Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) fans and Norse mythology fans may be familiar with the Norse god of thunder, Thor Odinson, and his enchanted hammer, Mjolnir.
Thor is one of the most powerful Asgardians in the MCU, with the ability to control the weather and summon lightning to enhance his attacks and abilities. However, during the events of his first movie, the thunder god was depowered and banished to Earth after being a little bit too arrogant for his father, Odin.
Odin placed a spell of some kind on Mjolnir that prevented Thor from lifting it until he finds out what causes the hammer to reject him despite being his hammer. Although people would dismiss the feat as magic, from a technological point of view, the hammer could be obeying Odin's "enchantment" through a program embedded within the hammer.
So what is causing this phenomenon and is it a magical spell from Odin, or the result of technology ages ahead of ours?
Asgard - Mythological Realm or Highly Technological Alien World?
Before we talk about Mjolnir, let's talk about where it comes from and how the hammer was made.
Asgard, the home of Thor, Loki, Odin, and other Norse gods in Norse Mythology and the MCU, is a world where people enjoy technological wonders that could be considered magical by us in 21st century Earth, with us being defined as a Type I civilization on the Kardashev scale, according to Space.
The Kardashev scale is a classification system for hypothetical extraterrestrial civilizations, which includes three categories based on how much energy a civilization is using.
Yes, Asgardians, the Norse gods themselves, are aliens, at least in the context of the MCU. According to Wired, the first Thor Film defines Asgardians as a race of alien beings, which explains their "technological wonders," like the Bifrost Bridge.
If you're having a hard time conceptualizing the idea of Asgardians being an alien species, just think of what the reaction of the ancient Romans would be like when they see the technology we have should they manage to time travel to our time. We, too, would look like aliens and god-like to them, as Comicbook.com puts it.
Back in the first Thor film, Mjolnir was said to be forged from a fictional metal called Uru, as was requested by Odin to the Dwarves that forged it in the heart of a dying star.
The feat of using a dying star to forge Mjolnir alone would mean that Asgardians (or the dwarves, at the very least) have been enjoying revolutionary technology that humans could only dream to achieve.
The Worthiness Enchantment
If you're a Marvel fan, you may have heard Odin's "spell" that prevents anyone, even Thor, from lifting Mjolnir if they are unworthy of the god of thunder's power.
"Whosoever Hold This Hammer, If He Be Worthy, Shall Possess The Power of Thor," were Odin's exact words for his "worthiness enchantment" on Mjolnir.
Assuming that the Asgardians are, indeed, aliens armed with technology humanity can only dream of, that means that Mjolnir took a voice command from Odin to prevent anyone unworthy from lifting the hammer, even if it's Thor himself.
Tony Stark would later speculate that a biosensor in Mjolnir's shaft recognizes when Thor is holding it. Only, due to the voice command Odin placed on it, the biosensor is not reading Thor's fingerprints, but is instead reading the biological and psychological profile of the person that is holding the shaft. In this case, Thor after the events of the first "Thor" film.
Should the hammer determine that the person is worthy of lifting the hammer, which was done by Vision, Steve Rogers, and Thor during the climax of the first Thor film, it will let the wielder do so.
However, if it determines that someone is not worthy, it will remain locked in place, no matter how strong they are, as the rest of the founding members of the Avengers saw during their afterparty.
Mjolnir could probably do this by changing its mass, so if a person trying to lift the hammer is found to be unworthy, the Rur metal that makes up Mjolnir will exponentially increase its gravitational attraction with Earth to the point that it is immovable to all but the worthy.
