Only a worthy enemy who is more than capable of decimating the character can make a powerful superhero complete. It is then that the superhero’s flaws become so sympathetic to the audience that they begin to root for him against all obstacles. The Marvel universe has been bolstered by a slew of immensely powerful villains, including Thanos, who has instilled fear in the hearts of fans.
Many comic book fans, however, have long complained that the actual potential of some of the most powerful villains has never been realized in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. With the introduction of Gorr the God Butcher in the upcoming Marvel film Thor: Love and Thunder, some of these criticisms will be addressed.
This infamous character has plagued even the most powerful of celestial beings, and the fact that he has beaten Thor at times demonstrates his extraordinary abilities. Gorr is well-known for slaughtering Gods and destroying worlds on his own, as his name suggests. If you look into the lore behind Gorr, you will find him to be a fascinating villain, which will only heighten your desire to see him on screen. In this video, we will cover everything there is to know about this mighty God-killer, as well as speculate on Gorr’s likely portrayal in the next film.
The God Butcher’s Humble Beginnings
Before turning into a serial killer who specializes in taking down Gods, Gorr had a rather tragic background. He did not start off as a powerful villain, and he was born on a poverty-stricken nameless planet. The inhabitants of the planet lived in near starvation, and the conditions were pathetic.
However, they still had a strange faith and trust in the Gods. Gorr was one of the many suffering inhabitants of the planet, and he was struggling to make ends meet like everyone else. He had a son and a pregnant wife, but despite all his prayers, the Gods never answered. They neither found a proper food resource, nor found water, and survival was becoming impossible.
People around him started dying one by one, and after the loss of his wife and son, his faith took a major hit. He wandered off, and in near-death conditions, he witnessed something strange. He saw two Gods fighting between themselves, and one of them sought help from Gorr.
The man who had watched everything around him destroyed because of the ignorance of the Gods was now filled with fury. He had started to believe that Gods did not exist, but now, he had raw hate for them all! He killed the first God that day, and he swore that he would create a universe without the existence of Gods. This is where he got the source of all his powers – the Necrosword.
The Necrosword was a form of the All-Black symbiote, which was manifested from the shadow of the evil deity Knull. It took the form of a sword that was made from living darkness, and after bonding with Gorr, it made him extremely powerful. He had all the abilities that Knull possessed, and Gorr was transformed into some kind of an immortal and evil God.
When he took a vow to slaughter all Gods in existence, Gorr used the Necrosword to construct his own planet and his soldiers. Previously, we have seen Hela, the goddess of death, use the Necrosword, and it was quite potent to take down divine forces.
Gorr went about killing numerous Gods, and he absorbed all their powers and was growing stronger with each kill. While the Necrosword was making him so powerful, it also meant that Gorr would be vulnerable without the power of his weapon! Is this the chink in his armor that can be exposed? Well, let us look into the comic book narrative to find the answers and learn more about the vicious God Killer!
Thor vs. Gorr – the rivalry across time
The character of Gorr the God Butcher is relatively new in Marvel, and it was first introduced in the comic book titled Thor: God of Thunder. This series written by Jason Aaron is a standalone story of Thor and his interaction with the ultimate nemesis of all Gods. The narrative spans several timelines, and you get to witness Thor from different times fighting Gorr the God Butcher.
One is Thor from the past, young and energetic, but one who doesn’t think twice before his actions. The second one is from the present, and he is a member of the Avengers. The third Thor is from the future, and he is portrayed to be an aged God who now rules Asgard. The story begins in the year 1893 and things start off on the Western Coast of Iceland. This is Thor from the past, a young man who is enjoying a party with his fellow companions.
Suddenly, they all hear someone screaming in agony, and young Thor rushes outside with his ax. He hadn’t become worthy of the Mjolnir, but even without his mighty hammer, he was still a force to reckon with. After coming outside, Thor witnesses a strange sight. The stream nearby is filled with blood, and he finds the severed head of an individual.
