Movie Review: Thor: The Dark World (Thor #2)

Oh my god so I haven't written a review in forever and honestly its been bugging me because whenever I read or watch something I immediately start waking mental review notes and this movie was the last straw so I'M BACK. I'm also ten times weirder. Also I'm super pumped because I just watched this movie like two hours ago and whooooooooooo

Title: Thor: The Dark World (Thor #2)
Director: Alan Taylor
Starring: Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman, Chris Eccleston, Tom Hiddleston
Genre: Action, Fantasy, Marvel superhero movies
Release Date: 8 November 2013 (USA)
Warnings: Well emotions because a lot of people died but nothing really

Synopsis:

Marvel's "Thor: The Dark World" continues the big-screen adventures of Thor, the Mighty Avenger, as he battles to save Earth and all the Nine Realms from a shadowy enemy that predates the universe itself. In the aftermath of Marvel's "Thor" and "Marvel's The Avengers," Thor fights to restore order across the cosmos...but an ancient race led by the vengeful Malekith returns to plunge the universe back into darkness. Faced with an enemy that even Odin and Asgard cannot withstand, Thor must embark on his most perilous and personal journey yet, one that will reunite him with Jane Foster and force him to sacrifice everything to save us all.

Review:

So I'm BACK! Anyway this movie left me completely pumped enough to write this review. I also have the incredible urge to rewatch Thor again. I have like a ton of opinions about this movie. I seem somewhat better at comprehending the weirdness of confusing plotlines that frequent the movie world lately.

**So this is the non-spoilery part.**

Basically the story was complicated. In my attempt to keep up with the story I didn't really pay attention to the whole of it, but basically it was sort of filled with too many mini climaxes that at the final climax I, as the viewer, didn't know if it was the end or there going to be more. But despite that, it didn't feel rushed, as is the case with FAR too many ambitious screenwriters.

Which I need to talk about the writing. It might not really suit your tastes, sine I know and admit that I have strange tastes when it come to this sort of thing, but the writing and dialogue was great. Being a character-centric movie it needed a strong dialogue, which the writers definitely delivered on. Darcy came back as the hilarious, yet totally real intern/sidekick, and Loki's witticisms were, in my opinion, far more hilarious than the first movie. More on that in the spoilery section.

The acting was mostly typical of a Marvel movie, not bad but not completely real enough to connect to you emotionally either. Except for Loki. I swear, every scene with him just made me tear up. Tom Hiddleston is a wonderful actor. All his scenes just felt raw and vulnerable, and it felt real. It stood out from the other actors' performances. This was a very Thor character-centric movie, so most of the other characters come and go, but Chris Hemsworth did a decent job of embodying the character development and such.

The effects were pretty good too. It was, overall, a cross between Star Wars and Middle Earth. It brought back most of the magical, fantasy/fairytale feel from the first movie while adding a bit more technology and modern, Star Wars Coruscant/Cloud City effects to it to better suit the overall themes of the movie. I really like the blend of modern weaponry with the sort of ancient feel of the costumes and buildings. The action was great, though oh god is it really worth all the property damage? And the sets were beautiful and pretty well employed in the action sequences. Totally worth the money going into production.

**so on to the spoilers**

So I'm mostly commenting on the characters because that were most of the details lie.

Thor: Chris Hemsworth did a pretty good job, as I said above. Thor was pretty much the focus of the movie, but the other characters did get enough screen time to balance it out pretty well. There was a lot of character development this time, and the cool effects with the thunder was something we haven't seen before. His decision at the end not to become king was a great display of character development, so good job, writers.

Jane Foster: From what I heard, Natalie Portman didn't want to come back for the movie. But she did a pretty decent job as jane. Again, credit to the writers for making the character of Jane more endearing and realistic than the first movie. I loved the date scene in the beginning--it's exactly the kind of human touch to fantasy movies that I love. I also loved the way that scene became a pivotal moment in the movie later on. Great work there. I also loved Jane's costumes in this movie. Her journey to Asgard was an interesting arc for her. She also got to display more of her scientific knowledge, adding more credit to her character as a scientist.

Loki: Okay we seriously need to talk about Tom Hiddleston's acting here.  It was raw, vulnerable and amazing. The way his grief for the death of his adoptive mother, the only one who still went out of her way to make him comfortable after his betrayal, felt so real that I cried. And the helplessness in his expressions when Thor visited him was just so great, kudos to costume, makeup, hair, sets and woah. The writers also exploited Loki's status as the god of mischief much better in this, actually showing us Loki's talent for comedy rather than just telling us about it. It was witty sassy and downright hilarious, especially with the surprise appearance of Captain America when playing around with illusions. I also liked how they later brought back the illusions power for the action scenes which I alway think is great. However his death scene fell slightly flat, but I think that was the intention. His skin didn't turn blue as I would have expected since he's a frost giant but I guess that was a hint to the audience.

Darcy: I needed to talk about her character. She's not just funny, she's relatable and down to earth despite all the weird stuff going on around her. You hear what she has to say and what she does and you just think: That's what I would think or do in a situation like that. The cutbacks to Darcy and her intern Ian in the midst of all the fantasy la-di-da action going on the Asgard was grounding and funny and kept the movie from skyrocketing out of proportion.

Malekith: So I don't read the comics so I don't really know what sort of character he is in the comics. But as a villain he felt sort of one-dimensional. In the task of developing the story on Thor's side, we didn't get much about him and his motivations. He appeared to be single-minded and flat, with the sole intention of bringing darkness to the nine realms for personal gain and for vengeance for his people, which, you could add, was his fault. I think he could have been developed more. Also Chris Eccleston is a great actor, but I think his role wasn't well written enough for him to have space to breathe life into the character. And the prosthetics. When I was watching the movie I had totally forgotten that Chris Eccleston was playing the villain, and the prosthetics were caked on so heavily that the character didn't really have a wide range of expressions so it left him completely unrecognizable.

Overall, not a bad movie. It had its faults, but I would say it was a generally well written movie. Poorly paced, but well written.

(Also can we TALK about that ENDING what HAPPENED to ODIN I don't underSTAND so they just confirm that there's going to be a Thor 3 but LOKI and I don't GET IT)

Grade: A- Not bad. Pretty good, to be honest.