When Thor lost the worthiness to wield Mjolnir during "Original Sin" a mysterious woman picked up the hammer and became The New Thor. This woman was Jane Foster and we are not talking about her. We're talking about the Thor of the 90's, the Z-Lister known as Thunderstrike.
First appearing in "Thor #391" in 1988, Eric Masterson was an architect injured by falling girders and taken to the hospital by The Mighty Thor. As if leg injuries weren't enough, the villain Mongoose injured Eric so badly Thor requested Odin fuse him with Eric so that the architect may live. As a result, Eric Masterson shared his body with the thunder God and became The New Thor. With this new life, Eric turned custody of his son to his ex-wife to keep him safe. After his adventures as Thor and with The Avengers, Eric's son Kevin was kidnapped by Loki and Thor seemingly killed The Trickster God. For his murder, Thor was banished by Odin and the title of Thor was solely given to Eric. Multiple wars and adventures later, Eric was fooled by The Enchantress into battling the original Thor for the love of Sif. During their battle, Eric accidentally struck Sif and angered Thor into defeating Eric and reclaiming his hammer. Odin discovered The Enchantress' ploy and allowed Thor to keep Mjolnir and gave Eric a new mace called Thunderstrike. Now calling himself Thunderstrike-after the mace, apparently-he began fighting crime. Eric's greatest enemy was a villain named Bloodaxe, who was secretly his love interest Jackie Lukus. After this, Eric was in a losing battle against the Egyptian God Seth and decided the only way to defeat the God would be to use the cursed Bloodaxe weapon. Yeah, the villain Bloodaxe was named after the weapon Bloodaxe. I know, it's stupid. The corruption of the Bloodaxe coerced Eric into murdering his enemies and he soon battled The Avengers who sought to arrest Eric. Thor was emotionally unable to kill Eric, so Eric fought the manifestation of Bloodaxe within his own mind. This battle resulted in the destruction of the weapon and the death of Eric Masterson. Before moving on to the afterlife, Eric requested Thor watch over his son Kevin.
Speaking of Kevin Masterson, the boy eventually grew up into a young man who rolled his eyes at the concept of superheroes. Even after Captain America gave the magic mace to Kevin, the boy still had no interest in "spandex-covered glory hounds". On his way home Kevin tried to save a mother and child from the villain known as The Rhino and even used the power of the mace to become Thunderstrike. He then assisted Thor in battling the monster Mangog and accepted his role as The New Thunderstrike. He went on to train under Brunnhilde the Valkyrie and enroll in The Avengers Academy.
As far as Thor-replacements go, Eric wasn't a bad superhero. He thought of his son, made hard decisions and gave his life to protect people. Decent job, I suppose. With a character like Thor, we often forget the alternate hammer wielders and sidekicks because the modern representation of Thor is just the actual Norse God played by an Australian adonis. No human form, no weird frog phase, and no horse-faced aliens. Not yet at least....Beta Ray Bill for Thor 3! Thanks for reading!
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