The Mighty Thor vol. 3: The Asgard/Shi’ar War

A couple days ago I wrote about how “The Negative Zone War” over in “X-Men:  Gold” didn’t really live up to its title. Among its many problems was the fact that the war in its title didn’t really amount to a skirmish or two before the statue of a god came to life and started rampaging through a city.  Thankfully Jason Aaron and Russell Dauterman are on hand to show us how to properly stage a war in five issues with this latest volume of “The Mighty Thor.” You’ll just have to get over the opening speed bump first.

By that I mean the two-parter that kicks off this volume and has Aaron going back to one of his more fun ideas from earlier in his run.  Back in vol. 3, Thor teamed up with a group of characters from different parts of the Nine Realms to form the League of Realms in order to capture and bring Malekith to justice.  Their complete failure to do that aside, it was still fun to see Thor knock heads alongside the likes of a dandy pistol-wielding light elf, a dwarf with a love of explosives, a harsh-tempered troll, a frost giant, and a dark elf who… we’ll find out more about her in this volume.  This time around the team has roped in a wood wizard of Vanaheim, a new frost giant, Angela, Sif, and Roz Solomon Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. to save Alfheim, home of the Light Elves, and its queen from Malekith.

For most of these two issues it’s a fun adventure that has Aaron getting a lot of good material from applying his over-the-top sensibilities to this band of misfits who barely manage to tolerate each other in some cases.  However, if you thought that this was finally going to be the time that our heroes manage to achieve a win against Malekith, then you’re going to be very disappointed. I get that Aaron wants to build him up into the big bad of his run and to do that he has to keep winning.  The problem is that it feels like there’s no struggle attached to the Dark Elf’s ambitions and that he keeps winning because the plot demands it. All I can say is that when he finally does receive his comeuppance it had better be a lot more than Thor smacking him in the head and throwing him back in the pit from which he crawled out of.

There was one thing I found surprisingly enjoyable about this story:  the art from Steve Epting. He’s usually a great artist… when he’s sticking to grounded stories like those he told with Ed Brubaker in the first few volumes of their run on “Captain America” and especially “Velvet.”  When he tries to do crazy, epic superhero stuff, in the case of his “Fantastic Four” work with Jonathan Hickman, Epting’s groundedness tends to get in the way of the fun.  That’s not the case here as he’s sporting a looser style that accentuates his linework and plays better with the crazy stuff. It could also be down to the fact that the Alfheim he’s being asked to draw is a much darker and desolate place than usual, which certainly plays to his strengths, but his work here counts as a win simply because I enjoyed it when I wasn’t really expecting it to.

Getting into the war mentioned in the title, things kick off with a bang as Gladiator shows up on Asgard’s doorstep to beat down Heimdall and lead a Shi’Ar invasion force on the city.  Their goal: The capture of Thor so she can be brought before the Shi’Ar gods Sharra and K’Ythri. Why have they done this? Well, it turns out a certain Asgardian God of Mischief may have told them that there was one god who was beloved throughout the cosmos and the Shi’Ar gods got really pissy about it.  So they decided to arrange a Challenge of the Gods, with full approval from Omnipotence City, to determine who’s actually better at this whole “God” thing. As for the Asgardians, even though their current leader Cul Borson is glad to be rid of Thor, Sif manages to frame the Shi’Ar attack as something that needs to be answered for and the Asgard/Shi’Ar war is in full swing.

Much of Aaron’s run on “Thor” has been concerned with what gods mean to people.  This was most explicit with “The God Butcher” arc of the first two volumes and it’s stressed again here as Thor competes against Sharra and K’Ythri in challenges like “Cosmic Manipulation,” “Inspirational Infanticide,” and “Genesis” and “Apocalypse” rounds that involve rampaging giants and merciless plagues.  Aaron has made it clear before in his run (and elsewhere in his canon) that he doesn’t have much time for the Biblical definition of how a god should conduct itself and we get that reiterated here. In ways that are ridiculously grandiose, terrifying and sometimes both at the same time.

What I like about Aaron’s take about how a god should conduct itself is that it has largely been positive in its execution.  Sharra and K’Ythri are another in a long line of gods who conduct themselves unto their own whims and lord over their worshippers.  Thor, on the other hand, goes around actually answering other individuals prayers and whacking bad guys with her hammer. She even winds up losing most of the challenges to the Shi’Ar gods because she’s more concerned with saving lives than displaying her power.  This is Aaron’s ideal when it comes to godhood. As for the fact that the writer’s most positive take on this subject can only be found in the unrealistic world of superhero fantasy, I think that’s pretty telling on where his overall opinion on godhood lies.

With regard to the parts of the story that are actually concerned with war, they’re pretty epic and silly in only the way someone like Aaron would dare.  I say this because the Asgardians begin their war against the Shi’Ar by sailing out into space in wooden boats and unleashing a hail of arrows on the first ship they see.  This does lead to some great scenes, like the valkyrie Hildegarde ripping through attack drones and Gladiator going toe-to-toe with the Destroyer armor. All courtesy of Dauterman who turns in some truly stunning work here.  He’s able to capture the magnificent scale of this conflict, and that of the godhood challenges, remarkably well on the page. Even though Aaron does well with setting up the action, I don’t think I’d be able to call this a war without the excellent art from Dauterman.

Oh, and in case anyone was wondering if the Shi’Ar’s involvement meant that the Phoenix wouldn’t be far behind… then you’d be right.  The good news is that it allows for Aaron to bring back one of the best parts of his run on “Wolverine and the X-Men,” Quentin Quire. He gets to bring some welcome snark to the action late in the game and maybe even embrace his destiny along the way.  I’m not sure how that squares with the recent “Phoenix Resurrection” event that brought back adult Jean Grey, but it works really well here.

While Malekith’s scheming does drag this book down a bit, the title arc is definitely a high point in Aaron’s run on “Thor.”  Not only does he offer an appreciatively positive take on what a god should be, but he also backs it up with some crazy action and clever twists.  While the end of this volume heralds what’s likely the beginning of Jane Foster’s end as Thor, what’s here leaves me little reason to believe it won’t be a sendoff worthy of the character.