Short Take: LOVE AND THUNDER IS A SHAPELESS MOB SCENE

 

The comic book fan website CBR.COM argues that director Waititi deserves better treatment than what he's gotten after the release of Thor: Love and Thunder, his second at-bat with the character. He’ll get a better treatment when he makes a better movie. His first turn on the Thor franchise worked because of a couple of smart decisions, the first being turning the film into a Hope-Crosby style road comedy and developing an effectively humorous relationship between the two. Moreover, it was very cool and effective to bring some Jack Kirby influenced designs to the look of the film. As far as story lie, line it was complete and with a satisfying resolution, Thor's hero's journey in learning what it means to be "worthy" of his mantel. Love and Thunder undoes by making the return of Jane Foster into a romantic comedy, a genre that generally requires the hero, Thor in this case, to be a self-centered, preening, emotionally immature dolt whose intellectual capacity is as dismal as his powers are impressive. The newly matured and worthy Thor of Ragnarök is erased. The film is overcrowded with too many characters, far too many gags that are essentially all set up and dud punchlines, tangents, spectacles, abrupt and unearned shifts in tone. It starts as a romantic comedy, wanders deep and far into Clash of the Titans territory, becomes a superhero version of a PBS kiddie show by the movie fourth quarter, tries to redeem the rioting themes, tones, and battalion of one-dimensional characters by turning it into a three-hankie weeper with the death of Jane. Worse, though, is the shallow grasp to keep fan loyalty by holding out the chance that we'll see more of the Jane character by showing in Valhalla, an afterlife I'm sure writers will no doubt contrive to enable Jane to leave and enter again as the franchise rolls forward. Waititi is a talented writer, director, and actor and one can expect good things from him again, but he overplayed his hand on his second go around on Thor. It was an unmitigated mess in all respects, as most of the Phase films have been so far.