Thor Odinson, God of Thunder Appreciation 2019

[Panic]

Sorry Charlie, my post is huge once again. I've ramble on and on in order to explain why I feel what I feel, but it's very tl/dnr.

But you have to realize "below par" is a subjective claim. Art by its very nature is subjective meaning that people view it differently, what chapped my hide is that: if someone enjoys Aaron's Thor they have a "conflict of interest" - what conflict of interest? Who is there to have a conflict with?

Some readers of Thor probably never even read Thor prior to Aaron; so you can see how it is unfair to these new readers to make the blanket statement: Aaron fan = faulty fan.

By conflict of interest I mean conflict of interest between those who love Jane in the Thor role, and those who love "classic" Thor (and by classic Thor I don't just mean Odinson, I mean the smart, resourceful, understands contemporary Earth society, fairly level-headed style Thor). I've said before that Jane as Thor and Odinson as Thor are not really compatible - I do not think the market will accept two Thor books when both characters are essentially the same. I think they tried it with Thunderstrike, and he simply didn't have enough of his own identity to make the book work, not when he had to compete with the original. At the moment Jane's Thor uses Mjolnir, which is important to her identity because it has a prestige, a weight of history behind it, and Jane wielding it rather than a new version gives her a certain credibility as Thor that she wouldn't have if she got a new hammer all her own; she has similar problems with the name, because "Thor" again has a prestige to it, and a new name might take decades to build up the kind of cache that "Thor" has; and she's not got a supporting cast of her own, nor an area of operations separate to Thor Odinson, as both Asgard and New York are where she's been operating just like Odinson traditionally does.

Now I'm going to stray into hypothetical territory in an effort to explain my point of view on the fan situation, so sorry if it is a bit long-winded:
imagine Jane coming back onto the scene under the pen of a new writer who, say, keeps her super-strong but gives her an adamantium mace instead of Mjolnir, gives her a new code-name, and makes her a "fun" supporting character for Thor, someone who blunders into trouble and needs to be rescued, someone who brings a certain comic-relief to things but isn't really half as a effective hero as Odinson is... that version of the character might be popular with some people. You might very well find that a bunch of people from this thread, people who are big Thor Odinson fans, absolutely embrace that version of the character and think it is far superior to her "Thor" identity. I would guess that in Jane's appreciation thread there would be a certain conflict between fans of Jane-as-Thor, and those Odinson fans who are now fans of the new Jane character, the one that doesn't compete with Thor for his identity. I imagine the fans of Jane's heroic "Thor" personality would complain that's she's not as good as she was, whilst the fans of the new Clumsy Jane would say she's a much better character like this, far more entertaining, far less cookie-cutter. Both sets of people are fans, but both relate to the character in a different way. One set see her as a reader-stand-in hero, the other set see her as a character first, hero second.

Fans of Jane as Thor will want to make a bit of noise about the fact that she's not being written the way they want and that Marvel aren't doing the character justice; fans of the new Jane identity will argue that the first group don't speak for all fans and that they have just as much a right to have a say on the direction of the character that they love, and of course it's true. But Jane-Thor fans are going to be particularly annoyed because Clumsy Jane's fans tend to be Odinson's fans, and they are getting their reader-stand-in hero in Odinson, whilst denying Jane-Thor fans theirs. They are going to see a conflict of interest where Clumsy Jane's fans are concerned, because as Jane fans they get to have a voice on the direction of the character, but they have a reason to not want the character to be written as heroic as they once were, and that is because they like Odinson as Thor more than Jane as Thor.

Basically I think comic-readers tend to have heroes that they closely identify with for whatever reason and want them to be their stand-ins or champions; and then they have other characters that they might like for slightly different reasons, characters that they see as characters first, heroes second. Most people on the forums set their favourite hero as their avatar. My 4 favourites these days are: Captain Mar-Vell, Captain Britain, Iron Fist, Thor. Years ago Rachel Summers would have been between Captain Britain and Iron First in my list. Back when Claremont was writing X-Men and she was a member she was my favourite X-Man by far, she just seemed so incredibly complex and fascinating, and all through her struggles when she was trying to process a lot of trauma and making bad decisions I rooted for her. Then Wolverine gutted her. I eagerly awaited for the Phoenix limited series that was promised... it never arrived. Then I heard she was going to be part of a team with Captain Britain and I thought all my Christmases had come at once.

