Broken Pawn: Movie Review

'Thor:Ragnarok' is easily the best Thor film to date.

  I went to see the latest Marvel superhero movie ‘Thor: Ragnarok’ at the local theatre with Kathy three weeks ago on the opening weekend. The Saturday night showing we went to was half full which was expected for the #1 movie of the weekend but far from the norm for most movies I go to see in Marshalltown. This is the third Thor movie in the current series following 2011’s ‘Thor’ and 2013’s ‘The Dark World’. The first two movies alternated between Thor’s cosmic realm of Asgard and Earth with the major subplots being Thor’s relationship with earthling Jane Foster and his half-brother Loki’s persistent betrayal of Asgard and his adoptive father the all-powerful Odin. The movies were good but the earth action and constant showing off of the grandeur of Asgard made them slow-moving as well.

  ‘Ragnarok’ starts with an action scene and never lets up. It begins with Thor battling the demon Surtur on a hell-like planet. After his ultimate victory, Thor brings Surtur’s head back to Asgard for safekeeping as it was foretold that Surtur was the harbinger of Ragnarok (otherwise known as the end of Asgard). Upon his return Thor immediately sees that his father Odin is being impersonated by the mischievous Loki and the pair head to earth to retrieve Odin from the Norwegian village where Loki banished him.

  The trip to earth was as light-hearted as the battle with Surtur was action packed. This was a hallmark of ‘Thor: Ragnarok’ – the movie had both a great humor and superior action and the ability to switch between the two in an unforced manner. On Earth, Thor has a funny run-in with Doctor Strange who proves to be Thor’s match in every way and sends him to find Odin and Loki where Odin dies after giving some expository on his first born daughter Hela. Hela immediately appears and she is every bit the menace she is shown to be in the comics and more as she destroys Thor’s hammer with one hand and banishes Thor and Loki to the far ends of the universe by disrupting their escape through the warp-like BiFrost as she heads to Asgard to begin her quest for domination of the ‘Nine Realms’ (Asgard, Earth, etc..).

  At this point the movie takes another about face as Thor finds himself marooned on a planet controlled by the ‘Grandmaster’ where he is put to work as a gladiator while being enslaved by an electric shock device. Thor is desperate to get back to Asgard and promised by the Grandmaster his freedom if he can defeat the gladiator champion in battle. It turns out the Grandmaster’s champion is none other than the Incredible Hulk who disappeared at the end of Avengers: Age of Ultron. The Grandmaster is crazily played by Jeff Goldblum who oscillates between being a cutthroat killer and a party animal.

  After a great fight between Hulk and Thor (which Thor seemed to be winning until being ‘shocked’ into defeat by the Grandmaster), the movie pivots to Thor’s attempts to escape from the Grandmaster’s planet and reminded me a lot of ‘Star Trek Discovery’ except with super heroes. There is the help from a resident of the planet, finding an escape ship, and the eventual escape and obligatory chase scene. The best part of this section of the movie was the screen time afforded to both Bruce Banner and the Hulk. Instead of the mono-syllabic Hulk of the Avengers, this Hulk was intelligent in a petty and child-like way and liked being the ultimate gladiator of the Grandmaster’s planet. When the Hulk finally turns into Bruce Banner Mark Ruffalo’s Banner is not the mild-mannered scientist I’ve been used to but more of an arrogant type that argues he is more valuable than the Hulk because of his doctorate degrees but also manages to keep his pulse rate down while flying the escaping space ship.

  After the funny adventures on the Grandmaster’s planet, Thor and his team of Loki, Hulk, and Valkyrie (a confidant of Grandmaster but originally a resident of Asgard) head to Asgard for the final battle against Hela in which the good guys win but at a tremendous cost.

  This was a well-made and fun movie and in my opinion the best Marvel Studios production to date. The other Thor movies seemed too full of the ‘grandeur’ of Asgard or Thor trying to find himself or figure out his relationship with Jane Foster but this movie was just action or humor. Cate Blanchette was an incredible Hela with a bone chilling disregard for anything but revenge and power. Her costume was an improvement over the comics with an expanding headdress that gave her battle horns a ‘Medusa-like’ quality. Mark Ruffalo and the Hulk were perfect complements to the ever serious Hulk and stole every scene they were in. Tom Hiddleston was his usual superb self as Loki and Chris Hemsworth mixed humor and gravitas as he has seemingly figured out how he wants to play Thor.

  With the exception of February’s awesome looking Black Panther, this is the last Marvel Studio release until next spring’s much anticipated Avengers: Infinity War starring Thanos the Destroyer. I know it will be a big box office success but I wonder why after nearly a decade of Marvel Studios films there are still only three movies a year being produced. This year saw Spiderman: Homecoming, Guardians of the Galaxy 2, and Thor: Ragnarok and that was it. Each movie did gangbusters at the box office. Marvel films are such proven moneymakers I can’t understand why they aren’t coming out at least every other month until the market proves it is oversaturated. There is such crossover between characters that these movies could be made two or three at a time for later release. I can see why a Planet of the Apes or Transformers movie can only come out every few years – the story centers around a basic theme and characters. I can’t understand why a multi-faceted franchise like the Marvel Universe can’t produce their movies like the money-making factory they have proven to be.