An immortal man is trying to evade mercenaries hunting him down for his power, hiding in an inhospitable desert planet.
Adapted from a short story of the same name by Neal Asher.
Tropes:
- Adaptation Dye-Job: Snow is a one-handed albino, although he does not look it much. The original story makes sure to describe his paper-white skin and bright red eyes as things that make him stand out, but in this short he simply looks like a regular man with greying hair and has both hands to begin with, although one is shot off in the opening act.
- Adaptation Explanation Extrication: Snow and Hirald seem to have sex so abruptly it makes it seem like he's just suddenly turned on by his dead wife's dress. In the short story, the two would already have been romantically involved by that point, and the fact that they have sex for nearly 12 hours straight without any sign of Hirald being worn down is what serves as the Five-Second Foreshadowing of her true nature.
- The Ageless:
- Snow lived for thousands of years, maintaining the appearance of being in his late 30s, further made "younger" by his albinism. He can be still killed - it just happens to be extremely hard to do due to his Healing Factor.
- Hirald is also this, since her body is fully synthetic and as such doesn't age.
- Albinos Are Freaks: Aside from being an immortal who can easily regenerate lost limbs, Snow is also an albino. It's not made explicit if it's an actual surname or just a nickname. It's also unclear if the albinism relates in any way to his immortality. However, the first bounty hunter who approaches him notes his albinism derisively.
- Bait-and-Switch:
- The villain wants Snow's balls. At first it sounds like something a loan shark or a mafioso would want for a Cool and Unusual Punishment, but then it's revealed Snow testicles produce some sort of hormone responsible for his Healing Factor.
- No, Hirald isn't there as a Honey Pot or a spy or whatever. She's searching for a soulmate that would be just as ageless as she is.
- Big Damn Heroes: Hirald saves Snow's life twice during the short, always preventing his execution.
- Censor Shadow: When Hirald undresses, all we see is her silhouette against the sunlight coming in from behind her.
- Compressed Adaptation: Several subplots are missing from the original short story, including a plotline where Snow tries to figure out what it is people want from him, where in the episode he seems to already have a good idea.
- Conveniently Timed Attack from Behind: Hirald's favorite way of saving Snow's skin - sneaking up on his assailants and back-stabbing or shooting them at the last possible moment.
- Cruel and Unusual Death: A futuristic pillory, where convicts are locked in a sealed container and left to the sun. In a resulting heat, all the water in their bodies slowly evaporates, staying inside the container, but not before the convict dies out of dehydration.
- Cyborg: All that's left of Hirald's organic body is a spinal column and "mostly" human brain. Everything else is an advanced synthetic body which is both superhumanly strong and durable (she can effortlessly drive her hand all the way through a man's body, while being shot point-blank by a Hand Cannon only damages her skin, and doesn't appear to affect the underlying structure at all).
- Death World: Water is so precious in the desert world that stealing it gets you locked inside a container where you'll dehydrate and overheat to death as described above and beer delivered to bar patrons is locked behind glass covers requiring a PIN code to remove, and it's so inhospitable that the native dragon-like creatures cover under their wings and people need a special "day tent" with an internal cooler to survive during the day.
- Disney Death: It looks like Hirald is killed with a Boom, Headshot! until we learn that she is a cyborg.
- Driven to Suicide: Snow's last wife killed herself once she became an old woman and he was still at his prime.
- Epunymous Title: "Snow in the Desert" refers to the main character's name.
- Equal-Opportunity Evil: The merc group includes three different species, both male and female.
- Five-Second Foreshadowing: If you look closely, when Hirald is being shot, her wounds glow, rather than being turned into mince, like in case of every other character. When she shows up in the end to rescue Snow, her synthetic limbs are shown to be made out of some white, glowing substance.
- Foreshadowing: When Snow asks Hirald if she has her own sun tent, she says no. Given the planet they are on, it seems like a suicidal lack of preparedness... but since she's a cyborg, the heat does nothing to her.
- Hand Cannon: All the guns present are oversized and overpowered, routinely leading to blown-apart limbs and punching huge, gaping holes in the body.
- Hand Sliding Down the Glass: A suffering water thief inside a sealed glass container lets his hand slide down the wall as Snow walks by.
- Healing Factor: Snow isn't just immortal, he can regrow blown-out limbs in a matter of days. The hand he got blown away in a bar is already regenerating a few hours later.
- Immortality Begins at Twenty: The nigh-immortal Snow is perpetually stuck looking like he's in his late 30s.
- Ink-Suit Actor: Snow and Hirald are dead ringers for their respective voice actors Peter Franzen and Zita Hanrot.
- I Surrender, Suckers: During the fight scene, Snow plays dead only to jump his opponent when he draws close.
- Kirk's Rock: The rock formation that Snow and Hirald pass by at night looks like this.
- Match Cut: Early on, from the "Wanted!" Poster to a closeup of Snow's face at the inn.
- Mayfly–December Romance: Snow has had several wives, but at least one killed herself when she grew old and he didn't.
- Mundane Luxury: A container full of cryo-preserved, fresh strawberries. They had to cross half the galaxy to reach Snow and he's actively risking his life to get them, solely so he can enjoy some.
- Never My Fault: The male mercenary at the end blames Snow for killing his wife, ignoring the fact that he was the one who gunned her down in the Shoot the Hostage situation below.
- Nigh-Invulnerability: Hirald. She sustains a short burst of machine fire that was shown capable of shredding flesh into pink mist. But since she's a cyborg, all damage it does is remove the outer, cosmetic layer of human skin.
- Obligatory Earpiece Touch: The female bounty hunter at the inn lifts her hand up to her ear when giving orders to her partners via earpiece. Also later during the attack, the mercenaries use this gesture while communicating.
- Outlaw Couple: The duo of mercenaries with face tattoos is a married couple.
- Proud Warrior Race: The first set of bounty hunters Snow encounters belong to one of this, hence why the leader makes a big show of issuing Snow a formal challenge; in their culture it would be unthinkable to turn a formal challenge down.
- Replacement Goldfish: It originally seems like Snow is looking for one for his deceased wife. Turns out he couldn't care any less.
- Robotic Reveal: Hirald is an ageless cyborg, also looking for a soulmate.
- Shoot the Hostage: The male mercenary has no qualms shooting his female partner who Snow uses as a Human Shield.
- Space Opera: A sci-fi story that doesn't really care about the "sci" part of the genre and instead focuses on all the cool aspects of being set on a far-away planet, with weird aliens, cool robots and even cooler superpowers.
- Stating the Simple Solution: Hirald approaches Snow with the proposition to allow himself to be studied by the organization she works for, while also preventing his immortality from being reverse-engineered by the wrong people. Snow asks why not just kill him and solve the second part, to which Hirald replies her organization doesn't destroy knowledge. By the end of the episode, it becomes clear that even though this may be her assignment, she, like Snow, is also functionally immortal, and looking for a companion to ease her loneliness.
- Trademark Favorite Food: The container and new shipment that Snow ordered (and risked his life for)? Strawberries. Which given the circumstances of the planet he's on, are quite a luxury.
- "Wanted!" Poster: Sci-fi version. Snow is seen on a large, digital screen that marks him as wanted when roaming into the settlement.
- Who Wants to Live Forever?: Downplayed example. Snow can die and be killed, it just happens that he doesn't age at all. It seems he came to peace with the fact that people around him age and eventually die, but it still affects his life.
- Would Hit a Girl: While Snow does casually kill the female leader of the bounty hunters, he makes every attempt to avoid a conflict first. The short explicitly states he's doing this because he genuinely doesn't like killing young women like her.