Well, I hated Claremont's Excalibur. Captain Britain was portrayed as a cheating overprivileged buffoon, and Rachel stopped being complex and compelling - we barely got to hear her thoughts, and she didn't seem to have any internal conflicts. I slowly lost interest in the character. When I found CBR a few years ago I saw a Rachel Summers appreciation thread and started reading, expecting them to feel the same way I did about Rachel being a fantastic character in the Claremont/Romita JR years, and being turned into something of a dull, bimbo power-house in CC's Excalibur. I was completely wrong. Lots of people in the thread became fans of Rachel's during Excalibur, and many of them hated the earlier X-Men characterisation because she was always ****ing-up, getting lectured, talked down to and getting put in her place.

They related to her in a completely different way than I did. I think I was a teen when Rachel was in the X-Men, and she was one of the few comic-book characters I had a crush on. I guess I liked the flaws in her character, her emotional vulnerability, because I found they made her a more romantic character. I liked her as a character first, wish-fulfilment hero second. Looking at it now, of course a lot of Rachel's fanbase see Excalibur as the best Rachel has ever been written - yes she's got a lot less going on in her head on the page, but as a reader-stand-in hero she's a lot better than she was in X-Men; there she was the ****-up who did stupid things and everyone was angry with her, in Excalibur she's super-hot, lusted after both for her looks and her top-tier power, is referred to as the most important person in the omniverse, and kicks major tail in practically every issue.

I occasionally make the odd post in the Rachel Summers/Grey appreciation thread, but I'm not the same type of fan that they are. It's not that they are "real fans" and I'm a "faulty fan", but she's not really fulfilling the same type of role for me as she is for them.

I've also had some pretty big conflicts in Excalibur threads because Davis & Moore's Captain Britain is a super-hero I feel very personally attached to. My problem with Claremont's Excalibur is that it really strips away a lot of the positive aspects of Captain Britain until he is horribly flawed and humiliatingly ineffectual as a hero, but at the same time it removes many or all of the flaws of Kitty, Nightcrawler, and Rachel so they are operating at personal bests. For those three heroes you'll find their appreciation threads wishing writers would write them like they did in Excalibur, siting it as an example of really good writing that does all the characters justice. When I point out it completely screws Brian (and Meggan, but in a different way) in much the same way they complain more modern portrayals of Kitty, Nightcrawler, and Rachel do, they defend the writing to the hilt. Super-hero fans want that empowering, feel-good aspect of their heroes, but they also long for more realistic flawed characters in more emotionally complex storylines, and it often leads to one super-hero getting to be awesome whilst another stands there and face-plants repeatedly. It drives me nuts.

[Prof. Warren]

I avoid most appreciation threads. I resist hanging around the X-Boards even though they would be my natural home. I am not a fan of modern fandom and especially not a fan of the kind of fandom that many appreciation threads attract.

Appreciation threads seem to largely attract fans who are hostile to anything that, in their eyes, "diminishes" their favorite character. But these fans don't seem to understand that the point of dramatic storytelling is oftentimes to punish a character, knock them down, break them apart, to put them in a position where they fail and have to fight back from a disadvantage - and over the course of a long term narrative, not just for a few panels.

How many times have creators - whether it be Dan Slott on Spider-Man or Nick Spencer on Captain America or Aaron on Thor or Coates on Black Panther or (most recently) Donny Cates on Venom - been vilified by a subset of "true fans" for not understanding the character? And every time the general accusation is that these writers are undermining or destroying the character by making them weak or ineffectual.

The stories that these fans would seem to crave for their characters instead, and the depictions that they would seem to prefer, are not ones that would be interesting to read or would benefit these characters in the long run.

[JKtheMac]

Appreciation threads seem to largely attract fans who are hostile to anything that, in their eyes, "diminishes" their favorite character. But these fans don't seem to understand that the point of dramatic storytelling is oftentimes to punish a character, knock them down, break them apart, to put them in a position where they fail and have to fight back from a disadvantage - and over the course of a long term narrative, not just for a few panels.

