What an epic debut!! I barely know where to begin! Both the art and storytelling here were brilliant and captured the old-school Asgardian stories in a way not seen since Fraction’s Thor mini series, while integrating modern long-form storytelling into the narrative as well.
Simply put: this book read like a reintroduction to those classic elements of a Thor of Journey into Mystery title before JMS grounded Asgard to earth. Believe me, I was and am a huge fan of everything JMS did with the character and the Thor mythos at large, but this title alone proved to me that returning the order of the nine realms was the right move. The storytelling possibilities of returning the realms to their former place begin to be explored here and the promise of stories to come in this lush storytelling landscape felt incredibly exciting as I read this perfectly paced issue.
Interestingly then that, flipping through the book again I see that the bulk of the book was squarely focused upon the character of Loki and exactly how he fits into this landscape. Indeed, Gillen pulls off the truly difficult task of introducing this sandbox he’ll be exploring almost entirely through rich character development. Handling this type of set-up issue through tightly constructed character drama, and lushly drawn realms of fantastical worlds—with particularly fantastic coloring I must say—these tasks coming together as well as they do in this issue is no small feat. It’s clear to me that both Gillen and Braithwaite GET the Thor universe and that the promise of Gillen’s earlier Thor work appears as though it may now be fully realized. By itself this issue is a fantastic construction; if it can live up to its promise going forward?? We’re in for some damn fine Thor stories. A fantastic debut issue by any standards but a perfect debut for this Thor fan.