DCfnaf Movie Reviews: Thor: Ragnarok

DCfnaf Guardians of the Galaxy 3: Ragnarok

Looking back on some of my older superhero film reviews, like my Guardians of the Galaxy 2 and Wonder Woman reviews, I came to the realization that I was being way too generous to these movies. Currently, I would give Guardians 2 a 7/10, and I'd give Wonder Woman an 8/10. Like most Marvel and DC flicks I’ve watched, their absurdly high ratings on Rotten Tomatoes were not deserved. Shouldn’t we be giving scores like a 96% to movies that try to innovate, have original ideas, teach a useful lesson, etc.? I’m not saying that these movies are bad in any aspect, but there’s a reason a large quantity of the comments on the Best Movies of 2017's Wonder Woman entry are comments complaining about its overhype.

The exact same thing is currently occurring with Thor: Ragnarok. Rumor has it that this latest installment to the Marvel Cinematic Universe has been critically acclaimed to the point where people are claiming that it’s the most beloved MCU movie of all time.

And I legitimately don’t get it.

Don't get me wrong, there are definitely positive aspects here and I did have some fun while viewing. Even so, this is still a very messy film and it also contains that all too familiar formula that these movies have had for a long time. I’d even go so far as to say that it’s probably the most unoriginal, lazy movie they’ve made to date, and that’s really saying something.

Serving as the third entry in the MCU to feature Thor as the protagonist, Thor: Ragnarok centers on the iconic character, played by Chris Hemsworth, who is on a journey to prevent the destruction of his home-world, Asgard, and take down the goddess of death who is behind said destruction, Hela (Cate Blanchett). During the journey, he is trapped on another planet and is forced to play in The Grandmaster's (Jeff Goldblum's) Contest of Champions in order to escape. Others that are featured are Mark Ruffalo as The Hulk and Tessa Thompson as Valkyrie who "contribute" as side characters to the story.

What follows is your typical post-Guardians of the Galaxy MCU film, meaning all of the excellent and poor elements of each one are still here.

The visual style and setting both draw inspiration from the Guardians of the Galaxy films from the same universe, which definitely help the film look the part and guarantees that viewers won’t be checking the time on their cell phones begging for it to end through the runtime. The same can be said about the action sequences, which are entertaining in their own right and were extremely well done. Particularly, one epic battle towards the end was phenomenal (though I can't share anything about it in fear of spoiling anything).

Other than that...this is just more of the same crap you’ve seen before. Basically everything I couldn’t stand about Guardians of the Galaxy 2 has returned, except it is even more problematic since it’s not supposed to be a Guardians of the Galaxy movie.

In fact, that’s the biggest issue with Thor: Ragnarok as a whole: It tries to be something it shouldn’t be. It draws so much inspiration from the Guardians of the Galaxy 2 that it might as well be called Guardians of the Galaxy 3: Ragnarok. Why? Because it lacks the creativity to make the story behind Hela and Ragnarok, which isn’t even that original to begin with, long enough to last two hours. The plot literally leaves Thor stranded on a Guardians of the Galaxy-esque planet, run by the Grandmaster, for 3/4 of the film's runtime when it has very little to do with the main storyline back at Asgard. If the narrative actually gave me a real reason for Thor and Loki to wind up on the Grandmaster's planet, then maybe I’d have more positive things to say about it. But no, Thor (and Loki) are thrown here because the crew behind this realized that their 30-minute story involving Hela taking over Asgard didn’t fill up the 2-hour runtime they were striving for. Quite frankly, it just comes off as lazy and pandering, particularly because Guardians of the Galaxy is one of the most popular and beloved movies of the decade. Make no mistake about it, they knew full well that simply turning Thor: Ragnarok into it would get them more viewers, more positive ratings, and more money.

This means that bothersome wittiness of the humor and dialogue has returned, and it basically turns this entire two hour adventure into a comedy. Unlike the other films in the franchise that used this writing, such as Guardians of the Galaxy and Spider-Man: Homecoming, this writing style simply does not work for Thor: Ragnarok. The difference between the former two and the latter is that Starlord and Spider-Man are both witty, smartass protagonists, while Thor is supposed to be a serious God of Thunder in a serious environment (aside from Loki, who's just a wackjob). For some reason, however, Thor becomes a walking smartass joke character who cracks a ton of unfunny one-liners. This makes him undergo a transformation from a powerful, serious, intimidating character into a clumsy, repetitive, and annoying one. Even if it gives what would otherwise be a dull, bland character a bit more of an interesting personality, that doesn’t change the fact that that’s not what he is supposed to be, and he’s only like this to mask the fact that he’s still a dull, bland character.

