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There's a fine line between sincerity and glibness, and "Thor: Love and Thunder"
has a very difficult time straddling that line. Where the last film focused on
the God of Thunder, at least as depicted within the Marvel Cinematic Universe,
was breezy and fun and delightfully weird, "Thor: Love and Thunder" has a
surprisingly difficult time trying to recapture that goofy lightning in a
bottle, in spite of the fact that director Taika Waititi has returned and now
serves as co-writer. This is ostensibly even more Waititi's film than "Thor: Ragnarok" was, considering how big a success that film was creatively and
commercially, but its attempts at humor are as sweaty as they are frequent, and
its attempts at pathos and tragedy are both unexpected and ill-handled. Parts of
"Thor: Love and Thunder" are effectively managed, but more often than not, this
latest extension of the MCU struggles to right the ship.
We last left Thor Odinson (Chris Hemsworth) with the Guardians of the Galaxy and
also with a little extra body fat. But as his rocky friend Korg (voiced by
Waititi) explains, Thor worked through his pain — primarily that of having lost
his true love, Jane Foster (Natalie Portman) — by losing his weight and taking
on all manners of alien beasties with the ragtag group led by Star-Lord (Chris
Pratt). It is, however, obvious to everyone but Thor that his presence is a
little tiring, so when a distress call from Thor's old Asgardian friend Sif (Jaimie
Alexander) comes through, the Guardians use that as an excuse to vamoose. From
Sif, Thor learns of a mysterious villain named Gorr (Christian Bale), who goes
by the moniker "The God Butcher" because he has a powerful sword that can kill
gods, and he's been using it ... a lot. Gorr's latest target is New Asgard,
where Thor is shocked to find his ex Jane is inexplicably wielding his hammer
Mjolnir and is imbued with Thor-like powers.
"Thor: Love and Thunder" runs into trouble from the start, with a grim prologue
introducing us to Gorr and making clear why he wants to kill gods, to the extent
that he has an extremely effective, if heartbreaking, argument for fighting
against the rulers who care so little for those below them. Gorr sees gods like
Thor as being selfish, ignorant, and destructive, and then the film proceeds to
further that argument by showing us Thor acting ... well, selfish, ignorant, and
destructive. It's an intentional creative choice meant to help establish an arc
of growth for Thor, but the problem is that this is a Marvel movie, so the good
guys are going to win and Gorr is not the good guy. (That he rouses Thor into
action alongside Jane and Tessa Thompson's Valkyrie by kidnapping a group of
children helps establish Gorr as the bad guy.)
The real issue comes down to the script, by Waititi and Jennifer Kaytin
Robinson, which veers from dark and dour tragedy to glib, dismissive comedy
often in the same scene. Much of the back story surrounding Jane Foster's return,
and why it is that she's transformed herself into The Mighty Thor, is steeped in
pathos ... until she tries to riff her way into getting the right catchphrase.
(Jane's return also leads to Thor dealing with a love triangle of sorts between
himself, Mjolnir, and his newly created ax.) Though it's nice to see Portman on
the big screen again — with this being her first mainstream movie since
"Annihilation" — it remains more than a little difficult to buy the love between
Jane and Thor as having been so massive and epic on the same level as even that
of Steve Rogers and Peggy Carter. It's not that Chris Hemsworth has more
chemistry with either Tessa Thompson (who's more than a bit underused here) or
Thor's hammer Mjolnir, but his chemistry with Portman isn't exactly off the
charts.
Where "Thor: Love and Thunder" does work unequivocally is in serving as a
reminder that Christian Bale is an excellent actor. For a cinematic franchise
built on good guys vs. bad guys, there are not a ton of truly memorable villains in
the MCU, but Bale makes Gorr pretty close to unforgettable with his genuinely
very solid performance. Bale, like Portman, hasn't been on the big screen in a
few years, not since "Ford v. Ferrari." While he's no stranger to the world of
comic-book movies, Bale's performance is predictably a far cry from his Batman.
The risk of Gorr is that his character's brief back story is a very emphatic
warning that "Love and Thunder" is going to try to be a bit darker than "Thor: Ragnarok."
The good news is, Bale makes that shift to a grimmer tone work very well; even
when Gorr tries to entertain the abducted children with a warped bedtime story
of sorts, he's extremely creepy.
The flip side is simple: by making a good chunk of this new "Thor" movie fairly
dark, Waititi and Robinson end up stumbling when it comes to bringing back — or
trying to bring back — the flippant comedy that made "Thor: Ragnarok" stand out. Some
of the jokes are just lazy, as when we get a variation on the sit-commy gag of
one character talking badly about another, pausing, and then saying "They're
right behind me, aren't they?" Then there are largely soulless one-liners, as
when Valkyrie, upon seeing Thor destroy the ceiling of a New Asgard building,
says "I'm going to invoice you for that." Even the gags that work only work so
much, because of the grim overarching story.
The best thing that can be said about "Thor: Love and Thunder" is that as rough
as the experience is, it's not as bad as "Thor:
Dark World." And Christian
Bale is going for it as Gorr. The same can also be said for his "3:10
To Yuma"
co-star Russell Crowe, who makes an extended cameo appearance as the legendary
god Zeus, here turning the Olympian god into a fey and selfish ninny. But maybe
"Thor: Ragnarok"
was, at least for the world of Marvel, too good to be topped. Or maybe you can
only get so lucky so many times. As hard as the cast and Taika Waititi try,
though, it just doesn't work. "Thor: Ragnarok" felt effortless. "Thor: Love and
Thunder" is working very hard, and not getting a lot to show for it.
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