Thor: Ragnarok
Cast & Key People
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Our Review
Taika Waititi took the series’ most solemn hero, fired the Shakespeare, and made the funniest film in the canon. Thor: Ragnarok opens with Thor cracking jokes in a monster’s cage and never looks back: the haircut, the gladiator planet, the discarded quilt, the roommate who is somehow also a rock creature. Chris Hemsworth reveals he has been a comedian trapped in a cape for six years.
The first hour is the best stretch, a Sakaar buddy picture with Jeff Goldblum operating at maximum Goldblum as the Grandmaster and Tessa Thompson stealing the movie as a bounty hunter with a drinking problem. The Hulk speaking in full sentences turns the green guy into a character instead of a payoff. Cate Blanchett’s Hela, the death goddess sister who shows up to claim the throne, vamps through magnificently and gets less to do than her entrance promised.
The finale burns the whole franchise’s premise down, Asgard destroyed because sometimes home is a people not a place, staged to Led Zeppelin’s Immigrant Song as Thor arrives in lightning. The comedy occasionally flattens the drama, a problem Waititi’s sequel would inherit at twice the dose.
The most purely entertaining movie of Phase Three. Our score: 8/10.
Seasons
Season guides coming soon.
