She's a Maneater: Hela Will Have Another Deadly Marvel Villain's Powers in 'Thor: Ragnarok'

We've known for a while that Cate Blanchett's Hela will be the main villain of Thor Ragnarok and that the Goddess of Death will mount an assault on Asgard. The first trailer showed a rather ominous shot of Hela shattering Mjolnir in her bare hands; clearly, she's not one to be trifled with.

Since the first two trailers have been revealed, there's been speculation that the #MCU incarnation Hela may have been inspired by another villain; because of the black substance surrounding her when she uses her magic, fans began to speculate that this was a reference to Gorr, The God Butcher. Gorr is able to manifest extremely powerful weapons out of dark energy thanks to All-Black the Necrosword, a weapon that allows its wielder to manipulate dark energy. It seems that Hela has acquired this blade in the MCU as the sword she wields bears a striking resemblance to Gorr's blade:

This was confirmed by Comicbook.com on a visit to the Thor: Ragnarok set earlier this year:

“A lot of the design of Hela is a combination of the early Jack Kirby stuff but also...especially his power set, the villain Gorr, who has a very specific power set of being able to manifest an infinite number of weapons.”

Why Is The God Butcher Significant?

It's fairly obvious that Hela is already going to be a huge threat to Thor, and adding Gorr the God Butcher's abilities into the mix will certainly make her an even more formidable opponent. As his name implies, Gorr is a serial killer who travels across the Nine Realms murdering all of the gods he comes into contact with. As the God of Thunder, #Thor and the rest of Asgard are in his sights.

He was introduced in the excellent comic book run Thor: The God Butcher, which featured the Asgardian following Gorr's trail of slaughter across the Nine Realms. The first time Thor did battle with Gorr he barely managed to escape alive, only managing to summon some lightning just as the God Butcher was about to land the killing blow. When they next met, Gorr actually managed to get the upper hand on the Asgardian, tying him up and torturing him for 17 days to try and ascertain the location of Asgard. Fortunately, Thor is made of stern stuff and was able to hold out long enough to be rescued by his Viking followers.

In truth, Gorr's battle with Thor stretches across millennia and he is a huge threat to all of Asgard. Because of the blind hatred he has for gods, Gorr kills without thought. He renounced gods after his mate and children died, but after discovering that gods are real, he goes mad — he can't comprehend why any of the gods didn't help his family. From this point forwards, he sets out to prove that being a god means nothing, and they can have their lives taken away just as mortals can.

How Will Hela Be Different?

While Hela may have Gorr's powers, she will certainly pose a different kind of threat to the Odinson. It seems that she's been planning her seize of Asgard for quite some time and she clearly has little respect for Thor. She mocks Thor in the trailer, asking what he is the god of; she's taken away his hammer and in doing so she has taken away the one thing that he treasures the most.

The moment when she destroys Mjolnir is also significant as it takes away Thor's main weapon, and in the process damages his ego — remember the lengths he goes to in the first Thor film to reclaim his hammer? Thor will have to learn to live without Mjolnir it seems, and this actually calls back to Gorr as well.

After the events of Original Sin in the #Marvel comics, Thor becomes unworthy of his hammer; Nick Fury whispers something into his ear and Mjolnir drops to the ground. For a long time, the words Fury said to the Odinson are a mystery, but we found out earlier this year that he said "Gorr was right".

While it's definitely speculation that Hela's destruction of Mjolnir will have made Thor unworthy of his hammer, it's not to say that this wasn't the inspiration for him losing the Uru hammer in #ThorRagnarok. Without his trusty hammer, the God of Thunder has to find another way to win and it's clear that this will be vastly different to any Thor film before it.