Also, there are moments in this that are not suitable for younger readers or work. Nothing graphic, just words you might not want to talk about yet. Parents have been warned.
In order to recover from what many believe to be the worst of the Marvel Cinematic Universe so far, it would appear that not only did Thor need to be hacked to the bones, losing his mother, father, his hammer, his eye, half his cape, his friends and his home, but also the Shakespearean style to the Thor movies, and going the complete opposite, a Sci-fi space romp where most of the film is on a junk planet with a little bit of Roman gladiatorial combat. Look, this movie is weird, and its time to take the same drugs Taiko Waititi took when making the film, here's New Doug Ragnarok... I mean Thor Ragnarok.
This movie has two major main plots, one set on Asgard concerning the main villain Hela, goddess of death, and the events of Ragnarok itself. On the other side of the story, you have Thor landing on a far messier and far more technologically advanced (compared to the comics) version of Sakar, and a loose adaptation of Planet Hulk... ok very loose adaptation of Planet Hulk as its missing Beta Ray Bill, the Illuminati, Hulks Allies, the Red King (whose name escapes me even though I played Lego Marvel 2 recently...), the red spores creatures, the desert planet, Hulk's love interest. Like I said, very, very loose adaptation of Planet Hulk. Thor, after being forced off the Bifrost by Hela, finds himself in the Contest of Champions, a game run by Jeff Goldblum... I mean The Grandmaster... ok yeah no, this is just Jeff Goldblum, I'm not even going to try. Anyway, Thor's goal whole on Sakar is to try and escape Sakar, and in the process enlists the help of Hulk, Loki, which, you know what, I might as well make this joke at this point
Come back next year for the follow up to that.
Back on topic, alongside those two are newcomers Valkerie, Korg, and (eventually) Scourge who unfortunately doesn't have his Sweeps... wait, sorry, wrong Scourge, in order to stop Hela from concurring the universe. Yeah, the plot's very basic and is meant to be loose enough for more jokes, but it does work especially since this is right before Infinity War, so its kind of skirting by. A lot of people would find this more annoying, but its kind of refreshing to see a Marvel movie go "Yeah, this is a holdover until the next crossover, and we just want to have fun, let us!"
The characters are what sell the movie, as you can tell everyone involved was having fun with this. From things like Taiko's Korg (yes he voiced the character) to character moments like "Please help", to even things like Sir Anthony Hopkins saying "oh shit", which I find funnier here compared to The Last Knight. To give you an idea as to how far they go with the jokes, the ship Thor, Banner and Valkerie steal from Goldblum, is his orgy ship that has a button that shoots fireworks and a song called "It's my birthday". No, I'm not kidding and no, that's not the only somewhat perverted Goldblum moment in this movie. It's actually hard to talk about this one because of all the jokes in it. I don't want to spoil all the punchlines. The returning cast all put in strong performances, and I can safely say that this is the best performance Chris Helmsworth has put into Thor so far. All the new characters are also really nice inclusions to the MCU, and far more interesting than the previous Thor films characters. Cate Blanchet is an excellent villain in this film, and while Hela (who I will admit I see more of the Enchantress in terms of personality) is not one of the deepest MCU villains, she is still one of the best villains due to the fact that she just wants to be evil, and hams up the performance accordingly. This is an old-school, moustache twirling, evil for the sake of evil villain, and I always enjoy seeing one of those. Valkerie and Korg are stand out characters as well, and it's nice to have some meaty character development given to both Bruce and The Hulk.
In terms of presentation, the locations do look really nice, and most of the CGI looks fine, it's just some of the destruction moments that look fake and out of place. I'm also not a fan of the soundtrack overall because, with the exception of the licenced song, everything else just blends into the shots, making it hard to tell if it's actually there or not a lot of the time. Most will not think of that as a bad thing, it's just a personal preference on my end.
Are you looking for a serious story? Then you will hate this movie. You need to be open to a weirder story that goes for the joke over the serious story moment. As someone who is looking for that in movies (at least for right now) its enjoyable for me, and easily the best Thor movie. Just make sure you come for a laugh, rather than a serious plot. Up next on here, we conclude MAYvel... in June... with Black Panther, and come this Sunday, the final Lego set review for a while, the Hulkbuster Smashup.
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