Review: Thor: Love and Thunder (2022)

Thor: Love and Thunder

Rating

Director

Taika Waititi

Screenplay

Taika Waititi, Jennifer Kaytin, Robinson

Length

1h 58m

Starring

Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman, Christian Bale, Tessa Thompson, Taika Waititi, Russell Crowe, Jaimie Alexander, Idris Elba, Chris Pratt, Dave Bautista, Karen Gillan, Pom Klementieff, Sean Gunn, Vin Diesel, Bradley Cooper, Carly Rees, Kat Dennings, Brett Goldstein, Stellan Skarsgård, Luke Hemsworth, Matt Damon, Sam Neill, Melissa McCarthy, Ben Falcone

MPAA Rating

PG-13

Original Preview

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Review

A lot has happened in the six years since Thor: Ragnarok showed audiences a new way forward for the Asgardian prince and his stalwart cohorts. Thor: Love and Thunder intends to build on the success of that prior feature while also melding into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but those two goals might just be counterintuitive.

Set after the events of several Marvel films, Thor (Chris Hemsworth) has finally come around to understanding and believing that his contributions matter, but hasn’t fully internalized that situation. He’s still galivanting around the cosmos thinking that he is a gift to all mortals and that his actions don’t have consequences. This is presented with great humor and obliviousness on an alien planet where an army is about to destroy the population and Thor goes about thwarting the villain to much success and the cheers of his onlookers, but neglecting to show any concern for the property damage his actions cause, ultimately decimating their temple. While Thor himself doesn’t know, a new threat has emerged that is traveling the stars and eradicating the gods of the universe. This villain, made flesh by Christian Bale, is perhaps a more dark and foreboding enemy than Thanos was, yet he’s a villain who’s sure to be easily dispatched by our hero, right?

Thor is indeed on the hit list and after a thrashing at New Asgard on Earth, Gorr (Bale) hatches a plan to bring the Asgardian hero to his territory by abducting the children of the village. Add to the mix the revelation that Jane Foster (Natalie Portman), Thor’s love interest from the first film, is ill and the fractured shards of his legendary hammer Mjolnir might heal her, she inadvertently becomes a god herself and becomes a target of the mad deity-slayer. Thor, who had already broken things off with Jane, is now doubly distracted, which only makes the situation more dire. Then you have Thor’s other regular companions Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson), King of New Asgard, and Krog (voiced by director Taika Waititi) who are accompanying him on this journey and you have an overstuffed boat of adventure with a couple of screaming goats to pull it.

If there’s a better match for the Thor films than Waititi, it’s not obvious who that would be. Waititi understands how to blend absurdist humor with great skill, making ludicrous situations such as the aforementioned goats, a pompous Zeus (Russell Crowe), and other even more bizarre situations and events shine. His inventiveness doesn’t quite overcome the weaknesses of the screenplay, namely overly familiar tropes and philosophical ramblings that never quite materialize into something compelling or cohesive.

That’s not to say they aren’t clever. Everything Waititi does is clever. It’s just formulated to fit into the Marvel Cinematic Universe without the kind of room needed to grow into something more exciting as the previous film, Thor: Ragnarok, was able to do, being removed from most of the other existing storylines and not needing to advance much in the way of MCU phasing. Hemsworth, Thompson, and Portman lean in to the abjectly weird premise that surrounds them while Bale presents the film’s villain in an overly serious, darkly unhumorous way, which makes the events taking place in the film feel frivolous.

Therein lies Thor: Love and Thunder‘s biggest issue, its inability to balance tone and spectacle. There are some great moments in the film, especially any scene with the goats, but when there’s a grandiose soliloquy by Zeus, the weight of the peril facing the children of new Asgard, whom the heroes are supposed to be rescuing, feels out of place. It’s like they tried to blend the super-seriousness of Thor: Dark World with the lighter tone of Thor: Ragnarok. The end result feels like a diminishment to the level of Dark World rather than successful building on the foundation of Ragnarok.