Ragnarok finds humor at the world's end

Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and Hulk (Mark Ruffalo) in Thor: Ragnarok. Image courtesy Disney.

Thor: Ragnarok is a weird movie. It's weird because it's a movie about Norse mythology that focuses more on technological marvels than the mythology inherent to its title. It's weird because of the dramatic tonal shift from the other Thor movies. And it's super weird because Jeff Goldblum shows up with shockingly blue facial hair and literally melts a man with a stick. Ragnarok is a trip, but it is one heck of a journey to a place more bizarre than other Marvel movies have ventured.

What's so hard to reconcile about Ragnarok is how lightly the movie takes the end of a world. Superhero movies are all about saving planets from destruction while making sure the people are safe and the damage is minimal. A few jokes are sprinkled in to ensure the story doesn't get too dark, but for the most part the superhero as savior concept is a foundation for a lion's share of comic book-related lore. Except for Ragnarok, in which the threat of the destruction of Asgard starts as a gag between Thor (Chris Hemsworth reprising his role) and a skeleton just above a pit of fire. It sets the rhythm for the rest of the movie, with the comedy taking a precedence over the gravity of the situation the characters face. Everyone cracks a few jokes, from the naturally talkative Loki (Tom Hiddleston), to the goddess of death/destroyer of world Hela (Cate Blanchett), to the otherwise stern Heimdall (Idris Elba), to the fallen Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson). Even the Hulk, the Incredible Hulk and not Bruce Banner (both of whom are versions of Mark Ruffalo) showcases something resembling a sense of humor.

And you know what? It's actually kind of glorious in its own way. The sense of humor is akin to what’s found in the rest of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but Ragnarok makes it unique by changing the context to make the jokes a greater joke itself. Ragnarok is a slightly different family tree as Dr. Strangelove, in which the biggest laugh is earned by the insanity of the movie mocking the inherent somber nature of earth's destruction. The story Ragnarok tells is just as dark as Dr. Strangelove, but with brighter colors and Disney's stamp of approval. That also means the Thor movie can't be as nihilistic as Dr. Strangelove is; it is still a blockbuster first and foremost. But director Taika Waititi and the screenwriters push Ragnarok further than the other Thor films to do what the best MCU movies have done; make a movie with their own imprint on it. There are, again, limits to how far creatively the filmmakers can get with the Marvel movies – an entire cinematic universe is at stake – but Waititi and company turned a Thor movie into a comedy. Like the excellent Captain America: The Winter Soldier and the very good to great Guardians of the Galaxy movies, Ragnarok stands on its own as a piece of cinema.

Still, there remains a bit lacking with Ragnarok that pushes it a step or two down from the aforementioned Marvel movies and puts it more on par with the fun Spider-Man: Homecoming and Iron Man 3. There is what should amount to a great story arc involving Thor and the uncovering of his father Odin's (Anthony Hopkins) past, something that should force the mighty god of thunder to confront his own background and the demons his father has wrought upon his people. It's a Shakespearean bit in line with the first Thor movie, with the evil Odin committed living far beyond the good he brought in. Ragnarok barely touches the surface of this story, having Thor just sort of go with the news that his father was a monster for a very long time. That could be marked as a sign of character growth, but Thor does drop a few tears for Odin early on, and the amount of time the movie spends reconciling Odin's history is disappointingly minimal.

But the baseline for a quality superhero movie – good action, likable characters, expansive world building – remains intact, and the goofy nature and general oddness of the situation only add to those key elements. To repurpose another classic literary line, Ragnarok opts to end the world not with a whimper but with a bang and a lot of laughs along the way toward doom.

Review: Four out of Five Stars

Click here to see the trailer.

Rating: PG-13

Run time: 130 minutes

Genre: Action

Ask Away

Target audience: As with every Marvel film, everyone who has ever watched a movie from the MCU and wants to keep up with the ongoing story.

Take the whole family?: Really depends on how OK the parents are with a lot of violence but little blood to show for it. A couple years under the PG-13 mark should be fine.

Theater or Netflix?: It's fun for a trip to the theater, although the 3D isn't really worth it though.

