Thor: The Dark World

Thor is kind of a odd hero for me. Much like Superman, I never really cared for or enjoyed him in the comics. The first Thor movie was okay, but not something I really enjoyed. Given how little I had seen on the new movie, I did not go into it with high hopes. After Marvel made the avengers movie though, I figured I would have to give this one a shot. I liked Thor in that movie, so maybe they would find a way to win me over with Dark World. It feels kind of weird to say it, but the thing I was looking forward to the most was the after the credits stinger.

So did the movie win me over? Well it was certainly different then the first one. They had a much smaller scale story with far less going on. They had less characters and focused more on Thor the God then Thor the man. The changes did seem to work in its favor though, and really created a better overall flow. I don't think the Thor movies will ever be at the level most people tend to put the Iron Man ones, but this was a good step forward for the franchise.

The story is based on Malekith the Dark elv. There is a artifact that will allow him to destroy the nine realms, earth is one of them, but it can only be used for a short window of time. The movie starts with some history, and shows the Dark Elves fighting the Asguardians led by Thor's grandfather. Malekith tries to activate the weapon, however the Asguardians are able to hold him off long enough that the chance passes by. They win the fight, but Malekith sacrifices his army in order to allow himself to escape. The weapon is hidden, and remains so for years. Skip to present time and to Jane Foster, Natalie Portman's character. The 9 realms are aligning themselves, which is what causes the weapon to activate. It also causes rifts to open up on the different worlds creating weird events. One allows Jane to find the weapon, which alerts Malekith and he sets off in search of it and her.

Most of the story revolves around Malekith trying to destroy the realms. By focusing on a single event the story actually comes off feeling much tighter then the original movie did. Thor is able to focus solely on what is ahead of him instead of dealing with that and trying to adjust to midguard or earth. Plus once the action starts, and the story takes off, it really doesn't slow down to much. The movie had a good pacing throughout, and it didn't have any real problem areas or weak scenes that I can think of. I even enjoyed the Humor, Chris Evans cameo was a stand out moment. As was seeing Thor forced to use public transportation due to loosing his ability to fly.

The effects were good, but honestly we have come to expect that from Marvel. They have the money and ability to make everything look damn good if they want to. The elves have these black hole grenades that were easily the best effects in the movie. They toss them, and then the grenade creates a black hole sucking up everything around it. They looked fantastic, and caused by far the coolest death in the movie. Everything else was top shelf as well, from the ships to the portals. I am sure there is something to complain about here, but I didn't catch whatever it was. And with Guardians of the Galaxy coming up, where at least 2/5ths of the team is cgi, I am very confident about how well they will end up looking.

So this is a action movie, how did the fights turn out? Hit or miss in some areas, but always entertaining. Most of the action looked great, and all of the battles ended up coming across positively. That being said, Thor's fighting style does not always end up looking that good on screen. Some of his hammer shots just looked bad, and seeing the Dark Elves stop firing there guns long enough for the Asguardians to close into melee range was infuriating. I understand a close range battle is more fun to watch, but it looked horrible how they transitioned into it. The final battle though was fantastic, and really closed out the film in a strong way. The realms are all coming together so there are portals everywhere, and the battle takes place across multiple worlds on different fronts. It really was a cool concept, and it was executed greatly.

While the first movie had a strong focus on Thor and Foster, this one really doesn't. They do have a few scenes were they try to focus on the relationship between then, but most of the movie doesn't deal with it. I felt that was the right choice here. Instead of seeing Thor deal with his feelings, and his desire to stay on earth, we get a movie about him flying around and beating people up. But we still get some closure on the romantic front, so it is kind of a best of both worlds thing.

So Thor: The Dark World. Action was good, story was enjoyable and had some solid humor. The effects were impressive, and I enjoyed the direction they took the Thor character. Was this a better movie then the first? Absolutely it was. My only real disappointment with it was that I waited until redbox carried the movie to see it. I may still not care for Thor in the comics, but the movie Thor has my support now. And that is something I did not expect to say going into it.