My Review of Thor: Love And Thunder (2022)

 

Written by Taika Waititi And Jennifer Kaytin Robinson

Directed by Taika Waititi

Thor (to Gorr, re Jane): "You've won. Why should I spend my last moments with you, when I can spend them with her?"

Every once in a while, the mostly invincible MCU has a little wobble of sorts. The odd movie or Disney+ series doesn't quite escape the scrutiny of critics. It happens and with a franchise that has tried to experiment with it's current phase, this scrutiny has become a bit more intense. This movie in particular has certainly generated more scrutiny than solo movies in the past.

It appears that while a lot of people found Taika Waititi's shake up of Thor's world refreshing with Thor: Ragnorak, this romantic of sorts themed follow up has seen Waititi's format proving that sometimes lightening really doesn't strike twice. I have to admit myself, there are some issues with this particular installment that leave a bit to be desired.

First of all, you've got two very big storylines competing with each other in something of a limited time frame. The first one being our villain arc of the piece with Gorr the God Butcher (Christian Bale) on the rampage to murder some gods and he's bored of picking off the lesser known ones. His attention doesn't take long to pivot on Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and he's not above taking the children of New Asgard to lure the himbo God of Thunder into his shadow realm.

Thor of course doesn't shy away from the fight. After going his separate ways from the Guardians Of The Galaxy (who add nothing to the main story at all), he's soon reunited with Korg (Taika Waititi), King Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson) and ex-girlfriend, Jane Foster (Natalie Portman) as they head to Mount Olympus and fail to get party boy Zeus (Russell Crowe) to help in their efforts to get an army against Gorr while royally pissing off the orgy obsessed God instead.

The MCU have had a mixed success rate with villains to put things mildly and while Christian Bale looked suitably creepy and delivered a fun performance as Gorr, I'm not sure he actually worked as a baddie. With the limited screen time he had, I think Gorr lacked a bit as a villain (except for one exchange when he had Thor and company bound and gagged in his realm) and his redemption at the end, while a bit of a dynamic game changer for Thor himself, did feel very rushed and unearned. 

Then there's the Mighty Thor plotline with Jane Foster. In the comics, it's a storyline that factored in with the character having cancer and it's no different here. Natalie Portman definitely delivered a strong performance, was convincing in her action scenes as Mighty Thor and her romance with Thor itself got some reasonably good closure. However as with the Gorr storyline, the Mighty Thor arc while good undeniably felt rushed as well.

As for the much hyped LGBT content, it's another case of the MCU really doing the bare minimum. We did learn that Korg's species are all male and he does get a husband, there's at least one trans/non binary character in the mix and Valkyrie alluded to an ex-girlfriend of her own but didn't get a female love interest in this movie. I definitely on this front, the MCU can pick up the pace here.

- The mid credit scene introduced Brett Goldstein as Hercules with Zeus recruiting him to kill Thor. 

- The post credit scene had Jane go to Valhalla with Heimdell (Idris Elba) greeting her. Darcy Lewis (Kat Dennings) and Erik Selvig (Stellan Skarsgard) made their returns here too.

- Aside from flashbacks to previous movies, this was also a Loki free zone. We did however get actors, including Melissa McCarthy to reenact the events of the previous movie.

- Chris Hemsworth's daughter, India played, Love, the daughter of Gorr who Thor ended up adopting at the end of the movie. Lets just say she gave Mjolnir a bit of a makeover.

- Standout music: Guns n Roses Sweet Child O' Mine and Enya's Only Time.

- Chronology: It's a bit a while for Thor since the events of Avengers: Endgame

Thor: Love And Thunder definitely could've fleshed out it's two main stories better than it did and while I can understand that the humour wasn't for everyone, I felt it was the least of the movie's problems. Overall, there's definitely enough to enjoy with this movie but it's also a movie that maybe needed a little longer to breathe and should've been better than  it was. Still, it has it's moments.

Rating: 7 out of 10

SDCC 2019 - Marvel Cinematic Universe: Phase 4 Announcement (Spoilers Included)

They sat out SDCC last year and this year upon their return, Marvel decided to go big with the announcement of five movies and five streaming shows on upcoming service, Disney+

So, here's a look of what we can actually expect in the next two years from the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Black Widow: Due for release on May 1st 2020, this prequel movie will see Scarlett Johansson reprise her role as Natasha Romanov in a movie that is rumoured to be set during the events of Captain America: Civil War and Avengers: Infinity War. Joining Johansson here will be David Harbour as Alexei Shostakov / Red Guardian, Florence Pugh as Yelena Belova, O. T. Fagbenle as Rick Mason, Rachel Weisz as Melina/Iron Maiden as well as Ray Winstone in an undisclosed role. The main antagonist for this movie will be Taskmaster. Filming for this movie started in May.

