America is dressed as the Marvel god/superhero Thor, while the rest are dressed as the version of the gods from the comic "Valhalla". Sweden is dressed as Odin.
One superhero that for sure will never be taken seriously in Scandinavia is Thor. Ever.
"Valhalla" is a re-interpretation of the old myths. For example, even though he’s a jackass, Loki doesn’t turn more and more evil. It’s just the other gods who trust him less and less because he keep causing trouble, and in the end they start blaming him for things he didn’t do.
In the story about Balder’s death he doesn’t intend for Balder to die. He just wanted to make a fool of Balder’s brother Hod by making him think he could hurt his brother with a mistletoe. So Loki was just as surprised as everybody else when it killed Balder.
Neither did he betray the gods during Ragnarok. The jotuns captured him without the gods knowing, so when the battle started they saw him on the jotuns’ side. He tried to get over to the gods, but was attacked by Heimdal.
In 1986 the comic got turned into a cartoon http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNX_Heix390
@ben3b The Avengers was a good movie, yes. But Marvel's Thor is probably the goofiest depiction of him (Sif was also not dark-haired, Loki was not adopted but rather immigrated with his wife and I have no idea why there were spaceships in Asgard). He's more like He-Man or something. But Americans don't understand anything, so I guess it's okay.
@CrazyFox8 Gandalf is kinda based on Odin so you're not too far off. There are plenty of references to norse mythology throughout the LotR and Hobbit movies. Gandalf is also the name of a dwarf(I think it was) mentioned in the Edda
"One man's god is another man's devil". As each subsequent civilization became a dominant power, among its first acts was to depose and demonize whoever the previous culture had worshiped. The Jews attacked Belial, the god of Babylonians. The Christians banished Pan and Loki and Mars, the respective deities of the ancient Greeks and Celts and Romans.
Satan is depicted with cloven hooves coz... Pan had them, and he carries pitchfork based on the trident carried by Neptune. All the demons of Hell formerly reigned as gods in previous cultures.
Even the word "demon" originates with Christian theologians who misinterpreted "daimon" in the writing of Socrates. Originally the word meant 'muse' or 'inspiration,' but its most common definition was "god."
Who could imagine that cross-cultural anthropological theology could be so absolutely fascinating
Me (murican w/ Ukrainian and irish roots) to murica :That is actually how norse gods look and marvels thor is entierly wrong. for instance, loki is (historicaly) odins blood brother not adopted child and Sif isblond and married to thor and ragnarok is entierly different and... you know what just read these *hands D'aulairs book of norse myths, Neil Gaiman"s Norse Mythology, and a translated edda*
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