Thorgal

Thorgal is a Belgian comic book series by the Belgian author Jean Van Hamme and the Polish artist Grzegorz Rosinski. It has first been published in 1980 by Le Lombard, and later appeared in Tintin magazine. Translations exist in English, Dutch, German and Polish, among others. In 2002 parts of the the storyline were adapted into a point-and-click adventure game, titled Curse of Atlantis: Thorgal's Quest, that was released on Windows by Cryo Interactive Entertainment, a small French game developer.

The comic unites many themes and legends into one story, going from Norse mythology, science fiction and Atlantean fantasy.

Contents

1 Volumes 2 Storyline 3 Main characters 4 External link

Volumes

The volumes are composed of some story arches and a few stand-alone stories. The English titles in the below list are translations of the French original titles.

1. The betrayed witch (start of the Ice Queen story arc)
2. The island of frozen seas (end of the Ice Queen story arc)
3. Three ancients of the realm of Aran
4. The black galley (start of the Brek Zarith story arc)
5. Beyond the shadows'
6. The fall of Brek Zarith (end of the Brek Zarith story arc)
7. Child of the stars (short prequel-like stories)
8. Alinoe
9. The archers (start of the Qâ story arc)
10. The land of Qâ
11. The eyes of Tanatloc
12. City of the lost god
13. Between earth and light (end of the Qâ story arc)
14. Aaricia (short prequel-like stories)
15. Master of the mountains (very intricate time-travel story)
16. Louve
17. The Guardian of the keys (start of the Memory story arc)
18. The sun-sword
19. The invisible fortress
20. The mark of exile
21. The crown of Ogotai
22. Giants
23. The cage (end of the Memory story arc)
24. Arachnea
25. The blue plague
26. The kingdom under the sands
27. The barbarian (start of a new story arc?)
28. Kriss of Valnor

Storyline

The basic storyline –who Thorgal is– is explained in album 7, Child of the stars. The main character is Thorgal Aegirsson, who is found as a baby in some sort of stasis capsule by the Viking chieftain Leif Haraldson after his ship is torn to pieces by the elements of the Atlantic Ocean. Leif adopts the child and names it Thor-gal Aegirs-son, after Thor, the Norse God of thunder, and Aegir, the ruler of the sea, because he considers Thorgal to be a gift of the Gods.

What no one in the world knows, save a few, is that Thorgal is the soon-to-be last survivor of a highly intelligent group of space-farers, that are capable of psionics, changing the molecular composition of materials,... but Thorgal himself does not have these powers. Thorgal grows up, and on his eigth birthday he recieves some strange artifacts from Leif. One of the gifts, the metal that cannot exist, brings Thorgal on his first adventure, and binds his fate forever with that of Aaricia, who is born on that day. When he's twelve, the other gifts prompt him to visit an old wise man, who tells him who he really is, and that he should forget his identity. The old man then erases Thorgal's memory of what he just told him.

Main characters

• Thorgal Aegirsson: Viking, adopted by Leif Haraldson
• Aaricia: Thorgal's wife, daughter of former Viking leader, Gandalf the Mad
• Jolan: their son, who possesses the mystical power of disintegrating and reshaping matter
• Louve (She-wolf): their daughter, who possesses the mystical power of conversing with animals
• Kriss of Valnor: alternating lover and arch-enemy of Thorgal
• Treefoot: an exceptional bowman and -maker, has a pegleg
• Tjall (self-nicknamed Tjall-The-Fiery): cousin of Treefoot
• Shaigan the Merciless: alter-ego of Thorgal, notorious pirate leader, one-time husband of Kriss
• Frigg (Freya): wife of Odin, goddess and some-time protector of Thorgal. She is the ultimate link between Aaricia and Thorgal.
• Tanatloc: peace-loving Incan-type god, nemesis of Ogotai, died of old age
• Ogotai: war-loving Incan-type god, nemesis of Tanatloc, deceased

External link

• Official web site (http://www.thorgal.com/), in French only

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