Classic Review: Marvel Masterworks- The Mighty Thor Vol. 6

Quick Summary

Pros: The opening and closing chapters are exciting and depict some great battles. The artwork still captures the excitement of the book’s action scenes.

Cons: Most of the volume is not that exciting and feels pretty generic. The theme, upon which most of the volume is based, is very poorly handled. The “Tales of Asgard” feature drags in too many places and its conclusion is disappointing.

Overall: This volume sees a change for the worse in the Thor series. Though there are a few decent stories and chapters within this book, the majority of it ranges from lackluster to downright unappealing. Instead, the bulk of this collection depicts stories that often fail to truly generate excitement and are centered around an uninteresting premise. Readers already enjoying this series may find portions of this book to be passable but other readers should probably look elsewhere for good Thor stories from this era.

Story

The Mighty Thor Vol. 6, by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, is a disappointment, especially after the wild success of the previous three volumes. The bulk of this collection tells stories that are nowhere near as exciting or creative as the adventures that have preceded them. Even the justification behind these stories is weak and makes their climax feel pointless, rather than meaningful. The volume opens and closes with a few quality chapters but these only manage to prevent the volume from being a complete failure, rather than turning it into worth reading. In the end, this is an unfortunate turn for this series that I hope it will recover sooner rather than later.

(spoilers start here)

The Mighty Thor Vol. 6 starts out alright, with a few opening chapters that depict the cosmic-level battles that fans have been seeing over the past few volumes. These chapters have the drama and intense action that make Thor such an interesting character and are just plain old fun to read.

However, at this point, the narrative takes a turn for the weird. Odin gets mad at Thor for some perceived slight and takes away his powers. In an even stranger turn, this leads to Thor joining the circus and being manipulated by the circus owner, who is secretly a criminal. Even after this arc concludes, watching Thor flounder around without powers, at the beginning of the next arc, doesn’t make for the most entertaining read. This entire period of time is so strange and so noticeably less interesting than the adventures seen in previous volumes that it feels like the series has taken a dramatic turn for the worse. 

Even the payoff from this time is a disappointment. When Odin gives Thor his powers back, he explains it as an attempt to teach Thor a lesson about humility. However, by failing to truly establish Thor’s lack of humility or show him engaged in any sort of serious transgression, it completely takes away any meaning that this story arc could have had.

It also doesn’t help that the “Tales of Asgard” feature, running alongside this portion of the volume, also drops in quality. This feature essentially depicts Thor and the Warriors Three’s fight against a villain. However, the arc is drawn out in a way that makes it feel boring when it shouldn’t. In addition, the conclusion comes about so suddenly and with such little fanfare that it ends up being a big disappointment.

Luckily, The Mighty Thor Vol. 6 recovers slightly as it enters its final few chapters. These have Thor nearly die at the hands of an enemy, only to be saved when Lady Sif enters the body of the Destroyer and rescues him. However, being in the body of the Destroyer corrupts Sif’s actions and forces her to fight Thor. The entire ordeal is tense, is centered around an intriguing premise, and has stakes that feel real. It gives Thor’s victory and his reunion with his friends some meaning and allows the volume to close with a quality level that longtime readers of this series will be familiar with.

(spoilers end here)

Art

The artwork in The Mighty Thor Vol. 6, once again, sees some great visuals from Jack Kirby. His work here makes the battles feel as intense as they should and even improves the appeal of the book in a few places. In addition, the few glimpses at Asgard and its inhabitants prove to be very worthwhile.

However, I can’t help but admit that I was a bit disappointed with the change in visuals going from the previous volume into this one. The previous collections depicted wondrous and creatively designed worlds upon which Thor would adventure. This one only gives readers a few pages that display similar levels of creativity. This change mostly comes from the story’s change in setting but there are still a few places where more creative designs could have been used but were not. The artwork in The Mighty Thor Vol. 6 still looks good but is not quite as appealing as it was before.

Continuity

Marvel Masterworks: The Mighty Thor Vol. 6 continues the story from Marvel Masterworks: The Mighty Thor Vol. 5 (Review).

The story here continues in Marvel Masterworks: The Mighty Thor Vol. 7 (Review).

This volume also makes references to other comic books, detailed below:

• The Super-Skrull was introduced back in Fantastic Four #18, collected in Marvel Masterworks: Fantastic Four Vol. 2 (Review).