Fan Review Thread SPOILERS INSIDE - Part 2

[Herolee10]

Well personally, I did get the idea that Malekith was looking to restore the glory that his people once had over the universe before Asgard came in and took it over, and I can even get why they had him kill his own people since they probably wanted to show on how Odin was falling close towards being like Malekith when it came to the willingness of sacrificing innocent lives for the sake of achieving their goals, thus why Thor ended up disobeying his father and turning down the throne.

Be that as it may, I think having a shot or even a scene of showing Malekith's family being killed by Bor, may have stilled help and even make it more personal for viewers to follow and understand. I mean it's one thing where Malekith sacrifice his people in order to escape, but another thing if Malekith's family is directly killed by Bor.

 

[TeeKay]

Well personally, I did get the idea that Malekith was looking to restore the glory that his people once had over the universe before Asgard came in and took it over, and I can even get why they had him kill his own people since they probably wanted to show on how Odin was falling close towards being like Malekith when it came to the willingness of sacrificing innocent lives for the sake of achieving their goals, thus why Thor ended up disobeying his father and turning down the throne.

Be that as it may, I think having a shot or even a scene of showing Malekith's family being killed by Bor, may have stilled help and even make it more personal for viewers to follow and understand. I mean it's one thing where Malekith sacrifice his people in order to escape, but another thing if Malekith's family is directly killed by Bor.

I agree. I don't get how some people missed this at all. I just think he needed to be fleshed out more. It's one thing to dislike him as a villain but it's another to completely come out and say he didn't have any motivations, 'he was just evil for just the sake of it' is result of people not paying attention. His motivations were showed and explained in the film. His motives were essentially more or less the same as Zod's in MOS. People just need to pay attention.

Personally, I thought he was a weak villain, like even though I understood his motivations. I thought he was there just for the sake of having a villain and for someone Thor to have fight scenes with. He needed more screentime imo.

 

[DA_Champion]

I agree. I don't get how some people missed this at all. I just think he needed to be fleshed out more. It's one thing to dislike him as a villain but it's another to completely come out and say he didn't have any motivations, 'he was just evil for just the sake of it' is result of people not paying attention. His motivations were showed and explained in the film. His motives were essentially more or less the same as Zod's in MOS. People just need to pay attention.

Personally, I thought he was a weak villain, like even though I understood his motivations. I thought he was there just for the sake of having a villain and for someone Thor to have fight scenes with. He needed more screentime imo.

It is not the responsibility of the viewers do not need to pay more attention, it is up to the movie to capture the viewers' attention.

 

[TeeKay]

It is not the responsibility of the viewers do not need to pay more attention, it is up to the movie to capture the viewers' attention.

That's one of the dumbest things I've read here. So films need to spoon feed information to the viewers right? After all, the audience don't need to pay attention, the film will tell them everything they know right? So you're saying you just walk into a film and just sit there and wait for the film to grab your attention rather than actually try to pay attention yourself in the first place? Come on man, I get what you were trying to say there but you might need to re-phrase that statement. It is also the responsibility of the viewers too. It goes both ways buddy, viewers need to pay attention and films need to be engaging too.

I don't want to be spoon fed information or the whole film ends up being exposition after exposition. Some films do not do that but rather have the audience figure things out themselves, that's why I said they also need to pay attention. The prologue told us what we needed to know about Malekith, not only that, Odin explained it twice in the film and yet people missed it entirely? It was shown and told twice and some people don't know what malekith was trying to achieve?

 

[DA_Champion]

That's a fair assesment. but the prologue told us what we needed to know about Malekith, not only that, Odin explained it twice in the film and yet people missed it entirely?

I's normal for people to forget a lot. The majority of what makes it into short-term memory never makes it into long-term memory. There are lots of examples. Waiters only remember the orders they are currently serving, for the most part. Students typically forget 80% (by some estimates) of what they learn in a university class, by the very next day.

- they were bored;
- they had trouble following, because the story didn't make sense to them, for example internal contradictions;
- they had trouble following for other reasons, such as poor intelligiblity of character dialogue (Thor, Bane, etc), too many loud noises, special effects moving too fast, poor sound quality in the theatre, too many kids playing on their cell phone, or they needed to go to pee because they ordered the large fountain drink before watching the movie and thus couldn't concentrate.

