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Thor: Ragnarok begins by explaining the title when Surtur (Clancy Brown) tells Thor (Chris Hemsworth) that Ragnarok is coming, which means the end of all things, but the humour kicks in early as our hero’s bound in chains and its slow twisting and turning takes Surtur out of his gaze, our hero begging for his captor to hold on until he comes round again so the fiery creature can continue his threats.
There was more comedy early on than I was expecting, but that soon took a back seat once it came time to get on with the plot, as the evil Hela (Cate Blanchett) came along to cause havoc with the world, and take over Asgard. Since I didn’t know her connection with the Viking universe at the time, I’ll not spoil that here.
We know from the trailer, that she’s the baddie this time round – even more so than his brother, Loki (Tom Hiddleston), so can these two warring siblings join forces to deal with their new nemesis? And if they can, can they at least get on with it rather than let a film ramble on far too long?
I’m late catching up with Thor’s third installment, since his first two movies were ones I never got round to seeing first time round, and when I did, just before this movie was released in cinemas, I really had had enough of superhero movies and I found both of these quite tiresome. Perhaps I would’ve enjoyed them more had I seen them when first released. Either way, it was as a result of this that I skipped Thor: Ragnarok in the cinema.
I still haven’t yet seen Black Panther as I didn’t care much for that character and its hype machine, and until watching this one, I was considering making Avengers: Infinity War my last regular-ish superhero movie, but I’m really not fussed at all, now. As this post explains, I’m rather superhero-ed out.
In this movie, there’s references to Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, Flash Gordon, plus ’80s music, and I initially stopped after 50 minutes at first because I was getting tired of this, but I then continued, yet if the best thing I can say is the ’80s references, then that’s not a great thing.
Thor: Ragnarok wasn’t a complete waste of time, but with was way too much crash/bash/smash, I still wasn’t wowed, plus, at times the innuendo got a bit too stupid, such as a big portal being known as The Devil’s Anus. Really?! That was quite lazy scriptwriting.
Tessa Thompson, as Valkyrie, made for a reasonable sidekick, but doing nothing we’ve not seen before from any other sidekick in an action film. Jeff Goldblum, as the Grandmaster, was simply, Jeff Goldblum, while Idris Elba had a higher placing in the cast list, as Heimdall, despite hardly being in it! There was also just one scene for Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch), despite that film’s post-credits sequence suggesting we’d get a lot more and, in fact, that post-credits scene summed up EVERYTHING we saw from him in this!
Hulk is Hulk, and even when Mark Ruffalo is Bruce Banner, he really doesn’t put in any effort. Finally, I found Korg’s comedy relief quite annoying, but it was clearly director Taika Waititi giving himself a role as useful as Jar Jar Binks in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace.
There’s two scenes after the credits begin, which I’ll hide behind a spoiler heading.
Thor: Ragnarok is available to buy on Blu-ray, 4K Blu-ray, 3D Blu-ray, Amazon Video, and DVD and click on the poster for the full-size image.
Detailed specs:
Cert: 
Running time: 130 minutes
Studio: Sony Pictures
Year: 2018
Format: 2.35:1 (ARRIRAW (6.5K), Dolby Vision, Phantom RAW (4K) (high-speed shots))
Rating: 4.5/10
Director: Taika Waititi
Producer: Kevin Feige
Screenplay: Eric Pearson, Craig Kyle and Christopher L Yost (based on the comics by Stan Lee, Larry Lieber and Jack Kirby)
Music: Mark Mothersbaugh
Cast:
Thor: Chris Hemsworth
Loki: Tom Hiddleston
Hela: Cate Blanchett
Valkyrie: Tessa Thompson
Heimdall: Idris Elba
Grandmaster: Jeff Goldblum
Skurge: Karl Urban
Bruce Banner / Hulk: Mark Ruffalo
Odin: Anthony Hopkins
Doctor Strange: Benedict Cumberbatch
Korg: Taika Waititi (voice)
Topaz: Rachel House
Surtur: Clancy Brown (voice)
Hogun: Tadanobu Asano
Volstagg: Ray Stevenson
Fandral: Zachary Levi
Actor Thor: Luke Hemsworth
Actor Odin: Sam Neill
Actor Sif: Charlotte Nicdao
Barber: Stan Lee (uncredited)
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.