Thor: Ragnarok (Dir. Taika Waititi, 2h 10m)

There's a certain sense one gets with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, that, with a few exceptions, the good ship MCU is now practically unsinkable-it can take any manner of critical fire, but Stan Lee, Kevin Feige et al can simply point at their nigh insurmountable box office record ($12.5 billion), laugh, and promptly hire a director of small budget indie movies to direct the next in the mis-matched Thor trilogy, and send a wheelbarrow to collect the stacks of money. Thor Ragnarok, for all that, is a decent romp; a step up from the lacklustre The Dark World, and comes close to the original, albeit via a more tongue in cheek, (and one may even say, a touch campy) route than Brannagh's Thor.

At the heart of this film, the film essentially acts as a thematic repeat of the original, albeit by rather a different method-with Thor, consigned by the goddess (and close relation), Hela (an enjoyably scenery chewing performance from Cate Blanchett, who plays her Goddess of Death as a vengeful combat-hungry villainess, determined to return her previous home to its rightful place as a conquering power) to a gladiatorial junk-yard planet. Thus, Thor is a fish out of water once again, trying to get home to Asgard with the help of allies new and old.  Where the two films differ greatly is their tone.

Brannagh's original played its story as light hearted but essentially serious-Thor is clearly a flawed individual, somewhat boorish, and only with his self-sacrifice at the end of the film does he regain his powers-this, in short, was the tone of much of the MCU-smart, funny, but essentially grounded in normality. Even Guardians of the Galaxy, a film that never seems to entirely take itself seriously (and really, with a talking tree/raccoon, how could it) does, at least in its opening scenes and in its finale, takes things seriously.


Ragnarok's tone is overtly, almost facetiously funny-nothing, from the film's opening with an entrapped Thor delivering a to-camera needle scratch "Yup that's me" monologue, followed by an entirely played for-laughs fight to posses the film's big macguffin. To Led Zeppelin's Immigrant Song. Which then returns later, for another fight. Even the death of a major supporting character, important to multiple members of the cast, is treated surprisingly lightly. Heck, Benedict Cumberbatch's Doctor Strange rocks up at one point to essentially direct and feed plot to a suited and booted Loki and Thor on Earth, which basically consists of Thor and Strange teleporting around the house like a slightly more convincing Ganon from The Legend of Zelda cartoon, leaving chaos in their wake. Strange then disappears from the rest of the film in that bewilderingly useless way that seems to keep each MCU character in their respective films, unable to help characters elsewhere-I digress.


Dumped by the vengeful, and now very much free Hela into the junkyard world Sakaar, and entrapped and forced to fight in a contest run by an enjoyably daft Jeff Goldblum, where he runs into that "friend from work", The Incredible Hulk. And this is where the film finally seems to click, in a fairly straight, if PG13 version, run-thru of World War Hulk. This film also begins to flesh out a relationship between the two "hotheads" of the group, both characters trying to find their place after having lost their power in Thor's case, or in the Hulk's case, being scared that they may lose their humanity. This, in another director's hands would be the stuff of high tension. Waititi, however, plays it for laughs, with the Hulk and Thor amicably chatting after having fought nigh to the death the previous night before, and when Banner is restored, he promptly makes jokes about having to wear Tony Stark's clothing.

This is not to say that the humor is always so forced-in many places, such as Loki and Thor's enjoyably fraught relationship, which culminates with a satisfying backfire of Loki's usual plotting, Goldblum and the various combatants, most notably a rock monster played by Waititi himself, or indeed, Hela herself, who has an enjoyably crazed approach, both against her siblings, but also in her quest for power. Even the film's true villain is not entirely without humour. The problem is that, throughout the film, nothing is taken seriously enough to really give that humour any power-whether it be Thor's return to Asgard, Banner's struggle with Hulk, Loki's usual deception, or the titular Ragnarok.  It's an interesting turn, but not entirely a successful one.

Rating: Recommended.