Finally saw Thor: Ragnarok (or as Tumblr calls it, “What happens when Galadriel takes the One True Ring) after work on Friday.  After phenomenally irritating day that culminated in being two buses behind a bus crash that blocked up the road, then running ten minutes through the rain in a pencil skirt to meet the Best Girlfriend in the World so she could pick me up on another street…

Fortunately by the time we hit the theater, I had warmed up in the car and was no longer just spewing profanity and sputtering.

So, I have been waiting for Marvel to really disappoint me with a movie.  There have been one or two I wasn’t thrilled with (cough, Civil War, cough) but honestly, even those have been enjoyable.

Thor did not disappoint in the least.

I went in fairly grumpy, ordered a tall cider (boozy theater) and sat back for the ride.

I loved it.

As a villain, Hela was fairly complex. I would watch Cate Blanchett read the phone book.  Loki was Loki again, and spent an unusual, but pretty hilarious, amount of time being the straight man.

Tessa Thompson as Valkyrie was magnificent.  I loved her.  She is everything that is good and excellent about complex female characters.  Flawed, but ultimately heroic.

Casting Jeff Goldblum to play Jeff Goldblum was an amazing idea.  He was hilarious as Grandmaster.  “Why are you handing me the melting stick? He interrupted me. Interrupting is not a capital offense.”

Speaking thereof, Rachel House as Topaz was BRILLIANT.
Grandmaster: “I don’t like that word.”
Topaz: “What word? Mainframe?”
Grandmaster:  “The S word.”
Topaz:  “Sorry, the prisoners with jobs.”

I found it well-paced, and incredibly well-acted.  After an early experience with superhero movies that included The Punisher with Dolph Lundgren (btw, Sydney, Australia looks nothing New York or Seattle, which if I remember right was where they decided the movie took place), I have been delighted with Marvel’s movies.  I’m glad they dumped Joss “I have to sneak misogyny into my films else my wiener will shrivel up and fall off” Whedon, and the female characters have gotten a lot better and more complex since then.  I have high hopes for Black Widow in the Infinity War.

I definitely recommend seeing Thor: Ragnarok in the theaters if you can.  I hear it’s fairly impressive in Imax, which is a format I can’t watch without getting motion sick, so I have to take The Martian’s word for it. Taika Watiti is a fucking gem and if he doesn’t do more Marvel movies I am going to be bitterly disappointed.

I highly approve of the use to which Led Zeppelin’s “The Immigrant Song” was put.

Also saw the full trailer for Black Panther.

I am so looking forward to this movie.

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