Review: Thor: Love and Thunder

 What's better than a Thor? Two Thors!

Let’s talk Love and Thunder. The fourth solo film of the Thor franchise is the second directed by Taika Waititi. When we last left Thor, he’d been suffering from a severe depression form the events of Avengers: Infinity War, having gained a lot of weight and spent the five years after the battle drunk. He rejoined the Avengers to help undo Thanos’ snap, traveling through time with Rocket Raccoon to get a past version of the Reality Stone that was within Jane Foster. While in Asgard, Thor ran into his mother, who’s witch vision informed her that this was a time traveling version of her oldest son. The gut was a bit of a clue too, but magic helped. She gave her son the advice to try to be the man that he wants to be and not who she and his father wanted him to be. He reclaimed Mjolnir from his past self, confirming he's still worthy. In the present, Thor battled a time traveling Thanos with Captain America and Iron Man. When all seemed lost, the rest of the MCU’s heroes arrived and they did battle with Thanos, finally killing him and his forces with the sacrifice of Iron Man. After the battle, Thor decided to follow his mother’s advice, leaving Valkyrie as the official King of Asgard. He left earth with the Guardians of the Galaxy, clearly to Peter Quill’s annoyance, in search of said purpose.  We pick up with him there. Let’s get to it.

 

It's a good group.

We open Love and Thunder, not with Thor, but with Gorr. Gorr was the last survivor of his people along with his young daughter. Gorr spent his days praying Rapu, his God, as he and his daughter suffered in the desert. His daughter eventually dies, and Gorr buries her body. He starts hearing something call out to him and travels deeper into the desert. He finds an Oasis where Rapu is having a party with his pantheon. Gorr expects to be rewarded for his faith and the resurrection of his daughter and people, but Rapu is uninterested in him. Turns out, they’re celebrating the defeat of a warrior wielding All-Black the Necrosword. Gorr tries to convince Rapu that without followers, he’s not really a god, but Rapu claims that there are always more worshippers. Gorr denounces his God, pissing him off. Rapu starts strangling him, saying his sacrifice will serve his god. The Necrosword comes to Gorr’s hand and he uses it on Rapu, killing him. The God-Butcher is born.

 

We rejoin Thor, whom is on an adventure with the Guardians of the Galaxy. With some info dumping from future narrator Korg, we learn that Thor had spent time exercising, reclaiming his svelte physique. He tries to meditate under an alien tree, until he’s called in by the Guardians to help them clear out a group of alien Owl bandits that stole the native’s temple. Thor easily dispatches the aliens, but ends up destroying the temple much to the natives distress. They do thank Thor for this help, saying that they had lost the temple after the death of their god. They thank the Thor by giving him two giant goats. This is a reference to Thor’s actual giant goats that pull him around the universe in mythology, Tanngrisnir and Tanngnjostr aka Teethbearer and Teethgrinder. While looking through new distress calls, there are an insane amount across the universe, Thor sees his ex and friend Lady Sif sending one. Thor bids Farewell to the Guardians, they seem “okay” with him going, and leave him with the Goats. Thor takes them and his friend Korg across the galaxy via Bifrost Bridge to Sif. They find her beside the colossal body of the dead god Falligar The Behemoth. Sif seems okay with dying in battle as it lets her go to Valhala, but Thor tells her she’ll officially die after the battle, which doesn’t count. But her arm, her left arm had been severed above the elbow, might. She warns him of Gorr the God Butcher and Thor decides to take her to New Asgard to get help.

 

Batman with a death sword, oh no.

Meanwhile, we learn that Jane Foster is going through treatment for stage IV cancer. Darcy and Erik Selvig have cameos as Jane’s support system that are trying to help her. But unfortunately, they can’t find any way to cure her or speed her recovery. Desperate, Jane remembers some things she heard about Mjolnir and decides to visit New Asgard. Since Endgame, New Asgard has been turned into a lively tourist attraction. We get to see the death of Odin and Loki and Thor’s first battle against Hela retold by the Asgardians that looks suspiciously like Sam Neil, Luke Hemsworth, Matt Damon and, shockingly, Melissa McCarthy. It’s once again so bad it’s good. She makes it to the shrine they built around Mjolnir. Funnily, since no one could lift it, they excavated the area to make the pedestal it sits upon and the amphitheater for it. As Jane gets close to it, the fragments start to glow.

