Valhalla (comics)

Valhalla
Carlsen Comics (1987–present)
Genre	Historical
Publication date	1979
No. of issues	15
Main character(s)	Thor, Odin and Loki
Creative team
Created by	Henning Kure and Arne Stenby
Written by	Peter Madsen, Hans Rancke-Madsen, Per Vadmand and Henning Kure.
Artist(s)	Peter Madsen
Colorist(s)	Søren Håkonsson, Jesper Ejsing

Valhalla is a

was released.

History

During 1976 and 1977,

.

Valhalla started in 1978 as a strip running in the Danish newspaper Politiken. The first collected album came out in 1979. It was very well received, with several subsequent albums.

The tone of the albums has focused on humor, but the characters, and much of the plot, are based on the stories and legends in the

, which also served as inspiration for the Valhalla comics.

On January 5, 2007, Valhalla was published on the Internet for the first time as the Danish paper Jyllands-Posten began publishing the 14th album, Muren ("The Wall"), in their online edition. One page was posted weekly in the form of an animated Flash program, in an attempt to transfer the large album pages to a format suitable for the web.

Creative teams

Valhalla would become the major breakthrough for illustrator Peter Madsen, who has developed greatly during his work on the series. Apart from doing the art for all the albums, he has been a co-writer for most of them. By far the most high-profile member of the creative team, the series is often referred to as "Peter Madsen's Valhalla".

Hans Rancke-Madsen has been the major writer of the series, together with Peter and other co-writers Per Vadmand and Henning Kure. Rancke-Madsen has written for all albums but eleven and twelve, but will return for the thirteenth album.

The colouring has always been a great part of the art of Valhalla. The first eight albums were coloured by Søren Håkonsson. Peter Madsen did the colours himself for the ninth album, while albums ten to twelve were done by Jesper Ejsing. Håkonsson returned for the thirteenth album, where he did half the pages, the other half being done by Madsen.

Album titles and summaries

All the individual albums that were originally published by

.

1. Ulven er Løs ("

brought the wolf to Valhalla. An educational edition of this comic received The Danish School Librarians' Association's Children's Book Prize in 1982.

2. Thors Brudefærd ("Thor's Wedding"), Interpresse (1980). Based on the Þrymskviða. The giant (jötunn) Þrymr has stolen Thor's hammer Mjölnir, and will only return it in exchange for marrying the goddess Freyja. Thor and Loki have to dress up like Freyja and her maid to trick the giants and get the hammer back.

3. Odins Væddemål ("

.

4. Historien om Quark ("

Röskva

being the only ones he finally learns to like. (Quark isn't based on any original Norse myths, but is an original creation of Peter Madsen.) The story continues in the next album.

5. Rejsen Til Udgårdsloke ("The Journey to Útgarða-Loki"), Interpresse (1989). Thor, Loki, Þjálfi and Röskva travel to Utgard to have a competition with the jötnar led by Útgarða-Loki. The losers of the competition will have to keep Quark.

6. De Gyldne Æbler ("

.

7. Ormen i Dybet ("

, Denmark.

8. Frejas Smykke ("

. The comic was chosen as the best foreign comic album of 1992 in Norway.

9. Den Store Udfordring ("

Guldfaxe

is the faster horse. They race to Valhalla where Hrungnir proceeds to terrorise the gods. Thor challenges him to a duel, bringing Þjálfi and Magni along while the giants plot to kill Thor.

10. Gudernes Gaver ("The Gifts for the Gods"), Carlsen Comics (1997). The story of how the young Thor and Sif met, and of how the young Loki was made to travel to the dwarven realm and brought back several fantastic gifts, most notably the hammer Mjølner.

11. Mysteriet om Digtermjøden ("

.

12. Gennem Ild og Vand ("

Geirröd

has allied with the jötnar and brought misery to his country. As Odin and Loki travel to his kingdom to see what is happening, Odin is captured, though Geirröd does not know who he has caught. Loki and Thor return in an attempt to free him.

13. Balladen om Balder ("

. Since Loki never had been really evil in any earlier books, he isn't a deliberate perpetrator, here. In the afterword the authors explain and motivate this that out of the three accounts of the story, it is only in the Prose Edda that Loki actually has any hand in Baldr's death. The goddess Hel makes her first and only appearance.

14. Muren ("The Wall"), Carlsen Comics (2007). Mostly based on the myth of Skírnismál. It also includes the myth on how Loki gave birth to Sleipnir, appearing in the Prose Edda. It was released one page at a time on the online edition of the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten as of January 5, 2007.

15. Vølvens syner ("

The albums have also been collected in anthologies in some countries. All albums have been translated into

.

Animated film

Valhalla was made into an

in 1986. The story is based on albums one, four and five, focusing on Tjalfe, Røskva and their meeting with Thor, Loki and Quark.

Although the film was in some ways a milestone for

(approximately 5 million $), which it had no chance of bringing back in. No follow up to the film was made, although six short spin-off films, featuring Quark, were made by Swan Film Production. Quark is also the protagonist of his own comic series, of which several books have been published. Several more shorts were planned, but the studio collapsed from the troubles the Valhalla film had brought.

Several animators from the project later went together to found the studio

, one of the most successful animation studios in Scandinavia.

In 2003, the movie was released on DVD in Denmark.

Stamp and playing cards

In 2002 Post Danmark the Danish postal service made four stamps featuring Danish comic book characters. Peter Madsen drew the artwork for the Valhalla stamp and he also made a deck of playing cards with his characters. The other three stamps featured Rasmus Klump, Jungledyret Hugo and Cirkeline.

Live action film

In 2017, a live action adaptation of Valhalla was announced. It has been said to be serious and dark in tone, but generally follows the story of Tjalfe, Røskva, Thor, Loki and Quark once again, with more focus on Røskva than Tajlfe. A trailer has been released, then the film was released on October 10, 2019.

References

External links

• Peter Madsen's Valhalla 11 (Wayback Machine). The official site for the making of Valhalla 11. Shows the step-by-step process used for several pages and also features other album information and art by Peter Madsen.
• Peter Madsen's official homepage. (In Danish and English)
• Carlsen Comics. Current publishers of Valhalla (in Danish).
• Jyllands-Posten. Publishing the 14th album online.