5 Questions: Thor: Ragnarok

I’ve fallen a few years behind on my Marvel Cinematic Universe viewing regime. I just wasn’t able to keep up after Age of Ultron and I’ve plodded along ever since missing one or two each year. At some point, I’ll finally catch up and realize that most of the cast is either dead or been replaced by younger versions straight from that WB show about Archie. The Guardians of the Galaxy movies are maybe my favorite of the recent entries and it was a pleasant surprise when I found out that this newest Thor film was much closer to them tonally than to that awful second Thor movie with the weird liquid plot device. Being so far behind in the series has caused me to have to ask a number of questions about the movie that I just didn’t have the answers to…

Q1: When did Thor get so damned funny?

Okay. Chris Hemsworth has done some comedies and seems to be a sincerely nice fella with a funny way about him but when did he get so funny as Thor? I thought that Thor was the serious Shakespearian dude who was out of place amongst the other members of the Avengers because he wasn’t in on the joke. Now, every single like that Thor utters is some sort of quip at another character. I hate for this to sound like I’m bitching about it because I did get a kick out of the writing but it just didn’t feel very Thor-like to me.

Q2: Is Karl Urban in every major franchise now?

Is it just me or is Karl Urban in every major franchise in the world? Maybe it’s just that I watch far too many action movies (no way!) but I seem to run across Karl Urban every other week or so in some new franchise flick or early 2000’s movie about aliens. I’m a big fan of Urban, myself. I loved him in Dredd and am desperately hoping that Netflix picks it up as a series now that all those Marvel shows are gone but I think it’s time for some new blood in Hollywood to play in the muscle in movies like this.

Q3: Is Marvel just laughing hysterically at how depressing DC movies are?

While DC has now had a few successful movies by the standard of today, Marvel must be lounging around, counting their money, and laughing hysterically at how sad the DC superheroes are. Thor: Ragnarok is so fun and funny at times that even going back and watching Batman Vs. Superman sounds like a bad idea. And I’m a massive DC fan who has always chosen the Trinity to any Marvel heroes. The saddest part is that it takes so long to get a good movie off the ground that I might be 50 by the time a good DC movie franchise is made and my kids will be too old for me to buy them toys.

Q4: Did anyone else forget about the whole Hela taking over Asgard thing?

By the third act of the film I had all but forgotten about Hela’s attempt to rule Asgard. Cate Blanchett is a baller when it comes to acting and her character kicked a bunch of ass but she was also so one dimensional that I neither thought of her as a threat nor cared much for her based on the fact that she said like 10 lines in the entire movie. The same could be said for the weirdness of Jeff Goldblum’s character but that is something for another day.

Q5: How old will Sam Jackson be when he’s finally done playing Nick Fury?

Samuel L. Jackson has been running around in the Marvel movies since the first Iron Man and he’s no spring chicken. I know that his character isn’t supposed to be lifting cars over his head or going toe-to-toe with major villains but something tells me he’ll be the last actor standing when it comes time to replace these originals for the reboots. I’m not complaining about that, though. Jackson is probably the most perfect casting of any of the characters other than Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark. In fact, the massive success that the MCU has seen is in part because they’ve done such a phenomenal job at casting. All you have to do is look at this Thor movie with it’s ransom assortment of characters that I’ve never heard of and a director who seemingly came out of nowhere. When you’re king, everything seems easy.