It’s Thorin’ Time

I rewatch this pretty regularly.  Thor: Ragnarok is a dazzling, epic, cheeky odyssey across the cosmos. The Marvel dream factory gives us a truly mythic tale of gods and monsters with an 80’s sci fi twist forming a modern Flash Gordon vibe with explosive turns by all its stars. Taika Waititi’s lens brims with imagination and scope, color and form given life as if by supernova. Much like Mjolnir, the film itself feels as if it had been forged in the heart of dying star. I go back and forth on what my favorite marvel film is, usually swinging back and forth between Ang Lee’ Hulk, X-Men Days of Future Past, Infinity War or Guardians of the Galaxy volume 2. Sometimes doctor strange in the multiverse of madness gets thrown in the mix, but that’s more of a campy guilty pleasure type situation…But ultimately, I come back to Thor: Ragnarok. It just really captures just about everything I love about superhero comics into a single film. Hemsworth finally gets to shine as he makes the role his own ways otherwise left undone in previous movies. The villains are fun and memorable in the form of Cate Blanchett and Jeff goddamn Goldblum. Hulk fights a giant zombie wolf and Thor summons a kaiju fire demon to defeat the goddess of death. How is that not awesome!?!

The film also happens to be a pretty epic cross section between my two favorite marvel characters: Hulk and Doctor Strange. Doctor Strange only shows up for about 5 minutes but it’s absolute perfection and perfectly illustrates his role in the marvel canon. As for Hulk, while I think Ang Lee’s Hulk is generally a better adaption of the character…Ragnarok still uses the character in really fun ways that remain true to him, if to a far less in-depth degree.

Ruffalo gets to take his haggard, vulnerable take on Bruce Banner and really get to have fun with it, as well as finally get to imbue some actual personality into his Hulk persona. It may not have the atomic age gothic creature feature aesthetic that Ang Lee captured pretty damn perfectly, but Ruffalo still very much the Hulk and gets to do awesome shit like fight gods and monsters across the cosmos. Which is pretty much exactly what all the best Jack Kirby comics aim for. And that’s what this is. A pretty pitch-perfect rendering of a Jack Kirby comic brought to life. The set and costume design, the colors, the themes and story beats. 100% pure Kirby. There’s even a bunch of Kirby Krackles when Hela escapes her prison dimension. What can I say, I’m an absolute slööt for Jack Kirby shit.

I knew one thing for certain as soon as Thor was being chased by a space dragon while an 80s keyboard started blaring out to an epic drum section: This movie was made, almost specifically, for me.