Thor Odinson: God of Thunder Appreciation 2020

[Revolutionary_Jack]

I don't think I even had him say it.

But Stan did. Len did. Walter and Tom (deFalco) established that Asgardians (and others of their environs) were vulnerable to gunfire, and Walt's Thor called a bunch of ordinary spears fired at him "deadly," and defended himself from them.

Thor's comics history is full of times when he behaves or speaks in a way that suggests that either bullets and blades are dangerous to him, or that he's very, very mixed up. I don't think he's mixed up.

kdb

This is really fascinating, Mr. Busiek. I never noticed this myself.

I like the idea of Thor needing to defend himself from bullets because it feels true to the myth where the Norse, alone of all pantheos, are mortal, vulnerable, and capable of being killed and dying (and many suffer permanent injuries).

[Ichijinijisanji]

I don't think I even had him say it.

But Stan did. Len did. Walter and Tom (deFalco) established that Asgardians (and others of their environs) were vulnerable to gunfire, and Walt's Thor called a bunch of ordinary spears fired at him "deadly," and defended himself from them.

Thor's comics history is full of times when he behaves or speaks in a way that suggests that either bullets and blades are dangerous to him, or that he's very, very mixed up. I don't think he's mixed up.

kdb

oh yeah i remember hogun got shot up bad in thor #393

[Kurt Busiek]

oh yeah i remember hogun got shot up bad in thor #393

Ah, when I said Balder got shot up I think I was remembering Hogun.

Or did they both get shot, at some point?

kdb

[Kurt Busiek]

I like the idea of Thor needing to defend himself from bullets because it feels true to the myth where the Norse, alone of all pantheos, are mortal, vulnerable, and capable of being killed and dying (and many suffer permanent injuries).

That's what I liked about it too. It feels truer to the flavor of the myths.

Superman wades into battle against bullets because they can't hurt him. Thor wades in because they can, but he's tough enough and skilled enough to win anyway.

kdb

[Ichijinijisanji]

Ah, when I said Balder got shot up I think I was remembering Hogun.

Or did they both get shot, at some point?

kdb

Well if you remember daredevil being part of that story, then it was hogun lol

i'll let someone else jog their memory about if balder's been shot, but the guy's a master swordsman and deflects bullets like no one's business, so perhaps your reasoning applies

[Cronus]

Never in my run.

But Lee and Kirby portrayed Thor as vulnerable to bullets and blades, as did Len Wein, Walter Simonson and others. Far less so to broad impact damage, explosions and ray guns. Or at least, they had Thor speak and act as if he were vulnerable to bullets and blades, and I'm willing to take him at his word.

When I started writing AVENGERS, I read through every appearance of Thor, and took notes on his interactions with guns, and while they were inconsistent, the majority of the evidence suggested he was vulnerable to bullets and blades. Energy exposure, though, seemed to fall into the "lord of the living lightning" area, and didn't bother him very much.

When I answered someone's question about it online, some Thor fans freaked at the idea that Thor had been protecting himself from bullets with his hammer all those years for a reason, but I figured he knew what he was doing. Some of them seem to think that if Thor is vulnerable to bullets, then it would be easy to kill him, just like it's easy to kill Captain America, Spider-Man or all those other characters who've been shot at for years without dying, but I have rather more respect for Thor's combat skill than that.

Some people have tried to argue physics about an Asgardian god, but given that this is a mythos where Balder is invulnerable to everything but mistletoe because his mom asked everything but mistletoe not to harm him, the rules of science don't play consistently for Asgardians. [Balder, however, later got shot to shit by automatic weapons-fire, though, and it took surgery to save his life. Go figure.]

So I tend to think that Thor was vulnerable to bullets and blades because he was an inspiration to Viking warriors, and if weapons just bounced off him like a tank, that's not very inspiring. So he's actually woundable in a battle, even though it would take much, much more to kill him than it would an ordinary human. He's still got skin in the game, as it were.

