Essential Thor Volume 2 Tpb (Essentials)

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Summary: Essential Thor Vol 1
Review: After the first couple of pages, you don't even notice it's in black and white. The artwork is fantastic. Thor is illustrated with more realistic athletic proportions as was typical of the earlier comics. I guess it wasn't until the eighties or so that they started drawing the characters with muscles bulging down to the pinky level. The stories are very imaginative and top of the line. Of course, you'd expect that with Stan Lee at the wheel. Share it with your kids, or read it yourself to bring back those comic book memories. After reading the "Frog Thor" series (Thor 363 - 366) to my six year old son (who laughed hysterically when the frog lifted the hammer), he's requested that one Thor adventure be read each night. With over 500 pages, this comic should last about a month for the littlest comic book junkie in the family.
P.S. Don't buy a six year old a Thor hammer. Ouch, even those plastic ones really smart!!! Just kidding. Thanks, Stan.

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Summary: The Beginnings Of A Classic Comic Book
Review: Although some of the comics in the middle of this essential tome miss the mark, it's the bookend collaborative efforts of Lee & Kirby that make this collection a must for any comics library.

Now, if they'd only get around to publishing ESSENTIAL THOR VOL. 2; that's where things really get interesting...!

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Summary: It's about time!!!
Review: I would first like to say that Marvel Comics should have done these reprints a long time ago. But better late than never. These inexpensive reprints are very good to own as you can read them without worrying about the condition of the comic book. And while the Marvel Masterworks are cool to own as hardbacks, they are a bit pricey for someone who just wants to read the comic books reprinted. This review really goes for all of the Essential paperbacks that marvel is putting out but this is one I have waited a long time to read because Thor has always been one of my favorite characters. If you enjoy this one then please check out the others. One more thing. For those complaining about the paper quality I would say that you can spend a few thousand dollars for the originals if you want. If so go ahead. But as for me I will enjoy these cool reading copies.

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Summary: Lee and Kirby take a while to get the god of thunder right
Review: Volume 1 of "The Essential Thor" provides the stories of the Thunder God that appeared in "Journey Into Mystery" #83-112, including the five-page "Tales of Asgard" that started appearing in issue #97. In the Sixties I did not start reading Thor until the comic had taken on his name, so this was the first time I had read most of these stories, although I did pick up the "Tales of Asgard" collection that Marvel put out way back when. In retrospect it is hard to ignore that the original conception of this particular superhero was rather lame. However, once Stan Lee, Larry Leiber and Jack Kirby began to take the Norse mythology aspects of the character more seriously, the dynamic of these stories changed considerably.

The initial story is that Dr. Don Blake, an American physician vactioning in Europe, is fleeing from Stone Men from Saturn who have landed in their spaceship when he stumbles into a cave and discovers an ancient cane. When he strikes the cane against an immoveable boulder it transforms into a hammer and Blake becomes the legendary god of Thunder. The hammer has an inscription, in English no less, proclaiming "Whosoever holds this hammer, if he be worthy, shall possess the power of...THOR (yes, the inscription even includes the elipses).

Don Blake, with his bum leg, and his secret affection for his pretty young nurse, Jane Nelson, is set up in the mold of mild mannered Clark Kent and bookworm Peter Parker, where he is two-thirds of a love triangle all by himself (and his alter-ego). On the one hand the first couple of issues clearly give Thor the powers of the Norse thunder god--he not only calls forth rain and thunderstorms, but makes a volcano erupts--but the stories do not deal explicitly with whether he is indeed a deity. However, all of that begins to change in the third story when Loki, god of mischief, shows up and starts living up to his name.

Loki's arrival is crucial in Thor's transformation, not only because it is the beginning of taking the Norse mythology angle seriously (and the Thor comics would provide a scholarly fidelity to the subject), but also because the god of mischief became Thor's major foe. The opposition was ideal because unlike Thor's human opponents, such as the Cobra and Mr. Hyde, Loki could keep coming back for more issue after issue, either directly or through a proxy. Loki only arrived on earth after sneaking by Heimdall, the warder of the rainbow bridge called Bifrost, and once that door was open Odin, Balder and the rest of the Norse gods and goddesses were close behind.

Unfortunately the Tales of Asgard fillers are uniformly superior to the main adventures in "Journey of Mystery." Part of it is that they were written by Lee and drawn by Kirby, unlike the other stories (Lee and Kirby actually do less than half of the actual writing and drawing in this collection), and part of it was that they stuck to the ancient Norse legends about the gods. The other flaw was that they stuck with Don Blake and his romance with Nurse Jane, even while Odin went off on his "no son of mine is going to marry a mortal" rant. Eventually we will get around to the Lady Sif, but that is still a long ways off. For now, the more these early issues focus on Thor, Loki and the rest of the Asgardians, the better the stories. The rest require us to believe mere mortals and various meta-humans have a chance against an actual thunder god. But we still are not up to the glory days of the charcter, which is why the next volume of "The Essential Thor" is way past due.