Final Thoughts/Recommendation

Calling this the greatest movie they’ve made is a wild exaggeration. It’s got some good moments and it’s quite entertaining at times, but it’s really just the same Marvel nonsense you’ve watched several times before. The only difference this time around is that it’s even less creative because they basically ripped off several plot points of a more popular MCU film and just shoved them into the messy narrative, complete with its unfunny jokes. At this point, there’s really no reason for me to recommend or not recommend this film considering the most dedicated fans of the MCU will be forcing themselves out to the theater without question. As for me, I’m really hoping that we see a lot of great things come out of Avengers: Infinity War and I pray that Marvel doesn’t just make it Avengers: Age of Ultron again.

6 -- Alright (A 6/10 seems awfully generous for a movie that I just bashed for 2-3 paragraphs, but the action and visuals were both enough for me to give the film one extra point. The humor and unoriginality made it lose 4 points.)

🍅 Rotten Tomatoes Score: 92% from Critics, 88% of Audiences Liked It 🍅

💁🏻‍♂️ How I review movies: https://www.thetoptens.com/best-movies/56694.asp

🎥Next Movie Review🎥 : Justice League

Comments

They made Thor a comic relief which kind of annoyed me. You are definitely right that this movie made him a dull character. The movie was pretty funny in sometimes yet some of the 'adult jokes' made me cringe and drop my popcorn in the theater. The Thor vs. Hulk fight was VERY entertaining but then the ending of the fight kind of unsatisfied me a bit. The villain is great. One thing you are right about is that this movie is just like every other Marvel movie, especially Spider Man Homecoming. I haven't seen gotg 2 yet. - TristGamer (11/21/2017)

ID LIKE TO SEEE U DO BETTAR!

Also imagine thinking Thor should be serious. - LarrytheFairy (11/21/2017)

Imagine thinking this should be a comedy.

Turning every movie into GOTG is lazy AF. - DCfnaf (11/22/2017)

Thor should be a funny character - LarrytheFairy (11/22/2017)

But that’s not what he actually is. He was only changed to get more views.

Does every protagonist in these movies have to be a walking joke in order to get people to watch them? It just gives these movies of a formula for success and it’s lazy and unoriginal. - DCfnaf (11/22/2017)

He was like that since the original movie - LarrytheFairy (11/22/2017)

I never said the original was good.

Also, he never felt THIS annoying in the original movie. - DCfnaf (11/22/2017)

My proudest f*p. - Skullkid755 (11/23/2017)

I can't unsee - TristGamer (11/26/2017)

When a review has another user masturbating, you know you’ve succeeded. - DCfnaf (11/26/2017)

@TristGamer

How did you see? - Skullkid755 (11/26/2017)

I was glad this movie wasn't boring at the least like the previous Thor movies. I laughed quite a bit but I thought the villain Hela was lame and some jokes fell flat when they were at scenes where jokes weren't needed - Phillip873 (11/28/2017)

Hela was pretty awful. Very cliche, generic villain. Reminded me of that awful villain from Power Rangers this year. - DCfnaf (11/29/2017)

The Justice League villain managed to be even more forgettable for me - Phillip873 (11/29/2017)

Oh believe me, I’ll have A LOT to say about Justice League... - DCfnaf (11/29/2017)

Good review. - Tia-Harribel (12/5/2017)

I heard it's better than Batman vs Superman - TwilightKitsune (12/9/2017)

It is. Not that it's a big accomplishment or anything,LOL - Tia-Harribel (2/3/2018)

Regarding BvS, I've seen a whole lot better and not a lot worse. So Tia_Harribel is 100% correct. - DCfnaf (2/3/2018)

I dare you to do the MLP movie lol - visitor (1/20/2018)

Now now, we don’t want to torment our critics, do we? - DCfnaf (3/21/2018)

To be honest I liked the movie, but it seemed way too silly at times and the subplot on Sakaar was pretty boring. - visitor (8/8/2018)

I really liked it, but at times it tries too hard to make me laugh - iliekpiez (8/31/2018)

My favorite movie to be honest - visitor (12/1/2018)