Thor #133

Featuring: Thor
Release: August 2, 1966
Cover: October 1966
12 cents
Star-studded script: Stan Lee
Planet-pounding pencilling: Jack Kirby
Real Rigellian rendering: Vince Colletta
Lots of little lettering: Artie Simek
16 pages

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Every part of this planet upon which we stand is verily a part of Ego! He is everywhere– he is everything! He is a living world!

I’d like to say I own this comic, but really I own some fraction of this comic, as a lot of pages have been ripped out of my copy. I’m sure I didn’t know that when I bought it. I’m not too picky about condition. I look for “readable” copies… but readable includes having all the pages.

Wonder what I paid for it. I have no idea because I have tens of thousands of these things. Not even sure where I bought it. Probably at some comic convention with a couple hundred other comics I thought would help me complete the Marvel Universe so that one day I could read through all of them in order. Presumably it was pretty cheap– that’s what I was always looking for.

I spoke at length about how cool I thought it was when Ditko introduced a being that was also a universe. So of course I also think it’s cool when Kirby introduces a being who is also a planet. Not as cool as being a universe, of course. But still cool.

Thor is also impressed, and you figure this is a guy who’s been around and seen some stuff. He says that the planet developed a face right in front of them and then they heard it speak.

Now, even if a planet could speak, there’s presumably no way it could transmit that voice across space. Unless the substance of this Black Galaxy is really different from our universe. Or unless the planet is broadcasting its speech through some other means than sound, some form of transverse wave.

Reminder of where we are. Tana Nile has conquered Earth via a Space Lock. The Space Lock was controlled from Rigel, so Thor went there to free Earth. The Rigellians agreed to free Earth if Thor dealt with the menace of the Black Galaxy. So here is Thor, accompanied by a Recorder, confronting Ego, the living planet.

So now we get something cool and unique in our reading: a two-page spread. A single image that takes two pages.

The effect is somewhat lessened by breaking up the image into two parts. I did my best to cut them out and align them here. They don’t align perfectly. Perhaps a bit of connecting art is missing.

While unique in 60s Marvel reading, Marvel was generally more experimental with its page layouts back in the 1940s, as we saw in this classic Captain America story.

Ego fashions a face for himself to resemble other beings, and reshapes the environs of his world to be familiar to Thor– a New Asgard, even creating an avatar of himself in human form for Thor to interact with. But we must remember, Ego is not that humanoid being, but the entire planet.

Interlude. Jane has made her way to Europe under Tana Nile’s command. She has made friends with her travel companion Porgia. They are joined by Tagar, who insists that Jane must join them, for they need a teacher. It’s all a bit mysterious and we’ll learn more next issue.

Tagar refers to someone called “The High Evolutionary”. Not sure what that’s about.

Ego creates what he calls an Anti-Body, based on an analysis of Thor. He will make billions of copies of this Anti-Body to spread throughout our universe.

Interesting to note that Thor asserts he understands all about medicine that Donald Blake does. He knows what Blake knows and Blake knows what he knows. They really are the same person. But they weren’t once. Not before Blake found that cane.

Ego keeps bragging about having the power of a planet, but Thor notes that Odin has the power of a galaxy. And as any fan of Rock-Paper-Scissors knows, galaxy beats planet.

I appreciate the scene of the Recorder recharging. Makes him seem very cosmic.

I have recorded all that has come to pass! Now I must recharge my power circuits! Let the humanoid and the immortal stand back! Never have events of such scope, such import been preserved for future study! Never has a Recorder witnessed wonderment the equal of this!

Can Thor survive an onslaught of these Anti-Bodies? Of course. Thor is Thor. Here’s a cool splash page.

Often I question what Stan’s humorous narration really adds to such dramatic pages. But I am amused by his comment that no cameras have ever been beneath Ego’s surface, and so Kirby had to draw everything from memory.

