The Mighty Thor Appreciation

[Jarnsaxa]

If Jane Foster comes back to life despite her physical body dying from cancer then I'm calling bull. Handwaving cancer is just insulting.

This is a thing that I sort of find weird, you all do know that people survive having cancer all the time? This would be especially true of a doctor, like Jane is, that would have been doing her own self examinations. I always found it weird that the cancer got as bad as it did considering that Jane should have caught the cancer way before it would have been fatal. Maybe she had a death wish and wasn't doing her self exams? Hel, that might even be the reason she refused a magic treatment for her magic cancer.

And before anyone jumps on me for being disrespectful to cancer patients by suggesting that they might live through cancer, my own mother died from cancer the same day Jane did. I read issue #705 in the funeral home during the viewing. She'd nearly died of the cancer twenty years before, beat it, and then it came back. People don't just automatically die of cancer.

[Biclopcicle]

This is a thing that I sort of find weird, you all do know that people survive having cancer all the time? This would be especially true of a doctor, like Jane is, that would have been doing her own self examinations. I always found it weird that the cancer got as bad as it did considering that Jane should have caught the cancer way before it would have been fatal. Maybe she had a death wish and wasn't doing her self exams? Hel, that might even be the reason she refused a magic treatment for her magic cancer.

And before anyone jumps on me for being disrespectful to cancer patients by suggesting that they might live through cancer, my own mother died from cancer the same day Jane did. I read issue #705 in the funeral home during the viewing. She'd nearly died of the cancer twenty years before, beat it, and then it came back. People don't just automatically die of cancer.

Systemic chemo administration is fairly common even with early stage breast cancer. And it's not without its own side effects. So I guess the Thor transformations were eliminating the chemo drugs and accelerating the cancer progression.

One of my major problems with the whole premise of this portion of Aaron's Thor run is: how the hell does the Thor transformation eliminate the chemo but not the cancer cells? If being Thor improves your metabolism, immune system etc then the cancer cells should be destroyed. Our immune system regularly.eliminates dysplastic cells on a regular basis. A God's immune system (especially ones as long-lived as the Asgardians) should certainly destroy breast cancer cells

[Hulkout42]

I don't care if she is Thor or not, i am just happy she is alive and her story is not over yet.
I have to believe that there is a plan in this, that they won't just have Cancer take her...maybe even see her wield the storm once more alongside Thor, Beta Ray and heck even Storm.

[Biclopcicle]

I also don't really see where Aaron is going with the whole "worthiness" theme. How is Thor going to prove his worthiness if there's no hammer? We've seen frommsomenof the previews that a) he'll have a lot of hammers and b) they break easily.

I think the story would've had more closure if he and Odin managed to a)re-harness the storm and then b) let Jane be unrevivable. Thor would be worthy again but with a heavy burden that would further color his character.

Now we'll never know if he's "worthy," at least in the sense that we could before.


Having said that, doesn't Old King Thor have a Mjolnir? Perhaps there is something interesting yet to come

[Abe]

Really? I thought you would enjoy Ewing's Ultimates...to me, it felt like he did more expansion than re-writing....the Dark Celestials had already been established in canon (though vaguely so). Also, regarding his use of Eternity, I thought it was a logical extension of how Hickman employed them- Hickman had the Beyonders slay the Cosmic aspects at the "Nexus of realities" (or however he described it). It seemed reasonable to say that each reality possesses its own aspect of Eternity, and then the entire Multiverse is the sum total of all those eternities.

I'm not sure where he got that the 616 marvel universe was on the 7th iteration, but we do know that Galactus was from a previous iteration.

I think the most "off base" thing he did was to say that Galactus was always really intended to be "Seeder of Worlds." And I would agree with you on that. But I never really felt like Galactus was really a bad guy (Simonson's Reed Richards trial is great!l, so Ewing's alteration didn't bother me too much. But again I can understand why one would feel that way.

