Ragnarok has been one of my most anticipated films of this year, this is mainly down to the choice of director, Taika Waititi, who has produced two of my all time favourite comedies, What We Do in the Shadows and Hunt for the Wilderpeople. He is genuinely one of the funniest directors around who produces films that are both hilarious and beautifully crafted. So I was very excited to see what he would do with a Marvel film, but I was also very aware of Marvel/Disney’s track record with ‘risky’ directors. We had Edgar Wright who was going to direct Ant-Man, (I am still desperate to know what his version would have been like) and more recently The Lego Movie’s Phil Lord and Chris Miller being fired from the up coming Han Solo movie. With all this in mind I was so relieved that it all worked out in the end with Marvel and Waititi. Yay! What has been produced is the most thematically different Marvel film since Guardians of the Galaxy back in 2014, and it is really so refreshing.
The one thing that struck me, as with my previous review, Blade Runner 2049, was not the humour or the visuals, but the score. I have never really noticed anything special about any Marvel score, they don’t really stand apart from each other and feel like variations on the same kind of theme. In places, the composer, Mark Mothersbaugh’s score did hark back to previous Marvel scores, but on a whole his score was beautiful, fun and dramatic in all the right places, and was hugely helped by a healthy dollop of synth. But despite the synth-tastic score, I was particularly struck by the piece ‘Twilight of the Gods’ which was one of the slower pieces in the score, evoking folk-y nordic beautifulness that did tug at my heartstrings quite a bit! There are also many times throughout when Mothersbaugh brings out his inner John Williams and I loved it, and would love to see him work on one of the Star Wars spin offs in the works.
The overall feel of the film was greatly enhanced by the score, and that feel is just an overall sense of craziness, amazing, but downright madness. Think the 1980s, on LSD but in space. It was a plethora of colour, not just the nebula, rainbow road kind of colour seen in the previous Thor movies, but bright, garish and beautiful colour- especially on the planet Sakaar, which at times really evoked aspects of Blade Runner, but brighter and less depressing. I did really appreciate some of the practical effects in the film, especially with some of the city sequences on Sakaar, but it is a shame this wasn’t consistent throughout the film.
I am very aware that this is a very fantastical film and a lot of CGI is necessary, but I like my CGI when I can’t really notice it that much. But there was one fight scene that was so obviously CGI, it was so noticeable and it really took me out of the film and had the Uncanny Valley effect that is so distracting. It is definitely understandable that a lot of this film has to be CGI, but I really expect better from Marvel at this point, for something to be so obvious, it was actually quite annoying.
So lets get over that negative point and delve into one of the best aspects of the film, the humour. I was, I will admit a little bit worried that it may come across gimmicky and forced, but it really didn’t, the film is genuinely hilarious from start to finish. I was actually quite surprised with how much they managed to get away with really, and you will see what I mean when you see it! I have always loved the lighter side of Thor and I have always wanted it to be showcased more and it was to a huge extent in this film without it feeling out of character. All three of the familiar characters were all believably funny.
It was also great to see some new faces, I will start with Hulk, and I know that he has been in previous Marvel films, but we do get a lot of Banner and not much Hulk. But Hulk in Ragnarok, is amazing and I am so glad we got to see more of the character of Hulk, as a separate character rather than just a violent green monster smashing up buildings. I would also love to gush about how amazing Cate Blanchett and Tessa Thompson were as new characters to the universe, but I really don’t want to spoil anything about them or the film, so I will just leave it at: they are amazing female characters!!
So on that note, overall there were some amazing comic performances, great new characters, stunning visuals with some minor hiccups and some amazing and fun music to go along with all of it. I adored the wild, hilarious ride that was Thor: Ragnarok and I hope you do to!
8.5/10
By Siobhán Eardley.
Siobhan of the Dead 