But none of this ever made it into any comic I wrote. I treated Thor the way Stan and Jack and Len and Walter had, and never actually injured him, because he's really good at what he does.

I did play a part in the one time, as far as I know, that Thor's actually been injured by a bullet. That was when Christopher Priest called me up and said, "I want to shoot an Avenger in the head, who can I use?" I asked him if he wanted to kill someone, and he said no, he was going to do the "bullet just creased the skull" cliche. I told him that if he didn't want to do that, he could have someone shoot Thor -- the bullet could break the skin and knock him down, but it wouldn't do a thing to the bone underneath and it'd piss him off.

So Priest did that, and has been hiding out from Thor fans ever since, even though Thor was not significantly harmed by the bullet, just momentarily stunned and pissed off.

So this is something I hadn't heard before. So your understanding then is that Asgardian bone cannot be penetrated by bullets, but just the skin. Or do you mean Thor exclusively?

I know of some fans (characters unnamed) who troll writers on twitter for similar things. While I may express my discontent about writer's interpretations from time to time, I don't think that is a crime do you? It's a medium featuring fictional characters, spanning decades of continuity. Views are bound to differ. And along with that, do writers who are given an assignment to write these character's not think they might receive negative criticism from time to time? Wow. I suppose anyone writing in a fictional medium might need thick skin.

Since my time, though, Thor has been redefined as bulletproof, as shown clearly in the Straczysnki/Coipel run. So something happened in-between that made it so he doesn't need to use the hammer to protect himself any more.

Not only bullet fire, but ballistic missiles powerful enough to destroy planets (and less powerful obviously). I mean, I get what you're saying, that maybe like Wonder Woman? Thor's durability was at one point compartmentalized?

I don't think Thor needs that -- I think he's plenty capable of triumphing over foes of all sorts for centuries without having indestructible skin

Sure, Thor has a great win/loss record. But given your interpretation of Thor's lack of resistance to bullet fire, what skills does he have exactly that would prevent simple bullets from killing him (minus an explanation of Thor's bone structure)? It's not like he has super speed? So how exactly, does he over come someone shooting a .45 caliber bullet at him?

-- but some people have Superman-envy about Thor, and don't want Superman to be able to do anything that Thor can't approximate. I'd rather he be the best Thor, not a substitute for Superman, but there you go.

Where exactly is this coming from. Just so I'm clear?

In any case, I did think that Thor wasn't bulletproof at the time I wrote him in AVENGERS and GODSTORM, and still think that was true at the time, but Marvel's made him more powerful since.

Cates certainly has. He was definitely nerfed for a long stretch under Aaron. So I'm not sure what power up you're referring to.

Pardon the snark, it's Friday afternoon and it's been over 20 years that some Thor fans have been angry that I disagreed with them online.

kdb

No disrespect intended, but apparently, I'm not the angry one. I asked a simple question, from another poster and got what appears to be a passive aggressive response.

I think it's safe to say that it's okay for people to disagree about whatever, particularly fictional characters. But I think you'll find, fans of comic book characters can be just as passionate as sports fans. I suppose that's part of the fun of discussing (civilly?) these kinds of things. I get fired up about these topics, but over the years I try to focus my energies on the topic rather than attacking random posters on the internet who disagree with me. I don't think anyone on these forums, including myself, dislikes you personally because your interpretation of Thor's durability is different than theirs. And in fact, it seems most here, agree with you.

My personal take on Thor's durability? I don't think it's consistent for a character to shrug off things from missile fire to planetary level explosions to drop to bullet fire. Maybe, as you mentioned above, that's why other writers have written Thor as resistant to bullet fire.

[Snoop Dogg]

Never in my run.

But Lee and Kirby portrayed Thor as vulnerable to bullets and blades, as did Len Wein, Walter Simonson and others. Far less so to broad impact damage, explosions and ray guns. Or at least, they had Thor speak and act as if he were vulnerable to bullets and blades, and I'm willing to take him at his word.