How many times have creators - whether it be Dan Slott on Spider-Man or Nick Spencer on Captain America or Aaron on Thor or Coates on Black Panther or (most recently) Donny Cates on Venom - been vilified by a subset of "true fans" for not understanding the character? And every time the general accusation is that these writers are undermining or destroying the character by making them weak or ineffectual.

The stories that these fans would seem to crave for their characters instead, and the depictions that they would seem to prefer, are not ones that would be interesting to read or would benefit these characters in the long run.

Unfortunately the history of comics has somewhat encouraged this. As soon as people with editorial power started espousing the idea of "the illusion of change" and the fans who didn't want change bought into it, we were into a problem. The slow erosion of the fanbase, to the point where the only people left were people who believed superhero stories were somehow different to any other story. That repetitive stories about how great the hero is are what comics are supposed to be. That was made untenable by the rise of Vertigo and eventually modern Image. If we want to see Marvel comics wither on the vine then sure, let them tell stories that belong in the wilderness years of superhero comics.

It is made especially apparent when the hero is moved off of the page to make way for another hero. Many times people have said they would have been OK with Jane as Thor as long as Thor Odinson was also having a simultaneous redemption arc. Because that's what everyone has been conditioned to expect, regardless of how irrelevant it is to the story being told and how much it would detract from the themes.

Indeed during Knightfall, when they tried to tell a story that didn't have a simultaneous redemption arc the editors insisted anyway. Which resulted in the least satisfying part of the whole story and one that somewhat undermined the entire arc structurally.

[JKtheMac]

At the moment Jane's Thor uses Mjolnir, which is important to her identity because it has a prestige, a weight of history behind it, and Jane wielding it rather than a new version gives her a certain credibility as Thor that she wouldn't have if she got a new hammer all her own; she has similar problems with the name, because "Thor" again has a prestige to it, and a new name might take decades to build up the kind of cache that "Thor" has; and she's not got a supporting cast of her own, nor an area of operations separate to Thor Odinson, as both Asgard and New York are where she's been operating just like Odinson traditionally does.

But surely you recognise that this is what the story is all about. That the story is just as much to do with Thor Odinson as a concept and as a character, as well as the assumptions we have when we think of him? Making Jane some other Norse hero with her own hammer wouldn't ask any of these questions. It would be entirely pointless.

[zoch]

Is it just me or have the writers really got bad at writing Thor lately. It really hit me with a new Avenger's issue when they call for help in the Bowels and they make Thor out to be this dumb brute who doesn't know what a bowel is. They then say stuff like Guts, Belly, etc before he comes crashing in asking if he was in the right place.

That's when it hit me that they have lost touch of what Thor is. The dude is a God, not only his he the son of the God of Wisdom, he received possibly the best education anyone in the galaxy could probably get. He's learned hundreds of languages, trained in nearly every martial arts style in the cosmo, etc. He was educated to be a King. He is not dumb, he is actually far far smarter than a typical human, honestly I would put money that he probably got a better education than even T'Challa.

Thor is supposed to not understand human technology because it is primitive, and he is used to technology thousands of years more advanced. Not because he is stupid. It would be like a computer engineer nowadays getting sent back 300 years in time and being told to build the first steamboat. Just because he's out of his element doesn't mean he's stupid.


I don't know if any writers read this, but it would be great if they stop writing him as a stupid oaf and more just a man out of his element.

As someone else as mentioned Thor has been badly written this last 4 years by Aaron who in my opinion is one of worst writers Thor ever had.

[JKtheMac]

Is it just me or have the writers really got bad at writing Thor lately. It really hit me with a new Avenger's issue when they call for help in the Bowels and they make Thor out to be this dumb brute who doesn't know what a bowel is. They then say stuff like Guts, Belly, etc before he comes crashing in asking if he was in the right place.

