Director Taika Waititi
Starring Chris Hemsworth, Tom Hiddleston, Cate Blanchett
Rated M
Score 4.5/6

Imprisoned, the mighty Thor finds himself in a lethal gladiatorial contest against the Hulk, his former ally. Thor must fight for survival and race against time to prevent the all-powerful Hela from destroying his home and the Asgardian civilization.

Did Taika Waititi save the Thor franchise? I’m not certain that he did, because achieving box office success with a superhero movie is like shooting fish in a barrel and there was no doubt in my mind that Thor: Ragnarok was going to achieve box office success. The question on the table is did Taika Waititi do enough to prevent the metaphorical decapitation that comes curtesy of the Marvel fanboys. Though the biggest problem with the superhero genre is the over-saturation of the market.
Now it should be noted that there were a few groan worthy lines of dialogue that seemed out of place in a superhero movie and I thought that they would have been more at home in movie like Waititi’s 2014 movie What We Do in the Shadows.
There was a lot of what you expect from most superhero movies though there was what seemed to be an 80’s vibe to the movie, on several occasions I found myself thinking Flash Gordon. What I really liked about this what was done with The Hulk. Even though this was a Thor movie the filmmakers delved deeper into The Hulk’s character and his relationship with Bruce Banner. Both Jeff Goldblum and Taika Waititi who played Grandmaster and Korg had interesting characters that you might not expect in a Marvel movie. While Cate Blanchett was a great casting choice, though this is something you might expect to see her cast in. I can’t help but wonder if Blanchett’s children influenced her choice to take the role.