Thor Odinson: God of Thunder Appreciation 2020

[CaptainMar-Vell92 of the Kree]

Aaron doesn't like criticism and attacks anyone who dares doing so.

No, not really, one thing that I'd really like to change is this feeling of persecution the Thor fanbase seems to have, modern writers don't hate Thor, Marvel isn't out to ruin him, quite the contrary, as I have mentioned many times in the past, Thor's franchise is very strong and Marvel sees the potential in it, having based 3 linewide events in this last decade alone on his franchise, being one of the top players, difference maker, and main character in the others.

Now, does that mean he hasn't been mishandled ? Of course he has, there have been many questionable decisions done with him, as has happened with many characters, in fact, many of those mishandlings have happened due to the massive exposure Thor has been getting, he's gotten so popular that he guest stars in many books, half of them he does great stuff, and the other half he is really bad (Aaron and Ewing, please stop using Thor), but I doubt there is some evil scheme or conspiracy on Marvel to ruin Thor, we gotta leave this feeling of persecution behind. This is just a phase, as was the 90s where many people didn't like the direction Marvel was headed and thought they could never recover and they recovered. Thor has been through a rough patch since 2012, but I believe he is getting back up and will come back stronger than ever, with the newfound popularity he has gained and solidified as an A-Lister and one of Marvel's biggest players.

My biggest concern right now is honestly the MCU with what they did to him in Endgame and what will happen in Love and Thunder, I am terrified that they will follow Aaron's path and step all over Thor to make Jane look better. This movie will probably define how the general audience sees Thor for many years to come, so you can see why I am very worried about it.

Oh, i agree. Aaron's version of Jane coming to the big screen is one of the worst things to ever happen to a fictional character and its legacy. With general audience seeing Jane as the ultimate badass and Thor as a goofball loser.

And yes, while i love Ewing's work on Ultimates and GOTG, he doesn't get asgardian characters.

[CaptainMar-Vell92 of the Kree]

Not really, if companies and writers listened to every wish the fanbase had, there would be no stories to tell and challenge the reader, no acclaimed stories or disliked stories, there simply wouldn't be a place for the medium. Look at Spider-Man, the character with the second biggest fanbase (the first one being Batman) has been ignored for ten years, everyone has been asking for them to have Peter and Mary Jane with their marriage back and they have ignored that request for more than 10 years and only now are they in the path to solve it. In the meantime, we still got some great stories like Big Time, Spider Island, Dying Wish, Superior Spider-Man, Spider-Verse, Red Goblin, Spectacular Spider-Man and other countless acclaimed stories in between. Just because the fanbase doesn't get exactly what it wants doesn't mean they are not valued, there will always be great stories that won't exactly line up with what the fanbase asks.



Me too, so far Cates has been doing a really great job, the only thing I'd change is Thor's jerk-ish attitude, I really want the noble Thor back.



I don't think it will bleed back into the comic book, whatever happens, but it will stil be viewed by millions and will affect the general perception of Thor, remember that the amount of people that watch the movies as opposed to the comic book fanbase are outnumbered a thousand to one, so please Taika, do a good job, I have faith thanks to Ragnarok.



Well, it did bring a ton of new fans to the book while alienating long time readers, but again, I don't think it was deliberate nor a conspiration to do that from the beginning, remember Jason Aaron began his Thor run with one of the greatest and most epic Thor stories, "The God Butcher".

I always wondered why Batman is the only superhero who is liked by people who don't care about superheroes.

[Panic]

Like many have said, Jane was never the problem, it was everyone around her acting bad, out of character, and a shell of their former selves in order to prop her up as the best thing in the world, but the constant complaints from the fanbase everywhere you look does tell you where his run stands in the eyes of the fanbase, with half of them placing him as the best, and half of them placing him as the worst.

I personally have voiced how MANY parts of his run does show greatness and excellent storytelling coupled with good ideas, and even some of the bad parts are only bad because he is ignoring previous canon, if this was a creator owned story I'd be praising the hell out of it, but it isn't, he disrespected every single aspect of the Thor mythos, and then there are the parts that are simply really bad and cringeworthy.

