The Immortal Thorsday Thoughts 23

Let’s return to Thor #272, the original trip by Thor and Loki to Utgardhall, later recounted/retconned in The Immortal Thor #6-7. In that original story by Roy Thomas and John Buscema, adapted from The Prose Edda by Snorri Sturluson, Thor and Loki travel through the land of giants, following Skrymir, to Utgardhall where they encounter Utgard, the lord and master of Utgardhall. In the original Edda, it’s Utgarda-Loki specifically named as the king, which is how Utgard is presented in Thor #272. He’s shown as an older man wearing a crown and fur-lined robes, declaring himself “master of Utgardhall,” and, by all respects, the sole ruler of the land. When Loki retells the story, fashioning it into the larger context of Utgard as a Realm-Outside-of-Realms where some of the Elder Gods fled to avoid death at the hands of Atum, Utgard becomes Utgard-Loki as designed by Alex Ross, and it introduces itself to Thor and Loki as “MOON-KING, MONSTER-TAMER, MASTER-MAGICIAN OF UTGARD’S HALL... / ...YOU MAY KNOW ME AS THE UTGARD-LOKI.” It’s a shift from the ruler of Utgardhall to something more nebulous, still retaining the word ‘king,’ but adding a modifier along with numerous other titles. Yet, Utgard-Loki still takes on the grandeur and role of ruler of that Realm... in that retelling and throughout The Immortal Thor when we see Utgard.

So... Kemur, the minotaur at the centre of NRGL the endless city in Utgard, representing the idea of kingship. But, not the king of Utgard? I guess this is where you could argue that my hyper-literal brain is trying to impose too much order. If you look into Kemur/Kemwer, you find yourself into some Egyptian god stuff where Kemwer could refer to Horus or to Mnevis, a bull god, that was originally its own being, but was eventually subsumed into the idea of Atum-Ra as his physical manifestation or as the soul of Ra. The centre of worship for Mvenis was in Heliopolis, a large city and major place of religious worship. Funnily enough, the Mnevis bull was second to the Apis bull... Yet, Kemur is clearly drawing upon, for our purposes, more the Minotaur of the Labyrinth. Ewing is mixing and matching lots of influences, which complicates any background.

But, there are two things about the Mvenis bull that stand out as relevant to Kemur and this issue: that it was the second-most important bull and that it’s conception was eventually subsumed into Atum-Ra. The fact that the Mvenis bull was second to the Apis bull in importance is what I was trying to get at with referencing The Prose Edda and Thor #272: Kemur is second to Utgard-Loki (at best) in Utgard. He may be the embodiment of the idea of a king, but he doesn’t rule Utgard. He’s more like the Minotaur trapped at the centre of the Labyrinth, fed virgins by the King of Crete. He rules his area, but there is a larger world. This strikes at the central point of much of the discourse on kings in this issue, about their cowardice, their lack of rule through anything other than fear and force... Kemur is a pathetic creature living in the centre of a larger god, uninvolved in the true goings on in Utgard, content to sit on his throne and pretend himself important.

That the Mvenis bull began as its own god until eventually becoming the physical embodiment of Atum-Ra is, perhaps, where Ewing began to formulate the idea of Kemur. The big revelation of Kemur is that, when confronted by his half-brother, Atum, the god-slayer, instead of battling him in a battle to end all battles to determine the fate of the Elder Gods, Kemur ran, praying to his half-brother that he wouldn’t be killed. While not subsumed by Atum as the Demigourge, his fleeing is admitting defeat. Atum beat Kemur via forfeit and Kemur’s physical existence is like being an aspect of Atum, a reminder of Atum’s supremacy and power. Kemur is second to both Utgard-Loki and Atum.

