Review of Thor (2011) by Critic M — 02 May 2015

With The Dark World releases it is time to revisit the original Thor. In a world dominated by costumed heroes what exactly makes Thor stand out compared to the rest? He's the Fíng thunder god. Chris Hemsworth embodies every important physical and personality trait that the Thor from the comics should possess.

He's arrogant, charismatic, and a massive physical presence. Equally as impressive is Tom Hiddleston's portrayal of Loki, Thor's half brother and ultimate rival hell bent on sweeping the thrown of Asgard deceitfully from his brother and aging father, an always solid Anthony Hopkins as Odin.

Sure this one somewhat reads as a precursor to the Avengers midway through, but I believe overall this is the Thor story that needed to be told off the bat. The movie has great visuals, a great opening battle scene, and is a lot of fun overall to watch.

Detours would come from something in which I believe 95% of all MARVEL movies suffer from: They simply hold back on the knock out punch so the bar for a sequel isn't so high. Iron Man did it, all of the X-Men movies, Spider-Man, the only one that felt complete to me was Captain America: The First Avenger.

Furthermore, the tacked on love story with Natalie Portman is also bluh, but I can look past that because it has to happen. That being said this is definitely a true, loyal adaptation to the character of Thor and often gets lost in the shuffle of comic book movies.

Any character who wields an enormous hammer off the bat to me is going to be hard to screw up. Here's hoping that the new director that captures Branagh's vision in this one.