I think we can all agree, Warhammer 40k’s Inquisitors are cool customers. Once you put aside their whole shtick of being able to commit genocide on a whim, exterminatus-ing planets that have fallen to the predations of Chaos, they’re basically Witch Hunters hanging out in a moody and noir-ish sci-fi future. There’s a reason folks are excited for Dark Heresy.
They get to wear fun hats, run around with inquisitorial warbands filled with strange characters and xenos, and they get cool names like Ravenor, Eisenhorn, Adrastia, and Obiwan Sherlock Clousseau. Wait, what was that last one? Oh, you aren’t familiar with the work of Obiwan Sherlock Clousseau.
He’s well known across the stars for solving uncrackable cases with his astute deductions, fighting xenos with a legally distinct laser sword, and just generally bringing balance to the For- I mean Imperium. In fact, he was the very first Inquisitor depicted in Warhammer 40k, introduced in the original Rogue Trader back in 1987 and illustrated by Martin McKenna. You can see this model of Imperial virtue below.
I’m not sure why, but gazing into his eyes I feel like he’s saying “You best start believing in daemon stories. You’re in one!” And if you’re thinking this image gives off some serious Fighting Fantasy vibes, McKenna did also contribute illustrations to those books. The entry in Rogue Trader reads:
“A typical Inquisitor is represented here by the renowned Obiwan Sherlock Clousseau – a tireless exposer of psychic misdeeds and genetic deviance. He wears a suit of skintight powered armor under a long, enveloping cloak. Like most Inquisitors, he distains the wearing of a helmet in favour of civilian head-wear (Inquisitors tend to be eccentric in their dress as well as their life-styles.”
You might also be wondering why he’s wearing a yin-yang breastplate. I assume it’s because the yin-yang was used as Eldar iconography (another hangover from old Warhammer) and Inquisitors are often allowed to use xenos gear. The entry goes on to explain that Inquisitor Clousseau is hauling quite a bit of equipment about, namely:
- Various energy field devices—conversion field, stasis field, refractor field
- A bolt pistol and a power sword
- Three Jokaero digital weapons—hand flamer, laspistol, and needle pistol
- Several grenades secreted around his person—Two blind, choke, haywire, knockout
- Also one crack, plasma, stumm, tanglefoot, and vortex grenade
- A communicator, bioscanner, and energy scanner
- Nose filters, photochromatic eye drops, an immune injector and infra-vision contacts
- Chemicals for the Jokaero needler, a porta-rack, rad counter, and a stimulant chemical
- A syn-skin applicator with sufficient chemicals for three uses
- Three suspenders and a can of web solvent
You might be thinking, that’s a lot of gear for a man with only one coat pocket.
As a redditor I observed posits “he’s got 13 grenades stuffed up his ass,” which may very well explain his gruff countenance. Inquisitors are known for having a trick or two up their sleeve, though he may be the first agent of the throne to weaponise his anal cavity.
Perhaps the best bit about Obiwan Sherlock Clousseau is that, while he hasn’t appeared again since the 1980s, like much of Warhammer’s weird and wonderful past, he was never retconned. And since Inquisitors live to a ripe of old age due to their juvenat treatments and augments, chances are Obiwan Sherlock Clousseau is still out there in a galaxy far, far away.
I, for one, hope he returns one day, preferably during whatever 40k’s equivalent of the End Times becomes, scurrying in right at the very end to interject “Ahh that’s elementary, Emps”.