He’s also half-brother to Thor (and great-great uncle) being the son of Gaea and Tiwaz. That detail is almost too easy to gloss over in this issue. While Thor, king of Asgard, fighting Elder God Kemur, god of kings, already places Kemur in a place of external embodiment of Thor, by making him share the same mother and Kemur’s father be Thor’s great-grandfather, Kemur is placed that much closer to Thor. There’s a bit of Kemur that recalls old King Thor from the Jason Aaron run. The old king that sits on his throne in his empty city, ruling over no one, clinging to the idea of being a king despite having no true kingdom. The king as tyrant is also a version of Thor that we’ve discussed previously from the Dan Jurgens run and the future that Magni comes from. Basically, Kemur is what Thor could be. The king that rules for the sake of being a king. The Thor that would be weighed down by the idea of Asgard, the burden of his lineage – hence why Kemur is also family.

Kemur is eventually brought low by three things: Thor’s belt that represents his endurance, the assistance of Skurge and Hermod, and Loki shooting the Eternity Mask (now an arrow) right between Kemur’s eyes.

The importance of belt becoming the ring that leads Kemur by the nose is that Thor’s endurance is also his spirit of will. His unwillingness to bend from who he is, to always remain true to his ideals. By using this to defeat Kemur, it’s the dominance of his strength of character over the idea that he could ever become the tyrant king of various futures. It’s also the first Elder God defeated, in part, by one of the magical weapons that Thor brings with him to Utgard. He will face at least two more Elder Gods and he has...

That Hermod and Skurge assist him, fighting alongside him as equals, speaks to his strength as a king. These are both Asgardians that are subject to his rule, but they don’t fight here because he orders them to. There is an element of duty, but earned duty. They feel affection and devotion to Thor not just because of his title, but because he treats them as fellow warriors, equals on the battlefield, willing to fight and die beside them. They follow Thor as their king because they want to. Again, he’s not the tyrant king that commands subjects who obey only out of fear, he inspires them to follow him and be willing to trust in him.

And Loki’s entrance and slaying of Kemur with the Eternity Mask fashioned into an arrow is the first symbolic killing of Thor. The foreshadowing of what’s to come. Loki stepping back into the story to influence its direction, because, otherwise, it will not go where it is supposed to. Ideally, Thor would have come to Utgard with all three weapons, but he only has two, and that’s not enough. Loki kills one physical representation of Thor before they will kill Thor, their narration addressing their guilt and reluctance to do so. But, another element of who Thor is is slain here, stripping him of another aspect of himself, if only symbolically.

Next week, Thor dies for real.

The Immortal Thorsday Thoughts 18

The return of Magni Thorson was one of those moments that genuinely floored me. I remember where I was when I read The Immortal Thor #17: I had the day off work (maybe the week?) and I did as I often do when I have a Wednesday off – I went to get new comics and, then, stopped for lunch. In this case, it was McDonald’s for cheap Big Mac day and, over my food, I read that issue first. I don’t know the exact moment that I suspected it was Magni that Amora had tricked Thor into bringing back to life, but it was somewhere in the pages leading up to that final reveal. I thought that it wasn’t possible that Al Ewing would bring back Magni and, then, bam, there was the forgotten redheaded child of Thor and Amora from a future that would never be.

The story of Magni Thorson is really the story that Dan Jurgens told with a variety of artists over the final 30 issues of his run on Thor. Beginning specifically with issue 50 (though, of course, that issue flowed out of the ones preceding it) and ending somewhat abruptly with issue 79, it was a story about Thor, Lord of Asgard and, eventually, Lord of Earth. (The end of issue 17 specifically points to issue 68 as the place to begin Magni’s story and that’s technically the first appearance of the character as a baby, but that’s the middle of the larger story.) The cover for issues actually bore those subtitles as the story progressed. With Odin dead, Thor took up the mantle of king of Asgard and began looking to fix Earth. It’s one of those superhero stories that crop up from time to time where the hero tries to fix the world. They end droughts and famine, topple dictators and despots, and basically go to war with the powers that be. The story unfolded roughly as you’d expect complete with nukes, Avengers, and lots of shadowy government plans to stop Thor from his plans. It’s the sort of story that I find frustrating to read at this point as the over-the-top opposition is what turns the hero into the villain that they argue he is. After so much effort spent trying to kill Thor, including decimating New York, Thor eventually conquers the world – and finds him unworthy of Mjolnir in the process.