Also, the movie simply didn't develop the ideas that well. It's correct that Malakith had the same motivations as Zod (restore the old world), but Malekith's motivations were not developed. We don't know anything about this old world that Malekith wanted to restore, though we got a 28 minute opening introduction of Krypton. There are fewer Elven characters with names and dialogue than there were Kryptonians. Malekith has less screen time and less dialogue than Zod did. The idea is simply not reinforced.

ETA: But even without all that, people forget most of what they learn, for example:

6, 34, 57, 22, 91, 18, 23, 7, 15, 44

That's a string of numbers that I guarantee you won't remember in a week, tomorrow, in an hour, or possibly even by the time you're done reading it. The human mind effectively discards information which is not interesting.

 

[Mjölnir]

It is not the responsibility of the viewers do not need to pay more attention, it is up to the movie to capture the viewers' attention.

That's about the same as saying that whether a student learns something falls entirely on the teacher and nothing on the capacity of the student.

 

[DA_Champion]

- delete -

 

[TeeKay]

- they were bored;
- they had trouble following, because the story didn't make sense to them, for example internal contradictions;
- they had trouble following for other reasons, such as poor intelligiblity of character dialogue (Thor, Bane, etc), too many loud noises, special effects moving too fast, poor sound quality in the theatre, too many kids playing on their cell phone, or they needed to go to pee because they ordered the large fountain drink before watching the movie and thus couldn't concentrate.

They were already bored and had trouble following at the start of the film where all this was shown and explained by Odin? Yeah right. The prologue is the first scene you see in the movie, there's a reason it's at the start.

That's about the same as saying that whether a student learns something falls entirely on the teacher and nothing on the capacity of the student.

Good comparison.You just hit him with a dose of logic there. That was such a dumb thing he said.

 

[Mjölnir]

And to state my opinion on the matter, Malekith is by no means just 'evil'. He strives for a noble cause in the eyes of his people and he clearly thinks that the ends justify the means. It's actually uncommon in CBM's that the villain is someone who just wants to watch the world burn.

 

[DA_Champion]

That's about the same as saying that whether a student learns something falls entirely on the teacher and nothing on the capacity of the student.

Thor 2 is a generic 2 hour blockbuster. It's not Introduction to Quantum Mechanics. Your analogy fails.

And as far as Hollywood blockbusters go... the good ones rarely have any trouble capturing the audience's attention.

They were already bored and had trouble following at the start of the film where all this was shown and explained by Odin? Yeah right. The prologue is the first scene you see in the movie, there's a reason it's at the start.

The opening prologue of the film was generic, boring, and was against a backdrop of ugly cinematography. It loses people's attention right from the start. It then cuts to a completely different scene of Jane Foster on a bad date with some loser we don't even care about, who gets interrupted by Darcy.

As a serious aside, I'm not sure why the MCU doesn't try harder to get better cinematography. Oblivion, Gravity, Man of Steel, Pacific Rim, all wow-ed me and most critics in 2013 in terms of visuals. Thor 2 was a lot closer to Riddick and to Stark Trek into Darkness, I'm not sure why they didn't try harder. Visuals matter.

 

[Mjölnir]

Thor 2 is a generic 2 hour blockbuster. It's not Introduction to Quantum Mechanics. Your analogy fails.

And as far as Hollywood blockbusters go... the good ones rarely have any trouble capturing the audience's attention.

No, there are plenty of people that have trouble following simple plots (even though for some reason some described this plot as "ridiculously complicated"). The analogy works fine, just as it does for the most simple courses in school.

It's not really about how much you remember in the end, it's about knowing your limits. If you don't remember much then you shouldn't be arguing about details in a movie. I remember details even in the movies I find bad because it's all about the ability to process information.

I'm still waiting for your declaration of sources that irrefutably establishes that movie quality is an objective matter by the way. You left the conversation the two times I asked you for it before and you've only managed to contradict yourself on the issue. If it's so clear as you said it was you should be able to easily convey the information.

 

[TeeKay]

Thor 2 is a generic 2 hour blockbuster. It's not Introduction to Quantum Mechanics. Your analogy fails.

And as far as Hollywood blockbusters go... the good ones rarely have any trouble capturing the audience's attention.

Yes because referrencing Quantum Machanics is any better. His anology was a valid one, you simply made a dumb statement by saying it's not the viewer's resposibility to pay attention, same could be said for a student in class. If he/she doesn't pay attention, he/she will not understand or miss a few details. Simple as that.

