There are two(ish) comics that come to mind as I reread The Immortal Thor #24. I use the word ‘comics’ loosely to describe a group of issues from two different creative teams. There are a few moments that recall the Walt Simonson run, including Al Ewing and Jan Bazaldua following through on a moment so famous that it was adapted in Thor: Ragnarok: when Thor throws away Mjolnir and grabs Loki, telling him that nothing will stop Mjolnir from returning to the hand that threw it, not even Loki’s head. It’s one of those moments that makes a lot of top ten lists of greatest Thor scenes/moments and it’s one of those rare ‘clever Thor’ kind of moments, so Thor recreating it with Tormod and Mejed, the hooded god of ghosts and mysteries is fitting. His big ‘clever’ moment done with the weapon that represents his wit and wisdom. It’s such a purposeful callback that it’s impossible to miss and has the added level of Loki’s touch. If Loki is the teller of the tale, it makes sense that it would be a common moment between the two that’s repeated... Thor must triumph and will do so with Tormod, so Loki draws upon their shared experience and that influences things. How much happens outside of Loki’s influence/control is hard to tell.
Which leads to the other comic that I’m reminded of while reading this issue: the initial storyarc of Kieron Gillen’s tenure on Journey into Mystery where Loki works behind the scenes of Fear Itself to help defeat the Serpent, even if it means the death of Thor. That story has Kid Loki and his allies doing a variety of things that flitter under the surface of Fear Itself, giving that story a greater depth and meaning. This was the issue where it really felt like The Immortal Thor was Fear Itself with little bits and teases of Journey into Mystery existing somewhere out there and we can’t read it. Like Matt Fraction knew what Kieron Gillen was doing but Marvel refused to publish it, so Fraction grabs a panel here, an idea there, made Kid Loki the narrator, and teased them in Fear Itself, knowing that we’d never know the real story. Except here it’s all Al Ewing and, maybe, at some point, we’ll get something closer to the full story.
The parallels to Fear Itself/Journey into Mystery as fairly obvious with the old gods returning to threaten Earth, Thor standing in opposition despite the prophesized death that will come as a result, meanwhile Loki manipulates events to their own end, and it eventually culminates in Loki ensuring Thor’s death as he triumphs over those old gods. But, taken with the Tormod moment, I’ve been wondering: is this meant to be Loki drawing upon things that happened already? After all, Loki folds in the Demiurge, Atum, the Elder Gods, Utgard, Skurge, Magni, Amora... there are various allusions and repetitions of previous stories. Loki continually throws the past at Thor, pelts him with his own history, albeit in altered forms. Loki tests him (and the way Utgard-Loki tests him!) and has him craft weapons to represent himself. Thor must kill or defeat his forefather gods. It’s a modernist text made up of the history of Thor until Thor moves through it all, defeats it all, makes peace with it all, and we reach that second-last page, that ultimate moment of Thor having overcome everything about himself to reach the moment where he looks around, see Skurge on the Black Bridge and, beyond him, Sif with Loki narrating
And beyond him... just now arriving at the
very further end of the bridge, just
barely in his sight...
...was she who was his love in song and in story.
In that moment, Thor knew many things, and knew them with a perfect, crystal clarity.
He knew that he had been a fool, but foolishness was over. He knew who his true love had always been.
He knew that time ahead--with her--would be as boundless as the fields of childhood on the very last day of autumn.
He knew that everything would be all right now.
And, then, of course, Loki stabs him with arrow fashioned from Eternity’s Mask and Thor dies. That Thor dies at that exact moment is important, in that moment of total clarity and wisdom, where Thor has such a clear idea of himself, of who he is meant to be, if only on such a personal level as his relationship with Sif. It’s a moment where Thor actually reverts to an idea of Thor, the Thor of the stories in Norse Mythology. He sees Sif and his realisation is that who he is is the Thor of story and legend. Those half-known stories written down in The Eddas where Thor and Sif have two sons and we know nothing of their lives together... where you might as well call it a fairy tale that ends with “and they lived happily ever after.” This is Thor at his most pure as far as an identity is concerned. Not a full person or even a full character... an idea. And, once he’s been stripped down to this, Loki kills him, freeing him of everything that he was.
(It’s probably a coincidence that, beginning with the panel where Mejed dies, right through that final splash where Loki kills Thor, it’s nine panels. Right?)
There’s more to this issue from Utgard-Loki’s metafictional games and their inability to escape the rules of the games to the hilarity of Mejed, the smiter, who is just a muscular man wearing a sheet over his head to look like a ghost. To tie into NRGL coming from Egyptian mythology, Mejed seems to be based on Medjed, “the smiter” who is a pretty minor deity and look like one of the ghosts from Pac-Man with legs, which is pretty much what we get here, except crossed with the Juggernaut a little. But, Mejed being the god of mystery and his defeat being a trial that gives Thor a moment of clarity makes sense. The ultimate mystery is death and Thor seemingly overcomes it to be given a glimpse of what his life is meant to be... before he dies. It’s just a cruel joke, after a fashion.
Next week, the final Immortal Thorsday Thoughts as I discuss The Immortal Thor #25 and Defenders Beyond.