Note this image. In the years to come, we’ll see many depictions of a hero fighting a dense horde of foes that will recall it.

I’d like to tell you what happens next, but the centerfold of my comic is missing. Fortunately, I have the internet.

Ah, yes. As expected, Thor defeats all comers.

And then we switch to Tana Nile, who gets the bad news that she no longer rules Earth, and must return to Rigel.

Then a tender moment where Thor risks all to save the Recorder, though the Recorder is but a machine.

And then story falls apart. We are 15 pages into a 16 page comic. 15 truly excellent pages. Ego has created these beings to fight Thor, but not defeated him. But Ego hasn’t even begun to unleash his true power. His constant boasts are spot on. How do you defeat an entire planet?

Presumably, we will turn the page and see a cliffhanger. Thor’s bravado against impossible odds.

Unfortunately, we will not.

While page 15 ended with the story no closer to resolution, it does resolve on the final page.

Which is very sad.

I’m sure it wasn’t meant to. I’m sure Kirby intended something else. But whatever was intended wasn’t what happened. I was really loving this comic, but hate that ending. (Ask me how I feel about the theatrical cut of Blade Runner sometime.)

In fact, looking at the art alone, I can’t even tell Thor won they day. Just that he and the Recorder escaped. It’s the dialogue which tells us Thor unleashed some powerful god magic, and Ego surrendered, vowing to seal off the Black Galaxy and never again menace our world.

What the what?

Maybe it comes down to that galaxy-beats-planet idea. But really, it seems to have come down to a bit of poetry on Thor’s part.

In the name of the mighty Odin–
By the fury of the thunder–
Let the winds which fill the cosmos–
Tear this evil world asunder!!

Let the lightning and the gale–
Pierce this planet to the core–
Let the storm now humble Ego–
Thus commands the mighty Thor!!

Good poetry from Stan, but surely not the ending Kirby intended. Surely, Kirby did not intend an ending here at all.

Anyways, I’m displeased.

In some sense, it’s the opposite problem I had with the early Thor stories. I’m glad Thor is fighting an opponent worthy of his power. But just like I thought the Cobra shouldn’t have given Thor any difficulty, I feel like Ego should not have been beaten so easily. Respect the villain’s power levels.

I’ve used the phrase “Thor is Thor” a couple times in recent issues, when Thor was fighting Ego’s anti-bodies or the Rigellians. And I think that’s a fair answer to how he wins most fights.

But Ego is Ego.

Have some respect.

Steve Ditko has recently left Marvel over his working relationship with Stan, following the footsteps of Wally Wood and Joe Orlando. Kirby is well aware of this, and likely becoming increasingly aware of the creative differences he has with Stan Lee, which lead to endings like this.

At least whoever destroyed this comic saved me the letters page.

To be clear, by “destroyed this comic”, I’m referring to the person who tore the pages out of mine, not to Stan Lee.

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Of course, Ego made his movie debut in Guardians of the Galaxy vol. 2. As in the comic, he was an entire world, but created a humanoid form to better interact with humans.

This humanoid form was played by Kurt Russell.

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The idea of a living planet is one I love. Of course, our world is quite alive. I mean the idea of a world with a mind.

In some sense, it’s a very old idea. For example, Gaia is the mythological personification of the Earth.

This feels different than those old myths, as it’s more of a science fiction concept. There are mountains of science fiction literature I have not read, but I am not aware of any real science fiction referents of the concept of a living planet.

If you know of any, I’d love to hear them. I’ve seen similar ideas in the decades since. I’ll name a few, with a warning that this can all be slightly spoilery.

In a classic Green Lantern story by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons, we meet Mogo, a member of the Green Lantern Corps, who never seems to socialize.

