Thor: The Trial of Thor

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Thor: The Trial of Thor

Post by Somebody »

Just a quick run-through. It's not complicated, even if some points are odd.

THOR: THE TRIAL OF THOR
Writer: Peter Milligan
Art: Cary Nord

Cast:
BALDER
LOKI
ODIN
VOLSTAGG
HOGUN
FANDRAL
THOR
KARNILLA
TYR
HERMOD

One-offs:
THOR REPLICANT
ELIN (funeral attendant)
BRITT (funeral attendant)
FINN ("smelly mage")
VALI (changes into a wolf)

Generics:
Mortal worshippers (on Midgard)
Frost Giants
Dwarfs
Various generic Asgardians
Other funeral attendants, only one of which is clearly seen

Summary:
pg1:1-1:2
"In Midgard", blood is raining from the sky. Human sacrifices result to appease the gods.

pg1:3-4:4
"In Asgard", however, the gods have been warring against the frost giants for nine months, and are beginning to crack. As Loki tells Balder the giants are retreating, Balder - himself under heavy strain - tells Loki how he saw "Krental the Happy" commit suicide rather than keep fighting. As he tries to rest, however, Balder sees Thor killing a pair of Asgardians.

pg4:4:2 + 4:4:4 + 5
Balder tells Odin about it. Odin doesn't want to hear it.

pg6-8
Women watch over the bodies of the Asgardian dead. Then Thor turns up and starts to kill them.

pg9-10 + 11:1:1
"When day breaks," Odin summons the Warriors Three to the scene, and tells them to find out what happened.

pg12
They interview Elin, a survivor, and she tells them it was definitely Thor.

pg13-15
"Two days hence," they report to Odin and he dismisses Elin out-of-hand. They then bring in a "smelly mage" called Finn, who tells them that the dead women were definitely killed with a hammer made of pure Uru.

Odin accepts this means Thor did it, then tells them if he ever sees them again he'll have them killed.

pg16:1-16:2
The Warriors Three walk away, not exactly happy with their lot.

pg16:3-19:2
Thor is drinking in a tavern, when Balder, Tyr, Karnilla, Vali and Hermod turn up to arrest him. He angrily tells them it wasn't him, and they start fighting.

pg19:3-19:4
Odin sits alone, unhappy and wondering if they relied too heavily on Thor.

pg20
The Warriors Three come in and save Thor as he's about to be overcome

pg21:1-21:3
Hermod runs to Odin, and tells him Thor's escaped.

pg21:4-22:5
Far to the north, the Warriors Three tell Thor they know it was him, because of the pure Uru used to kill, but they saved him out of gratitude. Thor, confused, thinks he "must indeed be crazed," and Hogun tells him he has to do into "eternal exile"

pg23 + 24:1:1
Two days later, Thor's alone in the snow, and takes his frustration out on a rock. After it comes back, he looks carefully at Mjolnir, and comes to "an epiphany".

pg24-25
Later that day, Thor catches up with the Warriors Three, and points out that, given battles and time, the hammer's surface isn't exactly pure any more. He pointedly wonders who could forge an Uru hammer which was "too perfect."

pg26:1-31:2
In Nidvellir, the dwarfs and giants have formed an alliance and prepare to march on Asgard. Thor comes in and routs them, the Warriors Three behind. As a result, they release their Thor replicant, proving Thor's innocence, and the two fight.

pg31:3
As the real & fake Thors fight elsewhere, Odin feels the ground rumble.

pg31:4
"Midgard peasants desperately ask their wise men and holy fools, 'oh why does the very sky tremble".

pg32
Thor stands over his dead imitator.

Notes:
This appears to be set hundreds of years ago, before Odin prevented the Asgardians from travelling to Earth (at one point, he tells Balder to "go to Midgard and make sport with some mortal women") and allowed worship of them to die out. [The "Midgard bits" are in no way present-day]

No, the duplicate Thor isn't called a "replicant". He isn't given a name at all - the closest they come to saying what he is is when it says "I am of the race of dwarfs. I have been reared with one purpose. To be like Thor. And then to destroy him"). I just didn't want to use "clone", since it's not.

The fact that they're mostly wearing approximations of their current costumes (Thor, for instance, is wearing the jacket, belt, boots and - some of the time - the helmet of his current costume, but not the scalemail longjohns) is odd, but not inexplicable, I suppose.

Similarly, Karnilla being part of the party that goes to arrest Thor is bizarre, but... on the page.

Oh, and the big twist is undermined by the artists drawing both the real and fake Mjolnirs with the same sort of cracks & weathering.
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