Agreed. Aaron can write a compelling narrative - after all, he made Jane a compelling character... except he did it by ****ing over everyone else. Great independent universe story, but horrible for an in-continuity tale.

The most damaging stories for heroes are the ones written not by bad writers, but by good writers who just don't care about said hero but craft a story popular enough that it sticks.

What I despise the most though, is his petty attitude towards anyone who dares criticize him.

Yeah, he really did himself no favours there. It's very difficult to respect who someone who uses a position of power like that, but it is what people in positions of power do: see President Trump.

Does anyone else feel like other characters' fanbase is treated with more respect, like...writers and editors actually listen to the fans and acquiesce to their wishes a little more?

No, not really, one thing that I'd really like to change is this feeling of persecution the Thor fanbase seems to have, modern writers don't hate Thor, Marvel isn't out to ruin him, quite the contrary, as I have mentioned many times in the past, Thor's franchise is very strong and Marvel sees the potential in it, having based 3 linewide events in this last decade alone on his franchise, being one of the top players, difference maker, and main character in the others.
Now, does that mean he hasn't been mishandled ? Of course he has, there have been many questionable decisions done with him, as has happened with many characters, in fact, many of those mishandlings have happened due to the massive exposure Thor has been getting, he's gotten so popular that he guest stars in many books, half of them he does great stuff, and the other half he is really bad (Aaron and Ewing, please stop using Thor), but I doubt there is some evil scheme or conspiracy on Marvel to ruin Thor, we gotta leave this feeling of persecution behind.

Yes, I agree we should not shout so loud about Marvel hating Thor, especially outside of this thread. We don't need anymore standalone threads complaining about Marvel's treatment of Thor, because it's doing for Thor's fanbase what a few individuals have done for Storm's , imo. No offence meant to anyone.

I don't think the current Marvel writers hate Thor. On the other hand, I do not think that they like classic Thor, the idealised hero who talks big. The Marvel Architects have an idea of the general dynamic of the MU, and it has Cap as the idealised hero, the paragon, "the alpha of alphas" as I heard someone put it; classic Thor would at best take away from Cap, and at worst dominate centre stage. Marvel are committed to the Thor brand, not so much the character. I think they've been testing out the waters to see if they could get rid of Thor Odinson and replace him with someone less threatening to their vision of the MU. This has kind of split the fanbase. The other thing I think they've been doing is turning Thor into a version that they enjoy writing, moving him away from the paragon category and making him a slightly comedic jerk - less threatening in the 'he's better than your hero' mould, more 'funny muscle'. We know that a Thor written with the classic hero personality set works because, well, it did - it did throughout Kirby to Simonson, and places inbetween; plus, this is exactly how Jane was written as Thor, and that worked too (with the exception of screwing over everyone else to make her look awesome).


If you want to see a really horrible case of a talented writer destroying a hero in a classic run, check out Bendis' Daredevil story where White Tiger (Hector Ayala) is tried for robbery: Bendis starts off by making Hector look fairly incompetent, trying to stop a pair of no-name thugs robbing an electronics store, but getting temporarily overpowered and then being arrested by beat-cops who find him standing there like an idiot, holding a TV. Matt Murdock tells Hector he absolutely must not lose his temper in court. He loses his temper in court, and gives a ridiculous rant about how if he wanted to take stuff, no one could stop him. This makes him look particularly stupid (and macho) to the reader, especially because we saw that he couldn't even handle two stupid thugs. Then he unfairly blames Murdock for his disaster on the stand, losing any sympathy the reader has for him as he's blaming his stupidity on Murdock and not taking any responsibility for himself. Then he totally loses it in court when he's found guilty, grabs a gun off one of the guards, and runs out of the courthouse with a gun in his hand, straight into a bunch of cops who shoot him dead.