 

That night, Gorr attacks New Asgard, using the Necrosword to create giant monsters made of shadow. Thor, Korg and Sif arrive to help hold them off. When he sees Mjolnir flying in the air again, Thor tries to catch it, but it returns to the Mighty Thor, Jane Foster. She shows off a new power of Mjolnir after it’s shattering, that it can split into shrapnel and bombard her enemies.

 

"I still love my ex" face.

Future Narrator Korg breaks in to explain that Thor and Jane had an intense and loving relationship, but it fizzled out given their busy schedules and their fears of intimacy. But during their courtship, Thor tells Mjolnir that he wants the hammer to look after Jane always, it flashes with light to tell us Thor either intentionally or unintentionally added an enchantment to it.

 

They drive off the Necrosword constructs, but they discover he’d used the attack as a cover allowing him to kidnap the children of Asgard. Thor meets with Valkyrie and the rest of New Asgard to try to figure out where the kids are. They get a big help from Axl, formerly Astrid, son of Heimdall. He’s developed his father’s vision-based power and reached out to Thor. Thor uses the spell that Heimdall taught him long ago to astral project to the kids. He tells them to be brave and he’ll come to save them, and confirms that they’re in the Shadow Realm. Knowing that Gorr will be extremely powerful there, Thor proposes he goes to Omnipotence City, the city of gods for help. He tries to Bifrost himself, but Stormbreaker seems to be acting up. Jane suggests that they anchor Stormbreaker to help steady the bridge. Valkyrie has a tour boat gutted, they put Stormbreaker at it’s head and have Thor’s goats pull the boat.

 

While they prepared that, we get a scene alone with Jane. In her room, she lets go of Mjolnir, and without it in her hand or otherwise connected to her, she reverts to her extremely sickly human form. Valkyrie comes to get her, just after Jane pulls the hammer back to her and shatters her sink.

 

Omnipotence City is neat.

They travel to Omnipotence City. Fearing being spotted, they sneak in by stealing the clothes from other gods and enter the grand meeting room. Omnipotence City is run by Zeus, played by Russel Crowe. Thor tries to get Zeus to help against Gorr, but Zeus doesn’t believe him to be a serious threat to them. He disinvites Thor to the god Orgy and when Thor continues to struggle, he orders him imprisoned. Thor and his friends do battle with Zeus’ guards. In the battle, Zeus destroy’s Korg’s body with his Thunderbolt. His face remains intact, though and that’s enough for his species to survive. Thor gets the Thunderbolt and throws it through Zeus’ chest. They call the Goats and bid a hasty retreat.

 

Valkyrie should get the bolt back. Just saying.

Thor and co travel to the Shadow Realm, Thor learning that Jane has cancer on the way their and they rekindle their relationship. They arrive on a dead planet in the Shadow Realm. They find a tent that Gorr has sent up. They split up and search. Jane finds papers detailing Gorr’s plan and tries to warn them but is a bit too late to do more than fling Stormbreaker into space. Gorr’s plan is to steal Stormbreaker and use it’s ability to open a Bifrost Bridge to Eternity. It’s an ancient place that any person who reaches can ask a boon of and they realize that Gorr will ask for the extinction of the Gods. Gorr captures them all and strangles Jane and Valkyrie to try to force Thor to call Stormbreaker back. Thor does, freeing his allies and they battle Gorr and his monsters. The fighting proves too much for them, and Thor tries to Bifrost them away. But, Gorr grabs Stormbreaker at the last second and rips it away from him.

 

Back on New Asgard, they learn that constantly using Mjolnir and being in her Asgardian form has aggravated Jane’s cancer, as the transformation makes Chemo ineffective. It’s effectively a poison and Mjolnir protects her from it. Thor tells Jane to stay behind and recover. Jane wants to fight with him but he begs her to stay back because he loves her. Valkyrie is too injured to go with, either so Thor takes the Thunderbolt and uses it to follow Gorr.

 

Sooo many Thors.

