A jet pilot has blacked out and the plane is about to crash into the city. Thor leaps into action, pulls the pilot out and sets up a wind current to send the plane out to sea. The resuce mission finished, Thor hurries back to the office to return to his identntity as Dr. Don Blake. In the lab with his nurse Jane Foster he starts to confess his love for her but hesitates because of his hero commitments. Jane who returns his love is again offended that he won’t speak his mind and walks out. Alone, he changes back to Thor and summons the All-Father Odin, to ask permission to marry Jane Foster; Odin refuses and vanishes. As he determines to give up his role as Thor, Jane enters to announce she is leaving to take a job with Dr. Basil Andrews.
Elsewhere, a creature made of burning lava has arisen from a volcano and is heading toward New York; in Asgard, Loki looking for a new way to cause trouble for his enemy, suddenly recognizes the Lava Man as something he created then forgot about some time ago, and sits back to enjoy the show. The volcanic menace arrives in Manhattan where it claims the surface world and demands all human leave the land. The Army is helpless against him since he can turn their weapons to ash with a wave of his hand. Thor arrives on the scene and challenges the Lava Man to combat. The Thunder God strikes with his hammer, the creature evades the blow by simply burning through the ground and sending up a geyser of water. At this point Loki let Thor know who is the real enemy he’s facing and gloats. Thor sends his hammer through the sewers where it forces the Lava man to return to the surface to evade it. The creature hurls a coat of quick-drying lava at the hero, enwrapping him in a cocoon of stone. Thor exerts all his strength and breaks out and turns to face his foe—who expands into a huge tower of dried lava and topples to crush the Thunder God. Thor whips up a whirlwind which sends the monster hurling through the sky back to the volcano whence he emerged. Thor seals up the volcano and returns to Don Blake’s office. There Jane is leaving with Dr. Andrews, angry that Don did nothing to see to her welfare during the recent crisis. Alone, Don bemoans the irony.
Story #2Asgard! Home of the Mighty Norse Gods
Writer:
Stan Lee. Penciler:
Jack Kirby. Inker:
George RoussosSynopsis
Introduces the basic elements of
Norse myth: the good gods known as the
Aesir and their enemies the
Frost Giants. Their home
Asgard was bounded on the south by fire where dwells
Surtur the demon of fire and on the north by the land of mist. Beneath it all lay the
Well of Life from which emerged the first life:
Ymir, the greatest of the Frost Giants. Seconds later a magic cow appeared to provide food for Ymir. Then there came from the ice
Buri the first of the Aesir. He had a son
Borr, who fathered three sons, the greatest of whom was
Odin. Odin and his brothers took an interest in
Earth, set a ring around it and there grew
Yggdrasil to protect the new world.