Thor: Love And Thunder Had So Much Potential…

The premise of this film was so good, but it was mostly wasted in the end. I’ve finally gotten around to watching Thor: Love And Thunder and I have to say that it had so much potential to expand upon the most fascinating character (in my opinion) in the MCU but neglected Thor’s arc as the film ended up being a rushed, contrived mess of a movie.

Thor has undergone the most dramatic character transformation out of all of the original MCU superheroes.

From being a spoiled, stuck-up God-Prince, then becoming a vengeful, ruthless killer avenging his family and people, followed up by a self-loathing, fat, pathetic excuse of a hero, to finally reconciling with himself and abandoning his rightful throne to fight for justice around the universe, there really is no better character in the MCU than Thor.

Each one of his and the Avenger movies (apart from Thor: The Dark World; it’s best just to forget that one) had expanded upon the different aspects of the God of Thunder’s personality, while also giving him new, unique challenges to overcome on his quest to becoming a true ‘Odinson’, a selfless hero that put his family and people above his pride and glory, as his father always envisioned him becoming.

And Thor: Love And Thunder had the look of becoming another great addition to the story of Thor.

From just the trailer, it seemed that Thor was destined to choose between either settling down and rekindling his past life with Jane Foster (Hooray! Natalie Portman’s return to the MCU) or continue down the path of being a ‘Guardian of the Galaxy’ with the Guardians of the Galaxy. All the while an insane, and somewhat relatable villain was hell-bent on killing every god in existence for their neglect and contempt.

Sounds great, right? Actually, I can do one better by pointing out Jane Foster’s extremely fascinating and unique storyline in this movie: her terminal cancer diagnosis.

Unlike in the past two Thor movies with Jane Foster really only serving as the God of Thunder’s love interest, she was actually given purpose this time around as she tried to delay her inevitable death by using the powers of Mjölnir, while also looking to seek closure with her former romantic flame.

This movie truly did have the makings of being one of Marvel’s very best films…but it was all for naught as the movie had a terrible tone, unexplained plot-contrivance McGuffins, and was rushed beyond belief.

Okay, let me start with my last complaint first: it being rushed.

Out of the 29 released Marvel Cinematic Universe films thus far, only 8 of them have finished with a runtime of 2 hours or less. Thor: Love And Thunder is one of those eight movies at it clocked in at 1h and 59 min, making it the 7th fastest Marvel movie (strangely, Thor and Thor: The Dark World were also two movies that finished with a runtime of less than 2h).

This was a huge mistake by Marvel and director, Taika Waititi, as he needed at least another twenty minutes to make this movie as impactful as it should have been.

There were so many plotlines, character dilemmas, and new places introduced in this movie that everything felt rushed when quartet of heroes (Thor, Jane Foster, Valkyrie, and Korg) visited a new place and left it only ten minutes later.

I know they had to for time limit, but it caused the plot to feel contrived and it didn’t allow the viewer enough time to take in the scenery and new settings.

Plus, Gorr the God Butcher, the villain of this movie (portrayed by Christain Bale), was SUPER underdeveloped.

Gorr had the makings of a Thanos villain and had Christain Bale’s great acting skills behind the character to make him one of the all-time great Marvel villains.

Yet, Gorr was treated even worse than Ultron as he had no characterization aside from his hatred for the gods of the universe.

Moreover, everything about him had to be explained in brief, 30-second stints as he was a walking McGuffin…

Which this brings me onto my second complaint: the movie relied on way too many McGuffins.

The Necrosword, Stormbreaker, the Shadow Realm, the Omnipotence City, a God Army, Zeus’ Thunderbolt, Asgard’s Children, Eternity’s Realm, and the Bifrost. That’s just some of the McGuffins talked about and sought after in this film.

It’s okay when a film uses one or two McGuffins to drive a plot as searching for a lost item, person, place, things, etc. can create a really interesting, well thought out story if done correctly.

Yet, using 8+ McGuffins is just a sign that the writers, director, and showrunners/studio have no real plot for the characters and are relying on never-before-heard-of objects to keep the audience’s interest.

I mean, did anyone know about the Shadow Realm, the Omnipotence City, or the Necrosword before this movie gave us a quick, 30-second summary of what it is, how it works, and why it’s important?

These McGuffins ended up becoming bad plot contrivances, which I’m sure wasn’t the intent.

I know Taika Waititi is a busy man with a lot of projects swirling around him, but this movie really did feel like he breezed his way through writing the script in order to move on to another set/film. And the movie suffered heavily for it.

Anyway, for my final criticism, the movie having a terrible tone, this is really directed more at Waititi’s directorial style and why it needs a much simpler plot, or more runtime, to work. Thor: Love And Thunder dealt with one of the most horrific, sad tragedies any human could face: suffering from a terminal illness.

There’s nothing worse than learning that you have X amount of time to live due to of the many diseases and illness that plagues humanity today.

Yet, just when the film was focusing on the sadness, regret, denial, and pain Jane Foster felt from her diagnosis with cancer, it was followed up with a cheap quip about a god orgy, Korg saying something stupid, or Thor’s butt.

Nothing about Jane’s sickness felt meaningful until she actually died. Obviously, that’s a massive issue for the impactfulness of this movie.

The humor that worked so well in Thor: Ragnarök was strangely amplified by 20, even though Love and Thunder was a much more depressing movie (in terms of the plot on paper) than Ragnarök, causing Thor: Love and Thunder to feel like a movie suffering from an identity crisis.

Should it be funny and lighthearted like Ragnarök, or more serious like Infinity War? In the end, it couldn’t decide and ended up trying to be both to its detriment.

Normally, I would blame the director’s lack of experience for this terrible tonal choice, but I know Taika Waititi can pull off sad, but funny movies. He’s already done it with Jojo Rabbit.

Like I said, I think Taika Waititi wanted to be done with the Thor franchise and released a sub-par, bland movie to get his contract/quota done with.

Sure, said movie had elements of greatness (because Taika Waititi is a very talented writer and director), but they needed to be carefully worked on crafted in order for them to play out well.

And that was something Waititi didn’t have time for.

Thus, in the end, Thor: Love And Thunder ended up suffering from the same blandness and ‘lack of care’ that has plagued Marvel ever since Avengers: Endgame finished. It really does seem that even Marvel can suffer from the mediocrity and contempt that other huge franchises have faced.

I’d give Thor: Love And Thunder a 7.2/10 mainly because I’m super biased towards the God of Thunder. If this was any other Marvel character, this would have been a 6.5 or worse.

 

Images Source: Featured Image: (Disney/Marvel) (Marvel Studios’ Thor: Love and Thunder | Official Trailer – YouTube)

In Text Image 1: (Disney/Marvel) (Marvel Studios’ Thor: Love and Thunder | Official Trailer – YouTube)

In Text Image 2: (Disney/Marvel) (Marvel Studios’ Thor: Love and Thunder | Official Trailer – YouTube)

In Text Image 3: (Disney/Marvel) (Marvel Studios’ Thor: Love and Thunder | Official Trailer – YouTube)