Incredible Hercules, v. 5: The Mighty Thorcules

Collects: Incredible Hercules #132-7 (2009)

Released: April 2010 (Marvel)

Format: 152 pages / color / $14.99 / ISBN: 9780785136774

What is this?: For the good of Asgard, Hercules is asked to impersonate the Mighty Thor; Amadeus Cho, seventh-smartest person on the planet, investigates the mystery of the town of Excello.

The culprits: Writers Greg Pak and Fred van Lente and art by Reilly Brown and Rodney Buchemi

When I started reading Incredible Hercules, Incredible Hercules, v. 5: The Mighty Thorcules was what I was expecting.

Mighty Thorcules is, first and foremost, funny. At times, it’s hilarious, as when Hercules mocks the origin story of Thor or gives Thor a purple nurple (complete with the sound effect “NURP” in purple letters) during their fight. But it also continues the story of boy genius Amadeus Cho, confronting the architects of his woes, coming to grips with his parents’ deaths, and trying to get answers about where his sister is. However, writers Greg Pak and Fred van Lente manage to leaven Cho’s emotional adventure with humor, and there is a serious side to Hercules’s impersonation of Thor.

The issues in Mighty Thorcules alternate between Hercules’s masquerade in Svartalfheim and Cho’s investigations in the soap-company town of Excello, Utah. Hercules’s story is far more enjoyable and lighthearted; with his father Zeus (reverted to a pre-teen appearance and without his memory) in tow and without the wise advice of Cho or Athena, Hercules moves through the plot with his usual straightforward, stupid, lusty verve. He shrugs off his father’s insults as best he can, despite how obvious it is that Zeus prefers the god Hercules impersonates. Zeus’s amnesia and disgust at Hercules’s “ingenious” plans — such as his answering the challenge of three-dimensional chess by simply knocking the board over, rather than actually trying to figure out the answer — allows the boy-god to serve as a comic foil for the Lion of Olympus.

I missed volumes 3 and 4 of Incredible Hercules, but it’s easy to understand the dramatic elements to this humorous story — Hercules’s battle for parental approval. Cho’s story suffers, however, from the lacuna; his quest is interrupted in my mind, and his character development is more dramatically affected. His final confrontation with Dupree and his coming to grips with his parents’ death are sapped of some of their emotional impact because I’ve missed some of the stories. Still, Pak and van Lente can’t be blamed for that, and I had no trouble following the story. The writers can only be concerned with the coherence of each individual story and the emotional impact of total story they have written.

To bring Cho’s story to a head, then, Pak and van Lente have to write the mental confrontation of Cho and Pythagoras Dupree, the six-smartest person in the world, in a way that isn’t dull, and they succeed. They also give artist Rodney Buchemi the opportunity to draw something more interesting than talking heads. Using a role-playing game as a way of expressing the confrontation between Cho and Dupree in the middle of Cho’s story was an excellent idea as well.

(One word about the Mastermind Excello RPG: I could not figure out what the mechanics are for dice rolls. Are you supposed to roll high? Low? Given the artwork, it could be a callback to the charming but confusing mechanics of 1st edition D&D, where the desirable outcome varied depending on the type of roll.)

Whoever is putting in the sound effects for the battle between Hercules and Thor — most likely either van Lente and Pak or letterer Simon Bowland — obviously was having a lot of fun. Besides the purple “NURP” when Herc gives Thor a double tittie twister, Thor’s boot to Herc’s groin is labeled with the sound “NUHHKRACK,” and his follow-up wedgie is labeled “HWWWWEDGIE.” Other sound effects include “SHOKKAKAAAAAN” (thunder); “WHATTAMANNNN,” “THORRRRULZ,” and “BACKATCHA” (Thor’s punches); and “SUKKKAPUNCH,” “GODDATHUNDAAA,” and “GOTCHAGAAAIN” (Hercules’s). The battle is ended when Zeus dispatches Malekith’s minion with a resounding “MALEKRUNCH.”

Each storyline has its own artist. Herc’s story is penciled by Reilly Brown, and I have to say I love his art. Brown is great with comedy; his characters are expressive, with the humorous story allowing each character broad reactions to the situation. His style is clean and extremely attractive — I’ll admit, it’s exactly the comic art style I have a great fondness for. His fight scenes are clear, and the battle between Thor and Hercules is outstanding: he manages to balance the humor with the power the two combatants throw at one another. Buchemi is also very good, and his style, although obviously different from Brown’s, goes well with his fellow artist’s. Buchemi gets the better design challenges, with the bifurcated nature of Dr. Japanazi and his servants and the Boltzmann brains, and he makes them very memorable. The RPG materials he draws also look like old RPGS (mostly by aping 1st edition D&D, as I mentioned), and there are occasional nice details I didn’t pick up on the first time I read Mighty Thorcules (the “0” and “1” on the different halves of Dr. Japanazi’s skull, the dead member of the Junior Genius Brigade from the RPG adventure lying outside Dupree’s real lair). I didn’t like his work as well as Brown’s, however; his art seems less consistent than Brown’s, and when he draws Cho and Dupree as young children, they look roughly the same (other than glasses and a slight difference in hairstyle) despite their different ethnicities.

