Odin and Frigg’s son Balder is the Shining One — a champion of goodness, innocence and forgiveness. He is loved by everybody.

Wait! News has just reached us that he was killed by Loki. But how did he die? He was supposed to be invulnerable. His mother made sure of it — she got every living thing in existence to promise never to harm him, thus making him completely indestructible.

In fact, Balder was so impervious to injury that at banquets guests used to amuse themselves by hurling sharp objects at him. Not dying horribly was a hilarious party trick of his.

So how did Loki kill the unkillable kid? (It’s more convoluted than Agatha Christie or a Dan Brown novel but bear with us.) Ah yes, when all the world was promising not to hurt him, there was an exception. Mistletoe. Yes, mistletoe. Frankly, mistletoe was so tiny and insignificant that Frigg didn’t even bother to ask. Oops.

When Loki found out, he made a dart of sharpened mistletoe and gave it to a blind god called Hoder. In the middle of a banquet, Hoder with sharp ears and sharp mistletoe hit the target. Zap! The good god was now good and dead.

Don’t panic — there was a resurrection clause. With extensive mourning by all living things on Earth, he might have been brought back to life.

But no. It failed — one old hag called Thokk refused to weep, saying he never did anything for her.

But that’s not the end of it. The old hag turned out to have been arch-villain Loki in one of his many disguises. When confronted, he tried to escape by turning into a salmon. But he was not slippery enough to escape the net and now faces perpetual punishment.

There’s even more! Hoder turns out to be Balder’s unsuspecting brother. But was he full of hidden hatred? Will Balder return? Can Hermod save him from the Underworld? Don’t miss the next episode of the Baldur Murder Mystery.

As you might imagine, this Scandinavian soap saga is one of the most important of the Norse legends. Sadly for Balder fans he is famous mostly for being dead. Celebrity gossip has linked his name with the similar-sounding God of Goodness Belobog from Slavic mythology, but we are not convinced. Perhaps it will all become clear in Episode 427263. Can you wait for the next installment?

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Article last revised on September 22, 2018 by the Godchecker data dwarves.
Editors: Peter J. Allen, Chas Saunders

References: Coming soon.

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