Gorr has the Asgardian children with him as he uses the Stormbreaker to break the door to Eternity. Thor arrives. Knowing that he can’t protect the kids from the Shadow monsters and fight Gorr directly, he tells the kids to gather rubble and debris, anything they can use as a weapon. Using his own magic, Thor places Odin’s enchantment on these items, including a bunny, to temporarily imbue the children with the Power of Thor. They fight the monsters while Thor battles Gorr. Jane, sensing Thor is losing his fight, does what any hero would, summoning Mjolnir to herself, transforming and using Valkyrie’s winged horse to Bifrost herself into the fray. So, it’s Thor and Mighty Thor vs. the God Butcher. See the movie if you want to see how it goes.

 

The good first. Everyone in this film is giving 100%. It’s great to see Chris Hemsworth back as Thor. They walked a fine line with Thor in this one. He’s constantly smiling, constantly making jokes, but you just… sense that he’s hurting. He’s in pain, he’s angry, but putting on a brave face because Thor is brave. There’s a pretty good joke where he keeps trying to get Mjolnir back to him, and Stormbreaker comes at him like an angry current significant other. It was also good to see Tessa Thompson and Taika Waititi as Valkyrie and Korg respectively. I loved seeing Natalie Portman back as Jane. Especially after she was just kind of written out of Thor 3. She’s obviously nervous, loving the new power but terrified about her illness and showing vulnerability, especially to Thor. Christian Bale is amazing as Gorr the God Butcher. You get his anger, and his, justifiable, hatred against gods. There’s a scene that I could remember exactly where it occurred, but he’s taking the kids to the Shadow Realm, appears before them and mutilates one of his shadow monsters in front of them to terrify them. He’s furious and going to burn all gods to get hi revenge. Also, loved Russel Crowe as Zeus. He’s a goofy little bastard but is really closer to Zeus as he appeared in Myth than most other Zeus’. I laughed out loud when he reveals Thor by flicking Thor’s robes off, ripping off his under clothes as well, and the other gods on the platform with Zeus pass out when they see Thor’s… Gungnir. “You flicked too hard, damn it!” He also has a nice tattoo on his back in memorial to Loki. I’d like to think TVA Loki will see that and feel… odd about it.

 

The bad is minimal but there. The movie honestly wastes Gorr in this. Christian Bale is amazing, but he doesn’t appear in this enough. He has maybe 5 scenes where he gets to bust out his acting chops. The humor is fine in most of the film but goes a little too hard in places. Like when Thor is fighting the alien bandits in the beginning and there’s a long lingering scene showing him doing a Jean-Claude van Damme split kick when two of them try to ram him which just messes with me. And, while I liked seeing Jane Foster’s Mighty Thor in this, I wanted more. Much more. Like, where was this Disney+ show, Marvel? Give us six episodes of Jane learning how to use her powers while also dealing with her deteriorating body and I’d have watched it all in prep for this. So yeah, it’s biggest weakness is not fully utilizing it’s all star cast in my opinion.

 

Oh, also, loved the after-credit scene. In it, Zeus is being treated for his chest wound and lamenting the fact that somehow being a God has become less impressive than being a Superhero. He blames Thor for this and tasks his son, Hercules, with killing Thor and showing the universe not to trifle with the gods. And Hercules is being played by Brett Goldstien aka Roy F***ing Kent.

 

Overall, I liked Thor: Love and Thunder. Not as much as Thor: Ragnarok, but more so than the firsts two films. It’s funny, action packed, and has a lot of heart. While not utilized to his full potential, Gorr the God Butcher is a solid antagonist that you want to see beaten but totally get why he’s doing what he’s doing even if you don’t agree with it. He’s in agony over a loss that I would not wish on my worst enemy and has the power to punish those that wouldn’t help his child when they had the chance. I can total get wanting to massacre them all. They had a great version of Mighty Thor in this one and I wouldn’t be upset if they brought her back in at some point in the future. Thor, I think, is in a much better place now than he was at the end of Endgame and I’m looking forward to him facing off against Hercules someday. It’s always a treat to see the top Gods from different pantheons get a chance to brawl like those two guys love to do. I think next time we’ll be getting back into X-Men: Evolution. See you then. 

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