Patrick Doyle is without question one of my favorite modern music composers. In my opinion, he is second place only to the equally exceptional Hans Zimmer. Now hold on, I know what you’re thinking. How is it that Patrick Doyle, the veteran actor, newscaster and ex-husband of Nollywood actress Ireti Doyle also composes music? I am not referring to that Patrick Doyle. I am referring to the Scottish composer responsible for scoring the soundtracks to some of Hollywood’s biggest box office hits, from Bridget Jones’s diary to Nanny McPhee to Harry Potter and the Goblet of fire. My favorite among Patrick Doyle’s movie scores is the soundtrack to the movie based on the Marvel Comics character named Thor. In Norse mythology, the hammer wielding Thor, son of Odin, was the brother of Loki and the god of thunder. His character was played by Chris Hemsworth and the movie was a commercial success, grossing over 449 million US Dollars at the box office, almost triple its 150 million US Dollar budget. Doyle’s composition for this movie not only enhances the drama, suspense and action on the screen but also provides a great listening experience off the screen. You may listen to Sons of Odin on his YouTube channel.
Last year, I was giving a tour of the museum to some guests. We arrived at a cluster of sculptures which we fondly refer to as the Lamidi Fakeye shrine. Lamidi Fakeye was the most prominent of a lineage of up to 5 generations of woodcarvers. His sculptures feature works based on Yoruba mythology. I explained to the guests, who were pleasantly surprised to see such detailed wood carving, that the Yemisi Shyllon Museum of art holds the largest museum collection of Lamidi Fakeye’s sculptures, which include representations of Ogun, the Yoruba god of iron, hunting and war; Osun, the Yoruba goddess of love, fertility and purity and Sango the Yoruba god of thunder, lightning and fire. Just like Thor, Sango was a king and a warrior. He is often depicted with long braided hair and wields a battle axe which channels thunder. As I outlined these similarities to my guests, one of them exclaimed “Sango and Thor are one and the same. The only difference between them is packaging!”
Packaging, I thought to myself. That may very well be the difference. Sango, Amadioha, Zeus, Jupiter; all are referred to as gods of thunder. Could they all really be one and the same? In any case, there is a clear difference in the general perception of these deities. Thor has been presented to the world in a globally acceptable, advantageous way. Stories of Thor have been made into comic books and movies and creatively inserted into popular culture. The character Zeus was featured in the movie Immortals, where along with other Greek gods, Zeus joined forces with Theseus to save the world from destruction by the titans. Amadioha and Sango, on the other hand are largely seen as local dispensers of justice, inflicting punishment and suffering on wrongdoers. While Thor and Zeus are regarded with a sense of awe globally, Sango and Amadioha were viewed with a sense of fear locally. An important part of the differences in perception of these deities is not merely the stories that are being told about the Western deities, but more so the types of stories told and the format being used to present such stories to the world. Could we have a Sango or Amadioha comic or movie released soon? The black panther comics and movies were hugely successful commercially and are based on fictional characters. We really do not need the black panther, not while we have stories of our real-life superheroes waiting to be told. Who’s up for the challenge?
