Thor scribe Jason Aaron has revealed a number of pertinent details about the upcoming line.
Since announcing Marvel NOW! a couple of weeks ago, the publisher has released multiple teaser posters which contain a single word teaser, along with a simple pair of names to tell us who will be writing and illustrating the respective comic lines.
We’ve also been hearing some relevant news via numerous interviews, such as the one Iron Man writer, Kieron Gillen, gave to the Marvel NOW! blog earlier this week.
In the interview with Newsarama, Aaron discusses the plot direction of Thor: The God of Thunder, revealing that it will be a massive undertaking of scale, which will develop Thor’s background, and even show where he will one day end up in his role as the ruler of Asgard.
“I do flash back and show a young Thor in action, but he’s actually just one of three Thors that I want to focus on,” said the writer.
“This first story is an epic tale that plays out over the course of thousands of years. So we spend time with young Thor in the Viking age — the young, hotheaded god of the Vikings, who loves to come down to Midgard and get into trouble. In the present, we see Thor the Avenger on a journey that takes him to the far corners of space, interacting with all sorts of new space gods and wondrous new locations.
“And then we also see old King Thor, who’s the last king of Asgard, thousands of years in the future, where something has gone horribly, horribly wrong.
“Linking all these eras and Thors together is one villain, an all-new character, who is basically, at least initially, a serial killer of gods. He’s a guy with a serious axe to grind against all immortal beings in the cosmos, and he’s going around doing his best to kill them all off, one at a time, as brutally as possible. That villain’s story unfolds over the course of all these different eras. He starts as a serial killer of gods, but by the end, he has become something even more frightening.”
He’s referring here to a being known simply as Gorr the God Butcher, a character who is entirely new to the Marvel universe. This opening arc is slated to span six issues, all of which will focus on being particularly new-reader friendly – and mostly seperate from the rest of the Marvel universe.
We also can expect more Avengers-type action later in the series, or perhaps just in a different line altogether. Frankly, I think it would be great to reserve this specific line to stories about Thor throughout history, since he is an immortal and has been (and will be) around for thousands of years. That’s a lot of stories to tell which don’t necessarily fit into the Avengers time-line.
For the rest of the interview, which goes into Aaron’s own love of the character and his further ideas for where to take the line, check it out over at Newsarama. There are also a few more new interviews with creators of new series over on the Marvel NOW! blog.
Marvel NOW! will kick off in October 2012 with the Avengers/X-Men mash-up, Uncanny Avengers. Thor: God of Thunder #1 is slated for a November shelving