The story jumps from 2003 to 2020 briefly and, then, to 2170. It’s in that last time period that we truly meet Magni, the prince of Asgard. At this point, Thor is gruff and somewhat cruel, married to Amora, Loki is right-hand head of security, and Magni is a genuinely good person. All of Thor’s typical goodness is in his son. Their relationship is very much an echo of the Odin/Thor relationship with Magni not wanting much to do with the pomp and circumstance of being the prince of Asgard. He befriends a human and, through her, his eyes are opened to the reality of Thor’s rule on Earth – and, particularly, Loki’s role in that, which extends even further than Thor knows into an effort to be the power behind the power, you know? As Magni grows wary of Asgard, he’s led to discover Mjolnir in the ruins of New York, left since 2003 when Thor was no longer able to lift it.

His questioning of his father culminates in him confronting Thor and demanding that he prove himself still worthy by lifting the hammer. It’s a pretty charged scene as Magni is genuinely torn between his love and loyalty to his parents and the ways that he can see they’ve erred. One moment, he’s accusing his mother of marrying Thor solely for the power, the next, he’s apologising. It’s a messy scene that’s only broken up when Desak, Destroyer of Gods returns to kill Thor (awakened when Magni lifted Mjolnir). Father and son team up against the slayer of gods and, through that battle, Thor sees how far Loki has overstepped and realises his own mistakes, finally becoming worthy again of Mjolnir. He then travels back in time, imparts his memories to the Thor he once was in an effort to avoid this future, and the Jurgens run abruptly ends. It was clearly a rushed finale that does given the whole thing a bit of a sour ending. All in all, the 30-issue story takes the tired ‘superhero fixes the world’ plot and actually sees it through beyond the usual point where it ends.

In-story, the reason for bringing Magni back makes perfect sense. Amora knows Thor is meant to die, so giving him a son for the Odin-Force/Thor-Force to pass down to lets her either be the mother of the new king or, as she eventually admits, makes her possibly next in line to receive the power should Magni die. It’s pretty much the perfect Amora the Enchantress type of plot. Hell, there’s even the unsaid possibility that lurks in her mind where Magni’s presence warms Thor up to the prospect of a romantic rekindling. I wonder if that’s the true motive... probably.

I do have two questions: how does Amora know about Magni and why does Ewing bring back Magni? I pose them together, because, as you may suspect, I have a common answer: Loki. (Always Loki!) As I’ve discussed nearly every week, Loki is the teller of this story and, as such, influences what happens to an extent. From what I know, Thor has never told Amora about the future where they were married and had Magni (though my memory may be faulty, of course), leaving that gap sitting oddly. Unless the idea was planted by the Skald, making Magni’s arrival have a purpose in the larger goal of securing the freedom of everyone.

I’ve argued that part of Loki’s efforts is to break down Thor piece by piece, separating ideas of him from his physical self. This is why the weapons that Loki, in the form of Thor’s Enemy, spurs Thor to create to escape their rune riddles (runes that come from Thor’s own name). Bit by bit, the very ideas of Thor are being scattered, made physical apart from Thor himself, leaving what? A shell that’s called Thor but contains nothing that makes Thor. By bringing back Magni, another part of Thor is made physical. That other self, the future tyrant that he never became, those memories are given physical shape in the form of the person from that time that Thor would love best, would be most happy to see. Magni is the physical embodiment of that part of Thor. Just as the weapons don’t actually remove his wit or his endurance (or his worthiness), the memory remains, yet it also has representation outside of Thor. And in the world of Asgard and magic, ideas made physical can be quite powerful.

More than that, there’s an element of disconnect between Magni and this Asgard. When Thor dies and his power flows to Magni (as shown to be true in The Mortal Thor #4), there’s incongruity at work. Magni is Thor’s son and prince of Asgard, but he’s not this Thor’s son nor prince of this Asgard. By having the legacy of the Thor – which means the legacy of Odin, Bor, and Buri aka Tiwaz – go to someone not truly of that legacy, it severs the connection possibly. Another major piece of Thor and his lineage is sent away from him, made physical in another, and cut off from the source. The very idea of Asgard is separated from the Elder Gods yet is still of Asgard, in its own way.

