In Review: Marvel’s Thor: Metal Gods – Episode 2

Synopsis: Thor and Horangi go to an intergalactic concert where they discover K-pop dance routines aren’t the only thing keeping the crowd enthralled.

Review: The second episode of Serialbox’s ‘Thor: Metal Gods’ spends a lot more time with Thor and Horangi in order to paint us a fuller picture of the friendship they have and illustrate how Horangi is somewhat of a tragic figure.

The Story

Having calmed down somewhat from their initial reunion in last week’s opening episode. Horangi begins to tell Thor what it is all about and after some time catching up with each other over Tea they head out to an intergalactic concert. Once at the concert venue Horangi tells Thor that someone has been bringing her people from Korea on Earth to the concerts. As their god it is her duty to protect her people and whenever they are displaced or hurt she feels it through her connection too them. They see an act called Nihilator who is seemingly wearing an Asgardian crown, which is the reason why Horangi has brought Thor.

The audience is seemingly hypnotized by this Nihilator and becomes more frenzied when he brings in five of her people from Korea to dance, but it will not be an ordinary dance as Thor and Horangi witness the horrific truth of it.

The Narration

Daniel Gillies continues to do a solid job of the narration in an episode that doesn’t have quite so much action as the opening installment due it mostly being character beats between Thor and Horangi. The sequence of Narration where Thor is transporting Horangi to the concert has some fun moments and Gillies pitches the intonation of Horangi’s dry wit just about perfectly and as you’d imagine hearing it if you were reading the story yourself.

Overall

This second episode didn’t really have the impact of episode one in terms of action and so forth, but it does a great job of building the character relationships and peeling back a few more layers of the story. Once again the description of the concert and venue, as well as the bands that were playing and how they sound and dressed, was spot on. The big shock element comes at the close of the chapter, which is pretty brutal and is just enough to bring you back for the third episode, which will be out on Boxing Day.

A solid effort that gives us a lot more insight into Horangi and Thor’s friendship and why Horangi was angry with him.

• You can buy episodes of Thor: Metal Gods here at serialbox.com