{"id":5149,"date":"2010-03-25T20:51:56","date_gmt":"2010-03-26T00:51:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/?p=5149"},"modified":"2010-03-26T06:59:51","modified_gmt":"2010-03-26T10:59:51","slug":"well-my-arms-pretty-thor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/well-my-arms-pretty-thor","title":{"rendered":"Well, my arm’s pretty Thor"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’m having a not-so-good reaction to a tetanus shot I had on Tuesday at my annual physical. My arm & shoulder hurt like a mo’fo’, and I’ve got chills & exhaustion that comes and goes. I’m particularly wiped out in the evening, so I spent last night and this early evening reading Essential Thor, Vol. 1<\/a>\"\", a cheap b\/w reprint of the first batch of Thor comics.<\/p>\n

I don’t think I remember how hilariously bad these comics were. Sure, things got pretty insanely cosmic a few years into its run, but the first bunch of stories are just bizarre. It all starts with the wacky premise of an American doctor wandering through the Norwegian countryside. Oh, it’s not bizarre that a doctor goes traveling, but Dr. Blake is lame and walks with a cane<\/em>, so it’s a bit weird that he’d go meandering through a foreign countryside on his own. Lucky for him, he finds a cane that turns out to be the hammer of Thor, just in time for him to fight off an invasion of aliens from Saturn. It was 1962; that stuff happened.<\/p>\n

The collection is all kinds of awesome, even though Thor hasn’t quite started speaking in the mock-Shakespearean mode that Stan Lee would decide makes perfect sense for a Norse god’s speech. Oh, and it’s never quite clear as to whether Dr. Blake and Thor are two different people. If they’re not, then Blake doesn’t seem to have any recollection of, um, being Thor. The thunder god is treated just like any other super-hero with a secret identity. But that’s neither here nor there.<\/p>\n

One issue’s plot \u00e2\u20ac\u201d mobster wounded during getaway, henchmen kidnap Dr. Blake to fix him up \u00e2\u20ac\u201d gets recycled three issues later<\/em>. In another, mega-powerful shape-changing aliens invade earth and do puzzling things, like paint polka-dots on streets, to confuse mankind and leave us susceptible to invasion. But beyond the awful stories, there are some tremendous passages. At one point, Dr. Blake’s nurse Jane fantasizes about domestic life with Thor. This includes giving him a haircut for summer, ironing his cape, and \u00e2\u20ac\u201d I’m not making this up \u00e2\u20ac\u201d polishing his hammer<\/em>.<\/p>\n

My favorite moment so far, however, is from the subtly titled, “PRISONER OF THE REDS!” See, American scientists are suddenly defecting to the Soviets, and Dr. Blake suspects something is up. So he pretends to be developing a new biological warfare thing, and gets kidnapped. He goes into his lab to not really do anything and then<\/em> we see . . .<\/p>\n

A photographer reading a newspaper article about Blake’s supposed breakthrough! His thought balloon reads, “HMMMM… THIS DOCTOR BLAKE COULD BE ANOTHER USEFUL SCIENTIST FOR OUR CAUSE!”<\/p>\n

The caption above it?<\/p>\n

\"thor1.jpg\"<\/p>\n

That’s right: FINALLY, AFTER DAYS OF FAKE SCIENTIFIC EXPERIMENTATION…<\/p>\n

I’m starting to think Roy Lichtenstein was on to something.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’m having a not-so-good reaction to a tetanus shot I had on Tuesday at my annual physical. My arm & shoulder hurt like a mo’fo’, and I’ve got chills & exhaustion that comes and goes. I’m particularly wiped out in the evening, so I spent last night and this early evening reading Essential Thor, Vol. … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Well, my arm’s pretty Thor”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[26],"tags":[551,972,1001,1000],"class_list":["post-5149","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-comics","tag-jack-kirby","tag-roy-lichtenstein","tag-stan-lee","tag-thor"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4C7K-1l3","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":7405,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/podcast-the-show-must-go-on","url_meta":{"origin":5149,"position":0},"title":"Podcast: The Show Must Go On","author":"Gil","date":"October 26, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Virtual Memories \u2013 season 3 episode 24 - The Show Must Go On \"We have to decide what sort of comics industry we want before we decide what sort of books we're going to work on.\" Roger Langridge\u00a0has\u00a0become the best all-ages cartoonist in the business, despite (or because of) starting\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Comic books & strips"","block_context":{"text":"Comic books & strips","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/literature\/comics"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"http:\/\/ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com\/e\/ir?t=voyantpublishing&l=as2&o=1&a=1560972955","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2147,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/unrequired-reading-july-25-2008","url_meta":{"origin":5149,"position":1},"title":"Unrequired Reading: July 25, 2008","author":"Gil","date":"July 25, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"That's the sound of the men, working on the link gang. . . I wasn't sure if this qualifies for another installment of F*** You, You Whining F***, because I think she's actually right. Still, a 20-year-old complaining that \"I'm leaving the NYC literary scene for Paris\" borders on Whining\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "literature"","block_context":{"text":"literature","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/literature"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5748,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/unrequired-reading-november-19-2010","url_meta":{"origin":5149,"position":2},"title":"Unrequired Reading: November 19, 2010","author":"Gil","date":"November 19, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"I didn't get a chance to check in on my Google Reader while I was in New Orleans this week, so when I got home last night, I discovered that there were 4,082 items stacked up and waiting for me. Here are some of them. Once again, Montaigne was the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Comic books & strips"","block_context":{"text":"Comic books & strips","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/literature\/comics"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7003,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/podcast-visible-cities","url_meta":{"origin":5149,"position":3},"title":"Podcast: Visible Cities","author":"Gil","date":"April 15, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Virtual Memories - season 3 episode 8 - Visible Cities \"My impulse is to break the windows of Starbucks, but I'd get arrested if I did that, so I make comics about people breaking the windows of Starbucks.\" Cartoonist and MacArthur Foundation \"Genius\" Fellowship winner Ben Katchor joins us for\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Architecture"","block_context":{"text":"Architecture","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/architecture"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"http:\/\/www.assoc-amazon.com\/e\/ir?t=voyantpublishing&l=as2&o=1&a=0307906906","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5462,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/movie-review-tuesday-steroids-ivies-and-comics","url_meta":{"origin":5149,"position":4},"title":"Movie Review Tuesday: Steroids, Ivies and Comics","author":"Gil","date":"July 27, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Time for another installment of movie reviews! All documentaries this week! Bigger, Faster, Stronger: This is a documentary about the use of performance-enhancing drugs by athletes in America (well, North America, since Ben Johnson\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s 1988 Olympics disqualification gets some play). The documentarian, Chris Bell, is a young man whose brothers\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Comic books & strips"","block_context":{"text":"Comic books & strips","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/literature\/comics"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":370,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm","url_meta":{"origin":5149,"position":5},"title":"Riding SuzukiIchiro Suzuki, the right\u2026","author":"Gil","date":"September 5, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Riding SuzukiIchiro Suzuki, the right fielder for the Seattle Mariners, is chasing the record for most hits in a season for a major league player (257, by George Sisler, in a 154-game season in 1920).Yesterday, Ichiro somehow went five-for-five at the plate, raising his average to .379.I saw Ichiro play\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5149","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5149"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5149\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5157,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5149\/revisions\/5157"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}