Going beyond the larger plot (a little), Magni also represents something else, related to the weapons of Thor: immortality. This comic is titled The Immortal Thor and we should be asking what that means. We know Thor dies, so how can he be immortal? There are many ways. The use of the Eddas points to the largest one: Thor exists as an idea, a story. Thor the Marvel Comics superhero exists because the idea of Thor lives on in Norse mythology through works like the Eddas. As I’ve said, the weapons of Thor break him down into ideas. The traits of Thor come to represent him and carry on what he was. That’s part of what Loki is trying to do, just as Loki was able to free themself from the shackles of the idea of Loki to become something new, whatever they wished, they’re trying to do the same for everyone else. Yet, the ideas of who and what Loki is still remain. Loki as a being may be free of those ideas, but they linger on as a shadow self, in a manner. The idea and the person.

Another way of achieving immortality is through children. Thor had vowed not to have any children to this point, not wanting the burden of Asgard to be forced upon his child. That would make Thor synonymous with Asgard (which is what we saw in the King Thor of Jason Aaron’s run), tying the two together. By Magni arriving, by having a child to pass down something of himself, that severs his one-to-one link to Asgard and gives him another method of immortality. When he dies, there will still remain Magni Thorson. As the lineage is broken, it also retains continuity in a sense. It’s a bit of contradiction, I admit, but, sometimes, ideas are two things at once.

There’s also the idea of Magni acting as a double for Thor. As we’ve seen in The Mortal Thor, he’s becoming something of a replacement for Thor. It’s a common trope in superhero comics for the new version of a character to take over for the old one. It’s happened to Thor before with Eric Masterson and Jane Foster, so why not Magni? And, in that way, it’s another way to separate an idea of Thor from the specific person. Every ‘replacement’ version of a character is simultaneously that specific hero and something different. They embody the idea of the hero and bring their own elements to it. Miles Morales is Spider-Man, but he’s not Peter Parker Spider-Man, you know? Magni assuming the role of successor of Thor and, in a way, new Thor, somewhat separates the idea of superhero Thor from Thor.

More than that, this issue and the confrontation with the New Gods of Midgard further separates the idea of Earth from Thor – which will come into play when Asgard is severed literally from Earth and Sigurd Jarlson finds himself in New York. It wouldn’t shock me if Magni finds a way back to Earth at some point, but I could be way off... We’ll see.

Next week, it’s The Immortal Thor #19, the ‘Tales of Asgard’ artistic jam issue, and I’ll use it as an opportunity to talk about the Daniel Warren Johnson Beta Ray Bill mini-series.

The Immortal Thorsday Thoughts 15

The three weapons that Thor must gather in preparation to journey to Utgard is a subplot of the run with Loki in his form as the Skald and Enemy of Thor pitting Thor against the riddles of himself via rune magic to have Thor earn these weapons. What I find interesting is that Thor is known for his trio of weapons/tools of great power, as described in The Prose Edda: “He, too, has three choice possessions. One is the hammer Mjollnir. Frost giants and mountain giants recognize it when it is raised in the air, which is not surprising as it has cracked many a skill among their fathers and kinsmen. His second great treasure is his Megingjard [Belt of Strength]. When he buckles it on, his divine strength doubles. His third possession, the gloves of iron, are also a great treasure. He cannot be without these when he grips the hammer’s shaft.” Despite these being the three items Thor is known for, these are not the three weapons Loki has him earn.

