The Immortal Thor, Vol. 5: Death of The Immortal Thor

The Immortal Thor (2023) (Collected Editions)

by Al Ewing, Jan Bazaldua (Artist), Justin Greenwood (Artist)

The story ends…The hour had come for the Odinson, who stood before the gates of the Utgardhall and his final death - the death he fought for. Many challenges awaited before the end. Skurge the Executioner with Bloodaxe in hand and ready for battle. The Utgard-Loki who the Odinson had never yet defeated. Nrgl, Lord of Murder-in-Darkness in his own place of power, the beast at the center of the maze Kemur who was bull and hawk and serpent, who was fire and the sword. Alone stood the Odinson between the Gods of Utgard and all they would break asunder. And at the end of his tale, Thor Odinson strode into Vidblainn, third land of the dead, from whence nothing could return. Where one last time he fought for justice against the great Serpent to decide his fate. Collecting IMMORTAL THOR #21-25.

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Fantasy, Marvel, Science Fiction, Superheroes, Action

Kindle Edition

Published October 1, 2025

Reviews

[Frédéric]

The run started well, but from the third volume onwards, the plot gets bogged down in long convolutions and bombastic flights of fancy that lost me – and my interest in Thor's announced fate.

This last volume ends the run in a better way, but – and I think this is partly due to Bazaldua's poor artwork coupled with the loss of interest caused by the previous two books – this time it lacks the emphasis that an event such as Thor's "death" deserves.

Let's hope the new series will be more invigorating.

[Anna Quilter]

I have been enjoying this Thor run.
it's all pretty epic...as Thor should be.
and so it ends..
well ..till it morphs into MORTAL THOR.

[Dakota Morgan]

Al Ewing's baffling Thor run continues as Thor and Skurge team up to fight various gods in Utgard. I have zero idea why any of this is happening - maybe that was explained in an earlier volume? No one bothers to recap. Seems like the whole deal is Utgard Loki is scheming Thor's "Tru Death," which does eventually take place here (see the volume's title).

In the midst of all the nonsense battling and voiceover action, there's actually some decent stuff. Skurge makes an exciting sacrifice and a few of the bigger battles are really quite exciting. The "Thor dies" piece is kind of exhilarating, even though I know it'll be swiftly undone somehow. The artwork rarely rises above "decent enough," but it gets the job done. Let's see where Mortal Thor goes.

[Paul]

3.4 stars

[Alex Sarll]

I normally sigh when Marvel take the opportunity for a faux series end and a new #1 (or seven of them) within what's clearly the same run, but fair enough, if Immortal is in the title and then your lead dies, that's probably necessary. I didn't quite think this was everything it could have been – the art has settled down after the worst wobbles in the middle of the run, but at times it still felt a little low key (no pun intended) for the mythic grandeur Utgard especially should have. And while I normally love Al's synthesis of all past eras of characters he works on, the callbacks to the horrible Donny Cates era here reminded me of RTD's vexing refusal to sweep Chibnall under the carpet. These are quibbles, though – valiant last stands, jaw-dropping reversals and clever narrative tricks are all present and correct. Not to mention a deep fury at the notion of absolute rulers which, though clearly fuelled by current events, is still properly woven into the story rather than spewed on top of it, and even takes proper account of the series' hero being a king.

[Jason Tanner]

Al Ewing's Thor run has not really been my cup of tea so far. It's good, maybe even great -- we'll have to see it through -- but it's a little out there for me. They're layers to this story that I'm not really absorbing, I know that, but I really don't follow what Ewing is trying to tell us about the meta narrative.

Still, I enjoyed this book more than I expected. Fucking everybody is scheming. Rune Thor is acknowledged perhaps for the first time since Disassembled. Utgard seems to exist in a plane beyond Thor, but he apparently can still kill Utgard gods. Heimdall is back. Loki is doing their wheels within wheels thing. Donald Blake is The Lizard now, or something. (I don't know. Blake is something that really needs dealt with after JMS brought him back as a real boy and Donny Cates tortured him into insanity.) And now Thor is making a sacrifice of himself to himself for another turn at Odin's Unlimited Power Glitch, and we'll see how that goes in the next volume.

