Thor’s Day Is Such a Crazy Lazy Day

Cold Day in TreeBefore the Thor movie began, there was a trailer for the upcoming Captain America. It shows a scrawny Steve Rogers turning into a buff & cut Captain A. So you know they used computers to make the actor scrawny. And they probably used computers to give an extra shine to his buffness. Later on during the Thor movie, when Thor is shirtless, I swear it’s the same chest that Captain America had. So I don’t think that you can trust what a guy looks like in the movies any more. Good thing they wouldn’t tweak a woman’s body that way.

Brannagh did a good job of making the Asgard parts serious, but not too Shakespearean. And I always love it when Anthony Perkins chews scenery. The music is not Wagnerian, which is sorta disappointing. Not very memorable either.

It’s odd that they went so far out of their way to de-mythologize it. It’s no longer a myth-based fantasy, but rather straightforward science fiction. The gods are aliens. So are the demons. And there’s an astrophysicist thrown in to explain it all. It works like magic!

At one point this guy walks up to Thor’s hammer. It’s stuck in a rock, like Excalibur. He tries to pull it out, and fails. The guy is played by J. Michael Straczynski, the guy who created and wrote most of Babylon 5. He also wrote for the Thor comic book, and had some success with it.

One of the parts of  Babylon 5 that keeps coming back to me is how the war between the humans and the Minbari starts when the humans mistakenly kill the Minbari leader, and it drives the entire Minbari race mad. These previously rational people become murderously obsessed with ending the human race. But that was long ago.

The people I was with had problems with the 3D aspect of the film. They got headaches. My biggest problem was with character growth happening a little too fast. Or actually, all at once. When Thor realizes that he must sacrifice himself to save his friends, he also learns that you must not try to wipe out entire races. Where does that come from?

I realize that every movie since September 2001, one way or another, has been a metaphor. So is this one. It’s really obvious but not quite heavy-handed. And they used computer to make it look like things turned out better than they did.

 

 

 

 

About Lyle Verbilion

I'm just wanderin' around lookin' at things. Wow.
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