In The Immortal Thor #15, Thor resolves the problem of absorbing the power of Zeus by channeling it into a belt that can house it and help him contain it, Yolgjörd, not Megingjard, despite acknowledging the idea of Thor’s belt of power by mentioning that Thor fashions Zeus’s power “Into the shape he associated with his strongest self.” That gives him Tormod, the ax that holds his cleverness and, now, Yolgjörd, the belt that holds the power of Zeus. Now, these are both variations on his known tools, Mjolnir and Megingjard, which suggests that the third weapon (never obtained due to his banishing Loki in this issue) would be a play on his gloves of iron. Al Ewing doesn’t give Thor the weapons he’s most known for: he creates new variants. It’s a surprising choice for a run that references the mythology of Thor and the Aesir so much, but is rather keeping with his approach.

While Ewing draws upon the stories found in the Eddas for inspiration, weaving elements into existing Marvel continuity, and expanding details into something quite different, it is all in the service of something new. The Immortal Thor exists in a place beyond the Eddas with Odin dead and Thor as the king of Asgard. To have Thor gather his familiar tools would mean that he’s still the same Thor, that he hasn’t grown or learned or increased his abilities. But, Thor is still Thor and these are riddles of runes related to his name, so the weapons he would fashion to solve the riddles would still conform to the ideas associated with him. Instead of a hammer, he makes an ax. Instead of a belt of power, he makes... er, a different belt of power. Or, more accurately, his endurance. These new weapons, while recalling the old, do serve different functions. If the original trio were all centred around Thor’s strength and ability to fight, these new ones are more subtle, representing his wisdom and his endurance, things needed more by a king than a warrior possibly.

Looking ahead and at the third unknown weapon, I’m left wondering what it would have been and how Thor having it would have changed anything. He doesn’t get it due to his exiling Loki here, somewhat out of nowhere. Yet, if you’ll recall, Thor dies in Utgard not because he was lacking in magical weapons, but because Loki stabbed him through the back with Eternity’s Arrow. Moreover, that was Loki’s plan it seems all along, so how could a third weapon have saved Thor? What would have been different?

Or, perhaps a different question: where does the idea to banish Loki come from? This is a story told by Loki and I’ve theorised that certain elements of the tale come more from the teller than anything else. As Thor threatens Loki, they don’t seem particularly bothered by their brother’s anger or what he may be about to do. I don’t think Loki makes Thor banish them necessarily, more that the teller of the tale nudges things in a certain direction and Thor is more than glad to see it through.

That said, given the nature of the magical weapons and their origin, I don’t see the point in Loki pushing for their own banishment. If the goal of their plan is to somehow use Thor to free everyone, then not following through on the third weapon seems like an impediment. Each of the weapons were obtained/created to solve/answer a riddle – a rune-magic riddle featuring a rune of Thor’s own name. More than that, the weapons represent a part of Thor’s self. So, he externalises a part of himself to overcome another part of himself. Using himself to cancel out himself. It suggests a plan that involves Thor eliminating pieces of himself metaphorically until there’s nothing left, freeing himself of himself. Add that to the idea of the Utgard gods being an invention of Loki, a magical retcon generated when they recreated the Bifrost and they become further externalised ideas of Thor and the other gods. Toranos is the ur-skygod, Utgard-Loki, the ur-trickster, etc. And who is Thor set against as the seeming architect of their unleashing on the world? His own mother. It is about Thor fighting against parts of himself and it doesn’t seem like denying a third (or fourth or fifth or, etc.) weapon that places an idea of Thor in the physical world, outside of him, to be the smart play.

But, Loki is part of the story, too, and the teller must be true to the tale, eh?

The topic of the belt had me thinking about the last time he wore his belt of power. For all that the belt and gloves are associated with Thor as an idea, they’re not tools he often resorts to using. Over the decades of comics, there’s only been a handful of times that he’s wore either. Their most notable use was by Red Norvell when he sought to replace Thor, first to take Sif, and, then, at the behest of Odin when Thor chose Earth over Asgard. The main time that I can recall Thor wearing them for a specific purpose in a big way was at the end of the second year of the Dan Jurgens/John Romita, Jr. run on the title when Thor battled Mangog and Thanos (or a clone of Thanos), and needed further weaponry to be able to match the power of the two of them.