Well, I liked things in Ultimates, but I never felt the book to have a true epic vibe. And you're right saying it's more an expansion than a rewriting, but my feelings are that all that mythology lost its "beyond our comprehension" vibe. I agree it would be hard to maintain it for decades. It had been hard tbh. Simonson's Black Celestial story still had it. Byrne's Trial of Reed (it was Byrne's - he's even in the comics... it was an Assitant Editor Month issue after all) still had it of course.

So you're probably right : I'm surely a little too harsh about Ewing's work because it's a kinda necessary world building. But there are some huge errors in the design : golden Galactus looks a bit lame (I get the negative colours stuff but still disagree with that choice) and the Progenitors are definitively ugly. And the look matters!

Anyway I have to stop derailing this thread!

Let's just say that Ewing and Aaron have prepared the ground for some big mythological stories coming in Avengers. I'm still not sure to get involved in the book : will they take years to be told? What part will play the Thor book?

(Damn... Sorry guys...I'm still off topic : it's Jane's thread! And she deserves all attention especially after this week issue. I hope that they have planned so nice stories for her too!)

[Abe]

This is a thing that I sort of find weird, you all do know that people survive having cancer all the time? This would be especially true of a doctor, like Jane is, that would have been doing her own self examinations. I always found it weird that the cancer got as bad as it did considering that Jane should have caught the cancer way before it would have been fatal. Maybe she had a death wish and wasn't doing her self exams? Hel, that might even be the reason she refused a magic treatment for her magic cancer.

And before anyone jumps on me for being disrespectful to cancer patients by suggesting that they might live through cancer, my own mother died from cancer the same day Jane did. I read issue #705 in the funeral home during the viewing. She'd nearly died of the cancer twenty years before, beat it, and then it came back. People don't just automatically die of cancer.

All my condolences. I'm really sorry for your loss. All my thoughts for you and your family.

[Biclopcicle]

Well, I liked things in Ultimates, but I never felt the book to have a true epic vibe. And you're right saying it's more an expansion than a rewriting, but my feelings are that all that mythology lost its "beyond our comprehension" vibe. I agree it would be hard to maintain it for decades. It had been hard tbh. Simonson's Black Celestial story still had it. Byrne's Trial of Reed (it was Byrne's - he's even in the comics... it was an Assitant Editor Month issue after all) still had it of course.

So you're probably right : I'm surely a little too harsh about Ewing's work because it's a kinda necessary world building. But there are some huge errors in the design : golden Galactus looks a bit lame (I get the negative colours stuff but still disagree with that choice) and the Progenitors are definitively ugly. And the look matters!

Anyway I have to stop derailing this thread!

Let's just say that Ewing and Aaron have prepared the ground for some big mythological stories coming in Avengers. I'm still not sure to get involved in the book : will they take years to be told? What part will play the Thor book?

(Damn... Sorry guys...I'm still off topic : it's Jane's thread! And she deserves all attention especially after this week issue. I hope that they have planned so nice stories for her too!)

Yeah totally mixed that up that Byrne wrote that story. Somehow I got that mixed up with the Time Authority storyline- in a way Reed was also on trial for that, but for a totally different reason!

Back to the main thrust of the thread- I want to see how Thor goes from Golden (Adamantine?) Hammer/arm back to Uru arm/hammer. It's got to happen at some point during the run, right?

[DurararaFTW]

This is a thing that I sort of find weird, you all do know that people survive having cancer all the time? This would be especially true of a doctor, like Jane is, that would have been doing her own self examinations. I always found it weird that the cancer got as bad as it did considering that Jane should have caught the cancer way before it would have been fatal. Maybe she had a death wish and wasn't doing her self exams? Hel, that might even be the reason she refused a magic treatment for her magic cancer.

And before anyone jumps on me for being disrespectful to cancer patients by suggesting that they might live through cancer, my own mother died from cancer the same day Jane did. I read issue #705 in the funeral home during the viewing. She'd nearly died of the cancer twenty years before, beat it, and then it came back. People don't just automatically die of cancer.