That's when it hit me that they have lost touch of what Thor is. The dude is a God, not only his he the son of the God of Wisdom, he received possibly the best education anyone in the galaxy could probably get. He's learned hundreds of languages, trained in nearly every martial arts style in the cosmo, etc. He was educated to be a King. He is not dumb, he is actually far far smarter than a typical human, honestly I would put money that he probably got a better education than even T'Challa.

Thor is supposed to not understand human technology because it is primitive, and he is used to technology thousands of years more advanced. Not because he is stupid. It would be like a computer engineer nowadays getting sent back 300 years in time and being told to build the first steamboat. Just because he's out of his element doesn't mean he's stupid.


I don't know if any writers read this, but it would be great if they stop writing him as a stupid oaf and more just a man out of his element.

Wherever did you get this entirely unique idea that Thor has spent time being educated? He is a Norse God. He has spent time carousing, raiding, puching, hitting people with various sharp sticks, adventuring, arguing with his father, being lied to about lots of things also by his father, and generally being a warrior.

Then he bacame a superhero and did lots more adventurous things that mostly involved the same but with more structure to his day.

[charliehustle415]

Appreciation threads seem to largely attract fans who are hostile to anything that, in their eyes, "diminishes" their favorite character. But these fans don't seem to understand that the point of dramatic storytelling is oftentimes to punish a character, knock them down, break them apart, to put them in a position where they fail and have to fight back from a disadvantage - and over the course of a long term narrative, not just for a few panels.

How many times have creators - whether it be Dan Slott on Spider-Man or Nick Spencer on Captain America or Aaron on Thor or Coates on Black Panther or (most recently) Donny Cates on Venom - been vilified by a subset of "true fans" for not understanding the character? And every time the general accusation is that these writers are undermining or destroying the character by making them weak or ineffectual.

The stories that these fans would seem to crave for their characters instead, and the depictions that they would seem to prefer, are not ones that would be interesting to read or would benefit these characters in the long run.

Exactly my point, why even write new stories if "fans" only want a rehash of the greatest hits, just read those greatest hits.

Oy vey, reading about the garbage Cates is dealing with is beyond the pale.

[Panic]

Apologies for picking and choosing, but we've both written so much it's difficult to deal with it all.

I can appreciate that some fans do honestly believe that a character’s performance against specific threats somehow impacts the way the wider community sees a character. But I think that is a rather trivial concern. Surely here, in an appreciation thread, we all know that Thor is powerful character that can survive a little soul searching and depowering. I am not at all worried about his popularity, given how successful this run has been. In the future people will read the whole arc. We all know Thor will end up on top before Aaron lays down his pen.

This is one of those points where we utterly differ. A super-hero in the big two is extremely dependent on his credibility, it's one of the huge weaknesses of the genre controlled by Marvel and DC. Batman dethroned Superman as DC's poster boy in the eighties when DC published The Dark Knight Returns. It's a great story, but unfortunately it wasn't the quality of the story that really tipped things in Batman's favour, it was that at its culmination Batman took on Superman, DC's omnipotent flagship character, and literally stomped his face into the dirt. Miller cheated a little to make it happen, radically reimagining Superman using the leeway granted by the story being an "Elseworlds" non-continuity yarn to make him more vulnerable, but it worked. I don't think Superman has ever really recovered, and Batman has never looked back. And I'm saying this as someone who used to hate Superman because of the way DC used to treat him as untouchable. It's an embarrassing weakness in these power-fantasies that having Hero X beat Hero Y in combat will help propel Hero X upward in popularity. If you put Hero X and Hero Y together on the same page and have X shine whilst Y looks stupid or ineffective you'll get a similar effect. Marvel writers have been making use of this for years and years as it is quicker, easier and more surefire than just trying to rely on good writing and original ideas. You can cripple a hero's image and popularity with a string of losses long enough, with enough bad portrayals that they become the norm. Plenty of heroes have gone this way, though none as big as Thor.

