“Thor: Love and Thunder” (2022) is the twenty-ninth film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), the fourth Thor movie, the second that Taika Waititi helmed and an unofficial check in with Guardians of the Galaxy. It is set immediately after “Avengers: Endgame” (2019). Thor (Chris Hemsworth) answers distress calls with the Guardians of the Galaxy and is trying to heal after all the loss that he has suffered since “Thor: The Dark World” (2013). Gorr the God Butcher (Christian Bale) has begun to destabilize the universe with his vengeful genocide against the gods and has set his sights on the Asgardians.
“Thor” (2011) was an acceptable origin story. “Thor: The Dark World” was a major contender for one of the worst MCU films. I adored “Thor: Ragnarok” (2017). I would slip “Thor: Love and Thunder” as a solid second. It is “Mad Max Beyond the Thunderdome” (1985) meets “The Muppets” with a heavy dose of eighties and nineties rock favorites and a dash of Mary J. Blige’s “Family Affair.” Waititi alternates between bright, psychedelic colors and plunging into a black and white world that suppresses color. It feels as if Waititi inches closer to pure horror with every film.
The catalyst for the horror of “Thor: Love and Thunder” is the treatment of children and the threat of mortality. Waititi creates a world where children die so the stakes are high and credible. The film sympathizes with Gorr’s plight because his outrage is appropriate when he confronts gods that feel as if they could have fit in without notice in “The Hunger Games” franchise. These gods are depicted as elites, the callous haves who broke a promise to the have nots. Gorr is just holding gods accountable for not living up to their promises and lying to their followers. The message can be literal-that religion is nothing but a scam that hurts the followers, and/or it could be a metaphor for class hierarchy. His god even bleeds gold. Gorr’s origin story is a triumphant one that would make him a superhero for being able to turn the tables, but it also suggests that he is not acting entirely of his own volition. There is a “Lords of the Rings” enticement at play.
Waititi does not allow us to stay on Gorr’s side by depicting some gods, the Asgardians, as ordinary people. They dress like normal people and are shown as families, not warriors. Only Thor stands out because of his frequent outfit changes, muscles and bombastic personality. Since “Thor: Ragnarok,” Waititi has used Thor as a symbol of privilege who destroys revisionist history and confronts his people’s problematic past. He is a walking, talking #notallgods. He genuinely adheres to the idea that gods act as guardians for their people, assumes other gods are like him and decides to rally them to fight Gorr. Before leaving to do so, Thor gives a rousing speech, and he realizes that the way that he structured his sentence sounds as if he is encouraging eating children. It is a hilarious, almost forgettable joke, punctuated by his acknowledgment that apparently Asgardians did that, and he acknowledges that was wrong.
Thor’s meeting with the gods feels like a Star Wars prequel reference where we get to see all the gods, including Zeus (Russell Crowe), conduct a meeting. There is another awkward moment where Thor decides to interrupt the proceedings when the meeting starts a competition regarding human sacrifice tallies. Crowe plays Zeus with a Greek accent, and his groupies suggest that he is the Robert Palmer of the god world despite appearances. In contrast to Thor and even his showman antics, when Zeus leaves the stage, he moves delicately as if he is wearing an outfit with a long train that could get dirty if it touched the ground. It is a memorable cameo. Thor comes to the same realization that Gorr has. Gods are selfish and only care about receiving pleasure and adulation. His physical reaction to this epiphany about gods is almost identical to Gorr’s, and gold blood flows, but this moment moves faster and is framed as a caper, acting for the greater good and in self-defense. He also has different motivations, outrage on behalf of others, and is not alone.
Thor and Gorr’s reaction to disillusionment are similar, but are different in how they deal with loss. Gorr uses violence offensively and proactively in response to feeling loss whereas Thor tries to use it defensively on behalf of the defenseless. He uses his power in service to others and even distributes it to others so they can be empowered to fight beside him and on behalf of themselves. Gorr’s loss transforms him into a spectre of death, a boogeyman, someone that his pre-vengeful self would reject. In one battle scene, Thor emanates light from within and sparks color in a realm devoid of it. The trope that beauty reflects goodness is prevalent.
“Thor: Love and Thunder” also uses storytelling and the storyteller’s relationship to children to contrast the characters. Thor and his friend, Korg (also Waititi), who has abandoned his agitation for revolution for extolling the virtue of the gods, tell aspirational stories to children and other people to embolden them. Gorr enjoys telling unsolicited scary stories and frightening his listeners. Bale gets to use his real accent, which is a working-class accent, to great effect. If Gorr became a boogeyman figure to children once endowed with power, is the film adhering to ancient beliefs that power belongs to certain bloodlines, and ordinary people would automatically get corrupted once they have access to the power of the gods?
No because not only does Thor redistribute his power to weaker people, but Dr. Jane Foster, aka The Mighty Thor (Natalie Portman) acts another foil to Gorr. While they are both drawn to objects of power, they wield them quite differently. Gorr and Jane wield their weapons and confront their own mortality with dramatically different agendas. Gorr acts for himself, which is not a bad thing per se, but gives him tunnel vision unable to see how he is hurting others, not balancing the scales. Whereas Jane acts for others at a great cost to herself and adheres to the Asgardian goal of Valhalla. The Mighty Thor uses Mjolnir in such a deft fashion that she would defeat more opponents than Thor if Thor was just limited to using Stormbreaker, not his innate thunder powers.
“Thor: Love and Thunder” has an unexpected plot twist when it comes to the love portion of the name. We see a flashback of baby Thor in Fredda’s BabyBjorn as she fights in battle. With Jane and Mjolnir back, Thor wants them both back, which makes Stormbreaker jealous. The denouement finds a way for Jane to keep fighting and for Thor to have his baby while also fulfilling his godly duties and answering prayers.
“Thor: Love and Thunder” is a strange mix of regression and subversion. It approves of the idea of redistribution of godly power so people can fight for each other and the defenseless, not seizing it and becoming corrupted; however it does seem to suggest that while most gods are unworthy of adulation, Thor keeps his promises and is worthy of adulation. Also while “Hunt for the Wilderpeople” (2016) ridiculed the state’s pathologizing a normal child and “Jojo Rabbit” (2019) showed disgust at the concept of children being indoctrinated into a death cult, Waititi seems oblivious to the implications of images of children fighting. It was funny, and maybe because they are gods and defending themselves, it is acceptable, but it is still disturbing. While it is probably more Marvel, not Waititi, who has decided on the post movie bonus scenes, there does seem to be a cosigning Thor’s religion as fulfilling its promises thus negating the idea that Asgards are in a death cult. It will be interesting to see how this plays out in the future, but it did give me the impression that Guy Ritchie would approve. Thor is cloaked as working class, but really enforces the elite staying in power and deciding who gets power.
