A few exceptional publications have demonstrated new versatility in the chemistry of the noble metals over the last year. These include the highly luminescent hybrid pyridyl-carbene complexes of Ru(II) published by Son et al. (Inorg. Chem., 2004, 43, 6896) and the palladium and ruthenium complexes of the diimine "heterosuperbenzene" ligand of Draper and co-workers (J. Am. Chem. Soc., 2004, 126, 8694). The care and attention of Yang et al. (Chem. Commun., 2004, 2232) in the detailed study of the effects of isomerism in the luminescent properties of cyclometallated 2-phenylpyridine iridium(III) complexes is particularly noteworthy, as is the isolation of long chains composed of platinum species bridged with octadiynyl ligands as described by Zeng et al. (Organometallics, 2004, 23, 5896) which offers new insights into the preparation of electron rich molecular wires. Finally, the unexpected oxidative carbon-carbon bond cleavage in the formation of silver N-heterocyclic carbene complexes reported by Crabtree and co-workers (Chem. Commun., 2004, 2176) is worth emphasizing.