Odin enchanted the Belt of Power, Shield of Life, and Gauntlet of Tomorrows for Thor to use against them. In the original issues, the story ends with the hero triumphant. However, in Thor #24/750, Dan Jurgens returned with numerous past creators to tell the story of the immediate aftermath where Thor refuses to give the enchanted weapons up. Odin, realising that the power is too great for Thor, that he would soon give into it too much, is forced to demonstrate the danger of keeping them. Faced with the returned Mangog, Thor battles the beast for hours and, as he is about to go for the kill, Odin removes the illusion and Thor is faced with Balder, who he has been fighting the entire time. The shock of nearly killing his friend in a battle rage causes him to see how far he’d given himself over to the weapons.

What Thor does with the power of Zeus, using it to create a belt to house it, separate from himself, stems from this lesson. The endurance he has isn’t to simply withstand the onslaught of Zeus and to channel that power, it’s to endure the temptation of the power. Much of this run is about Thor considering the great power at his disposal and how he wields it. When he tricks Toranos into taking on the power of Thor, he tells the Elder God that the power of Thor is the power to hold the storm back, to not give into the urge to unleash all of his might. While it’s a recent story, Ewing has been drawing upon the Jurgens run quite a bit – and has a story himself in the same issue, one that bridges the gap between the end of Loki: Agent of Asgard and Defenders Beyond, but that’s for another time.

And that’s why his banishment of Loki surprises me enough to think that Loki had a hand in it. Compare it to how Thor handles his audience with Amora later in this issue, and his treatment of Loki seems reactionary. In this run, Thor is usually more thoughtful and even-tempered. But, right after crafting the belt, he lashes out at Loki and banishes them from Asgard. It stands out.

Next week, I’ll discuss The Immortal Thor #16 and dive into the villains of the issue.

The Immortal Thorsday Thoughts 02

It’s the second issue of the new Thor series. Thor faces a threat more powerful than he alone can handle. He tries the storm, it doesn’t work. He tries his physical strength, it doesn’t work. He tries the might of Mjolnir, it doesn’t work. In desperation, he gathers the last of his strength to create a dimensional portal to send away this enemy too powerful to defeat. The best that the Thunder God can hope for is a draw, of sorts. Send the threat away and hope that, if/when it returns, he’s able to muster the strength to defeat it.

In 1999’s Thor #2 by Dan Jurgens and John Romita, Jr., the threat was the Destroyer powered by the spirit of a US Army Colonel. In 2023’s Immortal Thor #2 by Al Ewing and Martín Cóccolo, the threat is Toranos, the Utgard-Thor, the god of the superstorm, the holder of the wheel of fate. Cycles repeat.

The 1999 Thor relaunch by Jurgens and Romita came after a period of no Thor comics. The previous series had ended during the Onslaught event that took the non-mutant/non-Spider-Man heroes off the board for the Heroes Reborn line by Jim Lee and Rob Liefeld where Thor was simply a character in Avengers with no solo series. Thor became Journey into Mystery and followed the plight of Asgardians as mortals on Earth while Asgard sat in ruins. When Heroes Reborn became Heroes Return, the four title of that line were relaunched, but Thor remained without his own series. This was partly to not launch more than four new titles at the same time, partly to build up anticipation and demand. To make people want a Thor series more. It would follow around five or six months later (an eternity in mainstream superhero comicbooks) to make its own big splash free of any other launches.

The first year of the title revolved around two plots: Thor trying to balance his life with that of a human, Jake Olsen, whose soul he’d been bonded with to return both from the dead; and the destruction of Asgard and missing Asgardians. I won’t go too in-depth into the former, except to say that it never really worked. It seemed to be an attempt to recreate Donald Blake, while also doing an inversion of Eric Masterson’s time as Thor where, instead of Masterson retaining his mind when he transformed into Thor, Thor retains his mind when he transforms into Olsen. It’s an idea with some legs, but never really cohered. It made for a lot of Parker-esque mishaps that didn’t go anywhere.