When I started writing AVENGERS, I read through every appearance of Thor, and took notes on his interactions with guns, and while they were inconsistent, the majority of the evidence suggested he was vulnerable to bullets and blades. Energy exposure, though, seemed to fall into the "lord of the living lightning" area, and didn't bother him very much.

When I answered someone's question about it online, some Thor fans freaked at the idea that Thor had been protecting himself from bullets with his hammer all those years for a reason, but I figured he knew what he was doing. Some of them seem to think that if Thor is vulnerable to bullets, then it would be easy to kill him, just like it's easy to kill Captain America, Spider-Man or all those other characters who've been shot at for years without dying, but I have rather more respect for Thor's combat skill than that.

Some people have tried to argue physics about an Asgardian god, but given that this is a mythos where Balder is invulnerable to everything but mistletoe because his mom asked everything but mistletoe not to harm him, the rules of science don't play consistently for Asgardians. [Balder, however, later got shot to shit by automatic weapons-fire, though, and it took surgery to save his life. Go figure.]

So I tend to think that Thor was vulnerable to bullets and blades because he was an inspiration to Viking warriors, and if weapons just bounced off him like a tank, that's not very inspiring. So he's actually woundable in a battle, even though it would take much, much more to kill him than it would an ordinary human. He's still got skin in the game, as it were.

But none of this ever made it into any comic I wrote. I treated Thor the way Stan and Jack and Len and Walter had, and never actually injured him, because he's really good at what he does.

I did play a part in the one time, as far as I know, that Thor's actually been injured by a bullet. That was when Christopher Priest called me up and said, "I want to shoot an Avenger in the head, who can I use?" I asked him if he wanted to kill someone, and he said no, he was going to do the "bullet just creased the skull" cliche. I told him that if he didn't want to do that, he could have someone shoot Thor -- the bullet could break the skin and knock him down, but it wouldn't do a thing to the bone underneath and it'd piss him off.

So Priest did that, and has been hiding out from Thor fans ever since, even though Thor was not significantly harmed by the bullet, just momentarily stunned and pissed off.

Since my time, though, Thor has been redefined as bulletproof, as shown clearly in the Straczysnki/Coipel run. So something happened in-between that made it so he doesn't need to use the hammer to protect himself any more. I don't think Thor needs that -- I think he's plenty capable of triumphing over foes of all sorts for centuries without having indestructible skin -- but some people have Superman-envy about Thor, and don't want Superman to be able to do anything that Thor can't approximate. I'd rather he be the best Thor, not a substitute for Superman, but there you go.

In any case, I did think that Thor wasn't bulletproof at the time I wrote him in AVENGERS and GODSTORM, and still think that was true at the time, but Marvel's made him more powerful since.

Pardon the snark, it's Friday afternoon and it's been over 20 years that some Thor fans have been angry that I disagreed with them online.

kdb

Well if we wanted a canonical explanation for the change, we can say that Asgardians got more durable bodies when they were reborn in JMS and Coipel. Fascinating post, btw.

[Kurt Busiek]

So this is something I hadn't heard before. So your understanding then is that Asgardian bone cannot be penetrated by bullets, but just the skin. Or do you mean Thor exclusively?

That's not an understanding, that's the potential scenario I offered Priest, to do rather than the cliche he was planning on. I made it up -- it's not meant as a conclusion about all bullets, all bone or anything else along those lines; it's a scenario that would serve Priest's story needs.

If he had needed to break Thor's bones (which I'd have advised against, but which other writers have done, and I didn't get to approve or reject his story), I'd have suggested he needed at the very least a fictional gun that did quite a bit more damage than an ordinary gun, and that he not shoot Thor in the head. But bullets range in how much impact they hit with, and bones range in how hard they are to break (and the angle at which the bullets hit, and the distance they're fired from modify that, too), so I don't think there's a one-size fits all answer to that.

