Thor: Love & Thunder (no spoilers)

(M) ★★★★

Director: Taika Waititi.

Cast: Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman, Christian Bale, Tessa Thompson, Taika Waititi, Russell Crowe.

The judges of American Idol had been through some shit.

Apparently this is an unpopular opinion in some quarters of MCU fandom, but I desperately want to see Taika Waititi direct a third Thor film.

His take on Thor, in cahoots with the God of Thunder himself Hemsworth, has been a far funnier, wackier Odinson than what had been seen before. The tone of the films was in line with Waititi's own Kiwi sense of humour, but Thor also became a more comedic character, to the chagrin of some fans.

I like it. In Thor: Ragnarok and Avengers: Endgame, the Thunder God is a profoundly affected by his time among humans and from suffering loss - something he's not had to reconcile with as an Asgardian. He's absorbed humanity like a virus and doesn't fully understand how that sits with his godhood. Humility weighs unevenly on his immortality, and his profound power is ill-at-ease alongside the traits he's picked up from his Midgardian acquaintances. 

Thus Love & Thunder finds him in search of himself and his place in the universe. Having set off with the Guardians of the Galaxy at the end of Endgame, he roams space, bouncing from one distress call to the next, smiting evil with his mighty battleaxe, and winning the day.

But it all feels so hollow and empty. He's missing something in his life - and that something is Jane Foster (Portman), his ex-girlfriend. But when he sees her again, he's in for a massive surprise.

Combining the Mighty Thor comic series with the God Butcher series is a masterstroke from Waititi and co-writer Jennifer Kaytin Robinson. We get great arcs for Jane Foster as she becomes the Mighty Thor and uses that persona to battle her own demons, and we get Gorr (Bale), who is a worthy villain with a worthwhile backstory, cut from the same potentially understandable cloth as Thanos or Ultron or Scarlet Witch. Portman and Bale relish the extra depth in what could easily have been thin characters, and help make the whole thing work.

The humour is a fine balance amid the bleaker elements of the story; as he did with Jojo Rabbit, Waititi manages to work a deft line between the morbid moments and the hilarity. It something he excels at - just watch his breakthrough films Boy and Hunt For The Wilderpeople and note the darker realities lurking below the surface, and how comfortably-yet-uncomfortably they sit with everything else. 

The same thing is on display in Love & Thunder. Cancer and mortality mix with the futility of life itself, while heartbreak and love battle it out. The whole thing is a damning diatribe against religion when looked at from Gorr's angle, a sad story of the inevitably of death when looked at from Jane Foster's side, and an examination of the devastations of lost love from Thor's perspective. The idea that Waititi has made the Thor films throwaway comedic fluff is nonsense.

Waititi's perfect use of Guns N' Roses is also to be commended, while there are visual flourishes (a fight in the Shadow Realm in particular) that are impressive. Some of the battles and action sequences feel a bit samey, as is to be expected 28 films into a saga, but there are moments where you can see Waititi is striving to bring some flair to the long-running party.

Waititi deserves a third film to close out his own Thor trilogy. If anyone is going to end the Thor saga, should Hemsworth want to hang up his cape, it must be Waititi.