reality, Janet comforted her and felt she had the potential to become a true hero.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Nadia soon joins the Avengers and gains U.S. citizenship. Upon realizing that the most intelligent women on S.H.I.E.L.D.'s index don't list any women above the 27th place, she jump starts the program G.I.R.L. (Genius In Action Research Labs) to look for women with genius intellects. When deciding her legal name, Nadia realizes that she can't take the name 'Pym' as she never knew much about her biological mother and father. She decides to take the surname 'Van Dyne' as Janet was the only person there for her and believed in her success.


title: Wasp (character)

text: In the alternate future of the "MC2" universe, Henry Pym and Janet Pym are parents of two children (Hope Pym and Henry Pym, Jr.). Giant-Man later perishes on the last mission of the original Avengers, and the Wasp dies of a broken heart. Their parents' deaths motivate Hope to be the Red Queen to form the Revengers while Henry, Jr. turns into the Big Man and joins a government reform team.


title: Wasp (character)

text: The "" series (set in its own continuity) features Janet van Dyne as Giant-Girl, showcasing her ability to grow rather than shrink, which she uses in combat. She is younger than her main universe counterpart and she cracks jokes along with her teammate Spider-Man. Issue 13 of the series reveals her origin as a wealthy socialite given access to size-changing Pym particles by scientist Henry Pym (here an employee of Janet's father rather than a superhero). Her maximum size is unknown, but she grows tall enough to catch a school. Instead of having her powers naturally, Janet requires a suit powered by Pym particles to change her size. Like her Earth-616 counterpart, Janet seems to change her costume regularly. The first costume is purple and black with a mask adorned with antennae that looks remarkably similar to the Giant-Man costume worn by Hank Pym in the mainstream universe. This costume allows her to grow while having the added effect of letting her control insects (though she never uses this power). This costume is later destroyed, and Janet wears a second costume that does not include a mask, as her secret identity had been revealed. Finally, Janet gains a third suit that allows her to both grow and shrink, with the suit changing in appearance depending on her size. While using this suit to shrink, she calls herself Wasp and has powers similar to her mainstream counterpart, such as flight, proportionally superhuman strength, and the ability to project bio-electrical stings. A recent preview of "Marvel Adventures: the Avengers" #19 has shown her wearing a costume which is primarily blue but has gold-yellow accents. Whether this costume increases her maximum size is yet to be seen. She also mentions that she has at least two brothers, although they have never been seen or given any names (see "Marvel Adventures: The Avengers" #3).


title: Wasp (character)

text: The Marvel Zombies series features an alternate Wasp as one of the main characters. She is now a zombie, another victim of the virus that has infected nearly all her world's superhumans. After Earth's human population is almost entirely devoured, Wasp is one of the zombies who finally kills (and consumes) Magneto.


title: Wasp (character)

text: The Wasp then discovers that Hank Pym has kept a secret food supply—a sedated and maimed Black Panther, held prisoner in Hank's lab. She confronts Hank, but he decapitates her by increasing in size and biting her head off in the struggle that follows. When the Black Panther later escapes the lab, he also takes the Wasp's still sentient head, which continues begging for food. He eventually reaches safety after encountering Magneto's surviving Acolytes. The Acolytes announce that they will study the Wasp, seeking a cure for the virus.


title: Wasp (character)

text: An epilogue, five years later, shows the Wasp exploring the deserted Earth alongside the Acolytes. Her severed head is now sealed within a liquid-filled helmet, controlling a robotic body.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Forty years later in "Marvel Zombies 2", her head is fixed on a more advanced machine with her head exposed to the air. She also develops romantic feelings toward one of the Acolyte survivors, a scientist named Reynolds. As she indicates, forty years with the Acolytes is far longer than the time she has spent with Hank. At one point, the two share a kiss.


