Weirdly enough, I actually liked a lot of this. It does depend on viewing it as a reboot rather than part of a huge cinematic universe that’s been going on for the last fifteen years, but as a stand-alone film (which to be fair, it isn’t) it was alright. Some of the love story between Thor and Jane was reminiscent of Eagle vs Shark, and I think Taika was allowed to show some of his indy roots with this one.
The problem is, Marvel are so concerned with world-ending threats that we’ve now reached the point where it seems reasonable to have a comedy film about a villain who wants to kill every god from every mythology. I really think this would’ve benefitted from smaller stakes, concentrating on Thor grappling with Jane’s diagnosis and everything that comes with it. But perhaps that wouldn’t sell so much, which appears to be all that the MCU exists for anyway. As a result of being so high stake all of the time, there are multiple points in this that should be really emotional, but they just aren’t. That’s a real shame.
I’m not sure I totally get the idea of the presentation either. There are multiple Guns N Roses songs and just generally an 80s rock vibe to it all, but it doesn’t really mean anything outside of the aesthetic of it all. To that end, it felt like it could’ve been an adaptation of Brutal Legend, which might’ve worked a bit better. As much as I enjoyed watching a good deal of this, all it really amounts to is a missed opportunity.
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