Now that is merciless treatment from Bendis, a writer arguably at the height of his powers. He utterly destroys any credibility Hector Ayala had, making him look weak, stupid, macho, irresponsible; then he kills him. He even has Foggy say that Hector has "loser stink" all over him (or something like that - it's been a while). That's not just throwing a hero under the bus, that's then backing the bus over him a few times, then pissing on the corpse. Not actually a bad story though, but a very unflattering characterisation of a perfectly good hero. He wasn't one of my favourites, but there wasn't anything wrong with him, and his fanbase certainly deserved better. Writers just do this stuff sometimes, when they stop seeing the heroes as important, and just see them as a toy to be messed with and discarded.

[The Cool Thatguy]

I find it wrong when Aaron supporters bring the word "success" to describe his run. If you look at actual numbers it was never a best selling book, it never outperformed previous runs, it stayed pretty much in line with what Thor has sold in the last two decades, not to mention his "War of the Realms" event was the worst selling Marvel event in the last two decades as well.

There is a difference between success and publicity, the latter which Aaron's run got in spades due to the sheer fact that we live in a politically correct/female empowerment era. Like many have said, Jane was never the problem, it was everyone around her acting bad, out of character, and a shell of their former selves in order to prop her up as the best thing in the world, but the constant complaints from the fanbase everywhere you look does tell you where his run stands in the eyes of the fanbase, with half of them placing him as the best, and half of them placing him as the worst.

I personally have voiced how MANY parts of his run does show greatness and excellent storytelling coupled with good ideas, and even some of the bad parts are only bad because he is ignoring previous canon, if this was a creator owned story I'd be praising the hell out of it, but it isn't, he disrespected every single aspect of the Thor mythos, and then there are the parts that are simply really bad and cringeworthy.

What I despise the most though, is his petty attitude towards anyone who dares criticize him.

I suspect that Aaron's critical success won't last too long.

I'm reminded of Joe Casey's Wildcats, which was critically well received at the time for looking at superheroes in a different manner. But after it was cancelled, it pretty much faded away, and rightfully so, because the execution was terrible.

Critics focused on the intent, while ignoring the content (among other creepy things, a rapist was used as the book's moral center. Yeah...).

I expect Aaron's Thor to fall to the wayside in the same manner. Him being unworthy of his hammer is Aaron legitimizing Thor's depression, and Gorr's statement amounts to racism. The most benign form of racism possible, as Gods are not used as a metaphor for anything, but all the same.

So yeah. I agree that Jane wasn't/isn't the problem. It's the larger themes around his run that will sink it in the passage of time.

[CaptainMar-Vell92 of the Kree]

Agreed. Aaron can write a compelling narrative - after all, he made Jane a compelling character... except he did it by ****ing over everyone else. Great independent universe story, but horrible for an in-continuity tale.

The most damaging stories for heroes are the ones written not by bad writers, but by good writers who just don't care about said hero but craft a story popular enough that it sticks.


Yeah, he really did himself no favours there. It's very difficult to respect who someone who uses a position of power like that, but it is what people in positions of power do: see President Trump.



Yes, I agree we should not shout so loud about Marvel hating Thor, especially outside of this thread. We don't need anymore standalone threads complaining about Marvel's treatment of Thor, because it's doing for Thor's fanbase what a few individuals have done for Storm's , imo. No offence meant to anyone.

I don't think the current Marvel writers hate Thor. On the other hand, I do not think that they like classic Thor, the idealised hero who talks big. The Marvel Architects have an idea of the general dynamic of the MU, and it has Cap as the idealised hero, the paragon, "the alpha of alphas" as I heard someone put it; classic Thor would at best take away from Cap, and at worst dominate centre stage. Marvel are committed to the Thor brand, not so much the character. I think they've been testing out the waters to see if they could get rid of Thor Odinson and replace him with someone less threatening to their vision of the MU. This has kind of split the fanbase. The other thing I think they've been doing is turning Thor into a version that they enjoy writing, moving him away from the paragon category and making him a slightly comedic jerk - less threatening in the 'he's better than your hero' mould, more 'funny muscle'. We know that a Thor written with the classic hero personality set works because, well, it did - it did throughout Kirby to Simonson, and places inbetween; plus, this is exactly how Jane was written as Thor, and that worked too (with the exception of screwing over everyone else to make her look awesome).