You say you think Thor will end up on top before Aaron lays down his pen. I genuinely don't think he will. I have said again and again that the fact that Aaron has written Thor in flashbacks much the same as how he is currently in terms of personality and intelligence suggests that this is how Aaron sees him and wants us to see him. Back when Mjolnir's origin was altered and it was made sentient I said that I felt Aaron was doing this to set Jane up with the hammer permanently, and my opinion hasn't changed. And back then plenty of people said that Odinson fans were fussing over nothing because of course Thor would be back to being Thor with Mjolnir magically in time for Thor:Ragnarok. Well that didn't happen. I can spot trends, and Thor has been on a downward slide since before Aaron took over, and that partly seems to be that the current Marvel writers are not passionate about him at all. The real x-factor is that I don't think anyone saw Ragnarok being so successful, or Thor coming out of Infinity War with increased popularity. I don't know what that means for the comics. Maybe nothing.

But surely you recognise that this is what the story is all about. That the story is just as much to do with Thor Odinson as a concept and as a character, as well as the assumptions we have when we think of him? Making Jane some other Norse hero with her own hammer wouldn't ask any of these questions. It would be entirely pointless.

And again, we differ. Yes it is to do with the concept of Thor, but it's not really asking anything, it's telling us that our idea of "Thor" is independent of Odinson, and that Thor doesn't have to be the blonde guy we've been reading about for years. It's very much a case of stripping Odinson of claim on the Thor title, of making "Thor" no longer a birth-name but a concept. Making Mjolnir an unwilling slave is all about separating Odinson from something that has become synonymous with the character, but unlike similar stories for other heroes, Aaron doesn't use this to stimulate growth in the hero. I think Ragnarok was a playful dig at Aaron's run. I'd suggest Thor being all "god of hammers" in the current arc was a riposte to the movie, but I'm not convinced he'd have had time to make that work.

[kilderkin]

Apologies for picking and choosing, but we've both written so much it's difficult to deal with it all.



This is one of those points where we utterly differ. A super-hero in the big two is extremely dependent on his credibility, it's one of the huge weaknesses of the genre controlled by Marvel and DC. Batman dethroned Superman as DC's poster boy in the eighties when DC published The Dark Knight Returns. It's a great story, but unfortunately it wasn't the quality of the story that really tipped things in Batman's favour, it was that at its culmination Batman took on Superman, DC's omnipotent flagship character, and literally stomped his face into the dirt. Miller cheated a little to make it happen, radically reimagining Superman using the leeway granted by the story being an "Elseworlds" non-continuity yarn to make him more vulnerable, but it worked. I don't think Superman has ever really recovered, and Batman has never looked back. And I'm saying this as someone who used to hate Superman because of the way DC used to treat him as untouchable. It's an embarrassing weakness in these power-fantasies that having Hero X beat Hero Y in combat will help propel Hero X upward in popularity. If you put Hero X and Hero Y together on the same page and have X shine whilst Y looks stupid or ineffective you'll get a similar effect. Marvel writers have been making use of this for years and years as it is quicker, easier and more surefire than just trying to rely on good writing and original ideas. You can cripple a hero's image and popularity with a string of losses long enough, with enough bad portrayals that they become the norm. Plenty of heroes have gone this way, though none as big as Thor.

You say you think Thor will end up on top before Aaron lays down his pen. I genuinely don't think he will. I have said again and again that the fact that Aaron has written Thor in flashbacks much the same as how he is currently in terms of personality and intelligence suggests that this is how Aaron sees him and wants us to see him. Back when Mjolnir's origin was altered and it was made sentient I said that I felt Aaron was doing this to set Jane up with the hammer permanently, and my opinion hasn't changed. And back then plenty of people said that Odinson fans were fussing over nothing because of course Thor would be back to being Thor with Mjolnir magically in time for Thor:Ragnarok. Well that didn't happen. I can spot trends, and Thor has been on a downward slide since before Aaron took over, and that partly seems to be that the current Marvel writers are not passionate about him at all. The real x-factor is that I don't think anyone saw Ragnarok being so successful, or Thor coming out of Infinity War with increased popularity. I don't know what that means for the comics. Maybe nothing.


