Thor Odinson Appreciation 2018

[kilderkin]

Not really how canon works though is it?

nice tidy win there

I'm good with that

[the illustrious mr. kenway]

I read What if? Thor was raised by Laufey and it was a good read. I wouldn't mind seeing this take again.

[Ichijinijisanji]

Really enjoyed the mythological eternal fight between Thor and Doom leading to earthquakes. We often see thor as a mythological norse god, but it's always nice to see his stories reflect it.

[616MarvelYear is LeapYear]

Thor #276 Oct 1978
"Mine... This Hammer!"
Roger "Red" Norvell puts on Thor's belt of strength and his Iron Gloves and becomes a new Thor,

as powerful as the original and able to wield Thor's hammer;

The new Thor forces Sif to leave with him or he will destroy all of Asgard.

Script by Roy Thomas, pencils by John Buscema (breakdowns) and Tom Palmer (finished art)

[Paradox_Nihil]

He is responsible for modern Odin. But not in his pre-Simonson stories as much as the one he wrote later. His later Odin is one who would lie about his motives over Jane, hide his true motives over sending Thor to Earth, and hide the truth about the reality of Blake. Thomas makes him a huge jerk and every depiction since has suffered from this direction. Clearly Thomas' solution to the Odin problem was to make him a selfish an dysfunctional father. He leaned into the negative side of a patriarch. The father that is prepared to do wrong by his son in favour of security.

That aspect of Odin was picked up strongly by Fraction, and is the character that Aaron inherited. To make him a kindly father after this would be a very big and unexplained turnabout. Aaron is rebuilding him slowly. I prefer writers to work with what they are given than to wave magic wands and make everything in canon go away. Frankly I am surprised anyone would prefer this given how much everyone here goes on and on about respecting canon.

The canon is a mess. You could try to play with that mess and squeeze some sense out of it or you could try to make things more coherent, but that will effectively make the mess even bigger for subsequent writers. There are no easy solutions. (For example, Simonson, in a very big and unexplained turnabout, depicted Asgard as a place of the Old Norse architecture! And many people, including me, loved it.)

Roy Thomas contributed to that mess enormously when he melded Kirby's Eternals, who were designed to be their own separate thing, with the main Marvel universe. And it's hard to believe that anyone with a profound aesthetic sense would pick up anything from his second run on Thor, which is a strong contender for the worst run of Thor ever. Maybe Fraction said it somewhere? But otherwise... not every concept had to be "taken" from a previous similar one. Some can be invented again.

Aaron over the last few years is the kind of writer that leaves things nestled in the subtext for a long time. He hasn’t always been this way but ever since W&tXM this has been a big part of his work. With Thor he has been building a long thematic narrative in which the parts all build to a whole that has yet to play out. He is building an entirely new mythology with his work on Avengers. I believe he is slowly shaping a status quo for Thor and his future. We will see when all the pieces are in place what that looks like.

You can detect this long term plan taking shape from the very beginning of his run, and we were talking about many of the things that have since developed years before they came to fruition. Some parts of the story are still in play, like the 'Mum and Dad are Fighting' element of the story. That is clearly something that will be resolved before Aaron is through.

Nobody can build a new mythology and respect the canon simultaneously. There are already too many mythologies in the Marvel universe, many of them utterly redundant. And Thor isn't a good place for a new mythology to grow. Of course, you can do it, but it's like digging a tunnel with a spoon. Other people, armed with better equipment, are going to do it better - meaning, outside of Marvel, on a clean plate. Even Kirby had to invent the New Gods, as a more appropriate playground for new ideas. And that happened in the early days, when the Marvel universe was far less populated.

And I have my doubts about any "long term plan" in the climate of "short term comic series", which are in perpetual danger of being cancelled if the sales are weak.

[Hypestyle]

Thor #276 Oct 1978
"Mine... This Hammer!"
Roger "Red" Norvell puts on Thor's belt of strength and his Iron Gloves and becomes a new Thor,

as powerful as the original and able to wield Thor's hammer;

The new Thor forces Sif to leave with him or he will destroy all of Asgard.
Script by Roy Thomas, pencils by John Buscema (breakdowns) and Tom Palmer (finished art)

so what happened to Red Norvell at this point?

[marge_23]

If we are still on the topic of odin's characterization, I think that Aaron is trying to do some character progression because...he kinda has to at this point. I mean Odin's egotistic personality issues have been a big problem in the Thor comics he has written so far so I doubt he is just gonna leave it unresolved. I view the entire Thor series right now as a big low for all the characters. Asgardia is destroyed. The realms are in chaos. There's supposedly a big war coming. Loki stabbed his mom. Odin's outrageous behavior has cost him his relationship to Freyja. Thor has some MAJOR insecurity issues about his hammer.

