500 word reaction – Thor: Ragnarok
Just got home from seeing Thor: Ragnarok and processing my reaction by writing it down in a sort of stream of consciousness. Mostly I find that I am a little disappointed. Or perhaps that’s stating it too strongly. I was ever so slightly bored.
I kept waiting for the story to kick in. By which I mean, I was waiting for them to get off the planet of junk and back to something more interesting. And it kept not happening, and then it was over. However, it’s very like the Thor comics in the sense that I always used to skim the stories in those, waiting for the bits with Loki in them. Bits with Loki in tended to have talking and subtle manipulation and cleverness, and that I think is what was missing here.
It was a very macho “the ability to Hulk smash things is the only source of true power” kind of film, and I got bored with the smashing really before the titles rolled.
On the other hand, I loved Valkyrie, and I loved the little earnest family moments between Thor, Odin and Loki – it’s nice that everyone is now accepting Loki for what he is. The continued outrage at him for being something other than what he was wasn’t productive for anyone. Hiddles still does a very good job with him, and perhaps it’s part of the character’s charm that he’s never allowed to move center stage. I don’t like heroes, after all, so he’s better off from my pov as a side character.
I loved Hela, and naturally I want her to return. Give her her realm back, you cowards! Why, why would anyone choose to bring Skurge out of the comics and not Amora the Enchantress? Amora would have added a nice touch of not-solving-all-your-problems-by-hitting-things, and Skurge is her executioner, not Hela’s. (Hela doesn’t need one.)
I loved whatshisname, Jeff Goldblum’s character, and most of all I loved his un-named sidekick, the woman with the melty stick. If I was to cosplay a character suitable for my build and age, I think it would be her.
The movie was very pretty–lots of colours and action. Heimdall fans will be very happy as he got a strong subplot as Asgardian Robin Hood. I very much enjoyed the rock guy, who undoubtedly had a name, but I’m not good at remembering names. He was a comedy character, but also surprisingly relatable for a rock monster.
Would I recommend it? I would say that it was worth going to see once. You would probably get the occasional giggle, and there are some nice action sequences, but if you couldn’t get to see it, you would not be missing anything of deep emotional weight. Which is an ambivalent reaction, I think, to a movie in which Asgard is destroyed and its population send out as refugees into the universe. I think I would have preferred it to deal with that subject with a little more seriousness.
Woman with melt-stick had a name, but I forget it ( Velda? Silva? something like that). The rock monster was Korg, motion-captured & voiced by Taika Waititi, the director. Jeff Goldblum played the Grandmaster (who is apparently going to be revealed to be the brother of The Collector, possibly in Infinity War?).
Yes, I liked Loki being an essential side-kick, and doing it right; and his acceptance by Odin (in that bit, just before Odin dissolved into sparkles, he looked to be almost in tears).
I’ve seen it three times (2D, 3D, and IMAX), and have assiduously been reading spoilers. Apparently in the first mid-credits teaser, the huge ship they encounter is probably Thanos’s Sanctuary II; and (I haven’t yet seen the film) Guardians of the Galaxy 2 has a credits-trailer with Thor smashing into the ‘windscreen’ of the Milano, which is also assumed to be something that’ll happen in Infinity War. So we may see what happens to the Asgardians then.
Ah, I thought there must be a connection to the Collector – it was a very similar aesthetic 🙂 Thanks for the names! And how funnythat one of my favourite characters was the director.
I’m going to go and see it again at the weekend and I’ll hopefully be able to catch a bit more nuance that time around, now I’ve got the basics of the story. I have to admit that by the end of the film I didn’t even bother to stay for the after credits sequences, as my interest in Marvel’s CU has waned quite a bit.
I’ve been a little mystified by the way most people seem to think it was a great movie. I enjoyed the humour, but as you say, there was no emotional depth, which left it an ultimately unsatisfying experience for me.
Interesting to compare it to Deadpool, which was extremely funny yet still managed to make you care about the characters.
Yeah, I didn’t see Deadpool, but just comparing it with the first Thor film was quite a wrench. I think it just wasn’t able to take itself seriously, and the characters’ emotions never really engaged as a result. Too much wisecracking – I hate wisecracking 😉
I liked the movie well enough, though I didn’t feel like I wanted to see it twice while it’s in theaters. I appreciated how it built on previous movies, so there were Easter eggs. They took some things from the comics, too, like the reference to Loki turning Thor into a frog. I was reading Thor comics at that time. Movie Thor had learned from experience with Loki and his tricks.
I liked seeing an appearance from Dr. Strange. The latest season of Sherlock was airing in the U.S. around the same time the Dr. Strange movie came out, and I found it odd to hear the actor with his natural accent on the TV show and a sort-of New York accent in the movie. I enjoyed his interactions with Thor in this movie.
*g* Oh yes, I enjoyed the nod to the Frog of Thunder. I thought movie Thor had got to the point of understanding Loki and calling him predictable *very fast* compared with comics Thor. Comics Thor took about twenty years of epic storytelling and several endings of the universe to get to that point, so it felt to me as if he was skipping all the bits in between. He’d suddenly arrived at this state of acceptance and resignation without having to do all the angst and thought and betrayal and self-examination in the middle. That really flattened the emotional arc of the movies for me.
But yes, I also really enjoyed the bit with Dr. Strange. I didn’t see the Dr. Strange film so that was my first encounter with him and I might have to get it on DVD now 🙂
My feelings about the Dr. Strange movie were mixed. Having the Ancient One be a young-looking white woman instead of a Tibetan man was an inexplicable change, in my opinion. The “forget everything you think you know” line was in an X-Men movie that came out around the same time, and was a clichéd line before that.
I was impressed by the special effects. There were moments of humor in the movie. Seeing Dr. Strange gain his magical accoutrements was a highlight for me. I think it’s worth seeing. You too might find it odd to hear Benedict Cumberbatch speaking in a sort-of New York accent rather than Received Pronunciation.
Have a good weekend!
Yes, I heard about the whitewashing when I was hanging out on Tumblr – which may have contributed to my not bothering to see it in the cinema. That and the fact that the only comics I’ve ever read were the Thor ones (And Elfquest, and 2000AD, but that’s a different kettle of movies 😉 ) so I wasn’t already emotionally attached to the character.
And Oh Blimey, it really was odd, hearing Benedict Cumberbatch speak like that. I wonder if it’s a good New York accent–I expect it would take a New Yorker to tell.
You too!