'Thor: The Dark World' Movie Review

Thor: The Dark World Movie Review:

Neither BetThor Nhor Whorse

BY IAN TAN

‘Thor: The Dark World’ marks the God of Thunder’s third visit to the big screen after bashing up alien Chitauri alongside his other superhero buddies in last year’s superhero mash-up epic ‘The Avengers’. It’s also Marvel’s second entry in the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s (MCU) Phase 2 of movies that will ultimately lead up to ‘The Avengers: Age of Ultron’. ‘Game of Thrones’ regular Alan Taylor sits in the director’s chair for this sequel, replacing Kenneth Branagh, who directed the first ‘Thor’ film. So, is ‘Thor: The Dark World’ a worthy sequel and second entry into Marvel’s Phase 2 of films?

Fortunately, ‘The Dark World’ pleases audiences with a fun, visually dazzling continuation of the God of Thunder that sometimes bests its predecessor, and sometimes doesn’t. The story picks up from after the Battle of New York in ‘The Avengers’ where Thor (Chris Hemsworth) returns to Earth after damsel in distress/ love interest Jane Foster (Natalie Portman) forcefully gets sucked into the film’s plot through the introduction of another Tesseract-like McGuffin called the Aether. Dark Elf leader Malekith (Christopher Eccleston) plans on using this McGuffin to bring darkness to all the nine realms to save his race and allow them to flourish and live once again, as well as to take revenge over the Asgardians. Pretty typical ‘bad guy wants to bring darkness in order to save his kind’ story we’ve seen time and time again; nothing new in terms of story-telling that’ll blow your socks off here.

Despite the shallow plot, the highlights of this film are it’s heroes, and, er, sort-of villain. Not Malekith, Loki. After sharing screen time in two Marvel films before, the two actors (Chris Hemsworth and Tom Hiddleston) have truly delved deep into their characters and conjure up wonderful performances whilst sharing great chemistry with each other.

The scene-stealer here is definitely Tom Hiddleston’s Loki, who later comes into the plot to help Thor and Jane Foster in their hunt for Malekith. Natalie Portman still fails to feel like a compelling love interest for Thor and still passes off as a weak character, although she and Hemsworth share better chemistry here compared to the first film. Don’t get me wrong, she’s a great actress, but the material she is given here really doesn’t do much to showcase her talents. Although her character plays an important part to the film’s plot, I can’t help but to feel it was forced. I won’t spoil anything, but the Jane Foster character here feels like just a vessel for the plot to move forward, while the character itself lends nearly nothing to progress the story.

And as s good as Tom Hiddleston is in this film, Loki’s presence in this film seems somewhat unnecessary and sort of underwhelming as he doesn’t have much to do or work with here. Heimdall on the other hand, played by Idris Elba as well as Queen Frida, played by Rene Russo are given more room for character development as well as ass-kickery and are pleasing to watch on screen. However, other side characters such as The Warriors Three are loosely involved in the story. Lady Sif (Jaimie Alexander) does get more lines of dialogue though.

Up until halfway through the film, the script gets audiences pumped up and excited with plot threads and certain character motivations, and later disappoints us by completely dropping them (e.g. a Sif-Thor-Jane Foster love triangle, a shared motivation by Thor and Loki to defeat Malekith that would bring about an excellent bad guy-hero team up ala X-Men 2, and a deeper character history of Malekith and the Asgardians). The sense of a thrilling adventure slowly fades away as the film progresses due to weak character motivations. The stakes in this film are high- the entire world and universe as we know it will be filled in darkness unless Thor stops Malekith, but as an audience this doesn’t feel one bit alarming, which makes for a climax that rarely puts the audience on the edge of our seats. This isn’t particularly the film’s fault, but more Marvel’s, as we know Thor will return for the sequel to ‘The Avengers’, where an inevitably larger threat will emerge. Also, where the heck has S.H.I.E.L.D. been throughout ‘Iron Man 3’ and this movie? Or even the other Avengers? This does not ruin the film, however, as Alan Taylor still treats us with impressive fight sequences, fantastical visuals (see: Asgard) and vast, beautiful landscapes and shooting locations. And be sure to look out for a (sort of) cameo from a particular Avenger.

From a visual standpoint, ‘The Dark World’ is a major improvement over its predecessor; story and character-wise, not so much. The banter between Thor, Odin and Loki and their continuing character arcs are interesting ones that should make for a good sequel, but without Branagh behind the camera during such scenes, they end up feeling secondary to the film’s visuals and action, thus creating a film that sports more style than substance. On a more positive note, those annoying dutch-tilts that plagued the first film are absent here, providing less neck strain for viewers. The humour here is also an improvement with genuine laughs with all cheesiness pushed aside. Kat Denning’s Darcy character, however, may still irritate some as she is now given more screen time and a subplot with a love interest that seems completely unnecessary.

As for its 3D, ‘Thor: The Dark World’ receives a much better conversion compared to ‘Iron Man 3’s earlier this year. Explosions blowing up in mid-air make you duck and cover, landscapes are made more realistic and interesting, Asgard looks and feels more beautiful than ever and the special effects during the film’s climax definitely benefit from great depth and realism. As good as the 3D may be, though, it isn’t a total necessity to enjoy the film. A 2D presentation on a big screen looks spectacular enough, but if you’ve got some extra buck to spare, the 3D isn’t likely to disappoint.

As a whole, one wouldn’t say ‘Thor: The Dark World’ is better or worse than its predecessor. It’s a visual treat and a fun film with fine performances all round, but it lacks that sense of magic, wonder and drama Kenneth Branagh brought to the first ‘Thor’. That being said, the film is shot with style and will please the summer movie-goer in you if you let it. It has a good musical score going for it and enough spectacle to dazzle and overcome flaws in its story or character department.

6.9 out of 10 stars