To their horror, Thor and his companions realize that the one slain is not a mere mortal, but a God! They all start to wonder who could have been powerful enough to slaughter a God like this! Thor observes a shadow at a distance, and he immediately goes after the entity. Unfortunately, Thor is completely unaware that the shadowy figure is actually waiting for him to fall prey. His hands transform into a magical dark sword, and he attacks Thor ferociously. Young Thor is no match for his extreme powers, and he is knocked unconscious.
This is the first sight of Gorr the God Butcher for the fans, and he is intimidating right from the start because of the way he handles Thor effortlessly. When Thor wakes up, he finds himself tied up and helpless inside a cave. He introduces himself as the God Butcher, and he tells Thor about his goal of terminating all Gods in existence.
He starts to torture young Thor for information about the other Gods, but Thor’s companions come to his rescue! They attack Gorr together, and even though they are no match for the God Butcher, they buy Thor enough time to free himself. He uses his ax to slash through Gorr, and he orders his companions to keep this encounter a secret. Little did young Thor know, that this incident would come back to haunt him again!
Let us take you ahead in time, where we see the Thor of the present, helping the inhabitants of a planet named Indigarr. The planet was suffering from extreme drought, and the people were faced with extinction. They desperately prayed to their Gods for water, but Thor came to their rescue.
However, Thor starts to wonder where the Gods of Indigarr were! He heads to the palace of the Gods of Indigarr, and he is shocked to find out that something had killed all the Gods and hanged them on the pillars. Thor heads to the Omnipotent City, which has a library with information about all the Gods in the universe. He realizes that in order to take down this mysterious God assassin, he has to consult other Gods.
However, he soon finds out that all the Gods have been slaughtered. Irrespective of how powerful or important these Gods were, they were all killed and this took Thor down memory lane. He realized that all this could be the work of the mysterious entity he had encountered back in his young days.
He heads back to the caves, where it all started. When he enters the cave he finds one of the Gods who managed to survive the rigorous torture of Gorr. The God reveals that the other Gods who were being tortured have perished, and he barely managed to escape.
Thor also learns that all this mayhem is because of him because the defeat all those years ago only strengthened the resolve of Gorr the Butcher. He is now back with a vengeance, and Thor is his final frontier! The surviving God reveals the present location of Gorr, who is now on a planet named Chronux, where people have mastered time travel.
Another jump in the timeline takes you to the Hall of Asgard many millennia from the present. An old Thor is sitting on the throne, and he single-handedly attacks some adversaries at the door. The attackers are some kind of animalistic soldiers, dark energy that has been conjured by none other than Gorr!
An old Thor is still a great warrior and he cuts through many of these soldiers until he is finally tied down and defeated. The soldiers leave him back in his palace, almost as an insult to his incompetence. Thor begs them to finish him off, but the soldiers pay no heed to his requests. It turns out that these soldiers have been doing this for ages, and they simply took pride in defeating the old king of Asgard again and again.
Back on the planet Chronux, Gorr kills the inhabitants of the planet and makes a huge pool filled with their blood. He wanted to utilize the powers of time travel in the inhabitants, and he finally walked into the pool himself. Gorr went back to the beginning of time, even before the creation of the Gods, and he picked up the heart of the Elder Gods even before their creation.
This way, there would be no Gods in the universe, to begin with, but when Gorr comes back in his time, he is greeted by Thor who has reached Chronux by then. By now, Thor had his hammer, but even the powerful Mjolnir could not defeat the God Butcher. Thor is knocked unconscious, but he quickly regains his composure and chases after Gorr who had plunged into the pool of blood yet again.
In the future, an old Thor tries to get back on his feet to prepare for another fight with the mysterious soldiers. He is defeated once again, but this time, he has some unexpected help. In a blinding flash of light, Thor from the present appears before him. It seems like he made use of the pool of blood to travel in time to the future. The old king fights alongside a young Thor, and together, they slaughter the monstrous army.