The second main plot of that first year wasn’t just about the destruction of Asgard and its missing citizenry, it was about the threat of the Dark Gods. A forgotten threat from Asgard’s past, the Dark Gods are presented as a pantheon that’s the opposite of Asgard’s shining golden city and its supposed code of honour. A destructive, greedy, evil pantheon that nearly defeated Asgard in war until Thor’s childhood determination inspired Odin to rally for victory. The trauma of their threat was so great that Odin erased them from all memory save his own, and this threat was now returned. They had Odin in chains and were using the other Asgardians as slaves after they transformed Asgard into their new home. There isn’t much more to the Dark Gods, no real depth or underlying motives beyond being evil, the opposite of Asgard. They’re eventually defeated via Thor’s determination and planning, along with the always lamentable Deux Ex Odin finish where the All-Father regains his power and uses it to finish off the matriarch of the Dark Gods and restore Asgard to its former glory.

The Dark Gods were far from the first rival pantheon to challenge Asgard in one way or another – and far from the last. Up until the Dark Gods, most rival pantheons had a basis in other human mythologies, like the Olympians or the Egyptian and Celtic gods. In the first arc of the Matt Fraction and Pasqual Ferry run, they created a threat somewhat like the Dark Gods, a rival evil conquering pantheon that had no basis in existing mythology and was similarly dismissed. It’s an appealing idea, these variations on our heroes, challenging them in ways that only other gods truly can. And, as is always the case in superhero comics, the threat is best when greater in power than that of the hero. Thor only defeats the Dark Gods by allying himself with the exiled Destroyer, using his ability to transform between himself and Jake Olsen’s forms to rescue some Asgardians, and even use another threat he faced earlier in the run as a tool to free Odin. He has to go beyond himself and his capabilities, just as we will eventually see him do when he travels to Utgard, armed with two new mystical weapons and Skurge the Executioner at his side. Because the threat of Utgard is presented as incredibly large, well beyond Thor’s abilities, even as the king of Asgard.

It’s all variations on the same ideas. Al Ewing isn’t shy about that in The Immortal Thor, purposefully referencing old stories and characters, explicitly setting up the Utgardians as the Ur-gods with everything that follows flowing from them. The best trick Ewing pulls is treating the Utgardians like they have a strong basis in Norse mythology when, really, they’re just as much his and his collaborators’ creations as the Dark Gods were of Jurgens and Romita. From the epigraphs that pull from the Eddas, to the use of names like “Utgard-Thor” (in opposition to “Asa-Thor,” which does come from the Eddas), there’s a sense that Ewing is pulling on some mostly ignored elements of the mythological roots of Thor. He isn’t, though he does a pretty good job at covering his tracks by merging elements from mythology and Marvel history and past Thor comics and simple allusions. For Utgard, Ewing mashes it all up to create these older gods that can play the role of the Dark Gods. A new threat to Asgard and Midgard and the rest of the universe, forces of power and destruction that will require Thor to gather new resources and allies to stand a chance. Cycles repeat.

*

The Immortal Thor #2 opens with a three page representation of Odin sacrificing his eye before Yggdrasil, the World-Tree, to gain knowledge. It’s an odd scene for the issue, which is not one that deals with sacrifice to gain knowledge. To delay/deter Toranos, Thor doesn’t sacrifice anything. He gains no knowledge save that he is not up to the task of actually defeating Toranos. Nor does it specifically relate to the final scene of the issue where Thor, on the moon, is confronted by Loki who discusses trust and reveals the new form of Loki the Enemy. It’s a scene that stands apart from the issue, although, I have to admit, that Loki’s narration ties it into the idea that Thor letting loose with the Thor-Power against Toranos, requiring the All-Sleep as a price paid for that power, but that’s a tenuous link. One that justifies the inclusion in this issue, but distracts from the larger picture.