If you want to see a really horrible case of a talented writer destroying a hero in a classic run, check out Bendis' Daredevil story where White Tiger (Hector Ayala) is tried for robbery: Bendis starts off by making Hector look fairly incompetent, trying to stop a pair of no-name thugs robbing an electronics store, but getting temporarily overpowered and then being arrested by beat-cops who find him standing there like an idiot, holding a TV. Matt Murdock tells Hector he absolutely must not lose his temper in court. He loses his temper in court, and gives a ridiculous rant about how if he wanted to take stuff, no one could stop him. This makes him look particularly stupid (and macho) to the reader, especially because we saw that he couldn't even handle two stupid thugs. Then he unfairly blames Murdock for his disaster on the stand, losing any sympathy the reader has for him as he's blaming his stupidity on Murdock and not taking any responsibility for himself. Then he totally loses it in court when he's found guilty, grabs a gun off one of the guards, and runs out of the courthouse with a gun in his hand, straight into a bunch of cops who shoot him dead.

Now that is merciless treatment from Bendis, a writer arguably at the height of his powers. He utterly destroys any credibility Hector Ayala had, making him look weak, stupid, macho, irresponsible; then he kills him. He even has Foggy say that Hector has "loser stink" all over him (or something like that - it's been a while). That's not just throwing a hero under the bus, that's then backing the bus over him a few times, then pissing on the corpse. Not actually a bad story though, but a very unflattering characterisation of a perfectly good hero. He wasn't one of my favourites, but there wasn't anything wrong with him, and his fanbase certainly deserved better. Writers just do this stuff sometimes, when they stop seeing the heroes as important, and just see them as a toy to be messed with and discarded.

This is exactly why i think Aaron is Bendis 2.0. They have the same flaws.

[JudicatorPrime]

I think people need to let go what happened many decades ago, whether Thor was bulletproof or not, doesn't really matter, he is now. Hell i remember Hulk had literally no healing factor back in those times but nowadays he has one of the most broken healing factors in Marvel, things change and evolve.

I agree. I run into similar nonsense when discussing Blue Marvel. Everyone wants to hold the character to his creator's original concept, but things change and characters often end up more powerful in subsequent writings than they were in their early appearances.

[GodThor]

LOL what's with people on Twitter saying that Storm would destroy Thor

[Frontier]

If you want to see a really horrible case of a talented writer destroying a hero in a classic run, check out Bendis' Daredevil story where White Tiger (Hector Ayala) is tried for robbery: Bendis starts off by making Hector look fairly incompetent, trying to stop a pair of no-name thugs robbing an electronics store, but getting temporarily overpowered and then being arrested by beat-cops who find him standing there like an idiot, holding a TV. Matt Murdock tells Hector he absolutely must not lose his temper in court. He loses his temper in court, and gives a ridiculous rant about how if he wanted to take stuff, no one could stop him. This makes him look particularly stupid (and macho) to the reader, especially because we saw that he couldn't even handle two stupid thugs. Then he unfairly blames Murdock for his disaster on the stand, losing any sympathy the reader has for him as he's blaming his stupidity on Murdock and not taking any responsibility for himself. Then he totally loses it in court when he's found guilty, grabs a gun off one of the guards, and runs out of the courthouse with a gun in his hand, straight into a bunch of cops who shoot him dead.

Now that is merciless treatment from Bendis, a writer arguably at the height of his powers. He utterly destroys any credibility Hector Ayala had, making him look weak, stupid, macho, irresponsible; then he kills him. He even has Foggy say that Hector has "loser stink" all over him (or something like that - it's been a while). That's not just throwing a hero under the bus, that's then backing the bus over him a few times, then pissing on the corpse. Not actually a bad story though, but a very unflattering characterisation of a perfectly good hero. He wasn't one of my favourites, but there wasn't anything wrong with him, and his fanbase certainly deserved better. Writers just do this stuff sometimes, when they stop seeing the heroes as important, and just see them as a toy to be messed with and discarded.

