Thursday, May 13, 2010

With a name like 'Demogorge,' it's got to be...a big, lumpy monster, apparently.

Sometimes, you can come across a character in a comic book, that you may never need to see again in a comic, but goddamn, you need an action figure of them right now. Marvel's Onslaught, for example. (I just did a quick search and while I've mentioned Onslaught more than once, I've never posted a scan of him!) Or the Spider-Hulk. Or maybe Demogorge, from Thor Annual #10, "A Time to Die!" Written by Alan Zelenetz, pencils by Bob Hall, inks by Bryant, Rubinstein, Mushynsky, Gordon, and Dzuban; with a co-plotter credit to Mark Gruenwald.

While the story opens with a bunch of backstory about Marvel's theology, and the funeral of Balder's beloved Nanna, things don't get moving until Odin notices Norse death goddess Hela didn't bother to show up. Hela's got her own problems, though; having been called to a summit meeting of death gods. Which sounds way more awesome than it turns out...
Worst game of ring-around-the-rosie ever.
The death gods are having a bit of a downturn in damned souls, since apparently they can't claim a soul that doesn't believe in them. And when you're Ahpuch of the Mayans, and are a little lacking in name recognition, that's a problem. The death gods plan on banding together for the first time, to drum up new followers and reap new souls. Having recently gotten trounced while trying to expand her own turf, Hela isn't down with the idea, but reluctantly accepts. And as she expected, the plan goes sour: instead of uniting their realms, they accidentally unleash Demogorge, the God-Eater.
How Demogorge isn't a metal band, I have no idea...maybe it is.
Unsurprisingly, Demogorge eats most of the death gods in attendance--Mephisto, in particular, goes out crying like a little girl--and gets grosser with each one, the eatens' faces appearing on Demogorge's body. He also does at least most of the eating with gross orifices in his hands, not unlike the Wraith of Stargate: Atlantis, but predating it by decades. Odin had sent his raven Hugin to see why Hela was a no-show; and gets the heads-up. Odin then alerts the other pantheons, and they agree to each send their mightiest to stop Demogorge.
Man, a box set of these figures would be awesome...whaddya mean, 'sacrilegious'?
Yeah, I had this issue as a kid, and I remember being peeved that the Olympians sent Apollo instead of Hercules. (Ares was still a straight-up villain at that point...) I loved Herc's limited series from Bob Layton, and he also got shafted out of the big Champion boxing match in Marvel Two-in-One Annual #7. Man, I still need a new copy of that one.

Anyway, long story short, the pantheons' champions all get eaten save Thor, who lets himself get eaten in order to kick Demogorge's ass from the inside. For anyone else, that'd be a colossal fail, but he's Thor.

Demogorge's scale seems to vary wildly in this one, partially because he seems to grow with each god he eats; but for the Marvel Universe scale figures, a good-sized version would still be smaller than the larger Marvel Legends. (Yeah, that made sense...I was thinking comparable to the ML Abomination or Hulkbuster Iron Man, although his wings would make him seem even bigger.) Sculpt him with at least three or four faces sticking out of him, and make him out of a softer plastic, so he feels lumpy and gross...ah, that'd be sweet.

I know Demogorge has made other appearances, including in Incredible Hercules, but I don't care. He'd be a neat looking monster, and that's enough.

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