It’s not uncommon for issue of The Immortal Thor to begin with short scenes that tie into the larger story more than the issue they begin. Little bits of thematic foreshadowing that Ewing drops in. That this is the first of such is meaningful as it points to the most obvious idea that The Immortal Thor revolves around: the idea of sacrifice for knowledge, power, freedom... The words of Yggdrasil could form the epigraph for the entirety of The Immortal Thor, to be honest:

YES

THIS IS THE LESSON

THIS IS THE PARABLE

THE STORY ALWAYS CHANGES

THE MEANING ALWAYS REMAINS

THERE IS ALWAYS A SACRIFICE

ALWAYS A COST, BOR-SON

FOR THE WINTER TO END

FOR SPRING TO COME AGAIN

YOU HAVE MADE YOUR SACRIFICE, BOR-SON

AND IN TIME TO COME

YOUR CHILDREN WILL MAKE THEIRS

These are words that will be repeated throughout The Immortal Thor in different combinations by different characters. And, as Ewing will reminds us, Thor has already made his sacrifice beyond Odin, back in the “Ragnarok” story where he sacrificed both eyes for the knowledge and power to end the cycles of Ragnarok, freeing Asgard from the endless birth and death pattern where they always stormed towards the same story. Yet, underlying all of this is a simple fact: that didn’t end the rebirth of Asgard. The story is different. But, here we are, with echoes of the past, repetitions and variations, and is the story actually different in the ways that count? Do the sacrifices ever truly end? Winter always comes anew, after all...

*

In rereading the first year of the Dan Jurgens/John Romita, Jr. run, I’ve been thinking about the choice of line artists for these books. The Immortal Thor is headed up by Martín Cóccolo, an artist that I’ll admit I wasn’t too familiar with prior to this comic. He’s got a clean line and actually, together with colourist Matthew Wilson, manages to pull off the visual design of Toranos really well, capturing the look and feel of Alex Ross’s design/art. Ross is the other element of The Immortal Thor’s art by providing the main covers (of which I’ve got most throughout the run, but did have the odd variant given to me as my copy, alas) and some of the character designs, as shown in the back of this issue. He did the redesign of Thor along with designs for Utgard-Loki and Toranos, and I’ve been thinking about that within the context of a new volume of Thor and excitement over the visual element of the book.

As much as I’m a writer-focused critic and struggle with the visual side of things far too often, the artist on a book can be more appealing than the writer. When the Jurgens/Romita Thor comic was announced, I was far more excited about Romita’s art than Jurgens’s writing. I was fond of Jurgens, going back to his time writing and drawing Superman (I made an effort to get as many of those issues during “The Reign of the Supermen” period), but John Romita, Jr.’s Thor was epic. There was a cover of Wizard magazine that he did that I had a poster of on my wall and even used as the basis for this math assignment where you needed to take a drawing, trace it onto a grid, and plot its coordinates so, theoretically, someone could use your list of coordinates to draw it themselves. I was obsessed with the idea of Romita drawing this title, going back to his work on the Amalgam comic Thorion of the New Asgods #1 where he drew the mashup between the Asgardians and the New Gods. He was so good at having one foot in the aesthetic world of Kirby, even if I didn’t fully get that then, and giving a Thor that look like he was partly made out of rock, a being older than we can imagine, but solid and powerful. At that point, Romita was a solid veteran, someone proven, pretty much entering the period where he kind of became the Marvel artist where his presence on a book let you know that it was important in some way.

And meaning no disrespect to Cóccolo... he isn’t that. I really enjoy his work on The Immortal Thor and wish he’d been able to stick around longer. As I said, I look at the work he and Wilson did on Toranos and it’s stunning. But, going into this book, there’s nothing like the ‘Romita hype’ of 1999. I’ve been thinking if there is an artist that can produce that sort of excitement on a book like Thor at this point. Maybe it’s me, a quarter century on, and unable to recapture that excitement. I don’t know... 

But, if you do go back and read the first year (or two!) of the Jurgens/Romita Thor run, the time without a Thor comic definitely helped hype the book up, but the inclusion of Romita as artist did so much heavy lifting. 

* 

Next week, I’ll be discussing The Immortal Thor #3 along with Journey into Mystery #116.