I pre-ordered this anticipating it'd be more expensive to buy the issues separately. It's actually not, or, wasn't at the time, idk about now.
So... Firstly.... If you're a bigot who looks at the queer community and wants to throw "Identity politics" and "woke" around like you're some sort of tough person (despite such types being snowflakes for getting offended that people that they avoid actually exist ;-D), stay away and don't but it...
If you don't care about a person liking the same sex and being a bit gender queer... Guess what? This has that situation.
As far as the story... Being pagan, and working with various Nordic deities over the years (primarily Loki), I can see this series pissing off some people in the Viking faith's because one of the plot points is the main character is setting out to kill Odin because he imprisoned a valkirye who didn't "fall in line".
So, yeah, there's a very big amount of story which takes very many liberties regarding what little is known about authentic Viking lore... I say what little is known because most of what we know is based off poems that monks preserved when they decided to eliminate Viking religions because that's what Christianity excelled at then and excels at now, granted since then they've decided to also include pushing for public executions based on nothing but hate but.. That's a bit off topic....
What I'm saying is that, there's not as much as you'd think that's known about Viking myths. Unlike Greece and Roman myths, like the Celts, if there were written accounts of myths that the Vikings had, those accounts were destroyed by the Anglo Saxons....
So, in example, when someone heard of Ragnarok one might automatically associate Loki with the Devil/Anti-christ and the ensuant battle as the fall of the gods and humans like in Revelations for Christians... However, there's growing support that points to the whole Ragnarok business being a way that Anglo Saxon monks tried to end Viking religion and convert people to the "What happened next" religion (for example, Baldur is resurrected and Adam and Eve are spared Ragnarok in what's easy to see as Eden).... This is further evidenced by studies of the "Devil", etc, where we find that Trickster deities end up getting habitually vilified.... The popular image of the Red, Sartyr like Devil being evidence of that...
Which, well, Loki is a Trickster, even if little was known about them, there is that knowledge.
That said, in terms of mythological accuracy, I'm not expecting a comic to be accurate, especially given how Marvel has treated Loki in all other properties beside the time they used mythological Loki to tell Deadpool that Deadpool is their son. Aside from that time, most other references to Loki are... Less than accurate... Far less... Point being that, Marvel set a low precedence.
This comic doesn't actually try to go for too much accuracy, but, not in the same way, it's more concerned with the characters than it is accuracy, which, to me, is fair.
There are a lot of so called "identity politics" issues inserted into the series, but, not with 2D characters, and, tbh, this kinda stuff doesn't bother me... Maybe because I'm trans and gay, but, even before I knew that it wouldn't have bothered me.
Why spend so much time of this review mentioning those issues? Mainly because I wanted to get the bigots and "mythology purists" to read that stuff and gtfo before I actually review the series. I figure, getting them pissed enough to not buy the series is better than them buying it, reviewing it and refunding it as that does nothing to accurately evaluate the star ratings, imo.
That said, liberties were taken and it's fair to say that deities are to be seen as characters and not the deities of lore itself, although, there was a level of accuracy with certain things I find refreshing.
The tale is about a girl who was slotted for execution by her community because it was discovered that she kissed a girl, liked it, and did not want to become a baby factory that was sold. Her father, loving his daughter, and not wishing that for her, decided to secret her away instead.
She finds out that a previous valkirye was ousted from her position and imprisoned in a magical ring of fire under a curse from Odin that, in order to leave the prison, she'd have to marry a mortal... Of which, said mortal must be able to get into the ring of fire without dying....
The main character, having seen the other side of the laws Odin instilled in the lands (the execution order was done as a way for the village to appease Odin), decides that she's going to save the valkirye, and the comic follows her journey both before and after.
I personally loved the story... It may be because I live in the US and am apart of a demographic that's hated by most demographics who are mostly okay with the idea of trans women being executed publicly... But... It is past that too.
What people don't think about is that, Viking life before the Anglo Saxons got involved, wasn't necessarily mysogonous. By what little historical info we have from before that poison was unleashed, women could rule, women could go into battle and women were seen as equals. Which, living in a harsh and border-line inhospitable area would definitely do that to a people.
That said, the main character isn't just a walking lesbian caricature who is constantly repeating "down with the man"... She's organic, and it isn't til later when she decides she'll be killing Odin.