Mighty Thorcules is an outstanding book, and not only is it worth reading, it was worth reading the first two volumes of Incredible Hercules to get to it. (And now I’m going to have to track down Love and War and Dark Reign; I’m eager to read v. 6, Assault on New Olympus, which was set up in Thorcules by promising a scuffle between Spider-Man and Hercules over Herc’s ex-wife, Hebe.) Mighty Thorcules is even a great value — six issues for $14.99 is a good deal at Marvel these days.

I find it hard to recommend Mighty Thorcules enough.

Rating: (4.5 of 5)

Thor Visionaries: Walter Simonson, v. 1

Collects: Thor #337-48 (1983-4)

Released: May 2001, as Thor Legends, v. 1: Walt Simonson; with current title, December 2008 (Marvel)

Format: 288 pages / color / $29.99 / ISBN: 9780785131892

What is this?: The mythological hero Thor deals with the noble alien Beta Ray Bill, the evil faerie Malekith, the dragon Fafnir, and the temptress Lorelei.

The culprit: Walter Simonson

There are some things comic book readers argue about constantly, and some things are taken as an article of the faith. That Walter Simonson’s run on Thor is one of the title’s few claims to greatness belongs to the latter group. But can we see that greatness in the beginning of the run, as collected in Thor Visionaries: Walter Simonson, v. 1?

First of all, let’s start with the high point: This book has the first appearance of Beta Ray Bill, the noble alien whose spirit is transplanted into an engineered / cyborg body to protect the rest of his race, who have been loaded onto sleeper ships on their way to a new planet. He gets in a fight with Thor — of course — and during the fight picks up Thor’s hammer, which only the worthy can do. Bill is probably the greatest thing to come out of Thor post-Kirby, a reflection of Thor’s dichotomy of mythology and space / cosmic adventures. Bill starts in the latter, but Simonson brings him into the former effortlessly. An impressive accomplishment, and one that helps show why Bill has remained a favorite part of the Marvel Universe for so many.

He’s not the only impressive creation Simonson came up with in v. 1; there’s also Malekith the Accursed, who, if nothing else, has a striking visual. It’s he and the other villains that give Simonson the most room for creativity. He draws and writes an excellent, if somewhat restrained, Loki; his Lorelei looks like the temptress she is. But I’m not sold on Fafnir, who is a dangerously dull for a dragon, or v. 1’s hidden villain, a flaming giant who looks laughable rather than frightening when he’s finally revealed.

It says something about the character of Thor that in what is hailed as the title’s best run, the main character shares the title with a large supporting cast. A large part of v. 1 deals with Baldur coping with his post-traumatic death disorder and Sif wondering what her part in the mythos is now; the villains get a lot of time to plot and scheme, and Simonson isn’t afraid to shunt Thor to the side and give the guardians of the Cask of Ancient Winters center stage for a couple of issues. Thor spends a couple of issues with his mind altered. I think this crystallizes my feelings about v. 1: it’s a large mythological tale without a real center — or perhaps with a big, bland, blond center who is more impressive when he’s off stage.

I can’t help feeling Simonson might have been better off creating his own mythological tales without the baggage of the Marvel Universe tied to his work. In many ways, Simonson’s Thor has a lot in common with Mike Mignola’s Hellboy: mythology heavy, lots of neat-looking monsters, with an ensemble cast, dealing with world-ending threats. But while Mignola’s Hellboy is a strong character, Simonson’s Thor isn’t, even if he gets a new civilian identity.

That’s really the problem, and there’s not a lot Simonson can do about it. He gives Thor small flares of personality when he feels abandoned by his father or when he fights over his hammer (in a spectacularly stupid plot point). But Simonson doesn’t really follow up on that, even though Thor has more than enough daddy issues to keep a series going. Thor doesn’t have a romantic life; he has some interest in Lorelei, but it’s impossible to tell how much. Thor’s character seems based on respect of other heroes. So Simonson has to turn to his supporting cast to keep interest high. It’s a lot like making cauliflower soup; you have to add a lot of other stuff to make it interesting, and after you add enough spices, meat, flavored broths, and salt, it isn’t cauliflower soup any more, and you wonder why you even thought cauliflower soup was a good idea in the first place.

And I will never ask for cauliflower soup, no matter how little it tastes like cauliflower. Even if it’s Asgardian cauliflower, and it’s dressed in a Kirby helmet.

Rating: (2 of 5)