They don't automatically survive either just by following their chemo therapy at some point either, especially not when it has definitely reached a fatal stage already. Here she has been brought back, she still has the cancer that did kill her but her survival is treated as a done deal. Through magical means her body is reset back to the point where she can absolutely beat her cancer on her own terms with non-magical means. This strikes me as having their cake and eating it too.

[Daniel22]

I also don't really see where Aaron is going with the whole "worthiness" theme. How is Thor going to prove his worthiness if there's no hammer? We've seen frommsomenof the previews that a) he'll have a lot of hammers and b) they break easily.

I think the story would've had more closure if he and Odin managed to a)re-harness the storm and then b) let Jane be unrevivable. Thor would be worthy again but with a heavy burden that would further color his character.

Now we'll never know if he's "worthy," at least in the sense that we could before.


Having said that, doesn't Old King Thor have a Mjolnir? Perhaps there is something interesting yet to come

I'm glad Jane didn't die, especially just to provide more emotional heft to someone else's story.

I think a point of the run is that Odinson has to learn to define himself and earn a worthiness apart from the hammer.

[whiterabbit]

This is a thing that I sort of find weird, you all do know that people survive having cancer all the time? This would be especially true of a doctor, like Jane is, that would have been doing her own self examinations. I always found it weird that the cancer got as bad as it did considering that Jane should have caught the cancer way before it would have been fatal. Maybe she had a death wish and wasn't doing her self exams? Hel, that might even be the reason she refused a magic treatment for her magic cancer.

And before anyone jumps on me for being disrespectful to cancer patients by suggesting that they might live through cancer, my own mother died from cancer the same day Jane did. I read issue #705 in the funeral home during the viewing. She'd nearly died of the cancer twenty years before, beat it, and then it came back. People don't just automatically die of cancer.

Well Jane is alive again like I expected them to. Magic handwave.

[JKtheMac]

Modern humans (H. Sapiens sapiens) first appear in the fossil record at 250,000. So +/- 50,000 isn't enough to explain the difference.

As I recall, Serpent crown saga does reference not only Set but the other elder gods, so it would indeed be a good idea to review.

I don't understand how you can be "partly created."

Also, I'm not sure what you mean by "this is the very end of the celestials." The first host came at 1M, and there were no more celestials until second host at ~20k years ago (the great cataclysm). If Kirby's account in Eternals is the baseline account, then the First Host visit was of minimal duration- only a single specimen was altered for each of the three strains. Perhaps even just one specimen for all three strains.(Kirby uses the singular in the text).

I am self conscious this kind of talk is not really for this thread but just on the Celestial clarification. They seem to be dealing with a Celestial that didn’t leave when the rest did. So it seems this isn’t directly from one of the two known periods it’s an anomaly. Aaron is doing one of those ‘between the panels’ stories.

He is also thematically possibly suggesting a recurrence of the Avengers archetypes over time that is somehow initiated by this interaction with the clelesial and the Infinity Stones. We really can’t tell yet where this story will go or how it will develop but I suspect it will lay down a modern version of prehistoric canon and a long history of superheroes. Think Wikdiv for Marvel with perhaps a dusting of DC’s Metal. A hint that mythology impacted the MU and humanity early on and shaped its whole existence. I imagine we will all have plenty of time to discuss this in Avengers threads.

[JKtheMac]

This is a thing that I sort of find weird, you all do know that people survive having cancer all the time? This would be especially true of a doctor, like Jane is, that would have been doing her own self examinations. I always found it weird that the cancer got as bad as it did considering that Jane should have caught the cancer way before it would have been fatal. Maybe she had a death wish and wasn't doing her self exams? Hel, that might even be the reason she refused a magic treatment for her magic cancer.

And before anyone jumps on me for being disrespectful to cancer patients by suggesting that they might live through cancer, my own mother died from cancer the same day Jane did. I read issue #705 in the funeral home during the viewing. She'd nearly died of the cancer twenty years before, beat it, and then it came back. People don't just automatically die of cancer.

Thanks for your perspective and I am so sorry for your loss.

