The Mighty Thor: I, Whom the Gods Would Destroy

– a Marvel Graphic Novel

By Jim Shooter, James Owsley, Paul Ryan & Vince Colletta (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-87135-268-0

When it was released in 1987, I, Whom the Gods Would Destroy offered a decidedly different take on the bombastic fantasy-hero – which perhaps explains why it has unfairly languished in obscurity ever since…

The plot itself is delightfully simple and fiendishly clever: Thor is an immortal of Asgard with all the responsibilities of a warrior prince and champion of justice. Moreover, he can transform at will into mere mortal iteration Don Blake – a crippled surgeon who revels in the minutiae of humanity, regularly and literally holding people’s lives in his hands…

After Blake loses a patient on the operating table he suffers a debilitating crisis of conscience and begins to question his own Divine right to and manner of existence.

Rebuffing the dutiful pleadings of his betrothed, beloved Lady Sif, he goes thoroughly off the rails, decrying the callous, patronising disregard the gods show to mortals.

After a tawdry fling with a girl in a bar Blake decides to abandon his immortal identity intending to live and die as a man, but the ever-present dangers of city-life soon compel him to become the crime-busting saviour-hero once more. Now, however this heroic role is dull and unappetising to him. He attempts to end his undying life…

Traumatised beyond endurance Blake tries to prove the myriad attractions of raw humanity to celestial Sif, but she cannot understand his fascination and rejects the world of mortals. Not even for him can she embrace or understand mankind…

An emotional Rubicon is confronted and crossed when Blake is once more called to operate on a dying patient. This time it’s a child and if he can’t save her, nobody can…

This compelling drama takes the most macho, two-fisted action-hero of the Marvel Universe and puts him through emotional hell in a tale with no villains where strength is irrelevant and compassion is the only weapon…

I can’t recall when Marvel last published an all-original graphic novel as opposed to a collection of previously printed material, but once they were the market leader with an entire range of “big new stories” told on larger than normal pages (285 x 220mm rather than the comic-sized standard 258 x 168mm of today’s books), featuring not only proprietary characters in out-of-the-ordinary adventures but also licensed assets like Conan, creator-owned properties like Alien Legion and new character debuts.

Nonetheless, their ambitious dalliance with the form in the 1980s and 1990s produced some classy results that the company has seldom come close to repeating since. Whether original concepts, licensed projects or their own properties, that run generated a lot of superb or at least different stories that still stand out today – or would if they were actually in print.

Released in 1987, I, Whom the Gods Would Destroy was conceived by Jim Shooter, written by James Owsley and illustrated by Paul Ryan & Vince Colletta; fitting comfortably into the tightly policed continuity of the mainstream Marvel Universe, just before Walt Simonson reinvigorated the title with issue #337 (for which see Mighty Thor: the Ballad of Beta Ray Bill).

A million miles from the usual Fights ‘n’ Tights, Mallets and Monsters monkey-shines, this thought-provoking, long-neglected tale takes Thor in a totally different direction that will similarly delight and surprise new readers and old fans. A cut above the average and well worth an open-eyed reappraisal, this is a Marvel Masterpiece well worth tracking down…
© 1987 Marvel Entertainment Group/Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.