Avengers out on DVD

[Terralthra]

It may have been an awesome weapon before that, but Thor was the powerful one who wielded it, until Odin stripped him of his power and placed it within Mjölnir.

And when Odin stripped Thor's powers, he tore off Thor's armour. Maybe Thor's power is in that. What's more likely? Son of the king gets all the good toys, or the difference in capability between Thor and the next best warrior is greater than the difference between Loki and Frigga (who we also see fighting, and who would probably make a good candidate for determining "base" Adgardian capabilities).

When Thor awakens on Earth, he clearly expects his godlike powers to still work, despite very clearly not wearing his armor. Plus, what kind of sense does it make for Odin to strip his armor, removing his power (assuming his powers are in his armor), then put them in the hammer? Why not just geas the armor, instead of moving the powers to the hammer and geasing that?

The most parsimonious explanation is that Thor has power, that Odin takes from him ("the power of THOR!", not "the power of THOR's armor") and imbues in Mjölnir, dependent on the wielder being "worthy."

[Ted C]

Also, I'm pretty sure that Loki's reconnaissance was more than just that one visit. Remember him wandering around those SHIELD storage vaults while invisibly controlling Selvig at the end of Thor? He knew what SHIELD had to use against him.

I don't think Loki was physically present in that teaser; he was more "inside Selvig's head", seeing and hearing what Selvig saw and heard and influencing Selvig's behavior.

[Ted C]

Well that fight, at the start of Thor on Jotunheim has Thor clearly demonstrating superior combat prowess, smashing giants left and right like play things while his Asgardian buddies seem more 'human' in their fights. Thor is clearly hitting a lot harder- presumably because of Mjolnir rather than some inherent power Thor alone possesses. Even Odin doesn't smash frost giants around like Thor and I dare say Odin is the one person we can clearly say is more powerful than Thor. I'm not saying Thor isn't super durable (he's certainly extremely strong) I'm just looking for examples to compare him to other Asgardians in terms of durability. How would Thor hold up to what Hulk did to Loki? Took Loki a good 20 minutes to be mobile again but frankly that's amazing after being smashed 2" into granite or marble or whatever that floor was.

Thor held his own in combat with the Hulk for several minutes, including getting smashed through a couple of bulkheads. You want to bet on whether Loki or one of the Warriors Three could have done that?

[Ted C]

On an unrelated note, I'm extremely curious as to the properties of Mjolnirs 'no lifting' spell. Does it only oppose sentient attempts to move/lift it?

Well, it didn't bring down the helicarrier when dropped on the deck.

[Crazedwraith]

Well that fight, at the start of Thor on Jotunheim has Thor clearly demonstrating superior combat prowess, smashing giants left and right like play things while his Asgardian buddies seem more 'human' in their fights. Thor is clearly hitting a lot harder- presumably because of Mjolnir rather than some inherent power Thor alone possesses. Even Odin doesn't smash frost giants around like Thor and I dare say Odin is the one person we can clearly say is more powerful than Thor. I'm not saying Thor isn't super durable (he's certainly extremely strong) I'm just looking for examples to compare him to other Asgardians in terms of durability. How would Thor hold up to what Hulk did to Loki? Took Loki a good 20 minutes to be mobile again but frankly that's amazing after being smashed 2" into granite or marble or whatever that floor was.

Thor held his own in combat with the Hulk for several minutes, including getting smashed through a couple of bulkheads. You want to bet on whether Loki or one of the Warriors Three could have done that?

Given Loki's performance at the end of the film clearly not.

He did survive being entirely embedded in a concrete floor though. So Loki's pretty tough, he just doesn't have Thor's skill at fighting, which is clearly what made the different when he went up against Hulk. He didn't go strength to strength with Hulk, he used technique. And of course a big scary hammer.

[Bug-Eyed Earl]

According to the Thor commentary, the stripping of Thor's armor was simply a callback to a movie Kenneth Branagh liked (I forget the name) that had a military officer being stripped of his medals. It may look like it should be more significant than it is, but its just visual storytelling.