There are real people who've been shot and had the bullet carom off a bone without breaking it, and of course many other people who've had their bones broken by gunfire. So results are variable even in the real world, and more so when superhuman and fictional weapons enter into it.

I think Asgardian muscle is tougher than human and their bones are stronger, and Thor's among the tougher Asgardians. By how much? I don't know -- someone would have to write stories that explored that.

I mean, I get what you're saying, that maybe like Wonder Woman? Thor's durability was at one point compartmentalized?

He's a mythic being -- he follows different rules, sure.

Sure, Thor has a great win/loss record. But given your interpretation of Thor's lack of resistance to bullet fire, what skills does he have exactly that would prevent simple bullets from killing him (minus an explanation of Thor's bone structure)? It's not like he has super speed? So how exactly, does he over come someone shooting a .45 caliber bullet at him?

If you look at the comics themselves, you'll see lots of people firing bullets at Thor. Usually, he blocks them by spinning his hammer -- it's one of his go-to moves.

And Thor is quite a bit faster than ordinary humans. And even among humans, Captain America gets shot at a lot too, and he hasn't been killed yet. Aside from that one time.

How does he overcome a man shooting at him? The way he did for decades -- it's simply not a scenario that we need to invent, because it's come up many, many times already.

Where exactly is this coming from. Just so I'm clear?

Years of observation, including people telling me directly that Thor is "Marvel's Superman," so it's not fair if Thor's not bulletproof, too.

No disrespect intended, but apparently, I'm not the angry one.

I don't think anyone suggested you were the angry one.

I asked a simple question, from another poster and got what appears to be a passive aggressive response.

I wasn't responding to you, but to Mar-Vell92. I was answering his question about when I had shown Thor failing to withstand bullets.

Since this has been a recurring point of discussion with some Thor fans for over 20 years (it first came up right around the time I started on AVENGERS in late 1997), my thoughts are to some degree informed by those experiences, and I referenced some of them. But when I say "some Thor fans," I mean that literally. That's my experience with some Thor fans. Not all Thor fans, and not specifically you -- I don't remember ever having discussed it with you before.

So the response wasn't to you and wasn't referring to you. I can't actually answer your question, which is about what Mar-Vell92 thinks. But I could answer his question, so I did.

But I think you'll find, fans of comic book characters can be just as passionate as sports fans.

I'm not new to that concept, really.

kdb

[Wall-Crawler]

Never in my run.

But Lee and Kirby portrayed Thor as vulnerable to bullets and blades, as did Len Wein, Walter Simonson and others. Far less so to broad impact damage, explosions and ray guns. Or at least, they had Thor speak and act as if he were vulnerable to bullets and blades, and I'm willing to take him at his word.

When I started writing AVENGERS, I read through every appearance of Thor, and took notes on his interactions with guns, and while they were inconsistent, the majority of the evidence suggested he was vulnerable to bullets and blades. Energy exposure, though, seemed to fall into the "lord of the living lightning" area, and didn't bother him very much.

When I answered someone's question about it online, some Thor fans freaked at the idea that Thor had been protecting himself from bullets with his hammer all those years for a reason, but I figured he knew what he was doing. Some of them seem to think that if Thor is vulnerable to bullets, then it would be easy to kill him, just like it's easy to kill Captain America, Spider-Man or all those other characters who've been shot at for years without dying, but I have rather more respect for Thor's combat skill than that.

Some people have tried to argue physics about an Asgardian god, but given that this is a mythos where Balder is invulnerable to everything but mistletoe because his mom asked everything but mistletoe not to harm him, the rules of science don't play consistently for Asgardians. [Balder, however, later got shot to shit by automatic weapons-fire, though, and it took surgery to save his life. Go figure.]

