Two Years after the events of Avengers: Age of Ultron, our hero Thor, puzzled and intrigued by the sudden resurgence of the "infinity stones" goes looking for answers on his own. On his journey, he comes across Surtur the fire giant who rattles on about Ragnarok and his prophesied destruction of Thor's home world, Asgard. After killing him (ahhhhh spoilers), Thor goes home for the first time since starting his journey.
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After Thor's defeat of Surtur, Thor returns to Asgard to discover that Odin has made a few changes to the city and is acting strangely. He quickly realizes that Odin is in fact Loki in disguise. The pair then head to earth to free their father from Loki's spell only to find Odin calmly sitting on a cliff side overlooking the sea in Norway. He tells Thor and Loki that his life is all that's stopping Hela, their sister, from coming back to conqueror and rule Asgard. Almost as though he knew it was happening, his spirit gently drifts into the wind, over the sea, to his final resting place of Valhalla.
Hela emerges from her exile with a vengeance and is slightly bitter that she missed the death of Odin. Overcome with anger and grief over the death of his father, Thor hurls the mighty Mjolnir at Hela and to everyone's shock, she stops it in its path with hardly a struggle and destroys the hammer. Enraged, Thor then attempts a charge at Hela but is whisked away by Loki, who calls to be summoned back to Asgard. With Hela hot on their tail, they are cast out of the Bifrost and into oblivion.
Or so they think...
Landing on the unfamiliar world of Sakaar, Thor begins another epic quest to save is home, from his evil sister. He is immediately Set upon by slavers and is saved by Scrapper 142, a fallen Valkyrie. He meets the evil(ish) Grand Master, the ruler of Sakaar, and is forced to fight in his arena against his champion. He finds Loki there, who seemed to have already won The Grand Master's favor. The Grand Master's champion Thor is meant to fight just happens to be his fellow Avenger, Hulk. Hulk being Hulk, attacks Thor immediately and pair fight to show us who's the strongest Avenger.
What follows is an escape from the Grand Master's clutches, and a return to Asgard to face Hela at last.
If you haven't seen the film, go see it. Really. Its fantastic!!
After his two previous movies and two Avengers films, we should all know who Thor is. Thor is Odin's son and heir to be ruler of Asgard. He is the God of Thunder. He and his trusty hammer, Mjolnir, are rarely seen apart. Being a god, he's a bit cocky and arrogant but has lightened up over the course of the previous films and has learnt humility and honor, while retaining an air of joviality.
Loki, the God of Mischief, is Thor's adopted brother. He specializes in illusions and trickery to get what he wants and is constantly betraying his brother in his quest to become ruler of something. He's done it in every film so far. Will he get away with it again?
During the events of Avengers: Age of Ultron, the Hulk was last seen flying away in a quinjet. We learn that he somehow goes through a portal and ends up on Sakaar. Here he becomes The Grand Master's champion and in the two years there he never turned back into Bruce Banner. He's comfortable and happy on Sakaar as he's able to get his fill of fighting in the gladiatorial arena. He is adored by the Sakaareans.
Scrapper 142 was a Valkyrie who managed to escape being killed by Hela, before Odin managed to exile her. She found herself on Sakaar and either because she's Asgardian, or because she's horrified by her abandonment of the Asgardian people, she has come to be a drunk, scouring the Sakaarean landscape looking for fighters for the Grand Master's arena. She's only ever referred to as Scrapper 142 and we never find out her name. But I'm going to call her Valkyrie even if it is just as generic as Scrapper 142 simply because its a better name.
Being Odin's first born, long before the birth of Thor and the adoption of Loki, Hela is the true heir of Asgard. She is a gifted fighter and commander able to conjure up blades from nothing. With her loyal dire wolf, Fenrir, at her side, nothing could stop her. Odin, with the help of Hela's ferociousness, was able conquered the seven realms and were undefeatable, but when Odin had had his fill and wanted to create a new world for his people, Hela protested wanting the conquer the entire universe. What ensued was a rebellion and subsequent exile of Hela. Odin tried his best to erase Hela from their history and never told Thor and Loki about their older sister.
Being the first "to be lost and to be found", The Grand Master is the ruler of Sakaar. He was the very first to end up on Sakaar where he started his kingdom. For his own enjoyment he started the arena to watch the other castaways fight each other to the death. Since time works differently on Sakaar, he may be hundreds, if not thousands of years old.
Other notable characters are:
For a list of all actors in this film I reference IMDB.