It really just feels like everything's gone to hel. Aaron has to address these issues before the conclusion of his run or it will seem unresolved. In Odin's case, he has to not to be such an ******* and learn to share power with the All-Mother. I know a lot of people have been upset with the treatment of this character up until this point, but I think Aaron will make Odin turn a new leaf and probably make him a little more complex. We've already seen an example of this in the last book of Jane's run where Odin demonstrated a little bit of acceptance towards Jane despite having hated her like two seconds before. Or when Odin called off his fight with JaneThor in order to heal the All-Mother. So we know that Aaron knows that Odin isn't all bad and I think he's going to bring out those not bad characteristics as he finishes up his run. Probably through the resolution of the conflict between him and his wife. And it's probably gonna end with the All-Father and All-Mother ruling together as joint-rulers.

That might make some of the older fans mad cause Odin's supposed to be the all-powerful monarch and all, but I really doubt that it's gonna end with Odin above all. Heck, it might end up with just the All-mother ruling. I wouldn't really like that but I don't write the stories so...yeah.

[GodThor]

A question for you guys!!!

How useful will Odin be in War of the Realms arc:

A: useless
B: very useless
C: sexist
D: not caring and will brag about his mighty powaaa

[JKtheMac]

The canon is a mess. You could try to play with that mess and squeeze some sense out of it or you could try to make things more coherent, but that will effectively make the mess even bigger for subsequent writers. There are no easy solutions. (For example, Simonson, in a very big and unexplained turnabout, depicted Asgard as a place of the Old Norse architecture! And many people, including me, loved it.)

Roy Thomas contributed to that mess enormously when he melded Kirby's Eternals, who were designed to be their own separate thing, with the main Marvel universe. And it's hard to believe that anyone with a profound aesthetic sense would pick up anything from his second run on Thor, which is a strong contender for the worst run of Thor ever. Maybe Fraction said it somewhere? But otherwise... not every concept had to be "taken" from a previous similar one. Some can be invented again.

From memory there are two direct references to later Thomas. I agree the canon is a mess. Indeed I don’t think our opinions are very far apart. I am perhaps more optimistic about what Aaron can and will achieve.

I would suggest that Aaron is tidying canon in a subtle way. What he is doing is rebuilding what is a mess into some form of coherence. He has forced Odin into reflective brooding mode so that he can presumably step into a new role. The approach to canon Aaron takes is to reference parts but in general let his own story pull everything in the direction he wants to go. It hopefully will have the effect of dragging a magnet underneath iron filings. I have trust in him where many here don’t because I would approach the mess of canon in a similar way. The way to approach canon problems isn’t to wave a wand and wipe out decades of non-continuity. You tell stories that result in your characters being in the places you would prefer.

Nobody can build a new mythology and respect the canon simultaneously. There are already too many mythologies in the Marvel universe, many of them utterly redundant. And Thor isn't a good place for a new mythology to grow. Of course, you can do it, but it's like digging a tunnel with a spoon. Other people, armed with better equipment, are going to do it better - meaning, outside of Marvel, on a clean plate. Even Kirby had to invent the New Gods, as a more appropriate playground for new ideas. And that happened in the early days, when the Marvel universe was far less populated.

And I have my doubts about any "long term plan" in the climate of "short term comic series", which are in perpetual danger of being cancelled if the sales are weak.

Aaron is being given time. More even than he originally envisioned. I can guarantee that if he hadn’t been given Avengers he would have moved forward with his plans for Odin in Thor, but for at least a while he is paused, brooding in Old Asgard while Aaron sets up the wider plan.

[JKtheMac]

If we are still on the topic of odin's characterization, I think that Aaron is trying to do some character progression because...he kinda has to at this point. I mean Odin's egotistic personality issues have been a big problem in the Thor comics he has written so far so I doubt he is just gonna leave it unresolved. I view the entire Thor series right now as a big low for all the characters. Asgardia is destroyed. The realms are in chaos. There's supposedly a big war coming. Loki stabbed his mom. Odin's outrageous behavior has cost him his relationship to Freyja. Thor has some MAJOR insecurity issues about his hammer.

It really just feels like everything's gone to hel. Aaron has to address these issues before the conclusion of his run or it will seem unresolved. In Odin's case, he has to not to be such an ******* and learn to share power with the All-Mother. I know a lot of people have been upset with the treatment of this character up until this point, but I think Aaron will make Odin turn a new leaf and probably make him a little more complex. We've already seen an example of this in the last book of Jane's run where Odin demonstrated a little bit of acceptance towards Jane despite having hated her like two seconds before. Or when Odin called off his fight with JaneThor in order to heal the All-Mother. So we know that Aaron knows that Odin isn't all bad and I think he's going to bring out those not bad characteristics as he finishes up his run. Probably through the resolution of the conflict between him and his wife. And it's probably gonna end with the All-Father and All-Mother ruling together as joint-rulers.

That might make some of the older fans mad cause Odin's supposed to be the all-powerful monarch and all, but I really doubt that it's gonna end with Odin above all. Heck, it might end up with just the All-mother ruling. I wouldn't really like that but I don't write the stories so...yeah.

