Thor: The Dark World - Illogical Villains, Heavy-handed Heroes, and Funny Science

WARNING:  SPOILERS AHEAD

I’ve been avoiding this post, and I think I finally figured out why.  Hopefully the reason will become clear as I write.

I saw Thor: The Dark World (hereafter TTDW) on opening day, like I do most of the movies I go to see.  Ever since then I’ve been debating with myself whether I liked it or not.  I eventually had to see it a second time to decide.

There are a lot of things in its favor.  It was visually pleasing (always a plus for me).  There were elements of humor reminiscent of the first move, but they weren’t overwhelming (another good thing).  One of my favorite characters from the first one, Heimdall, had more of a part (he’s a favorite because I really like Idris Elba and the character design is really cool).  Finally, Tom Hiddelston as Loki has so much fun with his character that you can’t help but like him even though he is undeniably a bad guy.

The cause of my consternation was two-fold.  First, the villains don’t make sense to me.  Second, elements of the story seemed like thinly veiled references to semi-current events having to do with the United States and terrorism.

The bad guys in TTDW were a race of people called dark elves.  They existed before light, so before the universe.  Their intent was to destroy everything so that they could go back to their previous existence.  Perhaps it’s my failure of imagination, but I can’t get my head around how existing before light would work.  For one thing, I don’t understand why they have eyes if they came about before the advent of light.  Also, why would their ships emit light if they’re that against it?  I know it’s a lot to ask, but I like my bad guys to have some logic behind them.

There were things about the dark elves that I really liked.  Their design was very appealing to me.  And, in spite of my above gripe, I really liked how their ships moved.  Also, one of their more devastating weapons actually made sense for them.  It was sort of a mini black hole grenade.  It made me think that whoever came up with the design of it was actually thinking about what kind of weapons a race that hates light might develop.

The other thing that bugged me was what I perceived as parallels between Asgard and the United States and between the dark elves and terrorists.  I don’t pretend to be up on current events.  Most of what I get is tidbits on the news that makes it through my protective wall of escapist entertainment and portrayals I see within said escapist entertainment (NCIS and NCIS: LA).  So here’s my admittedly frail (and over-simplified) perception of how the US and terrorists are seen:  the United States is a heavy-handed, self-appointed peace keeping nation and organizations such as the Taliban and Al Qaeda use tactics like suicide bombers and such.

The beginning of the TTDW showed a war between Asgard and the dark elves.  The dark elves created a devastating weapon that had the potential of wiping out the universe.  The Asgardians managed to take it away, hiding it in a place that was nearly impossible to get to and effectively neutralizing the threat.  In a last ditch effort, the dark elves crashed their ships into the Asgardian forces, sacrificing themselves in an attempt to destroy their enemies.  The Asgardians were portrayed as heavy-handed peace keepers.  The dark elves were portrayed, essentially, as suicide bombers with the dark elf leaders making their escape to hide until the time was right.

That beginning somehow made the heroes (Asgard) less likable to me.  And because of what I saw as parallels to the United States, it felt like an attack on my love of country.  And instead of being able to root for the entire nation of “good guys”, I had to mentally back a small group of “traitors”: Thor and his friends.  (As an aside, one of his friends uses a rapier-like weapon.  Against heavily armored foes, that weapon makes absolutely no sense!)

Don’t get me wrong.  I don’t mind some tarnish on my good guys.  It makes them more believable and, when done right, more likable.  But in this case, the tarnish was too much, and that was another attack on my love of country.  I know that the United States is not perfect.  But I believe that the world would be worse off if we hadn’t acted in many situations.

This post is ending up a whole lot more political than I’m comfortable with.  I think I need to switch gears.

Another minor gripe that I have is about the funny science.  The movie didn’t explain it well, which could be a good thing or a bad thing, depending on your perspective.  Good thing in that it wasn’t botched worse than it was.  Bad in that I couldn’t follow what was explained.  But it was a comic book movie, and I tend to give those more leeway on funny science.  So while it was a negative, it was one I could live with.

In conclusion, if I could figure out a way to turn off my brain, I think I would have liked TTDW a lot more than I did.  Like I said at the top, it was visually very appealing.  The character designs were really cool.  And Idris Elba and Tom Hiddelston were great!  (What does it say when your two favorites are a minor character and a bad guy?)  And, in spite of the illogic of the dark elves, the  attack on my love of country, and the poorly done science, it was a watchable movie.  The first one was better, though.