A Review of Thor: The Dark World

Thor: The Dark World is a 2013 production from Marvel Studios, directed by Alan Taylor with the screenplay written by Christopher L. Yost, Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely. It’s the second movie starring Thor as the main protagonist. That means Chris Hemsworth is included in a cast alongside Natalie Portman, Tom Hiddleston, Anthony Hopkins, Christopher Eccleston and Idris Elba. The movie received mixed reviews, scoring a 6.9 on IMDb, but only a 54 Metascore.

A Summary

Asgard is facing the reincarnated threat of the Dark Elves, led by their leader Malekith (Christopher Eccleston). Aeons ago, Odin’s father fought the elves off and hid their power source, the Aether. When the Aether accidentally gets found by Jane Foster (Natalie Portman), the elves take notice and prepare for another assault again the Asgardians.

With the events taking place after The Avengers movie, Loki (Tom Hiddleston) is a captive in the hands of the Asgardians. However, Loki’s attack on Earth has caused chaos across the Nine Realms as Thor (Chris Hemsworth) is leading the Asgardians in a battle to restore peace. While Thor defeats their enemies and restores peace to the Realms, Jane Foster is determined to find Thor through some sort of link between Earth and the other Realms.

She finds this link at an abandoned facility, where the laws of physics don’t seem to apply. Objects are disappearing into thin air and reappearing in other places. When she is looking around, Jane gets sucked into a portal which leads her to the hidden Aether. Unknowing of this Aether, Jane gets infected by it.

Prominent figures in Asgard are all aware of Thor’s affection for Jane as Heimdall (Idris Elba) is looking out for her. When he notices that he can’t see her, Heimdall sends Thor to Earth to find her. When he does, he sees Jane release an unearthly force upon a police officer who wants to arrest her. He takes her back to Asgard for further inspection.

As it happens, the Convergence is near. That is the alignment of all the Nine Realms. It is the only time Malekith can use the Aether to its full extend. With the Aether now being within Jane’s body, Malekith takes notice and attacks Asgard to capture her. He fails, but Asgard’s defences are severely weakened in the fight. Odin (Anthony Hopkins) orders Jane and Thor to stay in Asgard and prepare to defend it to the last Asgardian standing.

Thor doesn’t want to though as he believes Asgard will be destroyed and many Asgardians will die defending it. He frees Loki from his cell as he knows the only other way than the Bifrost to leave Asgard. Together with Jane, they leave for The Dark World, Malekith’s home planet. There they try to fight Malekith but fail. He takes the Aether out of Jane as Loki dies, or at least that is what Thor is led to believe.

Thor and Jane leave The Dark World through a similar portal as Jane saw before on Earth. They meet up with Jane’s research team and find out that Malekith’s attack will be in Greenwich. During the final battle, Thor and Malekith fight it out. With some help of Jane’s research equipment, they manage to teleport Malekith to The Dark World during his Aether charging, stopping the threat. 

The Story

Let’s start the beginning. The events of this movie take place after The Avengers and the first Thor movie. We see Loki getting brought to justice, as we would expect from the events we’ve seen in those movies. The Bifrost is repaired after Thor destroyed it in his first movie. However, the Nine Realms have been at war ever since the Bifrost was destroyed. Probably because the Asgardians couldn’t get to the other Realms.

We never got any explanation or introduction to these wars. And it seems that Thor was fighting on Earth with the Avengers while his people were at war as well? Seems a strange decision to me. In the same way, Dr Erik Selvig, what happened to him? He went completely nuts after Loki brainwashed him? That didn’t seem to happen to Hawkeye, who was already fighting hours after being back to normal.

Furthermore, the whole idea behind these inter-Realms portals is kind of weird. How does it work? How was Jane able to manipulate them to create portals at will? There are so many questions I could ask about these portals and that doesn’t help me enjoy the movie. Also, the portals are always conveniently located of course. Jane and Thor happen to go into a cave on The Dark World where the portal to Earth is located. The Convergence takes place near Jane’s lab. 

And then there is Malekith, our villain. After the first attack, it seems he only got like five guys left? When he is on The Dark World he has so few allies, while I would think he has a larger army? Odin himself seemed to think that Malekith could crumble Asgard with another attack, seems unlikely when he is so heavily outnumbered. Another inconsistency is Heimdall’s vision. During the first attack, he sees the hidden ship and jumps on it, while after the attack he is unable to spot the ship flying right above Asgard?

It also seems that the Dark Elves have quite advanced technology. Their ships are equipped with hologram display and such and their army has laser guns. Even though the Dark Elves have been gone for aeons, during which Asgard has been the strongest Realm, the Asgardians are still less technologically advanced?

The Characters

We see all the same characters return from the first Thor movie, with a few new additions. Loki plays a less significant role compared to the first iteration, while Jane sees more screentime.

Thor

My problem with Thor in the first movie was the attempt to make him funny. The writers seem to have let go of that idea for now. Something that is for the better in my opinion. His interactions with Loki have changed, of course, after the events in earlier movies. Still, their synergy is something not easily recreated on screen. Their dealings on The Dark World were well-thought-out and performed.

It’s a shame though that Thor is still unable to know when his brother is tricking him. I would think that Thor could sense it after all these years, but he seems blind to Loki’s tricks, which deserve some credit as well.

Malekith

I don’t know what to think of him. First of all, his looks don’t appeal to me. His ponytail doesn’t fit the villain in my opinion. His face on the other hand looks great, especially after Thor’s lightning strike. He seems to have some good motives for his actions, but a little more backstory would have been nice. And an army maybe, like I said earlier.

Jane Foster

During the first movie, Thor wasn’t impressed with Earth and he didn’t need much time to adapt. It seems Jane has the same trait as she gets brought the great Asgard, but she doesn’t seem impressed for more than five seconds or so. Also, the Aether is supposed to be super powerful and its energy would be too much for somebody like Loki, according to Thor. Jane, however, carries it with for the majority of the movie, while only needing a bit more sleep. 

The Production

The movie definitely made a step up from the last Thor film. The CGI looks way better and actions scenes are better choreographed and filmed, something that already was the case for The Avengers. However, I was disappointed when we only got to see the same Realms as in the first Thor movie, while the fight gave them an easy opportunity to show them all.