[Replicant]

Well that fight, at the start of Thor on Jotunheim has Thor clearly demonstrating superior combat prowess, smashing giants left and right like play things while his Asgardian buddies seem more 'human' in their fights. Thor is clearly hitting a lot harder- presumably because of Mjolnir rather than some inherent power Thor alone possesses. Even Odin doesn't smash frost giants around like Thor and I dare say Odin is the one person we can clearly say is more powerful than Thor. I'm not saying Thor isn't super durable (he's certainly extremely strong) I'm just looking for examples to compare him to other Asgardians in terms of durability. How would Thor hold up to what Hulk did to Loki? Took Loki a good 20 minutes to be mobile again but frankly that's amazing after being smashed 2" into granite or marble or whatever that floor was.

Thor held his own in combat with the Hulk for several minutes, including getting smashed through a couple of bulkheads. You want to bet on whether Loki or one of the Warriors Three could have done that?

Hulk playing ragdoll with Loki inside Tnoy's house, to me at least, demonstrates that Loki does not have nearly the phsyical endurance of Thor.

[Kojiro]

The most parsimonious explanation is that Thor has power, that Odin takes from him ("the power of THOR!", not "the power of THOR's armor") and imbues in Mjölnir, dependent on the wielder being "worthy."

Interesting that the 'power of Thor' seems to include the baseline attributes or most Asgardians. Loki is quite capable of kicking a man several meters and the Warriors Three can hurl their largest member a dozen meters or so (and he can easily survive the resulting backhand from the Destroyer). Stripped of his power Thor seems about exactly as powerful as a very well built 6'3" human.. I'm pretty sure the electricity from a taser wouldn't affect normal Thor, nor would a bump from van. What I mean to say is that Asgardians don't seem that different from us with their magic stripped.

I don't think Loki was physically present in that teaser; he was more "inside Selvig's head", seeing and hearing what Selvig saw and heard and influencing Selvig's behavior.

Wandering around imperceptible, such as when he goes to see Thor is a demonstrated ability so I'd be far more inclined to believe he was simply pulling that trick than mentally jacking into Selvig.

Isn't that opening fight scene well before Odin ensorcels Mjölnir? He enchants it, "Whosoever holds this hammer, if he be worthy, shall possess the power of THOR!" (emphasis mine)

It is, but I was more contrasting Thor's combat against frost giants to a younger (but still old) Odin in the opening. Odin is seen lifting and turfing a giant but not nearly so easily or far as Thor smashes them with Mjolnir.

Hulk playing ragdoll with Loki inside Tnoy's house, to me at least, demonstrates that Loki does not have nearly the phsyical endurance of Thor.

I don't know about that. Assuming Hulk can get a hold of Thor I'm sure he could execute the same smashing but that's a matter of skill. Loki drags himself out of that hole- that's pretty damn durable. Thor never takes a beating like that, so it's hard to say but if he could shrug that off. I'll agree he wouldn't fare worse than Loki but there's nothing to suggest he'd fare significantly better.

[SCRawl]

Talking about the power of Thor, I'm reminded of an arc a number of years ago in the Thor comic books. Thor and others (including Captain America, who was temporarily wearing a black uniform, having been forced to give up the red/white/blue by the government) were fighting their way through to fight the snake god Set, for what reason I can no longer recall. Anyway, at some point Asgard (which was being run by Balder in Odin's prolonged absence) needed to be protected, so Balder employed the "Celestial siphon" -- I am not making this up -- to draw Thor's power off remotely and imbue himself with it.

The effect of this procedure left Thor as a more or less baseline Asgardian, and Mjolnir as a more or less normal (indestructible) hammer. (According to the Marvel Handbook, Asgardians each have the ability to lift around 30 tons, and their tissues are about three times as dense as a normal human. Thor is supposed to be in the 100-ton range. I'm guessing that movie-Thor (and movie Asgardians) are a bit below this level.)

My point in all of this is that there is some precedent, albeit very silly precedent, for Thor having some special level of power compared with other Asgardians, and that it might be connected to the hammer in some way.

As for mechanical devices being able to lift Mjolnir, again there is some precedent in the comics, but it seems to be dependent on the whims of the writer at the time. Logically it must be possible, as has been noted.

[Batman]

Thor is able to hurl himself through whatever the bulkheads in the helicarrier are made of with enough force to take down The Other Guy, stand up to him and absorb considerable punishment via being thrown through random available obstacles without taking so much as a scratch before he even bothers to summon the hammer*. Loki is effectively incapacitated for however long it took from 'Puny God' to him wanting that drink afterall by being pounded maybe half a foot down into concrete. Yeah, definitely superhuman, but nowhere near what Thor took...without Mjolnir for most of that fight (and to the very end Thor was fighting to subdue, not kill).

