T2 80-FB

[Russ Chappell]

Does anyone want to take a stab at placing Thor, Odin and Loki, in the flashback in Thor (v2) #80?


watching: my so-called life

[Col_Fury]

For those interested, the flashbacks in question show:

page 1: Odin & his brothers Vali & Vi, they've just slain the giant Ymir. Also, the dwarves Brok, Buri & Ertri haul around their great weapon-making mold.

page 2-page 3, panel 2: Odin orders Brok, Buri & Ertri to forge Mjolnir, and they do. Once finished, it's handed over to Odin.

page 3, panel 3: Odin kills the giant Laufey

page 3, panel 4: Having just killed Laufey, Odin holds the infant Loki.

page 4, panels 1-2: A teenage Thor & Loki kneel before Odin, Odin hands Mjolnir over to Thor in front of the Warriors Three(& a bunch of other Asgardians) with a pissed Loki looking on, both still kneeling.

As for page 4, panels 1-2, I know that Thor gained Mjolnir in that 12-issue 'Young Thor' series, the name of which escapes me at the moment. So this wouldn't be the first time Thor laid hands on Mjolnir, but maybe it's a ceremony of Thor 'officially' getting it?

Any ideas?

[Somebody]

The story of Mjonir's forging is considerably more... dramatic than prior versions. And I'm not sure that the idea of it being done 65 million+ years ago has any currency...

page 3, panel 3: Odin kills the giant Laufey

page 3, panel 4: Having just killed Laufey, Odin holds the infant Loki.

These two are kind of complicated - if we take only comics published at this point, you get:

LAUFEY
JIM 112/2 (1-4)
T2 80 (3:3)-FB
JIM 112/2 (5)

LOKI
JIM 112/2
T2 80 (3:4)-FB
[...]

ODIN
[...]
JIM 112/2 (1-4)
T2 80 (3:3)-FB
JIM 112/2 (5)
[...]

[Incidentally, looking at Odin and Loki's chronologies, I notice:

ODIN
*T2 9-FB
*T2 11-FB
JIM 104/2
JIM 105/2
*JIM 112/2

LOKI
*JIM 112/2
*T2 9-FB
*T2 11-FB

Judging from Loki's presence as an Asgardian kid in the Dark Gods FBs, they should be after Loki is adopted in all cases]

However, JMS has retconned the hell out of Loki's adoption in T3, and his version is not only irreconcilable with JIM 112/2 (it takes place in a different setting; with a Loki who's an older child [circa 5 years old, or the equivalent], rather than an infant; Odin uses a sword rather than Mjolnir; and Loki is an active participant in events rather than a child to be found wrapped in swaddling clothes), but he's also worked to cement it by havin Odin recall JMS' version of events in T3 8, then Loki recalling these events in T3 12, and THEN Loki going back to cause the events to occur in T3 12*, wherein the events are watched by the adult Loki, who is the one to actually kill the wounded-but-not-dead Laufey.

*The events of T3 12 are presented as a predestination paradox - the adult Loki remembers being visited by his adult self while a child, and he thusfore goes back to cause the events he recalls to occur in the first place. His time-travelling in the issue has other effects - he initially goes back further to turn Bor to snow, shown in a T3 7-FB, and then reverses the spell in the present day in T 600; then goes forward a bit to pretend to be Bor's ghost, to torment Odin into adopting his younger self - something also corroborated by Odin in T3 8-FB - before finally going to arrange the fight with his father's death. [Like I said, he worked to cement it.]

Given that JIM 112/2 says at the end "many are the legends of Loki's birth - but this is one we favor!", which is phrased almost as an invitation to an alternative version, I suspect it (and the T2 80 panels) may have to fall... [Incidentally, there's a version of Mjolnir's origin in T@ 11 that has Loki interfere in the form of a moth, causing the handle to be too short, which clashed with the idea of Odin using Mjolnir to kill Laufey. It appears to be unlisted currently since it clashes with JIM 112/2, but if the JMS origin is canonical and doesn't involve Mjolnir in Loki's origin...]

page 4, panels 1-2: A teenage Thor & Loki kneel before Odin, Odin hands Mjolnir over to Thor in front of the Warriors Three(& a bunch of other Asgardians) with a pissed Loki looking on, both still kneeling.

As for page 4, panels 1-2, I know that Thor gained Mjolnir in that 12-issue 'Young Thor' series, the name of which escapes me at the moment. So this wouldn't be the first time Thor laid hands on Mjolnir, but maybe it's a ceremony of Thor 'officially' getting it?

Well, Thor: Son of Asgard #10-12 were an expansion of JIM 102/2 in the first place, and Thor also "laid hands" on Mjolnir earlier in both the JIM backups and T:SOA, just to less or no effect.

