Thor: Love and Thunder shows Marvel might have lost their Spark

GBNews24 Desk//

Marvel’s Thor: Love and Thunder released on July 8 globally as the only Marvel solo superhero project to receive a fourth instalment. Featuring one of the most beloved heroes of the franchise, the film was presumed to be pivotal in establishing Thor’s presence in the buildup of MCU’s Phase Four plan. However, the movie falls short on many fronts, providing the fans an empty and disappointing interpretation of some of Marvel’s most exciting comic runs in the cheesiest way possible, and making the movie feel like a parody rather than a romantic comedy.

The newest Thor movie picks up from after the events of Avengers: Endgame where Thor joins the Guardians of the Galaxy. On a mission to find himself, Thor confronts Gorr the God Butcher, an unnerving villain on a god killing spree, and also reunites with his previous love interest Jane Foster, now the worthy mighty Thor.

Structured identically to its predecessor, very little separates Love and Thunder from Ragnarok in terms of plot composition and progression. The exact tropes play out in parts of the opening and final acts, and in the majority of the seemingly unnecessary second act.

However, while Ragnarok succeeded in entertaining the viewers by presenting Thor in a new light as a more relaxed character who can switch between being humorous and serious based on the situation, Love and Thunder shows him as a goofball incapable of reading the room.

The storytelling by director Taika Waititi’s own admission is very childish in nature. Some plot points are barely touched upon, some are oversimplified to the point of lacking any coherence,  and some are just left to the viewer’s interpretation, making a lot of occurrences seem either too convenient or too meaningless.

Action scenes are few and far between with meagre close combat and mostly focusing on special effects. Similarly, a lack of exposition is evident which makes the acts flow much faster and therefore, lacking impact.