Thor #261
The Wall Around the World!
Thor, Sif, the Recorder, and the Warriors Three have finally located the Doomsday Star, where Odin has been taken since he gone missing some time earlier.[1] However, the world that orbits the star is protected by a massive wall armed with weapons that try to keep them at bay. Thor orders the Starjammer to try to by pass the wall from the above. However, they quickly discover a meteor storm preventing anyone from passing the all. Below it a celestial maelstrom. With no other choice, Thor tries to smash through the wall with Mjolnir. However, his strongest throw barely dents the wall. Before they can act any further, Thor and his allies are teleported away.
Watching from afar is an unknown individual who is pleased to see that Thor is still pre-occupied. He then returns his attention to Asgard, where Balder and Karnilla have been tricked into thinking Thor has returned. This Thor impostor is furious that Balder and Karnilla have done such a poor job protecting Asgard in his absence. He then convinces them that they were tricked battling mystical constructs of the Enchantress and the Executioner. As if to prove this, Thor makes the defeated pair vanish.[2] Thor then tells them that the real danger is inside the kingdom itself. Although Karnilla is suspicious about all of this, but keeps her concerns to herself for the time being.
Back in deep space, Thor and his allies wake up to discover they are on the other side of the barrier wall. As they try to make sense of the sprawling city around them they are attacked by armored soldiers in war machines that walk on telescoping legs. When Thor and his allies prove more than a match, the aliens try blasting them a massive cosmotronic cannon. Fandral, Volstagg, and the Recorder end up buried under rubble and are presumed dead. While Thor, Fandral, and Sif are eventually incapacitated and taken prisoner.[3] When Thor and his allies wake up they are in shackles. Their captors are a race of albino skinned aliens who ask to be called the Soul-Survivors. They assure the captured gods that they will be worshiped until the ends of their days.
On that ominous note, Hogun and the Recorder free themselves and Volstagg from the rubble. Scanning the area, the Recorder deduces that a massive golden tower is the likely place where their friends have been taken. Hogun decides they should go and rescue their friends or die trying.
Recurring Characters
Thor, N’gll, Warriors Three (Fandral, Hogun, Volstagg), Sif, Balder, Karnilla, Recorder, Kroda (disguised)
Continuity Notes
Odin has been missing since Thor #243, the details were given in issue #250 and expanded upon next issue.
The mystery man behind this deception is Loki, as seen in Thor #264 which also reveals that this is indeed the real Enchantress and Executioner and that the Thor impostor is Kroda in disguise.
Thor’s hammer doesn’t return to him when thrown here. It’s explained in Thor #263, that this was due to the fact that Odin’s impending death was weakening the enchantments that make Thor’s hammer return to him when thrown. The alien race that live on this planet are unidentified here. Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe #3 identifies them as the Dionists.