This scene is actually in reference to T@ 11 (16:4), but with some changes - notably, the designs are closer to T:SOA (the original scene used Thor & Loki's standard costumes & drew them as full adults), and the T@ panel didn't have them kneeling as the hammer was handed over - indeed, Loki was walking away (and nor did we see the Warriors Three, although the angle was different and they could easily have been off-camera).

I'm a tad confused about how the T@ 11 listings currently break down, however - there's no page ranges, and I suggested splitting a scene from T@ 11 around T:SOA 10 in Odin's listing in my Thor: Son of Asgard listings, but Russ hasn't done so. I'm wondering if I missed something there.

[Enda80]

page 1: Odin & his brothers Vali & Vi, they've just slain the giant Ymir. Also, the dwarves Brok, Buri & Ertri haul around their great weapon-making mold.

In Thor I#349, Odin recalled his first meeting with Surtur as just after he and his brothers slew Ymir. In any event, this would probably follow the Hyborian Age, where Ymir received worship on Earth.

[Russ Chappell]

Given that JIM 112/2 says at the end "many are the legends of Loki's birth - but this is one we favor!", which is phrased almost as an invitation to an alternative version, I suspect it (and the T2 80 panels) may have to fall...

Honestly, it wouldn't disturb me to declare the flashback in T2 80 apocryphal. It IS rather...mythic.

I'm a tad confused about how the T@ 11 listings currently break down, however - there's no page ranges, and I suggested splitting a scene from T@ 11 around T:SOA 10 in Odin's listing in my Thor: Son of Asgard listings, but Russ hasn't done so. I'm wondering if I missed something there.

I'll investigate this.

[Somebody]

Honestly, it wouldn't disturb me to declare the flashback in T2 80 apocryphal. It IS rather...mythic.

What about JIM 112/2, though? The only inconsistency between JIM 112/2 and T2 80 (3:3-3:4)-FB is the colour of Loki's blanket. Odin's FBs in T3 7-8 and Loki's time-travel in T3 12 drive a coach & horses through JIM 112/2 - and, as I said, JMS made sure to include plenty of supporting evidence for his version. Would you be okay with declaring the Stan & Jack version non-canon, even with that caption I mentioned?

[Michael]

Writers have disregarded other aspects of the Tales of Asgard backups- the claim that the battle between Surtur and Odin created the moon, the claim that Earth wasn't rotating until Odin fought Surtur, references to Hela when Loki was a kid,etc.

One thing bothers me about declaring JIM 112/2 out of continuity- are there any references to it between JIM 112 and T3 12 that are irreconcilable with JMS's version? I don't have all of Loki's appearances between JIM 112 and T3 12,nor do I know anyone who does- that's a LOT of appearances, and if Loki says something like "I was adopted by Odin before I could walk" in any of them, then JMS's version is in trouble.

[Somebody]

Writers have disregarded other aspects of the Tales of Asgard backups- the claim that the battle between Surtur and Odin created the moon, the claim that Earth wasn't rotating until Odin fought Surtur, references to Hela when Loki was a kid,etc.

Well, on the first couple - that sort of thing requires a certain doublethink. ALL creation myths are valid in Marvel. As is the real-world history (albeit modified in various ways), which usually predominates outside books such as Thor and Hercules. It's just something you shouldn't think about too hard.

As for the last... I'll toss a response to that in with the next bit...

One thing bothers me about declaring JIM 112/2 out of continuity- are there any references to it between JIM 112 and T3 12 that are irreconcilable with JMS's version? I don't have all of Loki's appearances between JIM 112 and T3 12,nor do I know anyone who does- that's a LOT of appearances, and if Loki says something like "I was adopted by Odin before I could walk" in any of them, then JMS's version is in trouble.

Asgardian history is one of THE most retconned and inconsistent areas of Marvel history though, mostly because (a) different writers pick different areas of the myths to focus on which are inconsistent with one another or (b) writers do something original, then a later writer references a myth directly which contracts the prior Marvel stuff. Sometimes the one overwrites the other, but other times they sit uneasily side-by-side.

Hela and Loki's relationship is an example of the latter in both cases - while I believe she's his daughter in the myths, that was never referenced in the comics until Walt Simonson used it in his last arc. And, pre-Simonson, Hela had been shown to predate Loki. And, since then, the fact that Loki is Hela's father has sat uneasily with the fact that Hela's chronologically older than him, and both have been further referenced at different times without the contradiction ever being addressed.

And, as I said upthread, this is one of those areas (this particular example predates Simonson, let alone JMS) - it's been shown Loki interfered with Mjolnir's casting and thus caused its' handle to be too short. And yet the pre-JMS version of Loki's adoption showed Odin using Mjolnir itself to kill Laufey before he found the baby Loki. By that standard, the pre-JMS version is "in trouble".