The Mortal Thor has been holding it down as one of Marvel’s best series since it began. It spun out of The Immortal Thor, dealing with the aftermath of Thor’s death. The biggest strength of both The Immortal Thor and The Mortal Thor is how mythological it all seems. Writer Al Ewing is leaning into Norse mythology heavily for these two series, and brings back a character we haven’t seen in a little bit: Odin. Odin, in both the comics and the Marvel Cinematic Universe, is one of the most powerful beings in the universe. The lord of Asgard has always played a complicated game with his kingdom, and his return is a part of that.
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Odin is in his one of the phases of his life where he’s “dead”. He was “killed” and went to Valhalla, hanging out with the honored dead and drinking. He’s shown up in a lot of Asgard-centric comics lately, including Ewing’s The Immortal Thor, giving his sage advice while staying in the hall of the dead. However, The Mortal Thor #4 saw the All-Father return to speak with Loki, which leads to their confrontation in the new issue. Odin reveals how and why he was able to leave Valhalla, finally taking what seems to his ultimate form.
The All-Father Becomes the Wanderer
Odin has died numerous times in the past, as have basically all of the Norse gods of Earth-616 at some time or another. There have been numerous powerful versions of Odin, just like there have been many different versions of Thor, but there’s one thing that The Mortal Thor #5 really drives home about the All-Father: that he chooses to follow the rules that he set for everyone else. When the latest incarnation of Loki asks Odin how he left Valhalla, the one-eyed skyfather told the God of Stories that he had walked out. He was the one who built Valhalla after all. It was he who knew the secrets. He walked out of his creation, leaving the cycle he had been on for millennia, but there would be a price to pay.
Walking out of Valhalla meant that Odin walked out of the Norse system, for a lack of a better term. He’s no longer the All-Father; in fact, he can now never be the All-father again. He’s now Odin the Wanderer. This puts him in a very advantageous position. One of the interesting things about the conversation between Loki and Odin is that drives home that the lord of the Norse pantheon is the one with all of the power and knowledge. He created the rules, and he presided over it all. He was the heart of the whole thing.
Now, though, he’s decided that he’s going to wander the realms, with all of that power and all of knowledge. While he swears off the throne and decides not to meddle in the affairs of his children (by meddling, obviously, because this is Odin we’re talking about here; his love language is meddling), Loki knows that his adopted father is playing the old rigmarole. Odin is free to do whatever he wants and you can be sure he’s going to play an important role in the affairs of his children and realm in the months to come.
The Mortal Thor #5 is on sale now.
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Image courtesy of Marvel Studios
