Thor: Ragnarok Review

Thor: Ragnarok Review – Spoiler Free

Thor: Ragnarok comes directed by Taika Waititi who also acts in the film alongside Chris Hemsworth, Tom Hiddleston, Cate Blanchett, Idris Elba, Jeff Goldblum, Tessa Thompson, Mark Ruffalo, Anthony Hopkins and Benedict Cumberbatch.

Thor: Ragnarok is the third in a series of Thor films and the seventeenth film taking place in the marvel cinematic universe. In this one, Thor must defend his home world of Asgard against Hela, the goddess of death who has come there to rule it.

Going in to see Thor: Ragnarok I had actually had my expectations a little low. While I enjoyed the last two instalments in the series, there was always something about them that just didn’t seem right to me. In this one, we get a new director, Taika Waititi. He’s from New Zealand and is fairly unknown, with this film being the biggest thing he’s done so far in his career. I had no idea what to expect.

But let me tell you something about Taika Waititi after watching Thor: Ragnarok. The man is some type of master, not only did he create what I thought to be one of the most entertaining films of the year. He has also made this third Thor film better than all the previous Thor films and possibly, this stands as one of the best films in the Marvel cinematic universe.

The tone for the Thor movies was always something that was hard to balance, but in this film it was done exceptionally well. Characters in no way take things too seriously and things are all lightly padded with humour all throughout. At the same time, we get a great mixture of the Norse mythology elements for the story and also a good balance of screen time for each of the characters. How this was done so perfectly and with proper pacing all throughout it, without anything becoming a mess, because it easily could have been, I don’t know. But in Thor: Ragnarok everything just works and I had a smile on my face all the way through it.

The actors in this are all great. This is the film for Chris Hemsworth to shine and he does. Chris Hemsworth delivered a good performance and whether it was the action scenes where his character was fighting all types of beings from gods to the Hulk or even just dropping some funny lines here and there, he never missed a mark. I was happy to see  Tom Hiddleston back as Loki yet again and enjoyed his performance and same with Anthony Hopkins who always seems to impress. Cate Blanchett plays the film’s villain and actually I didn’t recognise her in the film until I checked IMDB later on, but was impressed with her performance. Tessa Thompson who plays Valkyrie was an exceptional new cast member and I would be keen to see her stay as a character in any future sequels as she was very impressive in this film. Jeff Goldblum also made an appearance as the Grandmaster at the gladiator games Thor had to compete in and he was very entertaining to watch.

The music in this film is well done. There’s a big part for music to play in films and usually it does really make or break scenes. In this there’s some well chosen songs and some well scored themes all throughout it. ‘Immigrant Song’ from Led Zeppelin was used throughout the film to great effect, but I also enjoyed listening to ‘In the face of evil’ from Magic Sword.

Special effects in Thor: Ragnarok were excellent. Although some might not like CGI laden films so much, I really have no complaints about it here. When it came to characters like The Hulk or Hela, the special effects around them were exceptionally good. So too were the many explosions, space ships and mythical monsters. There’s a giant wolf in there called “Fenrir” who those who know Norse mythology would know well as an important creature, but he does appear here in Asgard and I certainly enjoyed seeing the beast in action, it was well animated.

Overall Thor: Ragnarok is an exceptionally well made film in amongst the films in the comic book genre. There are some films out there that I consider are all in good fun and are there really to deliver something entertaining to audiences and Thor: Ragnarok does this in every way possible. I came out of the cinema with nothing but a smile on my face and was very impressed with the directing from Taika Waititi, the studio should definitely try to sign this man up to do more films. All the actors deliver entertaining performances and both Chris Hemsworth and Tessa Thompson stood out the most, but there’s also great stuff from Tom Hiddleston, Cate Blanchett and Jeff Goldblum in there to see. The special effects won’t let you down at all and the humour should get you laughing. Thor: Ragnarok is certainly a good time at the cinema this weekend and I highly recommend seeing it, the entertainment value on this one is exceptionally high.