The World is not enough

Even though I saw it on opening weekend, I am once again behind the times when it comes to my movie reviews. In this case, it's for the latest entry in the Marvel film universe, Thor: The Dark World. This is the second solo film for the man with the mighty hammer, although he of course played an integral role in last summer's The Avengers as well.

While Thor's focus has been mainly on helping Earth in his previous adventures, this latest film sees him back in his home of Asgard. With his brother, the evil manipulative Loki (Tom Hiddleston) safely locked away in prison, Thor is enjoying peace among the worlds and poised to take over the throne from his father, Odin (played by Anthony Hopkins). Of course, peace and quiet does not last for very long as an dangerous army of dark elves, led by Malekith (Christopher Eccleston) is awakened and has set their sights on destroying Asgard and all of the other worlds in order to bring darkness across the entire universe.

The dark elves were reawakened thanks to Thor's Earth-bound love interest Jane Foster (played once again by Natalie Portman). While conducting some scientific research, Jane discovers the mysterious Aether, a substance that is the key to the dark elves' existence and their plan to bring darkness to the universe.

If all of this sounds a bit murky, shall we say, and confusing, then you're not alone. Once again Marvel has struggled to come up with a compelling villain to square off against one of its primary superheroes. The structure of the Marvel universe and the way these films are presented has certainly yielded big business but is also creatively putting them into a bind. The writers of these films are stuck with trying to find a villain that's compelling enough to be the focus of the film, yet not strong enough to make it reasonable that they can be dealt with by simply one hero as opposed to the entire Avenger team. Coupled with that is a lack of endgame to these films. As a result, each one is feeling procedural and perfunctory.

That is not to say that this film is not without its merits. Chris Hemsworth has embodied this larger than life character so smoothly that it makes you struggle to see anyone else but him in this role. And despite being imprisoned at the beginning of the film, there is still plenty of Loki found in this movie. He plays of Hemsworth and the cast very well to bring add some humor and malevolence to the scenes he is in. It is a shame that the Marvel films cannot develop additional villains that are as compelling as him. Let's hope that changes soon because they will be unable to keep going back to the Loki well every time.

Those who are fans of the fantasy genre will likely get more mileage out of this film than I did. Director Alan Taylor, who has worked in the past on shows like Game of Thrones knows how to stage the action nicely. He probably would have been better severed with having a film that remained exclusively in Asgard. The split time between Asgard and Earth presents some limitations. For one, too many characters from each world gets introduced without proper development. The Earth scenes are also problematic for the sake that they feel obligatory. It was as if the producers felt viewers would be turned off if the film wasn't at least partially rooted in our own world.

Too me, the Thor character works best as a team member rather than a solo star. This is certainly no knock on Hemworth. I just find myself caring less about Asgardian politics and more about seeing Thor just smash things with his hammer. As a weekend afternoon diversion, Thor: The Dark World is perfectly acceptable theater. But if you're looking for something truly epic, you'll have to keep waiting. This is a case of a lot of thunder, but the storm is still far off in the distance. Grade: B-