Due to how conflicted I felt after watching this movie, I was contemplating on whether or not I wanted to do a full review tackling every major detail that I came across as I normally would. What I've decided to do instead is to discuss just a few of the nagging thoughts that's been floating around my head after I walked out of the theaters once the movie was over. It's been a while since I've seen a comic book movie that left me in such a spiraling state of mixed feelings towards my overall enjoyment. At the end of the day, Thor: Love and Thunder is most certainly watchable with a satisfying enough helping of entertainment value on the surface to soak in. However, this is what I'd call a “disappointing fun time” if there was ever such a thing. So, let's discuss some of those aforementioned conflicting thoughts that I had after watching this highly anticipated sequel.
The Asgardians of the Galaxy
Though not as much as I would’ve loved to have seen, I did very much enjoy seeing a follow up to Endgame’s "Asgardians of the Galaxy" tease. Seeing the Guardians once again on the big screen was great and the scene(s) of their collaboration with Thor were honestly amongst my favorite of the entire movie. I enjoyed them almost to the point where I wish we’d just get an official “Asgardians of the Galaxy” movie exploring their entertaining ventures together. Seeing this team-up relationship highlighted with all of its comedic and visually entertaining elements was definitely a major highlight for me. I completely understood and easily embraced their limited onscreen time due to the heavy Thor-related story focus at play. However, it's hard not to imagine the better movie that was teasing itself earlier on compared to what we actually get at the end of the day.
An Incredible Concept Leads To Wasted Potential
One of my favorite things about the Thor movies (and my prime reason for not hating The Dark World like many people apparently did) is the excellent sci-fi fantasy lore elements. Whether it’s the striking visuals of mythological creatures and fantastical settings or the intriguing concepts behind the ancient history surrounding them, the Thor franchise on its own has never failed to impress in its lore exploration. With Thor: Love and Thunder, I was happy to see some sense of expansion into the mythology of “gods” and cosmic deities within the MCU. You get to see quite a few of these larger than life entities with interesting unique designs in addition to a few game changing name drops throughout.
That being said, and here’s where I’ll have to turn a positive into a negative, this component to the story wasn’t nearly as deep as I would’ve liked. I feel like the writers for Love & Thunder saw that they had a lot of cosmic and religious elements to introduce while juggling the buddy team-up comedy that they wanted to do so they decided to sacrifice one’s screen time for the other. For me personally, I would’ve much preferred a narratively deeper and rich sci-fi fantasy adventure surrounding the complex and questionable nature of worshipping gods. Exploring a story about how we perceive god-like beings through the lenses of a vengeful villain that lost everything to a god that abandoned him while simultaneously showcasing a god-like hero who has lost his very reason for being is fascinating.
Instead, Love and Thunder only tackles these ideas on a very quickly paced and minimalistic surface level by focusing more on the comedic banter and gags involved. This brings me to a very unpopular MCU related feeling that I have and here it is. Frankly, I don’t think Taika Waititi was the right director for any of his Thor movies. Now, wait!!! Just hear me out! I think Taika is an excellent filmmaker and his visual sensibilities are amazing in bringing out the more vibrant and colorful elements of Thor’s corner of the Marvel universe. That celebration worthy praise can be seen in both of his movies, and speaking as someone who practically drools over incredible design work, I do have to give major props to his creative direction here. The use of color to invoke a particular tone while playing on the supernatural lore surrounding Gorr was certainly an inspired choice.
However, I don’t think that his particular style of fast paced gag-after-gag with hints of a deeper narrative approach fits the much more conceptually darker stories that he’s given. The more that I think about it, I really do think that the “Asgardians of the Galaxy” bit in Love and Thunder as well as the Grandmaster colosseum buddy comedy section in Ragnarok are the individual segments where his direction shines best. The more serious story elements like Hela’s fascinating backstory and high stakes agenda or Gorr the God Butcher’s terrifying killing spree and tragic origins feel like watered down background dressing in his hands. This is more so a problem with the powers at be choosing which stories from the comics that Taika gets to adapt and which ones should be left for another filmmaker down the line.
I remember walking out of Ragnarok thinking “Wow, that was really entertaining all around and yet…I feel a little empty. How is this possible?”. It wasn't too long after until I realized that the hollow feeling came from recognizing how sidelined the potential-rich villain story was in regards to Hela’s familial connection and Asgard’s covered up history. And guys, I feel the same thing here with Love and Thunder. I had a few good laughs, I enjoyed the visual direction in parts and yet…I felt empty inside. On paper, Gorr the God Butcher is a dramatically compelling, visually interesting (though I would've preferred a more comic inspired design), and conceptually scary new villain for the MCU to explore with a standout actor in the role. The execution of the character however takes this general idea, offers you a little taste of it, then tosses it around a romantic team-up dramedy with a breakneck speed sense of pacing.
Gorr the God Butcher is certainly present in the movie and you do understand who he is, but he never remotely reaches the cinematic potential of what he is. Let's think about this for a second. We have a galactic serial killer brutally murdering gods from various mythologies out of some corrupted sense of justice manipulated by a mysterious evil sword. This is by far one of the more scarier blueprints for a villain that we've ever come across in the MCU. Considering the scope of the body count involved and the loss of his own child connecting to a tragic revelation surrounding faith, this is a dramatic-horror story that should be handled with care highlighting certain genre elements. Gorr is an empathetic slasher villain with an alluring weapon of fascinating lore that can perfectly imbue existential fear on a currently unstable Thor. Sadly, the direction of the movie decides to diminish these narrative strengths.
The story of Thor’s journey and Jane’s arc also feel like fascinating character concepts worth exploring. There's so much potential for powerful emotional resonance to be felt with where these heroes are in this particular chapter of their lives. The story of Jane here is both tragic and pretty hardcore while the story of Thor is dramatically profound in the grander scope of things. These are two people trying to carve out a new path for themselves after losing something significant to their lives. But much like Gorr, though you do understand what the characters are going through, the execution itself leaves much to desire. Not to sound like a backseat driver editor or meddling studio exec, but I would've easily cut out some of the jokes and replace them with more deeper character dialogue and interaction scenes. That's just me.
Remember how Avengers Infinity War and Endgame fully introduced the idea of Thor emotionally covering up his depression over the trail of dead bodies following behind him? Losing his mother, his father, his brother who finally reached some semblance of a redemption, having to kill his very own sister that he just found out about, and eventually losing half of his people in addition to his planet? The idea was that Thor covered up his feelings by playing up the “god-like superhero leader” persona which was arguably the most deepest character development ever done with him. We never did quite resolve this arc and Love and Thunder should have been the next natural stepping stone in this story.
Ironically, the execution approach of the movie itself reflects Thor’s sensibility by acknowledging the deeper and more interesting stuff happening while simultaneously covering it up with constant jokes and spectacle. I’ll remember the hilarious recurring gag with Thor’s axe feeling cheated on or hearing a bunch of screaming goats more than I’ll remember emotionally connecting to a single character in this movie. And guys, that's very problematic. It would appear that “just have fun and don’t think too much” is the motto here, and although I did indeed enjoy some of the comedy, visual elements, and general ideas presented, I simply can’t turn a blind eye to the glaringly more fulfilling movie desperately trying to break out.
Rating: 7/10
I still sometimes imagine what this movie would've been like under the hands of a different director.
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