When Thor from the present asks King Thor about the whereabouts of Gorr, the latter replies that he is 900 years late because Gorr has been ruling the universe for all those decades! Now, the powers of Gorr are almost impossible to defeat, and he was so powerful that he destroyed Asgard in a matter of moments, killing Loki and King Odin. He kept King Thor alive only to torture him and humiliate him with constant defeat.
However, this time with the arrival of Thor from the present, they make one last plan to eradicate the menace of Gorr the God Butcher! They head to his planet, and they find a young Thor who had been previously taken a prisoner by Gorr during one of their encounters. This is Thor from the past, and he was no match for the God Butcher. During his imprisonment, young Thor meets three women who claim to be the grandchildren of King Thor, the Thor from the future!
Meanwhile, there is another shocking revelation! It turns out that the God that Thor saved in the cave, was actually the God of bombs. This God bomb could kill Gods in all parallel universes as well, and this would be the ultimate weapon for Gorr. In a grand act of bravery, young Thor takes another bomb and hurls it at the God bomb. A massive explosion erupts, and he is thrown off the planet.
This is when he meets Thor from the present and King Thor. They make him understand the whole story and the three Thors head back to the planet of Gorr. They are surprised to see that the God bomb is still intact, but the three Thors fight valiantly. A powerful explosion throws Gorr several lightyears away, but he continues slaughtering more Gods there and makes himself stronger.
Even three Thors together are not powerful enough for Gorr, and he drags young Thor to the God Bomb. He even kills his wife, whom he had conjured using the Necrosword after her death. She had called him her God, and this angered him enough to kill her! But Gorr’s son, who was also created using the Necrosword, watched his mother being killed. He helps young Thor, and Gorr tries to activate the God bomb.
By then, King Thor, and Thor from the present arrive to help. King Thor hands his hammer to Thor from the present, and with two Mjolnirs, he strikes upon the God bomb. It still explodes into a blinding blast, but Thor used the powers of the two Mjolnirs to try and stop the impact of the explosion.
If he did not succeed, all Gods would be dead, but he finally tastes victory! He gets all the powers of Gorr, including the power of the Necrosword. Gorr is now almost powerless and rushes to his son who turns into dust.
As Gorr mourns the death of his son, young Thor strikes from behind and chops his head off. The three Thors reunite in King Thor’s Asgard, and Thor from the present and young Thor return to their own times! Everything is back to normal once again, and the tyranny and vicious nature of Gorr the God Butcher are finally over!
What kind of Gorr are we going to see in the MCU?
It is no secret that the legendary English actor Christian Bale has been roped in to play the role of Gorr the God Butcher in the movie. This means that the makers felt the need for a proper A-list actor to portray the character, and they certainly did not cast him for some insignificant appearance.
The fact that someone of the caliber of Christian Bale is required to play the role indicates that the narrative will explore the complexities of this character. The fans have loved him as the Dark Knight in Christopher Nolan’s Batman movies, and this time, he takes the shoe on the other foot and comes as a dreaded villain.
Everyone on the sets was ecstatic about the performance of Christian Bale, and it is quite likely that he will set the screens alive with yet another electrifying presence. Thor: Love and Thunder are being directed by Taika Waititi, and we are eagerly waiting to see how he brings the complex and tragic backstory of the character in the movie.
It will be time-consuming to dedicate so much screen time to Gorr, but it will be worth investing in a character that can be immortalized as a villain and become a recurring character later. If you are familiar with Waititi’s work in the 2019 film Jojo Rabbit, you are well aware of his skills to explore the humor in the darkest aspects of the villain’s story.
Some leaked images show Christian Bale in extensive prosthetics and the director could be heading the old-school way, but they can always add CGI effects in the post-production phase. However, it is quite possible that the movie will not stick to the appearance as projected in the comic books. Whatever be the case, the sheer intensity that Christian Bale will bring to the character is a mouth-watering prospect for the fans, and as avid comic-book lovers, we would love to see justice being done to this character.