"Thor: Ragnarok" - A Short Review

Thor: Ragnarok
(Chris Hemsworth, Mark Ruffalo; 130 min; PG-13; 2017)

First off, this is *easily* the best Thor movie they’ve made. Period.

There will be spoilers ahead.

Chris Hemsworth has frat boy Thor down to an art. Which sucks if you’re someone who doesn’t like frat boy Thor, but it is a pretty accurate modern interpretation of the mythological Thor. Myth Thor was kind of a douchebag sometimes. He has very solid comedic timing (which is also well-displayed in Ghostbusters: Answer the Call – in fact, he’s one of the best things about that movie), and if you’re into it, I’m assuming he’s pretty hot judging from the way Carrie’s breath catches when he’s shirtless.

Which brings me to one thing that got my attention in this one. He wasn’t big enough for my tastes. Hemsworth has never been big enough for Thor, even though I love him as the character. But it seemed like his workout routine for this one focused more on definition and bicep size than overall size, so he looked even smaller than in his previous portrayals. Not a huge deal (heh), but if you’ve read anything I’ve said about comic movies, you know physically matching the image in my head is a top priority. Physically, my preference is that they find someone about 3 inches shorter but with nearly the same physique as the most recent Mountain (Game of Thrones), Hafþór Júlíus Björnsson. That’s about how big Thor should be. But whatever.

This was an excellent mixture of the comic book mythological Thor with his weighty Asgardians concerns, but also the comic book Thor that often found himself mixed up in zany sci-fi adventures. It *looked* like a Thor comic from yesterwhen, which is something the previous two flicks failed to do. Someone finally remembered the contributions of Jack Kirby to Thor.

It was tremendously funny, which is no shock given that the director is the guy responsible for the Team Thor shorts (which tell us what Thor was doing during Civil War – go watch them if you haven’t), and Team Daryl (which is post-Ragnarok).

Honestly, it may have been a little bit *too* funny.

The best thing about Ragnarok, though, was that *finally* a Marvel movie showed us not the fear and torment of Bruce Banner, but the anguish, loneliness, and longing of Hulk. A lot of people think that you need the Banner character to properly do Hulk, but they forget that Hulk is a character in his own right. He’s just a bigger, angrier Frankenstein’s Monster. He has wants, needs, drives like anyone else, and like a lot of people, he doesn’t know how to deal with them. He’s got one tool in his emotional toolbox. It’s just that the one tool is the world’s biggest hammer, so every problem is a nail. That Hulk smash.

There’s something like *18* MCU movies now, and one of, if not the most, touching and heartbreaking scenes in them is when Thor goes to leave and Hulk cries out “Friend stay!”, chases Thor down crying for his friend to stay and freaks out, not wanting to change back into Banner. The movies tell us how much Banner loathes having this monster inside of him, but do little to tell us of Hulk’s imprisonment when Banner is dominant. When it’s Banner facing the world, Hulk is alone, trapped, and *powerless*. And that’s got to be something that genuinely makes Hulk afraid.

So, kudos for letting us actually meet Hulk finally.

Another thing I did *not* care for: Valkyrie. I don’t have a problem with the character of Valkyrie, nor one with casting a woman of color in the part. I just really dislike Tessa Thompson. She’s not a good actor. I’ve seen her in a few things, and “coming off as snotty” is acting. I guarantee there were dozens if not hundreds of more qualified women that auditioned for the part, and casting her was just a bad decision.

Cate Blanchett as Hela was effective, I thought (props for getting her headdress right). The whole time, I thought there was something kind of familiar about her, but it wasn’t until after the movie when I looked her up that I learned/realized that she was Galadriel in the Lord of the Rings flicks. I don’t know her other work, but she might be a pretty solid performer.

SKURGE THE EXECUTIONER!!!

On one hand, YAY for including this character in the movie! On the other hand, BOO! Skurge needs more build up than he got. On the other other hand, YAY! Karl Urban! I love Karl Urban!! On the other other other hand, BOO! They kind of wasted Karl Urban!!!!

Seriously, I appreciate that they drew from a classic story that just about everyone my age who read comics is familiar with. And it’s great that we got to see him with the M-16s. But on the downside, it was *just* the visual. We didn’t get the story that gave us . . .

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“They made a fool of me, Balder. They laughed at me. Everybody laughs at Skurge. Hela, Mordonna, even the Enchantress I love. They all laugh at me. Except you. Balder is too kind to laugh at Skurge. But whenever they laugh, I hurt inside. Maybe I die a little. Now I think I am dead already. And my axe was destroyed with Naglfar. So I will stay behind and the last laugh will be mine. ... I will hold the bridge myself.”

And

“And though the Executioner stands alone, and the warriors of Hel seem numberless, not one sets foot upon the bridge across the river Gjoll. They sing no songs in Hel... nor do they celebrate heroes... for silent is that dismal realm and cheerless... but the story of the Gjallerbru and the god who defended it is whispered across the Nine Worlds. And when a new arrival asks about the one to whom even Hela bows her head... the answer is always the same...

he stood alone at Gjallerbru...

and that answer is enough.”

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I was 12 when that issue came out. It had a powerful impact on me, and I was *so* disappointed that Skurge didn’t get to hold Bifrost alone against the hordes of Hela.

So, mixed bag on that one.

Korg (the big rock gladiator) was pretty great. I hope beyond hope that in one of the next MCU flicks, we get an extended conversation between Korg and Luis from Ant-Man. Make it an extra if necessary, but the MCU *NEEDS* this conversation to happen. Doesn’t even matter what they’re talking about.

Anyway, this was a damned fun movie, and I hope we get some more adventures from Hemsworth and Taika Waititi.

Man, imagine what these people could do for the DC Cinematic Universe. . .