—Thor to AeneasI come to say farewell...yet somehow, I feel that, whate'er may be the fate of this city thou dost defend... ...we two shall meet again.
Appearing in "Thunder over Troy"
Featured Characters:
Supporting Characters:
- High King Agamemmnon of the Argives (First appearance) (Main story and flashback)
- King Menelaus of Sparta (Main story and flashback)
- Odysseus of Ithaca (Main story and flashback)
- Achilles' troops (First appearance) (Main story and flashback)
- Diomedes of Argos (First appearance) (Main story and flashback)
- Philoctetes (First appearance)
Troy and its allies:
- Trojans
- Prince Paris (Main story and flashback) (Death)
- Cassandra (Main story and flashback)
- Hector (Main story and flashback) (Death)
- King Priam (Main story and flashback)
- Helen of Troy (Main story and flashback)
- Dardanus
- Prince Aeneas of Dardanus
- Anchises (Mentioned)
- Lycia
- Pandarus of Lycia (Death)
Antagonists:
Other Characters:
- Asgardians
- Volla (Mentioned)
- All-Father Odin (Mentioned)
- Hela (Mentioned)
- Tyndareus (Mentioned)
Races and Species:
- Asgardians
- Storm Giants
- Frost Giants
- Human-Olympian Hybrids
- Olympians
- Humans
- Mares of "divine breed"
Locations:
- Jotunheim
- mysterious tunnel through time [1] (Unnamed) (First appearance)
- Olympus
- Midgard (Earth)
- Anatolia
- Troy / Illium (Main story and flashback) (Destruction)
- Mount Ida
- Dardanus (Mentioned)
- Lycia (Mentioned)
- Hyperborea (Mentioned)
- Ancient Greece (Main story and flashback)
- Mount Olympus
- Sparta (Only in flashback)
- Ithaca (Mentioned)
- Argos (Mentioned)
- Aulis (Mentioned)
- Lemnos (Mentioned)
- Anatolia
Items:
- Mjolnir
- Achilles' armor (First appearance)
- Achilles' second armor (First appearance)
- Wooden horse
Vehicles:
- Chariot of Aeneas
Events:
- Trojan War
- Ragnarök (Mentioned)
Synopsis for "Thunder over Troy"
After battling some Storm Giants in Jotunheim, Thor and Loki discover a fissure in a nearby rock wall that Thor fears may be connected to the hidden entrance to Olympus that had been sealed off by Zeus during an earlier visit to that area. When Loki ignores Thor's demand that they leave and instead enters the fissure, Thor is forced to follow him, but Loki is already out of sight by the time Thor enters the caverns to which the fissure leads. Finding that there are multiple branching tunnels before him, Thor decides that he will try only one of the tunnels and, if he doesn't find Loki, then he will leave him to his fate. However, while walking through the tunnel he had chosen, Thor is engulfed by strange mists that rob him of his memory. Once through and in a strange forest, he meets Aeneas and finds himself involved in the Trojan War. After his adventures, and a battle with Zeus after regaining his memory, Thor returns to the forest where he meets Loki who tells him that he had lost his memory as well. Loki then adds that he had contributed to the war in his own way by giving a bit of advice to an astute Argive prince, Odysseus of Ithaca, leading to the creation of a giant wooden horse that would be instrumental in the destruction of Troy.
Appearing in "A Few Ounces of Troy"
Featured Characters:
Supporting Characters:
Other Characters:
- Argives
- Achilles (Mentioned)
- High King Agamemmnon of the Argives (Mentioned)
- Diomedes of Argos (Mentioned)
- Menelaus of Sparta (Mentioned)
- Trojans
- Hector of Troy (Mentioned)
- Paris of Troy (Mentioned)
Locations:
Items:
- Wooden horse (Mentioned)
Synopsis for "A Few Ounces of Troy"
Instead of a letters' page, The Hammer Strikes page features a full page essay on the making of this annual.