title: Wasp (character)

text: A long period without feeding seems to have cured her completely of the hunger. Now Black Panther's adviser and friend, she is forced to infect him when an Acolyte assassin attempts to kill him. This incident is orchestrated by Malcolm Cortez, the son of Fabian Cortez, wanting to take leadership from Black Panther. When the hunger resurfaces, she nearly eats Panther's wife before being stopped by him. Instead, they eat the assassin and they state they will go into isolation to control their hunger. This is a success. Multiple powered zombies soon threaten the colony. Wasp fights alongside Panther, Hawkeye (who had also been decapitated and inhabits Janet's own former cybernetic body), Forge, and a reformed Luke Cage and Spider-Man to save the people of New Wakanda from Firelord, Giant-Man, Wolverine, Gladiator, Hulk, Jean Grey and Iron Man seeking to finish off humanity and retain the inter-dimensional portal so they can enter a new universe. Eventually the zombies discover, as Janet has, that the hunger fades with time, and they stop their rampage only to have their numbers halved by the Hulk. Janet, along with the other remaining zombies (the new Colonel America, Spider-Man, Cage, Giant-Man, Wolverine and Black Panther), end up teleported to another universe by Malcolm Cortez.


title: Wasp (character)

text: The Wasp ends in the dimension of 'Earth Z'. She leads an alien invasion of the zombie-infected Earth in an effort to quash the flesh-eating threat. She fails at this and is destroyed.


title: Wasp (character)

text: During the period when she is presumed dead, a cyborg version of the Wasp appears in the Core, an underground city populated by robots. During a battle between the Descendants (the residents of the Core) and the Secret Avengers, Hawkeye encounters the cyborg Wasp. He muses that the cyborg must have been the reanimated corpse of Janet, and finds himself unable to harm her. This Wasp is later revealed to be from an alternate future where most of Earth's superheroes had been killed and rebuilt using Deathlok technology. After the death of her timeline's version of Hank Pym, the Deathlok Wasp attempts to kidnap and assimilate his Earth-616 counterpart.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Janet Van Dyne is a Stark International employee who wears a suit which grants her plasma wings. Janet has a rivalry with Iron Girl. Wasp helps defend the energy well from Hydra and Namor. During Rings of Fate she is presumably killed by the Hand.


title: Wasp (character)

text: The Ultimate Marvel incarnation of Wasp is Janet Pym, a 26-year-old mutant and a member of the Ultimates. She holds two PhDs (one known to be in molecular biology) and is portrayed as being of Asian descent. She is moderately fluent in German.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Her mutant status remains hidden from the public but is known by Henry "Hank" Pym and S.H.I.E.L.D. She can generate a glittering wasp-like sting which she discharges through her hands. Her bio-electric blast, when applied from within the ear to the brain, reverts the Hulk to Bruce Banner during the New York massacre. Side-effects of her insectoid genetics include the occasional consumption of bugs, forming her own larval nests, and laying egg-like constructs. During her college years, she shares a room with Betty Ross and starts seeing Henry. Henry is abusive to her early in their relationship and during college is known to have hit her at least twice, putting her head through a door on one occasion and splitting the roof of her mouth on another. Betty can also recall instances where Janet is missing chunks of hair. Janet also suffers from severe bulimia prior to joining the Ultimates.


title: Wasp (character)

text: Hank's attempts at change through medication and enlistment in the Ultimates does not improve his behavior. As a result of Hank's humiliating loss against Hulk and simmering jealousy of Janet's friendship with Captain America (Steve Rogers), Hank and Janet fight viciously until Janet resorts to stinging and Hank commands an army of ants against her. Janet is found in a state of anaphylactic shock, caused by receiving multiple ant stings she has received while at wasp-size. Captain America, upon learning of Hank's violence, tracks down and beats Hank unconscious for Janet. Captain America's visits Janet after the fight left her exasperated and angry, stemming from embarrassment of her personal life now being public. After stopping the Chitauri invasion, Captain America and Wasp reconcile as friends and slowly start dating, despite Hank's attempts at making amends. On one of their secret meetings, Janet later confesses to Hank, now classified as a security risk by S.H.I.E.L.D., that the generation gap between Captain America and herself, along with the elderly status of Steve's friends, put a large strain on their relationship. She walks out on Rogers and meets up with Hank in a bar.