I think that this film is the best Thor film by far and its currently my favorite movie in the MCU. It took the place of the first Guardians of the Galaxy. That is because it was able to capture the same or similar sense of humour as Guardians because of a thematic shift in the formula of Thor's previous films while keeping in the other worldliness of Thor and most of the characters in this film as they are obviously aliens on Earth. I know that that's obvious, but the previous two films seemed to focus on the humanity of the characters in a plot that mainly took place on Earth (the first one) and a plot that seemed to rival Thanos' conquest of the universe in a much less interesting way (in the second one). But these characters are all alien. This is part of the reason why the Guardian films are so intriguing. Because everything is different from how they are on earth, so its less predictable.
The previous two Thor films also, I feel, took themselves way to seriously and as a result didn't seem to fit in with the other films in the MCU. Thor, while always an interesting and integral part of the Avengers, didn't seem to get the same treatment as say Captain America and Iron man with his own movies. This all changes with Thor Ragnarok. Much like the trimming of Thor's hair and the loss of his hammer, the movies let go of this sense of seriousness and resulting in a much more relatable character, even if he is still the God of Thunder and becomes much more powerful.
The gladiator fight between Thor and The Hulk was epic.
The fight itself really showcased Thor's abilities as a warrior since Mjolnir was destroyed. In previous films, Thor's use of the hammer seemed to indicate that he was only powerful because of it. It was done several times, that without his hammer, he loses, with his hammer, he wins. This film actually shows that Thor isn't useless without Mjolnir and as the fight progresses and throughout the rest of the film, Thor, much like the audience, learns that his power comes from deep within and is innate in his character, and is part of the reason of his worthiness to wield Mjolnir.
It is important to point out however, that Hela is still more powerful than Thor. Their fight sequence shows that resulting in Thor losing an eye. Hela, who is able to take on a entire Asgardian legion on her own makes pretty easy work of Thor. It requires Thor to think outside the box to defeat her and I'm fine with how she is defeated, as Surtur destroys Asgard as prophesied taking away the source Hela's power. Its very different to how protagonists in the MCU typically easily win with seemly little consequence (most of the time) and Thor Ragnarok is better for it.
Loki and Thor's relationship is a troubled one. In keeping with his character, Loki attempts to betray Thor once more but is tricked by Thor who says, "You are becoming to predictable, brother." I think this may be a turning point for Loki as a character. We as the audience know that Loki is a bad guy but is like able despite this, but as Thor says, he's become predictable. Loki joins Korg and the rebellion ship to come save Asgardians (How? I don't know. Valkayrie says it would have taken months to travel there without going through the Devil Anus which needed a particular type of shielding system for the ship to get through). Towards the climax of the film, Loki finds the Teseract in Odin's vault and this change in his character is tested. Will he take it or not? ... Of course he took it and of course Thanos is going to get it. But the more important question to ask is whether Loki has been evil all along and simply gives it to him, or if Thanos takes it from him forcibly. We'll just have to wait and see in Infinity War.
I think its great that Hulk can talk in this film as we get a better understanding of his character. It really added to his character that he seemed simplistic and almost childlike in his conversations with Thor and/or Valkyrie which directly contrasts the way Bruce Banner talks. This is also obvious to anyone who knows the character, but actually acting it out has a greater effects on the audience.
All the jokes are great in this film. I can't recall any of the jokes missing their mark and none of them seemed forced or out of place. This is why movie studios go, "Be funny like Marvel films." The difference is the jokes are part of the script and not added in after the fact. From "Let's do 'Get help'." to "I know him, we're friends from work," its all seamlessly acted out and thematically consistent.
The Immigrant Song. Need I say more? but really, that song fits in with the rainbow bridge sequence so well. This iconic song by Led Zeppelin almost seems like it was written specifically for this film. The rest of the music is great as well with all the 8-bit electronica fitting in with the theme.
The Sakaar's visual aesthetic works well being colourful and otherworldly different from whats typically found on Earth much the same as Guardians of the Galaxy. I quite enjoyed the credits as well with the vector art (?) story board of the film.
I can't wait for Avengers: Infinity War to come out later this month. Thor Ragnarok sets up that film excellently and while I haven't yet seen Black Panther, I think I'm ready to go see it. I'll be seeing Black Panther as soon as I can. In the post credit sequence of this film, we learn that an enormous unidentifiable ship looms over the Asgardians and their fate is uncertain. We know that Thor meets the Guardians of the Galaxy shortly after this, but happens to everyone else. I sure we will find out.
Thor Ragnarok is a fun and engaging film to watch and is an excellent conclusion to Thor's trilogy of films. While distinctly different from the previous films, it fits in more seamlessly with the rest of the MCU. If you haven't seen it yet, definitely go see it. You won't be disappointed.
Thanks for reading Why I Love Thor Ragnarok. Let me know if you watched the film and whether or not you agreed with me.
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All Images from IMDB Image Gallery
