Movie: Thor: The Dark World (2013)

All the spoilers all the time.  You have been warned!

My Thoughts While Watching:

I did not think I could despise a female character as much as I did Pepper Potts. But then she took a back seat to Jane Foster. It is irksome to me that Marvel created these strong amazing characters (Potts is a renowned business woman while Foster is a scientist) and then make them annoyingly codependent.  They are all “Pick Me. Choose Me. Love Me.” I call it the Superman Relationship Phenomena.  Ever since Christopher Reeve’s Superman took Margot Kidder’s Lois on a magical carpet ride in 1978, the super hero industry feels the formula to success is: A) Introduce Hero, B) Give Hero Love Interest, and then C) Have Super Hero woo her with his super powers. Gods and Girlfriends…. ugh  I will say, I am always amazed by the perfect eyebrows being rocked in this movie.

The highlight of this movie was the naked scientist, Dr Selvig. His is my favorite character. Let’s take a minute to think on this – The actor who plays Selvig is Stellan Skarsgård. He is father to: True Blood’s Vampire Eric, It’s Pennywise and Viking’s Floki.  That family can act!

I like the makeup and costuming for Malekith. A really great villain in the comic books.  He looks a little more wicked in print:

I love me some Idris as Heimdall. THAT is a backstory I would watch from beginning to end…

It is fascinating that Loki grieves the mother he sent assassins to.

The ending was too easy and left me like…. meh.

Again: Yoohoo Avengers?  Where are you?

Rankings through this movie:

• Iron Man
• The Avengers
• Captain America: First Avenger
• Iron Man 3
• Thor: The Dark World
• Thor 1
• Iron Man 2
• Hulk

Some Interviews and Extra Video:

IMDB Synopsis: When Dr. Jane Foster (Natalie Portman) gets cursed with a powerful entity known as the Aether, Thor is heralded of the cosmic event known as the Convergence and the genocidal Dark Elves.

Starring:

	Chris Hemsworth	…	Thor
	Natalie Portman	…	Jane Foster
	Tom Hiddleston	…	Loki
	Anthony Hopkins	…	Odin
	Christopher Eccleston	…	Malekith
	Jaimie Alexander	…	Sif
	Zachary Levi	…	Fandral
	Ray Stevenson	…	Volstagg
	Tadanobu Asano	…	Hogun
	Idris Elba	…	Heimdall
	Rene Russo	…	Frigga
	Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje	…	Algrim / Kurse
	Kat Dennings	…	Darcy Lewis
	Stellan Skarsgård	…	Erik Selvig

Director: Alan Taylor

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My ranking scores –

0-19 Levels of: Ugh

20-39 Levels of: Meh (aka I cannot reach the remote)

40-59 Levels of: I don’t hate it?

60-85 Levels of: That was solid.

86-100 Levels of: I Loved It!

I rank this movie a 52!

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Trailer:

Additional Movie Info:

It received a Rotten Tomatoes rating of 67% Fresh?  It received a Rotten Tomato audience rating of 76% liking it.  Average Rating: 3.86/5 with a number of User Ratings: 310,030.

Movie Reviews:

• Roger Ebert
• NY Times

Specs:  Release date: 8 November 2013 (USA) / Runtime: 112 minutes / Budget: $170M

IMDB Trivia:

• Tom Hiddleston (Loki) wore a Captain America suit, and did an impression of Chris Evans. Evans later showed up on-set and shot his cameo, imitating Hiddleston’s impression.
• The prologue was filmed in a blend of live-action and CGI, as the Asgardian/Dark Elf costumes were too constrictive in which to fight effectively and convincingly. There are only three characters played by human actors in the entire scene, Malekith, Kurse, and Bor. All other characters are CGI.
• This is the last movie written by Don Payne (who also wrote Thor (2011)). He died from bone cancer before this movie was released.
• According to Natalie Portman, she was not available to film the post-credit scene where Thor and Jane Foster finally kiss. Instead it was shot with Chris Hemsworth’s wife Elsa Pataky.
• (At around one hour and five minutes) Thor accidentally destroys a statue of his grandfather Bor, and Loki wisecracks that he killed him. In the Marvel comics, Thor ended up killing his grandfather as part of a deception by Loki.
• There were about thirty hammers made for Thor of various weights for different uses. The main hammer was made from aluminum, but it is replicated in different materials and weights, including a “soft” version for stunts. Of the thirty, five versions were used most often, including the “lit hammer” that emits light when lightning strikes.
• Joss Whedon was brought in to do uncredited re-writes for a few scenes, including the extremely brief encounter with Kronan (which was originally a much longer scene) and Loki briefly masquerading as Captain America in a hallway conversation with Thor.
• Filming at the famous Stonehenge historical site proved to be a challenge. After finally getting permission from English Heritage, the filmmakers found out that there were lots of rules and regulations associated with filming there. They could only be in amongst the stones outside of the normal visiting hours. So shooting had to take place early in the morning before opening, which only gave the film crew about three hours before they had to pull back for wider shots, once the stones were opened to the public. Being a heritage site, no one was allowed to touch the stones, nor walk on any of them, so a lot of logistics had to be applied to the filming there.
• Zachary Levi is now part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and the DC Extended Universe because of this movie and Shazam! (2019).
• Stan Lee: (At around fifty-two minutes) As the man who asks Dr. Erik Selvig (Stellan Skarsgård) for his shoe back, when Dr. Selvig is in the mental ward explaining the Convergence theory.
• A dead giveaway that Odin was being impersonated by Loki at the end of this movie is his posture. When the real Odin is seated on his throne, he sits evenly and upright, proudly. When Loki rules Asgard in Thor (2011), he sits on the throne at an angle, leaning toward his left. At the end of this movie, Odin is seated in the exact same posture as Loki.
• The first non-Iron Man Marvel Cinematic Universe movie in which the lead villain is killed off by the end of the movie.