So I tend to think that Thor was vulnerable to bullets and blades because he was an inspiration to Viking warriors, and if weapons just bounced off him like a tank, that's not very inspiring. So he's actually woundable in a battle, even though it would take much, much more to kill him than it would an ordinary human. He's still got skin in the game, as it were.

But none of this ever made it into any comic I wrote. I treated Thor the way Stan and Jack and Len and Walter had, and never actually injured him, because he's really good at what he does.

I did play a part in the one time, as far as I know, that Thor's actually been injured by a bullet. That was when Christopher Priest called me up and said, "I want to shoot an Avenger in the head, who can I use?" I asked him if he wanted to kill someone, and he said no, he was going to do the "bullet just creased the skull" cliche. I told him that if he didn't want to do that, he could have someone shoot Thor -- the bullet could break the skin and knock him down, but it wouldn't do a thing to the bone underneath and it'd piss him off.

So Priest did that, and has been hiding out from Thor fans ever since, even though Thor was not significantly harmed by the bullet, just momentarily stunned and pissed off.

Since my time, though, Thor has been redefined as bulletproof, as shown clearly in the Straczysnki/Coipel run. So something happened in-between that made it so he doesn't need to use the hammer to protect himself any more. I don't think Thor needs that -- I think he's plenty capable of triumphing over foes of all sorts for centuries without having indestructible skin -- but some people have Superman-envy about Thor, and don't want Superman to be able to do anything that Thor can't approximate. I'd rather he be the best Thor, not a substitute for Superman, but there you go.

In any case, I did think that Thor wasn't bulletproof at the time I wrote him in AVENGERS and GODSTORM, and still think that was true at the time, but Marvel's made him more powerful since.

Pardon the snark, it's Friday afternoon and it's been over 20 years that some Thor fans have been angry that I disagreed with them online.

kdb

Even though I may not agree, you do make some very valid points Mr. Busiek, and indeed Thor has been retconned into being bulletproof in current days.

[K7P5V]

''Ultron! We would have words with thee.''

QFT!

[CaptainMar-Vell92 of the Kree]

QFT!

How Age of Ultron should have been.

[GodThor]

personally, I like different versions of their take on Norse Gods and other pantheons.

my favorite ones are in God of War universe.

problem with the comics is, writers don't tend to keep their eye on other comics written by other authors or at least check out with them to be more consistent.

[GodThor]

When did that happened?

Btw i'll take the worst Busiek story over Bendis and Aaron any day. Busiek's a saint. He understands superheroes better than most writers.

yeah, Thor was deflecting bullets in the early times but I remember him being shot by bullets only to destroy his armor but not his own body.

Hela was shot as well and was completely unaffected.

[Panic]

I think I've said before that one of the smartest things Stan and Jack did was to make Thor's level of resistance to injury somewhat ambiguous, with his whirling-hammer-shield suggesting that he was somewhat vulnerable to harm, even though by rights if he could take the superhumanly strong Ulik smacking him in the face with those knuckle-dusters without breaking the skin he shouldn't really be worried about bullets doing any damage. Whatever the logic, I find the whole invulnerable hero kind of dull - I'd rather see a Thor who bled a little in fights and used his hammer as a shield sometimes, to the modern version that stands there as bullets bounce off him. I'd keep it ambiguous if I could.

[GodThor]

I think I've said before that one of the smartest things Stan and Jack did was to make Thor's level of resistance to injury somewhat ambiguous, with his whirling-hammer-shield suggesting that he was somewhat vulnerable to harm, even though by rights if he could take the superhumanly strong Ulik smacking him in the face with those knuckle-dusters without breaking the skin he shouldn't really be worried about bullets doing any damage. Whatever the logic, I find the whole invulnerable hero kind of dull - I'd rather see a Thor who bled a little in fights and used his hammer as a shield sometimes, to the modern version that stands there as bullets bounce off him. I'd keep it ambiguous if I could.

I would rather have Thor fighting aliens then fighting on Earth against mortal weapons or whatnot.

have that cosmic scale, pls.