Thor: The Worthy #1: Thunderstruck

We open with a Beta Ray Bill story of sorts that centers more on his (at the time) lady friend, Sif! When Bill is struck down by a murderous rock Sif peers back in time and realizes it’s actually a troll Thor taunted to death when he was a kid or something. The troll is eventually defeated sort of and Odin reveals he’s known about the troll/murder rock all along and has been doing it to spite him or something. Pretty on brand for Odin honestly. The art by Mike Henderson with the legendary Sal Buscema on inks (inker for papa Walt himself in fact) is very good throughout and I love the sundress Odin appears to be wearing. Also noteworthy is the excellent lettering work of John Workman. If you like this story there is a recently released omnibus of Simonson Thor or better yet his current Ragnarok series (currently midway through its third arc) is quite good as well.

Secondly we get a Tom Defalco and Ron Frenz (Thor Corps baby!) Thunderstrike story. I’m gonna go ahead and call this “smart Thunderstrike (STS)” as our friend Eric Masterson talks less like a ninja turtle than usual as he takes on the Grey Gargoyle with the help of Code Blue, a painfully 90s elite swat team designed to take down supervillains. The action unfolds amidst grief at the death of a member of Code Blue due to a failure on STS’s part. In a Superman Returns esque finale Masterson reveals his real value is the ability to lift heavy things whilst dealing with his feelings and just like that the story is over. All in all I thought this vignette was fun for what it was and it definitely hit that 1994 vibe decently despite STS’s IQ bump. Apparently they recently released a Thor Corps TPB and that series is a lot of fun when the various Thors team up to fight Zarkko the Tomorrow Man.

Next we get a story by Kathryn Immonen and Tom Reilly where Lady Sif and Jane Foster Thor thwart a robbery in Asgard during the Congress of realms, early in the war of the Realms Asgard held an open invite to any who wished to send representatives to discuss what to do about Malekith, obviously we saw how that all turned out last May. I thought this was a solid story that dealt a bit more with Sif than Thor but had some good moments including one panel that has quickly gone viral for referencing Marvel vs DC vis a vis Superman and Wonder Woman proving themselves worthy. It was cool seeing Sif so much as she hasn’t been around as much lately and I’m always down for a Jane Foster story. I believe there are collected versions of Sif’s Journey into Mystery series which is really good as well.

I consider this issue to be well worth the cover price for all new material from classic creative teams.