I agree mostly. I would emphasise this is all part of the plan. Aaron inherited a problematic canon with many broken elements and some characters that just no longer make any sense, including Thor and Odin. I say this as a huge fan of Thor and Odin.

I believe it will finish with a clear role in the wider canon for Odin and Freyja, a more focused Thor with a clearer status quo, Old Asgard placed back into prominence but with a better understanding of why it exists and what its role is, and in general a clean sheet for whomesoever comes after. Aaron didn’t have this luxury. Fans can grumble as much as they like. They might applaud the next writer and wonder at the coherent world that it is written in, and say how much better the new stories are, but some of us including the editors, will know that all of the hard work was done in the preceding years.

P.S. The realisation, mid-rant, that Jane is not the villain is supposed to be a moment of epiphany. I think some thought it would be a turning moment, but realistically that isn’t how characters really change. It is sold almost entirely in the art. The facial expressions that Dauterman captures are perfect. Odin is coming out of the spell that has been cast over him by fear, and his next reaction is realisation that he isn’t making things better and removing himself. This is a negative reaction where some perhaps expected a positive one. He isn’t redeemed he is blamed. His anger and fears are still there but he is at least recognising that they are not helpful. His relationship with Freyja is a case in point. It is akin to a separation between a couple on the brink of a breakup. The recognition that they need space, but still full of blame and recrimination.

[JKtheMac]

A question for you guys!!!

How useful will Odin be in War of the Realms arc:

A: useless
B: very useless
C: sexist
D: not caring and will brag about his mighty powaaa

On a serious note, I think he will potentially be pivotal. Much of the story has been about getting Odin to a place of responsibility.

Odin is suffering from being used as a political analogy for the war on terror. Fear Itself was partly a commentary on isolationist politics and Odin comes out as the fall guy. He had nowhere to go afterwards. He was wrong and worse would have stood by while Earth burned. So his story here was designed to remind us of this isolationist position, demonstrate that it comes from fear, allow Odin some time to reflect, and then bring him back with a new purpose.

[JKtheMac]

Side note on continuity. While many fans like to convince themselves that their individual patronage matters by talking up their demographic, it is a sobering fact that comic stores tell us that the average age of a comic reader is not mid 40s or even early 30s.

Aaron’s Thor audience, if it were the average would be high 20s and by my estimation it probably skews younger because it seems to do well digitally. So those of us that care about anything written before 2008 are in the minority.

[JackDaw]

Side note on continuity. While many fans like to convince themselves that their individual patronage matters by talking up their demographic, it is a sobering fact that comic stores tell us that the average age of a comic reader is not mid 40s or even early 30s.

Aaron’s Thor audience, if it were the average would be high 20s and by my estimation it probably skews younger because it seems to do well digitally. So those of us that care about anything written before 2008 are in the minority.

That (age profile) is actually very encouraging.

It might be an interesting topic to “debate” (in my case put forward some guesses!) how digital comics will effect reading habits of new readers.

I think there’s a case, for example, to suspect that Marvel Unlimited may actually encourage new readers to read old material more widely than new readers of ten or twenty years ago did.

I suspect 20 years ago, most of us just plunged into current comics, without worrying about stuff that came before...among other things it would be difficult to get the old stuff. Now, if interested in a particular character, the “barrier” to getting the old material is so much lower.

[JKtheMac]

That (age profile) is actually very encouraging.

It might be an interesting topic to “debate” (in my case put forward some guesses!) how digital comics will effect reading habits of new readers.

I think there’s a case, for example, to suspect that Marvel Unlimited may actually encourage new readers to read old material more widely than new readers of ten or twenty years ago did.

I suspect 20 years ago, most of us just plunged into current comics, without worrying about stuff that came before...among other things it would be difficult to get the old stuff. Now, if interested in a particular character, the “barrier” to getting the old material is so much lower.

It would be interesting to know how people use MU. Or if it differs by age. Even myself at 50 have a limited attention threshold when reading sixties and seventies comics, and I grew up with seventies comics. They feel so old fashioned. I even find Simonson a chore to read these days and I remember really liking it originally.

A common theme on ‘please recommend’ threads is a stipulation for the stories not to be too old. For Thor I would be cautious recommending anything before Jurgens.

[kilderkin]

It would be interesting to know how people use MU. Or if it differs by age. Even myself at 50 have a limited attention threshold when reading sixties and seventies comics, and I grew up with seventies comics. They feel so old fashioned. I even find Simonson a chore to read these days and I remember really liking it originally.

A common theme on ‘please recommend’ threads is a stipulation for the stories not to be too old. For Thor I would be cautious recommending anything before Jurgens.

I wonder why that might be?

When I get interested in a character I read as much if them as I can irrelevant of the age do long as I like the art

I'll admit dome stuff from the 40s or 50s might get skimmed but 60s onwards, I'll read up coz for me at that point the art got yo where I liked it

I am curious as to why age of product would limit interest

maybe the mythos feels dated and too different? I am curious