I'll try to keep this spoiler-free, but I finally got around to watching the latest Thor movie and had some thoughts I wanted to share.
Background: I'm a big fan of the Thor comics. Enjoyed them for years. I absolutely love some of the various eras of Marvel comics -- though I've found much of the newer stuff to be almost unreadably bad. But the old-school stuff? Amazing. Some of the 1990s and early 2000's stuff (including some of the "Events" like Planet Hulk, Secret Invasion, Civil War, etc.) are also a ton of fun.
When I watch an MCU movie, there are three criteria that I tend to judge it on: "Faithfulness to the Comics", is it "Good for the MCU?", and "Enjoyability".
Faithfulness to the Comics
Was Love and Thunder faithful to the comics? Well. In parts... yes. Sort of.
In fact, some of the more "controversial" parts of the movie were actually (somewhat) based on the comics.
The character of Korg, for example, has been around for decades -- but only got a real important role in the "Planet Hulk" series of comics (which was a fun series). Within those comics there is a very (VERY) minor part -- almost a throwaway sidenote -- that deals with Korgs personal life. That is extrapolated on within this movie in a way that proved to be (mildly) controversial. However... it was semi-canon. Even if it was done (in the movie) in a way that didn't make all that much sense for the character from the comic.
On the the other hand: Several other parts of Korg are distinctly contradictory to the comics and the established character. Portions felt shoehorned in to make a point (or to provide a joke) that cheapened the character.
That same criticism applies to... the whole movie. It is, in many parts, clearly based on various stories from the comics.
Jane's illness being another example. While it was based (loosely) on the comics... it deviated from the comics in such a significant way that it took the actual story of "Mighty Thor" -- condensed it -- and all but obliterated the portions (in the comic) that were both the most enjoyable and the most emotional.
In many ways, it felt like the writer purchased a small stack of roughly 15 different comic issues (from over 40 years of Marvel). Then read one page from each (chosen at random)... and based the script on that. Failing to grasp the awesomeness of the source material.
Multiple times I found myself excited as something would happen in the film -- a line, a character introduction, etc. -- totally psyched that it appeared they were going ot tackle a part of Marvel canon that only the hardcore fans would know about. Those moment were, as the film progressed, dashed. Rather severely. The writer seemed to almost have no idea what actually happened with those characters or plots.
Score: 3 / 10.
Good for the MCU?
Putting the faithfulness to the comics aside for a moment... was this movie good for the overall Marvel Cinematic Universe?
Did it help the characters or larger plot arcs? Was it good for the vibe and style of the films? Did it stick to MCU canon established in the other films... or hurt it?
In short: Is the MCU better or worse off for this film existing?
This is an easy one to answer... the overall MCU was damaged by this film. In several ways.
It significantly cheapened Tønsberg (the MCU version of New Asgard). It did strange things with the Guardians of the Galaxy that made them feel like throwaway characters. Thor, himself, feels significantly more shallow (and inconsistent) as a character.
It took (yet another) "mass murder across the Universe" event and made it feel... flat and dull. A trend that has continued to harm the storytelling of the MCU and this film accelerated that problem.
It introduced some new characters in a way that was... in short... significantly less cool or interesting than it should have been. And set those characters up very, very poorly.
I can think of no way that Love and Thunder helped the MCU... and multiple ways in which the MCU is weaker, less interesting, and has more plot / canon issues because of it.
Score: 1 / 10
Enjoyability
That's not to say this film is all bad.
The truth is, there are multiple parts of the movie that were pretty enjoyable. Even quite funny on occasion.
While the jokes tended to fall flat more often than land -- and there were a lot of them... this was more of a comedy movie than anything else -- there were some gems in there. Enough good laughs that I did not regret watching it.
In fact... the number of jokes was a bit too much. The whole film felt like a montage of unrelated jokes. Almost like a clip-show of "Marvel inspired gags", stitched together by a villain recently introduced in the comics (Gorr) who had -- in the end -- almost no impact on the MCU.
Most of the battle sequences were dull and uninteresting. One of them was a lot of fun. Goofy. Silly. And caused some serious plot problems (both for this film and every other MCU film that Thor is a part of)... but still... fun.
And the heavy emphasis on "relationships" and "love" was a bit off-putting. Not because there shouldn't be love or relationships in an MCU film... but because they were both so flat that you really didn't care about the relationships (even though the film clearly wanted us to)... and so prominent that they distracted from the other portions of the plot. The movie dealt with relationships (and love) of a good half dozen characters. Which meant that a good portion of the movie was spent on relationships... without investing enough time into any one of them (at least not in any way where the audience could develop an investment into them).
Score 7 / 10
Overall Verdict
Would I watch this movie again? Well. Maybe. But probably not. Honeslty, if I were doing a marathon of MCU movies... I would probably skip this one entirely (along with Eternals). Other than introducing a few side characters (poorly)... the events of this film will likely have no (postive) lasting impact on the MCU that won't be easily replaced by a quick throwaway line in a future movie.
Do I recommend others watch it?
Only if you've already invested the time to watch all other MCU films. Then, honestly, might as well. At least it's better than Eternals!
Not a glowing endorsement, I know. But, hey, could be worse.