I can't give it five stars, because it's not a complete story, even with the low bar it takes for something to be "complete" in a serial comic book series. But I would give it 4.5 if I could.

[Adam Fisher]

Much lore and chaos here.
Highlights:
- Picking up from the fight from the last Volume, we find that Skurge merely wants to stand alongside Thor as he heads into the realm of Utgard-Loki.
- Finding both Hermod (a speedster) and Heimdall (not dead?), Thor and co stand against Kemur, minotaur King of Utgard. As Kemur is defeated and Thor believes that his death can now be averted, Loki arrives and stabs Thor in the back, killing him.
- Skurge destroys the Black Bridge, seeing Thor fall. This in turn also destroys the Rainbow Bridge, cutting Asgard off from the other realms, and deleting knowledge of Thor from the history of Midgard.
- Thor awakens in Vidblainn, a realm of lost souls. Fighting his former human counterpart, Donald Blake, he wins and awakens on Earth, a mortal named Sigurd Jarlson

Heading into "The Mortal Thor".... interested to see where this will go and how they will restore Thor as we know him to the standard MCU.
Very interesting path to take. Recommend.

[Chris Lemmerman]

Thor's died before. It's kind of his thing, what with Ragnarok and all that. That said, this 'death' is well-handled, and has pretty much been telegraphed since the beginning of the series, so I'm not complaining in the slightest.

Ewing's twisty-turny plot continues to twist and turn right up until the final page, and I love that he's still managing to write Loki even now, years after the end of Agent Of Asgard. He just does it so well. You never know if they're going to be good, bad, bad in a good way, or good in a bad one. It's so much fun.

The Tales Of Asgard jam session issue is also fun - I usually find these things a bit space-fillery, but this one adds a bit to the overarching plot rather than just being relegated to padding.

Onwards to the Mortal Thor, or whatever we're calling him now.

[Chad]

This run has just never gotten to be as good as I wanted it to be. Some of it is Ewing's dialog and exposition. It just always feel stilted. Some of it is the amount of obscure and new but meant to be old characters. You're just constantly going " Who?" This volume also suffers from Bazuldua's lack of backgrounds that they try and hide behind page effects. So this run just gets a "Meh" from me. Hopefully, The Mortal Thor will strive for greater heights.

[Ross]

WAYYYYY too deep for its own good...

Thor has known for a long time that his death is coming. How and where are the mysteries we haven't cracked. There's a LOT in this run that just doesn't make sense. It's too buried in legend and then buried in ANOTHER legend.

It's just too much.
----
Bonus: Maybe 'The Mortal Thor' will be simpler?

[Matt Sautman]

I am a bit confused by the lower ratings for this volume, but that may be partially due to the amount of background knowledge Ewing’s Thor run draws on combined with the fact that this volume acts as an “end” to the story arc when really Mortal Thor is a direct continuation of this story.

[Tyler]

Read as individual comics, ratings below:

#21= 3 stars
#22= 3 stars
#23= 3.5 stars
#24= 4 stars
#25= 4 stars

Overall rating of 3.5 stars

[Sam Bakos]

One of the best endings to a run I've ever read

[Daniel Butcher]

I know it’s myth based…but maybe too many new myths.

[Kyra]

Well, I basically more or less trust both Loki and Al Ewing, but I would very much like to know why they did that.

[Craig]

Yeahhhhhhhh......no. Welcome, Sigurd Jarlson.

[Litter Bug]

This was a good ending to the story, I think!

[Dave]

EPIC AF! The volume features fantastic art and a great story that homages some of Walter Simonson's classic Thor tales. I loved it.

[Gosha The Consumer of Comics]

Pretty good ending of a mostly mid run. Epic Thor moments, Loki doing Loki stuff and so on

[Nicole]

I would give this 5 stars for issue #22 alone. What a brilliant gimmick to illustrate a time loop, and the skill on display to have each page work whether you are going forward or backwards is jaw dropping. I am completely obsessed. We also finally get payoff for everything that's happened so far. I'll admit this series lagged in the middle and not everything had payoff, but really this isn't the end yet since we have the sequel series so we'll see if those elements payoff later