And again, we differ. Yes it is to do with the concept of Thor, but it's not really asking anything, it's telling us that our idea of "Thor" is independent of Odinson, and that Thor doesn't have to be the blonde guy we've been reading about for years. It's very much a case of stripping Odinson of claim on the Thor title, of making "Thor" no longer a birth-name but a concept. Making Mjolnir an unwilling slave is all about separating Odinson from something that has become synonymous with the character, but unlike similar stories for other heroes, Aaron doesn't use this to stimulate growth in the hero. I think Ragnarok was a playful dig at Aaron's run. I'd suggest Thor being all "god of hammers" in the current arc was a riposte to the movie, but I'm not convinced he'd have had time to make that work.

In regards thor regaining mjolnir and being back on top so to speak

I don't really think it will happen in a purposeful way

I really think that a fairly permanent or long term change will happen to coincide with the loss of Hemsworth in the MCU

What that might be I'm not sure but I could hazard a few guesses

[juan678]

[GodThor]

hopefully, Hela won't act like a teenager...

[Celgress]

For those interested. Thor puts in an appearance in the latest chapter (three) of my Marvel/DC crossover story "Convergence Point" -

https://www.fanfiction.net/s/1319924...vergence-Point

In so inclined, enjoy.

[Frontier]

hopefully, Hela won't act like a teenager...

"Are you breaking up with me?"

Yeah...not a high point for Hela .

[JKtheMac]

In regards thor regaining mjolnir and being back on top so to speak

I don't really think it will happen in a purposeful way

I really think that a fairly permanent or long term change will happen to coincide with the loss of Hemsworth in the MCU

What that might be I'm not sure but I could hazard a few guesses

Well let’s see. I think that is totally unfounded paranoia.

[JKtheMac]

The Dark Knight Returns

Wikipedia would call your ‘Batman beat up Superman so he ended up more popular’ theory original research. I just don’t believe a word of it. Those who actually enjoyed The Dark Knight Returns at the time, (I hated it then and still do) were not taking away that Batman beat up Superman, they took away a dark, gritty and frankly broken Batman with dark and complex psychological scars. A Batman that was prepared to externalise that darkness and use it to maintain order based on fear.

It’s a Batman aimed at adolescent boys and adults that want ‘serious comics’ but equate serious with challenging and violent. Darth Vader in a cowl. A Batman I have never liked because I don’t recognise him. DC tried to pull some of these aspects into continuity to increase the popularity of their character and it worked. So now we have a Batman stuck in a world of grief and externalised anger, who can’t really relate to his friends. That isn’t Batman for those of us who remember him in the seventies. That’s a Batman inspired by cocaine and leather jackets. It is the Batman parodied in The Lego Movie.

You say you think Thor will end up on top before Aaron lays down his pen. I genuinely don't think he will.

I can only repeat what I always say. Wait and see. If you dig into the structure of the story it is obvious what is going on, but for those who like to just enjoy stories as they read them they will need to be patient. I can guarantee that Thor will be on top. Now let’s not equate that with this weird ‘intelligent’ Thor that fandom here seems to want. Nobody wants that outside of the rarified world of “my character is better than your character” world of fandom. Most are perfectly happy with the way he is being portrayed in Avengers for example. Sure in his own book he will have warrior smarts and appropriate intuitions, just like he has always had. He hasn’t been portrayed as an idiot, he has been portrayed as a drepressed and self absorbed guy going through some difficult times. If you don’t like warrior Thor I have no idea why you like him at all. That’s pretty much his default setting throughout the decades. You seem to want a character that has never really existed.

And again, we differ. Yes it is to do with the concept of Thor, but it's not really asking anything, it's telling us that our idea of "Thor" is independent of Odinson, and that Thor doesn't have to be the blonde guy we've been reading about for years. It's very much a case of stripping Odinson of claim on the Thor title, of making "Thor" no longer a birth-name but a concept. Making Mjolnir an unwilling slave is all about separating Odinson from something that has become synonymous with the character, but unlike similar stories for other heroes, Aaron doesn't use this to stimulate growth in the hero. I think Ragnarok was a playful dig at Aaron's run. I'd suggest Thor being all "god of hammers" in the current arc was a riposte to the movie, but I'm not convinced he'd have had time to make that work.

You are not just seeing things differently here you are not reading the story as it was written. Perhaps due to resistance to the delivery method you are entirely missing the whole message. You have constructed an entire narrative in your fantasies about the movie for starters.