Wow, I kind of underestimated how much that story did Hector/White Tiger dirty.

So yeah. I agree that Jane wasn't/isn't the problem. It's the larger themes around his run that will sink it in the passage of time.

I'm not trying to be malicious against Jane or anything, but it's hard for me to not see her as being part of the issue when the writing in relation to her time as Thor and the handling of her is so central to the problems some fans had with the run.

I mean, ultimately it's on the author, but I think sometimes it's hard to disconnect the two.

[The Cool Thatguy]

If you want to see a really horrible case of a talented writer destroying a hero in a classic run, check out Bendis' Daredevil story where White Tiger (Hector Ayala) is tried for robbery: Bendis starts off by making Hector look fairly incompetent, trying to stop a pair of no-name thugs robbing an electronics store, but getting temporarily overpowered and then being arrested by beat-cops who find him standing there like an idiot, holding a TV. Matt Murdock tells Hector he absolutely must not lose his temper in court. He loses his temper in court, and gives a ridiculous rant about how if he wanted to take stuff, no one could stop him. This makes him look particularly stupid (and macho) to the reader, especially because we saw that he couldn't even handle two stupid thugs. Then he unfairly blames Murdock for his disaster on the stand, losing any sympathy the reader has for him as he's blaming his stupidity on Murdock and not taking any responsibility for himself. Then he totally loses it in court when he's found guilty, grabs a gun off one of the guards, and runs out of the courthouse with a gun in his hand, straight into a bunch of cops who shoot him dead.

Now that is merciless treatment from Bendis, a writer arguably at the height of his powers. He utterly destroys any credibility Hector Ayala had, making him look weak, stupid, macho, irresponsible; then he kills him. He even has Foggy say that Hector has "loser stink" all over him (or something like that - it's been a while). That's not just throwing a hero under the bus, that's then backing the bus over him a few times, then pissing on the corpse. Not actually a bad story though, but a very unflattering characterisation of a perfectly good hero. He wasn't one of my favourites, but there wasn't anything wrong with him, and his fanbase certainly deserved better. Writers just do this stuff sometimes, when they stop seeing the heroes as important, and just see them as a toy to be messed with and discarded.

As an aside, I was always disappointed in the story never really contrasting Hector and Matt. Prior to appearing in DD, Hector had been nearly killed when his ID was revealed, and his entire family had been killed. Matt himself had just been outed, yet the subject was never really addressed

[Alpha to Omega]

LOL what's with people on Twitter saying that Storm would destroy Thor

Marvel's doing a battle royale on twitter and today's match-up is Thor vs Storm, Thor's winning the poll and Storm fans aren't happy.

https://twitter.com/Marvel/status/1260590335752916992

[CaptainMar-Vell92 of the Kree]

Marvel's doing a battle royale on twitter and today's match-up is Thor vs Storm, Thor's winning the poll and Storm fans aren't happy.

https://twitter.com/Marvel/status/1260590335752916992

I guess they aren't aware of that story (written by Claremont no less) where Thor knocks out Ororo with a kiss.

[Cronus]

I guess they aren't aware of that story (written by Claremont no less) where Thor knocks out Ororo with a kiss.

And if that doesn't work, we can alway defer to Ororo's own thoughts on who's superior....

thorstorm.jpg

[Doombot]

If you somehow found yourself in control of a Mighty Thor book tomorrow, would would be the first 5 things you would do to correct or aim the book and characters in a direction you feel is where it should be?

[Wall-Crawler]

LOL what's with people on Twitter saying that Storm would destroy Thor

Thor is stomping the poll but Storm fans seem to be more active in the comments. The arguments are kindergarden level, it actually hurts to read so much ignorance.

[CaptainMar-Vell92 of the Kree]

And if that doesn't work, we can alway defer to Ororo's own thoughts on who's superior....

thorstorm.jpg

Odin's beard she's gorgeous!