Thor: Ragnarok Gets The Honest Trailers Treatment
When it opened in theaters late last year, Thor: Ragnarok became the first Thor installment to truly blow fans away and helped radically change the landscape of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, due in large part to director Taika Waititi's screwball humor and general weirdness. Screen Junkies highlights both those accomplishments (plus more) in its recently released Honest Trailer for the film.
The video starts off by poking fun at the fact that the Thor movies series was, up until this point, lackluster at best. For Ragnarok, Marvel Studios trimmed away everything that failed to work in Thor and Thor: The Dark World, and put the whole franchise on lead star Chris Hemsworth's "steamed chicken diet." All the nonsense in Ragnarok's predecessors got eviscerated when Waititi took the helm: "his love interest ... to his homeland to his friends you couldn't name with a gun to your head, his right eye, his dad, his hair, [and] dang, even his hammer." In short, this "radical new formula for the Thor films" was simply "not making them suck."
Screen Junkies goes on to note that Ragnarok is a breath of fresh air, maintaining a vivacious energy and positive tone throughout, all while capitalizing on humor and quirkiness. And though some might say director Waititi may have taken things a bit too far and leaned on his crutch of comedy one time too many, the movie's Honest Trailer argues that it works in the grand scheme of things because Ragnarok is supposed to be silly — that's what makes it so fantastic.
"It's out with the old and in with the jokes, where boring exposition scenes get tagged by jokes, badass moments get tagged by jokes, and even heartfelt emotional beats get tagged by jokes. Yeah, they overdo it sometimes, but this is a movie where an orgy spaceship shoots fireworks over the Rainbow Bridge where Hulk fights a zombie wolf," the clip's narrator states. "If you're mad it tries to make you laugh, too, you're doing it wrong."
Next up for Honest Trailer analysis are the film's unique character design and colorful visual palette. Screen Junkies calls the Thor comic creators "nerds on acid in the '60s," and argues that Ragnarok is the first MCU movie to truly embrace what a "classic Marvel comic book" looks like.
The trailer then commends Ragnarok for having the "best bridge sequence since Deadpool, the best human laser fight since Starship Troopers, and the best vehicle chase sequence where the hero jumps out to take the bad guys down by hand" since the ones shown in Captain America, Guardians of the Galaxy, and Black Panther. It wraps up on a note that's distinctly nicer than normal for an Honest Trailer, calling Ragnarok "easily the best Thor movie, also the best Hulk movie, probably the best Doctor Strange movie, the second-best Guardians movie, and shoot, probably the best He-Man movie we're ever going to get."
Alongside Hemsworth as the now-surprisingly funny God of Thunder, Thor: Ragnarok stars Tom Hiddleston as Loki, Cate Blanchett as Hela, Tessa Thompson as Valkyrie, Jeff Goldblum as the Grandmaster, Mark Ruffalo as Bruce Banner/Hulk, Idris Elba as Heimdall, Karl Urban as Skurge, and Anthony Hopkins as Odin.
Thor: Ragnarok was released today on Ultra HD Blu-ray, Blu-ray, DVD, and On-Demand, so now there's no excuse for you not to catch the kooky film.