*Which, of course, raises the question of why the hell isn't he carrying it?

As for why Mjolnir can't be moved, while it probably makes not more sense than any other theory put forward, given the damn thing can be moved by Earth rotating, Earth orbiting the sun, the solar system moving across the galaxy or even the helicarrier moving around, I propose the thing can't be moved relative to whichever surface Thor decided to drop it on. Thor drops it in your sink, you can move your sink to your heart's content, but you can't get the hammer out of the sink unless you're worthy.

On the Iron Man suits having a built-in Arc reactor (or some other kind of power supply)-Tony fires up the Mk whatever he uses on the helicarrier via smartphone. Kinda hard to do if the thing doesn't have it's own power supply.

[Batman]

GHETTO EDIT: Essentially, it's also pretty much irrelevant if you can move Mjolnir by mechanical means...because wherever you move it to, it will continue to lie on the ground uselessly until you find somebody 'worthy'.

[Ahriman238]

Well, going by the film Mjolnir can't be moved with a pickup truck.

If we go by the comics Thor is a.) the son of the strongest, cleverest Asgardian there is, the man who literally created Asgard b.) the recipient of Odin's blessings (which are a tangible power boost) c.) the owner of a couple of powerful magic items, including Mjolnir, a magic belt that doubles the strength of whoever wears it, and occasionally magic armor.

If you go by recent (crappy) comics, Odin cut a deal with Gaia so his son would be half Elder God and thus on a level with entities like Odin, Surtur and Gaia herself.

In a 50 year comic run, Thor has run the range from "destroyer of worlds" to "glass-jawed thunder god." At no point has it been suggested that he's typical of Asgard. Not even for a joke. And they once had a storyline about Thor being turned into a bullfrog by Loki's magic.

[Batman]

In all fairness I should probably add that while my 'Mjolnir can't be moved relative to whatever it was dropped on' theory explains why it can be moved by orbital/stellar/galactic mechanics and so on but not picked up by anybody except those 'worthy' does jack all to explain how the hell that works.

[Shannon]

During the scene (in Thor) where Thor is in the throne room and about to be crowned King, Odin says that Mjolnir's "power is without equal, either as a tool to build or as a weapon to destroy." Note that this is Mjolnir's power, not Thor's.

During the fight with the Frost Giants, the Warriors Three, Loki and Sif fight in a way that suggests that skill-wise they are more than a match for giants one-on-one, but there doesn't appear to be that much difference in the physical power of Asgardians and Frost Giants. Given that Loki is a (smallish) giant and no one comments either way on his physical differences from baseline Asgardians (he fits right in, apart from his penchant for magic in a warrior society), this matches up. It's also interesting to look at the battle between Asgard and the Giants in 965AD - again, there isn't much separating them in terms of physical power. It is Odin's power (and he is injured) and Asgard's skill that appears to carry the day.

Thor, on the other hand, is noted for his physical prowess and takes hits from some of the biggest, toughest giants with only mild discomfort and retaliates with vastly greater effect, and not just with Mjolnir. Note that he doesn't get a bloody nose from being punched in the face by a large giant. The Hulk manages to do so during the early stages of a fight where, as already mentioned, Thor doesn't have Mjolnir.

The ability to confer Thor's own power is added to the hammer later, at the banishment (and note he specifically says 'the power of Thor', not 'the power of a god'. It would be interesting to know what makes Asgardians so special and how that can be taken from them as Odin did to Thor. Thor tells Jane that in Asgard, science and magic are the same thing. That suggests that whatever the Asgardians have going on can be quantified, and Thor has more of it.

[Ted C]

The most parsimonious explanation is that Thor has power, that Odin takes from him ("the power of THOR!", not "the power of THOR's armor") and imbues in Mjölnir, dependent on the wielder being "worthy."

Interesting that the 'power of Thor' seems to include the baseline attributes or most Asgardians. Loki is quite capable of kicking a man several meters and the Warriors Three can hurl their largest member a dozen meters or so (and he can easily survive the resulting backhand from the Destroyer). Stripped of his power Thor seems about exactly as powerful as a very well built 6'3" human.. I'm pretty sure the electricity from a taser wouldn't affect normal Thor, nor would a bump from van. What I mean to say is that Asgardians don't seem that different from us with their magic stripped.