A favorite example is from Ken MacLeod’s Engines of Light trilogy of novels. The idea there is that our bodies and minds aren’t one thing, but a sum of tiny cells and neurons, each doing their own thing, that come together harmoniously to seem to us like a singular mind. Similarly an ecoystem consists of little creatures and plants each doing their own thing for their own reasons, but together form a greater whole. The novels imagine little microscopic life that might gather on an asteroid over eons, that collectively make a unit, with each microscopic organism not so different from a cell to us, until an asteroid becomes a being. Could a group of asteroids then be a being? And by that logic, could a world consisting of lots of little creatures and plants and bacteria crawling all over it not evolve into a singular being, something not unlike a consciousness.

A human in the novel describing the intelligences he found within an asteroid:

They are like the microorganisms that produce the calcareous mats which build up to stromatolites. Except that what they build are not stacks of stone, but something between a larger organism and a computer, to put it crudely. To put it delicately, they build quasi-organic mechanisms of incredible beauty and diversity. The basic unit, the builder, is something like an extremophile nanobacterium. Obviously these are not the seats of consciousness, any more than our neurones are. Collectively, though, they build something greater than themselves.

Ken MacLeod, Cosmonaut Keep

N.K. Jemisin’s award-winning Broken Earth novels touch on similar ideas. It’s a world which may be another world, or perhaps our own world after a breaking. They speak of Evil Earth, as though the world has a will, and that will is angry with the people, and set against them via earthquakes and volcanoes.

Rating: ★★★★☆, 70/100
Significance: ★★★★☆

Has to lose points for weak ending, despite an excellent first 15 pages.

Well, also loses points for the missing center pages. Pages 1-12 and 15 were great.

Nonetheless, this remains one of the Best We’ve Read, displacing Avengers #15, the great final battle between Captain America and Zemo, in which Bucky’s death is avenged, as part of the battle between the Avengers and Masters of Evil that leads to the dissolution of the original team.

Characters:

• Thor
• Recorder
• Ego
• Mr. Porgia
• Jane Foster
• Tagar
• Tana Nile/Empress Tana the First

Story notes:

• Recorder activates Derma-Circuits for maximum and continuous operation; his entire body will accurately record whatever transpires.
• “It is truly a world which is not a world– existing in a time which is more than time…!”
• Ego exists not in the physical universe, but a fluid Bio-verse.
• A vortex of rapidly regrouping bio-versal molecules creates more familiar terrains from the memories within Thor’s brain.
• Ego creates human form and horses to take them to New Asgard.
• “It is not for me to say! I may only observe– and record!”
• Ego has been confined in Black Galaxy for millenniums. He seeks to escape and conquer all space.
• Jane and friend from plane dine in mountain village in Europe.
• Porgia and Tagar have been seeking a person possessing courage, enthusiasm, and dedication. They have selected Jane.
• Tagar tells Jane they seek a teacher, and they are on the threshold of solving the secret of life itself.
• Tagar swears by “the genetic table of the High Evolutionary”.
• Ego has been testing his power by destroying Colonizer ships, but awaited one more powerful, such as Thor.
• If puny human form can defeat Thor, then Ego can send out copies of human-self to conquer universe while his true planet-self remains in the Black Galaxy.
• Ego creates humanoid form of life out of anti-body organism using Thor as a molecular model. Because Thor’s human form is the learned Dr. Blake, he comprehends Ego’s science.
• “The son of Odin shall ever be a stranger to feckless surrender!”
• Thor and Recorder enter interior of planet through skin pore. Anti-bodies will repel foreign bodies like they were germs.
• “Observation: It shall take more than platitudes to stem this deadly tide!”
• Tana Nile requests increase in speed of Space Lock from Command Planet; her request is denied, as Grand Commissioner has ordered Earth be freed of the Space Lock.
• Tana Nile ordered to end colonization and return to Rigel.
• Thor causes elements to combine in universe-shaking thermo-blast.
• Ego humiliated by defeat and seals off bio-verse from any known universe.
• “I shall be a world apart– till eternity crumbles!” — Ego
• Thor and Recorder return to Rigel.

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