Thor: The Dark World in a nutshell. It makes the right moves, delivers the right flourishes, but somehow its missing the secret ingredient that takes it from good to great. Whats intriguing is that even as Marvels naming conventions attempt to break free of the trilogy mentality – this isnt called Thor 2, nor will we see a movie named Captain America 2 – the film itself has the distinct feeling of a middle-instalment. Its downbeat. Bad things happen to good people because they do the right thing. The victories are pyrrhic. Threads are started then dropped - Sif and Thors relationship, Heimdalls allegiances, Odins grief… – even the final scene is a cliffhanger. It couldnt be more The Empire Strikes Back if the hero got his hand… oh, right, yeah. Tom Hiddleston is coruscatingly brilliant as Loki. He’s funny, capable, charming and limitlessly evil. I don’t want to see a standalone Loki flick. But I do want to see him in as many Marvel properties as is practically possible. He steals the film out from its titular star’s (and its primary villain’s) noses. The problem, though, is Malekith. For all the plates the film tries to keep spinning, this is the one that wobbles too much. Malekiths motivations are flimsy, free from all subtext and complexity, and thinly-articulated to the point of one-dimensionality. Christopher Eccleston is horrendously under-used, and it doesnt help that most of his dialogue is in a made-up Elvish tongue. The original Thor movie wasnt perfect, but it knew what it was doing and got most of the way there. This one doesnt know what its doing, and ends up halfway to about three different places instead. So definitely go and see Thor: The Dark World. Laugh at its jokes, revel in spending time with the characters, and try to not to lose your grip when the story makes a leap you werent ready for. But for a film about gods, its a shame that for all its bluster, it doesnt quite deserve the worship you want to bestow on it.
Posted on: Sun, 03 Nov 2013 13:18:49 +0000
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