In a deleted scene, Volstagg pretty casually tilts a car up onto two wheels to retrieve something from under it. Any Asgardian is clearly much stronger and tougher than a human. Odin had to do more than take the power that made Thor stronger than other Asgardians; he had to bring him down to human.

I don't think Loki was physically present in that teaser; he was more "inside Selvig's head", seeing and hearing what Selvig saw and heard and influencing Selvig's behavior.

Wandering around imperceptible, such as when he goes to see Thor is a demonstrated ability so I'd be far more inclined to believe he was simply pulling that trick than mentally jacking into Selvig.

Except that doesn't explain why Loki has to go through what looks like a rather rough ride through a Tesseract-generated portal to get to Earth at the beginning of The Avengers. In your scenario, he's already on Earth.

[Ted C]

As for why Mjolnir can't be moved, while it probably makes not more sense than any other theory put forward, given the damn thing can be moved by Earth rotating, Earth orbiting the sun, the solar system moving across the galaxy or even the helicarrier moving around, I propose the thing can't be moved relative to whichever surface Thor decided to drop it on. Thor drops it in your sink, you can move your sink to your heart's content, but you can't get the hammer out of the sink unless you're worthy.

I essentially agree, except that you wouldn't be able to move your sink, either, once the hammer was "at rest".

In the helicarrier hangar, the hammer is "at rest" relative to the deck, and not even the Hulk can move it. That seems to be the key. No unworthy person can willfully move it from where it came to rest, even with machinery.

[Tsyroc]

Talking about the power of Thor, I'm reminded of an arc a number of years ago in the Thor comic books. Thor and others (including Captain America, who was temporarily wearing a black uniform, having been forced to give up the red/white/blue by the government) were fighting their way through to fight the snake god Set, for what reason I can no longer recall. Anyway, at some point Asgard (which was being run by Balder in Odin's prolonged absence) needed to be protected, so Balder employed the "Celestial siphon" -- I am not making this up -- to draw Thor's power off remotely and imbue himself with it.

The effect of this procedure left Thor as a more or less baseline Asgardian, and Mjolnir as a more or less normal (indestructible) hammer. (According to the Marvel Handbook, Asgardians each have the ability to lift around 30 tons, and their tissues are about three times as dense as a normal human. Thor is supposed to be in the 100-ton range. I'm guessing that movie-Thor (and movie Asgardians) are a bit below this level.)

My point in all of this is that there is some precedent, albeit very silly precedent, for Thor having some special level of power compared with other Asgardians, and that it might be connected to the hammer in some way.

As for mechanical devices being able to lift Mjolnir, again there is some precedent in the comics, but it seems to be dependent on the whims of the writer at the time. Logically it must be possible, as has been noted.

There's a precedent for that in the Thor comics from even before that. Odin strips Thor of his powers as the god of Thunder. Basically cutting his strength in half, putting him more in the upper Asgardian level like around Heimdal (and the Wrecking Crew) but probably less than Volstagg. The hammer was still indestructible but he couldn't do any of his weather moves with it or use it to fly by throwing it. I think part of the explanation for Thor still being stronger than the normal Asgardian was because his mother was Jord (Gaia) so some of his strength comes from her and not just from being an Asgardian. I've never been entirely sure how the power thing works for Thor and Odin. Odin supposedly has his own power and that of his two brothers and that passes on to Thor when Odin dies, presumably making Thor even more powerful than Odin was during his life. So maybe the ruling family of Asgard also has some inherent extra power, except that somehow doesn't effect Balder, who was revealed to also be a son of Odin's. So the only thing that remains consistent is that maybe Thor is stronger than normal because of who his parents are, and he might actually have inherited more raw strength from his mother's side than his fathers.

The Thor movie reminded me of this a bit because they kept him as Thor and not as Donald Blake when Odin strips his powers. Although in the movie it does appear that he is stripped down to where he's at human level instead of still well beyond the human norm. It could also be a mismash of the 616 comics and the Ultimate comics.

