Thor
8/10
Surpassed my expectations and thankfully the trailers didn't give away the whole movie because a few things surprised me.
Hemsworth is great and really pulls off the character. The whole cast is solid but Hemsworth has a lot of charisma. He handles the humor well but at the same time handles the action well. He's likable yet overconfident early on. The film rides on his performance and he delivers.
Tom Hiddleston deserves some praise as Loki. There are a few really clever ways that Branagh displays how and why Loki earns that trickster reputation. Hiddlestons performance has some nice subtleties and nuances to it where he seems passive and honorable but you know he's lying and has an agenda.
Hopkins of course steps into, for him, a familiar type of role as father figure/ruler but with the twist of being a godking on top of it. He does a good job with it.
Wasn't sure how Natalie Portman would handle this kind of movie. She's done fantasy and comic book movies before. Some she did well in and some she did not so well in but here she's good.
Edris Elba is awesome as Heimdall. Its a minor role but he is very memorable.
There are a couple of really cool cameos by other Marvel characters that worked very well. The earlier new one didn't stick out like a sore thumb and was subtle but cool.
The story is simple but effective. Thor and Loki both go through their respective arcs and both are very believable and compelling from a character point of view. The villains of the film work despite not being developed in very much detail. They do serve their purpose well though. The action is good and the way they bring to life things like Thor flying and spinning and throwing the hammer look awesome.
I've got to give a lot of credit to Branagh for pulling off the visuals of Asgard and its people. Its not an exact copy of the books but Marvel Studios and Branagh's take on it and they deliver something thats based on the world we've read about in the books but at the same time looks more classy. The look of THOR as a film EASILY could have turned out to be ridiculous but it works. The production design actually reminds me a little of Masters of The Universe only with a LOT more money.
I mean years ago when this film was first announces I had no clue how they'd pull off stuff like the Rainbow Bridge in a film with real flesh and blood actors but they came up with a design for it that makes it look awesome.
One of Marvel Studios best and probably one of the better recent films based on a Marvel comic period. I don't know if its in the top five of Marvel based films but its certainly in the GOOD part of the spectrum. When I rank it with Marvel Studio films I'd say Thor is below Iron Man but above Iron Man 2 and probably slightly above The Incredible Hulk as well (and I really enjoyed TIH).