Eternals: Due for released on November 6th 2020, this movie will focus on a space battle between the titular group and their enemies, the Deviants. Rounding off the cast for this movie are Angelina Jolie as Thena, Richard Madden as Ikaris, Kumail Nanjiani as Kingo, Lauren Ridloff as Makkari, Brian Tyree Henry as Phastos, Salma Hayek as Ajak, the leader of the Eternals, Lia McHugh as Sprite and Don Lee as Gilgamesh. There's still some more casting for this movie to be confirmed but filming will begin in September in London for this one.

Shang-Chi And The Legend Of The Ten Rings: Due for a February 12th 2021 release, this movie had been fast tracked by Kevin Feige since December 2018 and we now know that the title character will be played by Simu Liu with Tony Leung Chiu-wai portraying the Mandarin and Awkwafina also cast in a role in the film. Filming for this movie will take place in Australia within the next few months.

Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness: Due for a May 7th 2021 release, Benedict Cumberbatch's surgeon turned magical superhero will be getting a second solo outing and this time he'll be backed up by Elizabeth Olsen's Scarlet Witch as Nightmare has been confirmed as the main antagonist for this movie. This movie will also be tied into Olsen's upcoming Disney+ series, WandaVision, the latter which will stream prior to this movie's release.

Thor: Love And Thunder: Due for a November 5th 2021 release, I think we were all shocked earlier last week to find out that Chris Hemsworth was getting a fourth solo movie and with director Taika Waititi returning following the success of Thor: Ragnorak, this movie will not only see Thor reunite with Tessa Thompson's Valkyrie as the latter looks for a queen but in a major surprise, Natalie Portman will not only reprise her role as Jane Foster but she'll also be playing Lady Thor for good measure too. Between finally confirming Valkyrie's bisexuality and giving us Lady Thor, this movie isn't messing about.

Elsewhere, there was another surprise announcement of Mahershala Ali being confirmed as Blade for an upcoming movie while sequels for Black Panther, Guardians Of The Galaxy and Captain Marvel were confirmed with hints of mutants eventually making it into the main cinematic movies. However the fourth phase will seemingly be about the five above movies I mentioned and five upcoming television series, leading to this bit.

With Disney+ due to debut in the next few months, MCU fans will have a big incentive to watch the five upcoming series they're planning as these series will tie into the main cinematic universe in a fairly big way. First up will be The Falcon And The Winter Soldier with both Anthony Mackie and Sebastian Stan reprising their respective roles with Emily VanCamp and Daniel Brühl set to reprise their roles as Sharon Carter and Baron Helmut Zemo from August 2020. Then it'll be WandaVision, focusing on the relationship with Olsen's Scarlet Witch and Paul Bettany's Vision while Teyonah Parris will appear as an adult version of Monica Rambeau while Loki will see Tom Hiddleston's mischievous trickster in a post Avengers: Endgame timeline. Both those series will debut in early 2021. After that, we've got What If…?, an animated anthology series with Jeffrey Wright voicing the Watcher and several familiar characters appearing in rather different circumstances, with a mid 2021 date being earmarked for it's release. The last series then will be Hawkeye with Jeremy Renner reprising the title role but also handing it over to Kate Bishop. This show will debut in late 2021.

Meanwhile it's also been confirmed that Marvel's Agents Of SHIELD will end after seven seasons. The show currently into it's sixth season, airing on both ABC and E4 respectively will be the most successful of Marvel live action show in spite of it often being ignored by the MCU itself (although Clark Gregg did recently play Agent Coulson in Captain Marvel). I stopped watching the show a few seasons back but it's incredible that the show lasted as long as it did. I also think that following it's imminent demise, the only Marvel shows we'll be getting for the foreseeable future will be on Disney+

So that's the next two years for the MCU sorted then. What were the most exciting announcements for you? Which movie or streaming shows are you most eager to see? Was there something you wish had been announced but wasn't?