[Batman]

As for why Mjolnir can't be moved, while it probably makes not more sense than any other theory put forward, given the damn thing can be moved by Earth rotating, Earth orbiting the sun, the solar system moving across the galaxy or even the helicarrier moving around, I propose the thing can't be moved relative to whichever surface Thor decided to drop it on. Thor drops it in your sink, you can move your sink to your heart's content, but you can't get the hammer out of the sink unless you're worthy.

I essentially agree, except that you wouldn't be able to move your sink, either, once the hammer was "at rest".
In the helicarrier hangar, the hammer is "at rest" relative to the deck, and not even the Hulk can move it. That seems to be the key. No unworthy person can willfully move it from where it came to rest, even with machinery.

The problem is the hammer is being moved by machinery in that very scene-the helicarrier is carrying Mjolnir with it. Hence me surmising that while you can't remove the hammer from wherever it was dropped, moving the place it was dropped in is possible.

[Ted C]

I essentially agree, except that you wouldn't be able to move your sink, either, once the hammer was "at rest". In the helicarrier hangar, the hammer is "at rest" relative to the deck, and not even the Hulk can move it. That seems to be the key. No unworthy person can willfully move it from where it came to rest, even with machinery.

The problem is the hammer is being moved by machinery in that very scene-the helicarrier is carrying Mjolnir with it. Hence me surmising that while you can't remove the hammer from wherever it was dropped, moving the place it was dropped in is possible.

Yes, but it was dropped by Thor onto the deck of a carrier that was already moving (much like a planet's surface is moving), and it was also moving with Thor (which the hammer is keyed to follow). It certainly seems to be content to move with any surface it lands on, but it refuses to be moved relative to that surface by an unworthy person (hence a truck being unable to pull it from its crater).

Surely SHIELD tried moving it to a more secure location just by picking up the rock it was embedded in with a front-end loader or something. I give Odin's enchantment credit for being able to counter simple work-arounds.

[Batman]

How would moving the hammer be a workaround? The whole point of the enchantment wasn't to prevent the hammer from being moved, but from somebody 'unworthy' picking it up and wielding it, which moving the hammer's resting place elsewhere doesn't do squat about-instead of a hammer nobody can lift in a crater in New Mexico you now have a hammer nobody can lift in a SHIELD laboratory somewhere.

[Batman]

GHETTO EDIT:Now the fact that SHIELD didn't do this and instead erected a new facility around Mjolnir indicates that either indeed doesn't work or nobody thought of it (which isn't necessarily all that unbelievable), I'm just trying to reconcile the 'nobody can move it' aspect of the enchantment with the fact that actually, the damn thing is moving all the damn time, and can be moved by vehicle even when Thor's not holding it.

[Lost Soal]

GHETTO EDIT:Now the fact that SHIELD didn't do this and instead erected a new facility around Mjolnir indicates that either indeed doesn't work or nobody thought of it (which isn't necessarily all that unbelievable), I'm just trying to reconcile the 'nobody can move it' aspect of the enchantment with the fact that actually, the damn thing is moving all the damn time, and can be moved by vehicle even when Thor's not holding it.

The hammer is a magical magnet. Once placed the magnetic waves extend and fix it in place. You can't just cut through the column it was embedded in and move the whole thing because its still holding on to the rest of its surroundings.
Thinking about it, as bizarre as it sound the most likely reason is simply that Thor told the Hammer to let the Carrier move.
Can't really reconcile everything any other way.

[PeZook]

It's an enchanted thunder-controlling magical space hammer. I'm sure it's possible for ancient demigods to code stuff like "don't bring down airplanes if Thor drops you aboard one" into their magic

[Batman]

That Asgardian magic is capable of doing that is out of the question. However, the only information we actually have from the movies is
1. Nobody can move that damned hammer from where it's been put, yet
2. the helicarrier happily carries it along, and
3. it's being moved by Earth's rotation, Earth orbiting the sun, and the solar system orbiting the center of the galaxy (unless you want to argue those don't apply in the Marvel movieverse).

[PeZook]

And where's the problem? The hammer is probably "programmed", for lack of a better word, to prevent itself from being wielded ; So it won't try to resist floating through the cosmos or riding on a vehicle it was dropped on or rolling down a hill, but when say a government organization or bunch of rednecks try to move it using machinery or tricks, it fucks with their attempts because they'd want to wield it.