Gorr The God Butcher origin

Who is Gorr The God Butcher?

He may be brand-new to the MCU, but Gorr The God Butcher is within Thor’s top five deadliest and strongest enemies, but his origin is truly tragic.

His story starts off as when he was just a small child. He lived on an unnamed desert planet with very little water and food and his family worshipped (and trusted) the gods. 

His father died (the comics do not reveal how), and when he and his mother where hunting once, they were ambushed by Sand Tigers. His mother was killed, making him an orphan abandoned in the harshest of environments, but before she died, she told him to run and hide, and that the gods will protect him.

Gorr later grew up and fathered his own children, although most of them died. One day, he and his pregnant wife, Arra, were seeking shelter in a cave when tragedy struck again. An earthquake buried his poor wife, and all but one of his offspring were killed, his son Agar the sole survivor. His wife's last words were: “Gods help me!”

Years later, he and his child Agar, and his tribe the Black Berserkers, were desperately trying to find food and water. They were on the brink of starvation and sadly his sole remaining child didn't survive. When he wanted to bury his child at a tree they spent months finding, the tribe decided that: “No, we should sacrifice his body to the gods.” Gorr was outraged at this suggestion. He screamed back at them and when he rebelled, the tribe cast him out and threw rocks at him.

Days later, all alone and stricken with grief, something crash landed near him. As he went to find out more, he saw two gods battling each other. This was the first time he realised the gods he was brought up to trust and worship actually did exist. One was in an elder god shining gold armour and the other had armour forged of darkness - Knull. 

The elder god begged Gorr to: “Help me, please,” and this outraged him. He immediately yelled back in anger and that’s when he first gained his powers. The darker god Knull's symbiotic sword bonded with Gorr and turned into his new weapon, the All-Black Necrosword. He used this new dagger to impale the helpless, wounded elder god in the chest as punishment for never answering his prayers.

That’s when he realised there were more gods across the universe and flew into space to begin his journey of revenge. That’s when he became known and feared as "Gorr The God Butcher".

Fun Fact: Gorr landed on Earth in the 9th century and butchered Slavic and Americas gods. He captured Thor, torturing him for information on the location of Asgard, until Thor was rescued by his Viking worshippers, then he cut off Gorr's right arm, leaving him for dead.