Thor: Love and Thunder – Smashing the box office but not as expected

Thor four, officially titled Thor: Love and Thunder is the latest Marvel Cinematic Universe film to hit the big screen, and being the massive Marvel fanatic I am, it’s been on my radar since it got announced. However, the outcome was that of slight disappointment, which is felt by many as its joint lowest in terms of Thor Solo movies on Rotten Tomatoes. (With just 66%.) The film has brilliant comedy elements which is no surprise as the director is Taika Waititi, a New-Zealand comic director known for previous Thor film, Thor: Ragnarok (2017) as well as other projects but overall, not the same fast-paced action sequences that take up most of the screen time in other Marvel Projects.

The plot includes the re-unification of Thor (played by Chris Hemsworth) and his once-upon-a-time girlfriend, Jane Foster (played by Natalie Portman), from the first Thor movie in 2011, as they try to save the children of New Asgard from the Gorr the God Butcher who kidnapped the children. Along their journey they are joined by a star-studded cast including Russell Crowe, Tessa Thompson, Christian Bale and Taika Waititi himself with the young actors including all 3 of Hemsworth’s real-life children (India Rose, Tristian, and Sasha) taking starring roles as Love, Young Thor and one of the Asgardian children retrospectively and other big named actors having their offspring also in roles.

The idea is that the film explores Thor’s inner peace, which makes for the heavy emotional scenes compared to the standard and iconic fight scenes that the Marvel Cinematic Universe has become known for. The film used special effects instead to set the scene and tell the story, recreating iconic and specific scenes from the comic book it was based on, Thor: God of Thunder #3, which was written by Jason Aaron in 2014. One obvious comparison is the scene where Thor travels to the snow-island to find Gorr.

Overall, the film is funny and is a good story where we learn more about Thor and Jane. I also liked the plot, the effects used and the star cast, it was just disappointing in general for a MCU film, as you expected the big special effects scenes.  Personally, I wouldn’t see it again but also recommend people see it for themselves and make their own opinions.

Check out Ben’s review of Jurassic World: Dominion here!

Words by Ben Wheeler