It’s time to look at a Thor collection and this one actually brings the final issues of the 500 issue Thor series. The story moved onto another title and Thor fans may be a little disappointed in how the series ended as it doesn’t wrap a whole lot of things up. Still, 500 issues is quite the milestone and while I have not read all 500 of the individual issues at the moment, I’ve read a lot of them. This story is bogged down by several factors, which keep it from being a good collection.

Thor has mysteriously lost his powers so he must now learn to live and fight as a mortal. It’s pretty bad timing for him, but luckily he gets his powers back for an issue…only to lose them again. What is happening and why are his powers affected so heavily? He has the Enchantress to help him out, but more questions continue to arise and no answers can be found. Thor ends up bringing back and unlikely ally to tip the scales.

These issues came out during a time when Marvel’s comics were rather chaotic. The art would result in a whole lot of splash pages and everyone constantly looked off model. The fights were typically glorious, but that was about it although the art could be unintentionally humorous. This definitely happens to Thor, but the art just isn’t good. Thor doesn’t really look (or act) like Thor and a lot of the characters do look rather strange. The art is definitely under average although I wouldn’t call it terrible. It could just be more consistent and easier to follow.

Still, the main issue that I have with the comic is that all of the characters are just unlikable. I’m not sure about all of the circumstances surrounding the characters, but it doesn’t change the fact that I don’t like them. Thor fans in particular will be dismayed at how the title character is portrayed. Gone are the days when he was a very smart combatant who knew when to fight and when to talk. Now, he just fights the villains for fun and he actually hangs out with the Enchantress. This wouldn’t be a bad thing if she was totally reformed, but she still has slaves who attend to her every needs and Thor doesn’t care at all. That’s the oddest part about the whole collection. It’s why the relationship between the Enchantress and Thor has never worked out and shouldn’t ever work out. Thor is a hero so he shouldn’t tolerate such things.

He still is the hero of the story, but this just seems like a huge oversight and it compromises his position of being someone who tries to stamp out all evil. I also didn’t care for the plot where he is losing his powers and the tie ins just make it feel even worse as Thor had to quickly regain his powers for an issue so that he would be ready for the event and then he lost them just as quickly for the sake of the main story’s plot. I definitely don’t think that the comic planned that part out too well.

During the story, a major part of the plot is the fact that everyone from Asgard seems to have vanished and the next Ragnarok appears to be happening. Loki’s behind the scheme, but it’s rather vague and constantly gets thrown aside for the tie ins. The actual graphic novel ends with a tie in about to begin as Onslaught has gotten ready to destroy everything so Thor must join the fray. That fight sounds like it would be fun, but that is sadly not included in this collection. Back to the Asgard plot, Odin makes an appearance and things aren’t looking well for him.

He seems to have lost a match while trying to stop Asgard from being destroyed so he was stripped of his powers and sent back to the 1970’s or something like that. Tired of everyone ignoring him, Odin succumbed to beer and whiskey. He is now a drunk old man who is a shell of his former self. It’s a very sad drop for him and he definitely looks pretty bad. As I mentioned, the Enchantress has not reformed her ways so I would hardly call her a good character either. She also doesn’t have much of a role here although she helps out while in the background.

The only decent character that I can think of here would be the policewoman who helps Thor out. I don’t believe that I’ve seen her before and I guess she was just added to give Thor a contact who was on the force. She doesn’t do a whole lot, but at least she can fight and takes the whole trip to the savage land in stride. The comic had a guest star in the form of Red Norvell and I read the classic comics that introduced him. Unfortunately, he is definitely not likable here. He fell into hard times and went into some shady businesses to keep himself afloat. Thor gives him another chance to have super powers and Norvell takes it, but then the comic is essentially at its end so he doesn’t get to do anything with his new found power. Either way, he just doesn’t seem like hero material.

The comic is actually interesting while you’re reading it, but not a whole lot happens when you look at it in retrospect. Thor fights a lot of average humans, but we don’t get to see any real super threats. It makes sense since Thor is depowered, but the issues needed someone who could fight. As such, we only got a few brief fight scenes, which is too bad since you would expect more than that from the Thor comics. With better characters, the story could have gone places. Instead, it feels a bit like it’s in an alternate universe, which is how I feel about a lot of the 90’s stories in Marvel. Superman had a similar identity crisis over in DC at the time.

The rest of the Avengers make a cameo at one point when they recruit Thor and you can tell that the teamis at a rough spot. When Black Widow is essentially the leader of the group and there’s only one other member, you realize that the villains have likely already won. I believe that Dr. Strange made a cameo here although if he did, I’m pretty sure that he didn’t look so great. I suppose that you can’t win every battle right? As a send off to the Thor series, this definitely wasn’t a great way to do it, but the actual comic series was a lot of fun. It just jumped the shark towards the end of its run.

Overall, This is a very odd Thor comic. It simply doesn’t feel like it could take place in the Marvel universe and Thor is seriously out of character. There isn’t a lot of action to be found here either although the fight scenes are okay. I wouldn’t call this a good comic, but I don’t think that I would consider it to be a bad one either. It’s just around and it made some mistakes. It’s an interesting read, but you should keep in mind that it feels like an alternate universe title the whole time and the actual plot doesn’t get to advance that much throughout the whole graphic novel thanks to the tie ins and a long visit to the Savage Land. If you want to read a good Thor comic, I suggest heading back and reading the classics from the 1960’s. The Marvel Masterwork collections is a good way to find them.

Overall 5/10