The opening prologue of the film was generic, boring, and was against a backdrop of ugly cinematography.

It loses people's attention right from the start. It then cuts to a completely different scene of Jane Foster on a bad date with some loser we don't even care about, who gets interrupted by Darcy.

Are you speaking for yourself here? Because let's not assume that you went to everybody and asked them if it lost their attention at that point. It certainly didn't lose my attention.

As a serious aside, I'm not sure why the MCU doesn't try harder to get better cinematography. Oblivion, Gravity, Man of Steel, Pacific Rim, all wow-ed me and most critics in 2013 in terms of visuals. Thor 2 was a lot closer to Riddick and to Stark Trek into Darkness, I'm not sure why they didn't try harder. Visuals matter.

And you thought the shaky cam in MOS was any better? I didn't hate that movie but I didn't like the way it was shot.Thor: The Dark World was the most visually appealing and the best looking MCU film to date imo. Besides, this is Taylor's first attempt at a big budget film, cut him some slack because you're comparing him to the likes of JJ Abrams, Zack Snyder and Guillermo del Toro who have directed more than 2 feature films and have been doing this for a long time, which isn't really fair considering this was Taylor's first shot at a big budget film. I thought he did great shooting on location, using practical sets, practical effects and avoiding CGI whenever he can.

all wow-ed me and most critics in 2013 in terms of visuals.

Speak for yourself. Don't bring critics into this because I'm sure I can find reviews where the cinematography and visuals are praised.

 

[Iceman]

I liked this film, entertaining throughout and I love the main cast. Not really a fan of the final shot though.

 

[Rock Sexton]

I see DA Champion's shift hasn't ended ..... been slamming this movie non-stop for about 3 weeks now.

It's funny how when somebody hates something so much, they can spend an inordinate amount of time on here discussing it. Apparently he believes copious amounts of repetition is the key to argumentation.

 

[Brain Damage]

.Thor: The Dark World was the most visually appealing and the best looking MCU film to date imo.

You seriously thought so? I thought it was easily the worst looking. I found it to be very bland and generic in its production design, and equally so in it's cinematography. I can't rememeber a single memorable shot, to be honest.

Personally, I think Iron Man 3 is the best looking Marvel film. Say what you will about the plot, that film is ****ing gorgeous.

But I agree with whoever it was that said for the most part Marvel tends to have pretty generic cinematography.

 

[TeeKay]

You seriously thought so? I thought it was easily the worst looking. I found it to be very bland and generic in its production design, and equally so in it's cinematography. I can't rememeber a single memorable shot, to be honest.

Personally, I think Iron Man 3 is the best looking Marvel film. Say what you will about the plot, that film is ****ing gorgeous.

But I agree with whoever it was that said for the most part Marvel tends to have pretty generic cinematography.

Yeah. The climatic battle in IM3 involving the iron legion vs extremis soldiers looked like a video game imo.

 

[R_Hythlodeus]

It is not the responsibility of the viewers do not need to pay more attention, it is up to the movie to capture the viewers' attention.

I'm sorry, but that statement is beyond stupid

 

[Herolee10]

The ironic thing about Malekith for me is that on a visual standpoint, he is intimidating and comes off as menacing.

Heck, when he was walking into Odin's throne room, with the whole slow motion shot going on for him mixed with the great music in the background, he really came off as a badass.

I think the mistake was to show him being the type of villain that could have easily been defeated by Thor's mom had Kurse not been there. Malekith didn't even possess any magic of his own unless he had the Aether with him.

It seems like Marvel isn't really willing to have characters that can project energy blasts on their own unless they have some type of device or weapon that allows them to do so.

 

[The Sage]

This was pretty good. Thor deciding he'd rather be the protector of the realms than king of Asgard for now I saw coming. I like how Thor learned he could trust Loki. I really thought Loki had turned on him, and I loved how it was part of the plan. Best part of the movie was Thor and Loki working together. Of course, that ending left questions as it was supposed to, and now I want to know what happened to Odin. Hiddleston is just great and Loki is without question Marvel's best villain.

I thought this did have a little too much humor, mostly due to Kat Jennings' character.

Easily better than Thor. I'm more interested in seeing Thor 3 than seeing Avengers: AOU at this point.

 

[DA_Champion]

I'm still waiting for your declaration of sources that irrefutably establishes that movie quality is an objective matter by the way.