Notes
- This issue is a tale of a much younger Thor as noted in the story by the text, "When eternal Asgard was young." However, it does take place after the first meeting of Thor and Hercules in Journey Into Mystery Annual #1, a meeting that Thor remembers in a flashback.
- In Thor #289, Odin makes it clear that the first two encounters between Thor and Hercules took place as shown in Journey Into Mystery Annual #1 and Thor Annual #5, and that they occurred in that order and before the events depicted in this annual. However, Odin also mentions that Thor (and Hercules?) had forgotten their first encounter by the time they met for the second time, and refers to how that was because of some mysterious reasons about which only he and Zeus know. While this may fix the continuity error of Thor and Hercules not knowing each other when they met and fought in Thor Annual #5, it doesn't explain how, in this story, Thor can remember having once accidentally traveled to Olympus where he met and battled Hercules. The most obvious explanation is that, sometime after the events of Thor Annual #5 but before this annual's story, Thor (and presumably Hercules) somehow regained their memories of their first encounter. However, there has never been any in-story mention made of them having regained a forgotten memory.
- Additionally, since Thor Annual #7 revealed that the brief war between the Asgardians and the Olympians in Thor Annual #5 was fought immediately before Thor journeyed to Earth and first encountered the Eternals in South America not too long before the arrival of the Celestial Third Host, this means that the first few pages of this annual's story, when Thor and Loki trespass into Jotunheim, must take place about one thousand years ago.
- In Thor #289, Odin makes it clear that the first two encounters between Thor and Hercules took place as shown in Journey Into Mystery Annual #1 and Thor Annual #5, and that they occurred in that order and before the events depicted in this annual. However, Odin also mentions that Thor (and Hercules?) had forgotten their first encounter by the time they met for the second time, and refers to how that was because of some mysterious reasons about which only he and Zeus know. While this may fix the continuity error of Thor and Hercules not knowing each other when they met and fought in Thor Annual #5, it doesn't explain how, in this story, Thor can remember having once accidentally traveled to Olympus where he met and battled Hercules. The most obvious explanation is that, sometime after the events of Thor Annual #5 but before this annual's story, Thor (and presumably Hercules) somehow regained their memories of their first encounter. However, there has never been any in-story mention made of them having regained a forgotten memory.
- Although Thor thinks to himself that their encounter with the Storm Giants had taken place on the very spot where the hidden entrance to Olympus had existed (until Zeus had sealed it off) and worries that the fissure that Loki discovered might also lead to Olympus, he is never shown actually thinking that it is the same fissure. Also, while the secret passage to Olympus was a void through which Thor fell for "a time without end" until he landed in a shadowy chamber with a corridor that led to Olympus, this fissure instead leads to a network of branching tunnels along which travelers can walk and, in so doing, will pass through a clammy, cloying mist which temporarily robs them of their memories. So, very different passageways.
- That mysterious passage connecting Jotunheim to Troy was not named in this story. However, Thor Annual #10 contained a text page ("A Gazetteer to Asgard and Environs") that identified the Cavern of Time as a cave in the mountains on the border of Jotunheim which contained strange transtemporal passages to other times and dimensions, and stated that Thor had once emerged from the Cavern in the midst of the Trojan War. Why later entries in the Official Handbook called it the "Cave of Time" is a mystery.
- The Cavern of Time's only other appearance is in What If? #39. In that story, the Watcher reveals what happened in an alternate timeline where Thor chose a different tunnel to follow, one that transported him to the Hyborian Age where he met, battled and befriended Conan the Barbarian.
- A plot assist for this annual is noted on page one to Don Thompson and Maggie Thompson.
- The last panel of the story promises that next year's annual will be about the founding of Rome by Aeneas. The essay "A Few Ounces of Troy" by Roy Thomas also indicates that the following year's annual will feature the second meeting of Aeneas and Thor. Yet Thor Annual #9 was a completely different story written by Chris Claremont instead.
See Also
Recommended Reading
Links and References
References
- ↑ Thor Annual #10 ; A Gazetteer of Asgard and Environs