Partial Spoiler:
Odin, in turn, at first, and most of the way through the series is portrayed as the oh so stereotyped "The patriarch".... However, though that's maintained throughout most of it, at the ending, you realize that he wasn't doing that as a "men first" issue but... Well I'll stop right there, suffice to say that this ties into the Anglo Saxons and the harsh bigotry of the pathetic whelp xtians call a God and Odin's want to ensure that his people don't get infected by that Insanity.... So, a depth of character actually is with Odin in this series, though you don't realize that til waaaaay down the pike.
That said, the story itself was able to navigate multiple topics that usually require some 2D walking cliche, and does so in a way that isn't a 2D walking cliche.
Aka, if like me, you're not an SJW because they too hate you despite whether you are or are not severely a minority because... You're white... This series doesn't do that, it's not a propaganda piece, social awareness topics are present, but, they aren't the central aspect, just present.
The artwork is basic at times, but, I think that's intentional. The whole series has an appeal to its anesthetics which heavily remind me of those comics that'd be in the Sunday comic strips which weren't meant to be funny... The Phantom comes to mind.
That's also not to say that the artwork is bad, it isn't, there is a surprising amount of detail in scenes that are important. I ended up liking the art style despite, usually, having standards that'd oppose it.
Now... Idk what else to review, so, I'll end on a few notes....
First is seeing a huge amount of "This is a propaganda piece meant to turn you gay." reviews....
As a person who is "infected" with "The Gay", and as a person who was born that way and still is... I can assure you... If you're not gay when you're born, you're not going to "come down with a case of The Gayness" because that isn't a thing.
I was attracted to women before I realized so late in life that I'm trans, and, even after getting operations, I'll still be attracted to women.
Also, you're not going to "catch The Gay" because, if this series speaks to you and you realize that you're gay, or bi, you didn't catch anything, you stripped away the memetic programming that society inflicted on you early in life and realized that who you actually are is different than what people assert you should be... Aka, you stopped long enough to realize that "Huh... Actually, my dad and society was wrong, I don't want a person of the opposite sex."
That's not being woke, that's not being trendy, it's coming to the realization that what defines you can only come from 2 places: Your actions, and within yourself... What's within yourself may or may not be related to your actions.
In other words, that's you realizing that you've been acting like someone you're not to appease the Freudian projections others have of who you "should be", versus who you actually are. Aka...
You're realizing your authentic self and are starting a journey to understand actual You and daring to question the false assumptions others have about you.
Can that happen by reading this? Sure! Absolutely... It kinda did for me.
Why? I bought this after I realized I was trans, I didn't buy it BECAUSE I realized I was trans, but, did so because I wanted to see how good the series was. When I first realized I'm trans, I thought (because this is the image US society pushes) that I automatically had to like men.... Yet, having read this, seeing a character who didn't fit binary norms, and reading something that's more about emphasizing being your authentic self, I realized... "Just because I was born with a mind that's female with some traits that are female doesn't mean that supercedes my sexual orientation... I was born attracted to women, I'm still attracted to women."
Now, that's my journey, I do not know your journey, but what I do know is that, if you all of a sudden realize that you are drawn to a certain sexual orientation or other queer sorts of aspects.... That's not new, it's something that was always present that you've never been able to experience....
So, yeah, I make jokes about "Catching The Gay", but do so as satire, in truth, that's not a thing at this time... Yeah, technically it could be if LGBTQIA things were to replace the current.... Intolerance for basic animal rights with the same rigid societal expectations, at which point, memetics would be a factor.... However, that's not where we're at... And we have a huge potential to not go that route since most of the actual propaganda that normalizes things like "Be trans or be gay, you can't have both because society only partially approves of one or the other." or "People are forcing and brainwashing others to be gay and trans".
So, if you read this series.... Just read it to read it... Don't expect it'll change anything in you that wasn't already there... And... Ffs.... Help stop the hate... Gods know there's too much of it present in society as it stands... I should know...
I was born in a body that's biologically mostly male, of an ethnic background which though technically a minority (my direct lineage, mind you) itself and technically Caucasian or Anglo Saxon. I identified as cis before I realized how much that's not the case. I'm autistic, my mind works differently from most people on the planet because my brain was wired differently at birth, and I'm also a Veteran... Among other things, like, being pagan in a time where most pagans are okay with discriminating and marginalizing other pagans because those other pagans don't have the same beliefs.... So, the amount of hate I endure on the daily.... It's intense... It's also, all of it... Because of who I Am, and not what I've done... So, although, hate itself is natural and shouldn't be completely removed, imo... The overuse of hate which seem to be like breathing for most people that has taken over most modern societies... It's.... Time to change that...
Stay safe and, hopefully this series can serve as a needed distraction for you like it did for me.
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Marcus Egi
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