I didn't leave that conversation, I had already provided some (albeit incomplete) explanation. I admit it wasn't complete, but a complete explanation would exceed the length of anything either of us has ever posted here. I'm also not going to repost the arguments I posted. Use the search function.

Basically, everybody can have an opinion on anything, if you ask them. But not all opinions are equal as you believe. As a general rule, the more intelligent and informed the person is (and sometimes, the more detached), the more valuable their opinion, and that is true of any subject, with the exception of subjects like homeopathy where there are no experts because the subject is fake.

You might deny this, but I'm sure it's not how you live your life. If you had a daughter, and you wanted her to learn music and assuming you are sufficiently well-off, you would pay for music lessons, because you believe, deep down and despite your protests to the contrary, that there is such a thing as objectively better music, at least on average. And so it would be for all the arts and indeed all human activity. You can argue that music and storytelling, ok fine. But if you had any ambition yourself to become a storyteller, I am certain that you would read some material on how to write stories, that you would get help to make the product better -- which proves that you believe that there is such a thing as better.

Can we be ever know exactly how good a movie is? Well, can we ever know the exact mass of the electron? No, but we can make a very good approximation, sometimes. Thor 2 has a 50% score among top critics, so that's a decent approximation, and admittedly, it proves I'm probably too harsh on the movie.

 

[DA_Champion]

I'm sorry, but that statement is beyond stupid

I watched Catching Fire tonight, giving that movie my full attention required no effort beyond going to the movie theatre.

It's kind of like reading a good novel -- I don't need to force myself to read the book, the book actually takes over my life until I'm done. There's a phrase for this, a "page-turner".

 

[DA_Champion]

Besides, this is Taylor's first attempt at a big budget film, cut him some slack because you're comparing him to the likes of JJ Abrams, Zack Snyder and Guillermo del Toro who have directed more than 2 feature films and have been doing this for a long time, which isn't really fair considering this was Taylor's first shot at a big budget film. I thought he did great shooting on location, using practical sets, practical effects and avoiding CGI whenever he can.

That's a fair point about Taylor. I look forward to Terminator 5, if only to find out how he does away from Marvel, but also I love the first two Terminator movies. I hope Taylor makes a better movie than McG did.

 

[Spider-Fan]

Well, if those Malektih scenes were actually IN the movie instead of being cut for no reason besides "pacing", even though this movie had serious pacing issues regardless, maybe it would have been more convincing. You're projecting your own beliefs instead of what's actually in the film itself. His complete lack of anything even vaguely resembling some small semblance of an interesting personality didn't help either. I could have bought his "revenge" motive more if he even once came across as being remotely upset about his people or family, but he didn't. Again, Hannibal Lecter at least had interesting character traits and an entertaining personality, Malekith had neither. As for "inscrutable mysterious" villains, I often times find that to be a convenient excuse/cop out for being either too lazy or uncreative to actually give your villain any depth. There's not goddamn reason why they couldn't have given Malekith, or Sif, or the Warriors 3 SOMETHING interesting to do. I'm so freaking tired of hearing filmmakers justify a lack of good characterization or development by claiming that the "pacing" would be hurt, it's such complete and utter ********.

Did you watch the movie? There was a prologue showing what happened to him, and then he had a scene where he came back to his homeworld and talked about what he sacrificed and what he was reclaiming. So, it was outlined IN THE MOVIE! Not in a cut scene. In all honesty, I don't think the cut scene in question was necessary. Eccelston played Malekith in an "alien" way, meaning he didn't seem to convey outward emotions. Thus, even with this scene, the audience wouldn't have sympathy for him. It's not the writing in question here, because those elements are in the script and in the movie. The character's body language just simply distanced himself from the audience in a way in which he was unsympathetic.

I can see why it was cut.

 

[Herolee10]

It kind of makes me wonder at times, do you guys think that it was the right choice to give the Dark Elves their own language and have most of Malekith's scenes presented in that format? Or would it have been better if they had allowed him to speak English for all of his scenes?

 

[Saturius]

It kind of makes me wonder at times, do you guys think that it was the right choice to give the Dark Elves their own language and have most of Malekith's scenes presented in that format? Or would it have been better if they had allowed him to speak English for all of his scenes?

I think it was better the way it was presented in the film and am actually a bit surprised that others would want them speaking English. I don't have a problem reading subtitles and I thought them having their own language just made them seem more alien and authentic. It gave them (Dark Elves) a more substantive history. Them constantly speaking English would have taken away from that imo.