From the end notes it does seem like both Dauterman and Aaron were constantly being sent moving stories and that may have reinforced the seed of hope that this story holds. Of course even if Jane lives on and beats this there is still no guarantee. She will be a character in remission. That in itself could be interesting to read. A story I don’t remember reading in a Marvel comic.

Superhero stories about cancer can be as realistic as the writer wants them to be and that the readership can bear. It seems this book was popular with cancer patients and I can see why. Anyone feeling this is anticlimactic maybe could reflect upon the moment one gets the all clear from cancer. It has a huge ‘but’. In many ways cancer is just a very apparent and immediate confrontation with our inevitable death. It can be both tragic and awesome. It can inspire greatness and despair in equal measure.

Also diagnosis itself is not perfect. I myself had an unspoken but very real nonetheless diagnosis possibility of a fatal cancer. It was ruled out, but I need regular checks to ensure it stays that way. Just that light touch had a profound effect upon me. I can only imagine how it would have been if they hadn’t ruled it out, as the prognosis would have been ‘sort out your affairs say goodbye to your loved ones’. But in a way I was preparing for that.

[JKtheMac]

I'm glad Jane didn't die, especially just to provide more emotional heft to someone else's story.

I think a point of the run is that Odinson has to learn to define himself and earn a worthiness apart from the hammer.

Certainly seems so. And now he has a sounding board of somebody that understands him and can hopefully inspire and cajole him in turn. There are some potentially fascinating possibilities arising from this. We have already seen one. Jane delivering her speech instead of it reverberating at her funeral.

[JKtheMac]

All this talk of Jimmy in this thread and others makes me think. Maybe I am not clearly evaluating the impact Jimmy had. Maybe the 1994-95 Roy Thomas run is a highly regarded gem of a book that everyone rereads at least once a year.

Who can forget little Jimmy! His dialogue was so profound. There was “Mummy I was scared” and “Aww… Anak promised to play with me some more.” Oh the memories come flooding back, honestly I didn’t need to look them up. Those resonant words are held so close to my heart. Such a rounded character.

His almost total silence as he watched the grown-ups talk was such a great commentary on the grounded but challenging home-life of secondary characters in superhero books. The casual domestic neglect of children for minutes at a time when in adult company that have no interest in children magnified under the lens of the costumed hero arena. Especially ones that decide to live in artificial analogies of Mount Olympus with the High Evolutionary standing in for a creator deity of choice. The very gods themselves ignoring the silence of a child! Its so resonant with the way Jane's feelings are often ignored.

And, such deep and profound commentary on Jane’s second chance at being worthy of Thor. A new home of the gods to prove herself in and a new All-Father to impress. How heart-breaking it must have been when she learnt the truth about Odin’s scheme to separate them. So powerful was her reaction that it was left to Sif to put it in words. But what words “Lord Odin manipulated us!” What a shock that must have been. Odin had always seemed so honest and open. Jane’s total absence from the scene that explains so much about her character, both in the past and going forward is such an interesting choice by Thomas.

No wonder Jurgen’s felt the need to reference Jimmy that one time in passing, presumably Marvel wouldn’t let him use such precious IP. But at least JMS did that huge plot about divorce. So short in pages and dialogue but surely we all took it to heart. Oh the tragic heartbreak of a divided family in the face of forces beyond our control, like Odin’s schemes to thwart the love of a woman that wasn’t good enough for his son. Such realism is rare in comics. Only the other day Demeter stepped on my toe and didn’t even say sorry! I was reminded of Odin and his inhumanity to Jane. It really hit home. If only Aaron had continued down this oh so fruitful line of story that resonates with so many of us instead of disregarding the greatness that was little Jimmy and moving on from the Jane/Thor/real-nay-artificial-Blake will they won't they romantic triangle. Both storylines will be missed!

Seriously I sometimes think I read this run far too much. It's some kind of horrific punishment placed upon me for being interested in canon.

[Digifiend]

Systemic chemo administration is fairly common even with early stage breast cancer. And it's not without its own side effects. So I guess the Thor transformations were eliminating the chemo drugs and accelerating the cancer progression.

That's exactly what was going on.