Thor has been on a team-up kick as of late. He recently had a crossover with Hulk. Now he is teaming up with Venom to deal with another Godly threat in the form of Darkoth, the Death-Demon, who was taken over by a new symbiote along with getting the Devil’s Hammer. This latest development appears to be part of the greater storyline going on around Thor’s future vision that included Thanos using a symbiote and Infinite Stone-powered Mjolnir. Let’s find out how this all goes with Thor #28.
CREATIVE TEAM
Plot: Al Ewing and Donny Cates
Script Writer: Al Ewing
Artist: Salvador Larroca
Colorist: Edgar Delgado
SYNOPSIS
Underneath Asgard, Loki’s venomous snake continues to torture Donald Blake for all his crimes.
Elsewhere while fighting Darkoth Thor is stunned to find that Od’s blood is coming out of Mjolnir. Seeing that Darkoth is overpowering all of them Thor and Venom fuse together to defeat Darkoth.
Venom absorbs the symbiote controlling Darkoth. Venom then picks up the Devil’s Hammer and reveals that they are the Eddie Brock from the future who has long gone by the name of Meridius.
Meridius states he knows the future Thor has seen in his vision and Thor’s ultimate fate. Meridius then attacks Thor after telling him to let him go free.
Pissed off by this Thor decides to show Meridius why he as the All-Father of Asgard is the King of Gods. Thor then uses his own power without using Mjolnir to completely annihilate Meridius and destroy the Devil’s Hammer in the process.
As the symbiote Darkoth was using disappears into the ground Loki wonders where it could’ve gone.
Deep underground the symbiote lands on Donald Blake’s eyes where Loki’s snake was dropping its venom. This transforms Donald Blake into a snake-looking symbiote user. End of issue.
REVIEW
The “Venom Of Asgard” is a story arc that has felt disconnected from everything else going on because of how random the story was told. That was what the previous issue felt like and Thor #28 continued that trend. Even the connections to previous story arcs did not help the overall story told.
The biggest problem with everything that went down is that there is half the story that felt untold. Specifically, I felt completely lost with the whole story about Meridius being a version of Eddie Brock from the future as an evolved form of his current Venom King In Black status quo. Whether that is a reference to current events in the Venom series or not, this had no impact at all. Even Meridius referencing Thor’s dark future vision felt forced to make the villain more dastardly.
What made the Meridius reveal worse is how it quickly makes Darkoth nothing more than a plot device. The character is not a villain or anything. Darkoth was simply a thing to get us to the Meridius reveal. And even in that reveal was all for three and a half pages worth of an appearance by Meridius. Meridius is completely decimated that he is even more of a non-factor than Darkoth was.
The only thing that the whole Meridius plot accomplished was an impressive showing of power by Thor. Thor defeating Meridius with his power alone is a strong reminder of how powerful he is. Its something that’s easy to forget given that we still see Thor using Mjolnir. But one of the big things with Thor’s character that has been emphasized in recent creative runs is how Mjolnir is more of a conduit to his power. Seeing that again as Thor shows why he is the King of Gods looked great in the way Salvador Larroca drew the impact of the attack.
With all that said the ending of Thor #28 was certainly noteworthy. Donald Blake now having the power of a symbiote along with his current powers was an unexpected surprise. This development makes Donald an even bigger wild card in whatever Donny Cates has planned.
As mentioned before, Larroca’s art was at its best when drawing the action. Thor’s display of power when defeating Meridius was an impressive sight. The same goes for the Venom Thor fusion’s appearance doing a great job combining the two characters. Though there were things that kept this issue back from having the same quality that you expect from Larroca. The character designs for Sif and Loki in particular made them look more like cosplayers than the actual characters themselves. There was just something off about the designs that they didn’t look like how they normally look.
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FINAL THOUGHTS
Thor #28 is a disappointing end to this crossover with Venom. Every development came across as forced and rushed just so the story would end in two issues. Hopefully we can quickly move past this stumble and back to what’s made Thor one of Marvel’s best titles.
Story Rating: 2 Night Girls out of 10
Art Rating: 6 Night Girls out of 10
Overall Rating: 4 Night Girls out of 10