How has 2017 been for the MCU?: Pretty great. Despite releasing three movies, two of which were a second and a third installment to long-running series, this is the first time in a while that Marvel fatigue hasn't hit that hard. It helps that the three movies released were good and different enough to offer some separation to the weary viewers. It also offers some hope for 2018, with the release of Ryan Coogler's Black Panther and the probably stupidly stuffed Avengers: Infinity War.

Watch this as well?: Along with the other MCU entries, comedian/author John Hodgman has a comedy special devoted to the impending Ragnarok, called John Hodgman: Ragnarok, that is quirky and hilarious, highlighted by his decision to send a kid out in the cold to wait for doom to come

Transformers: The Last Knight as dumb as expected

Optimus Prime in Transformers: The Last Knight. Image courtesy Paramount.

To begin with, the title for Transformers: The Last Knight is incorrect. There are several knights to be found in this movie, all of whom interact with other knights throughout the movie. There is nary a final knight to be found in this movie, making the title the warning sign for a wretched movie that sucks the energy right out of its audience.

Watching The Last Knight is a dire experience. It has so little going for it that the asinine madness Sir Anthony Hopkins inserts out of his general lack of interest in the material is the best thing the movie has going for it. Everything else is garbage, detritus spawned by barely earned nostalgia and producers sucking those happy thoughts for all the money they are worth. And that's how movies like this come to be, prepackaged as big budget experiences targeted at people who care little for the value of their entertainment. The old fashioned way of describing them are rubes, making director Michael Bay, producer Steven Spielberg, and everyone else involved in creating this rubbish high-priced grifters.

None of this really matters though. The Last Knight will make hundreds of millions of dollars, possibly more than a billion dollars, at the box office in the coming weeks. People will watch this despite protestations from many, many people over its lack of quality. This is the dark side of nihilism that doesn't reveal the optimism of nothingness once the absence of importance is accepted. What's being accepted here is bad cinema with too much regard devoted to viewers who take pride in their anti-intellectualism.

To be fair, movies don't need to be smart to have value; the Furious series is pretty great despite how legitimately dumb those films are. Yet they possess both passion and insanity, a desire to entertain their viewers and provide satisfaction for the money spent. The Last Knight does not entertain. A movie supposedly about giant robots fighting one another somehow cannot provide entertainment, even on the fun side of the puerile level. This movie very much lingers on the dark side of juvenile, with a few bits of casual racism and Marky Mark Wahlberg comparing his female co-star Laura Haddock to a prostitute added in to serve as jokes. That it sexualizes pretty much all of its female characters, including a 14-year-old (played by Isabela Moner), is disturbing but expected for this series. Still, none of it actually provides an iota of entertainment. Nothing keeps viewers interested in the characters on screen or the fact that, sometimes, giant robots fight one another to the death.

It's about right that The Last Knight only shows its giant, morphing robots fight on just a few occasions, holding franchise stalwart Optimus Prime in the background until the final act. Bay and company instead toss in some elements that, if one squints hard enough, begin to resemble a story and allow Wahlberg and Haddock to serve as the centers of attention instead of the giant fighting robots. It would have helped if the screenwriters actually tried to keep their narrative logical and create contradicting plot points, or if the haphazard editing had stuck with a logical timeline. There's also some awful, hacky, and terribly worded expositional dialog to move things forward, because this movie doesn't feel the need to show what's happening or allow the actions to guide story.

The selling point for The Last Knight is the action sequences, or at least they would be if viewers could actually follow along with the poorly framed battles. At this point in the series it's tough to find a way to inject interest in seeing the same giant robots fight one another to the death. Bay and crew have effectively run out of ideas on how to make these sequences look cool, which is an odd thing to say considering this is a franchise about giant robots with guns, explosives and swords going at one another. Bay, for all his faults as a filmmaker, used to create singular, well orchestrated action sequences that at least came close to making what are otherwise bad movies at least a little fun. Five films into the Transformers franchise and the thrill is gone for Bay.

Without any redeeming value aside from the scenery Hopkins consumes, The Last Knight is a slog. It leaves them drained from boredom and confusion over the preposterous state this film exists in, and the two-and-a-half hours of it to sift through. But, again, none of this really matters. A ton of people will watch this movie, more than enough to fund two more movies in the near future. Critics will rip them apart to as Bay, Spielberg and Paramount executives sleep comfortably in the piles of money they've conned out of audiences everywhere.

Review: One and a half out of Five Stars

Click here to see the trailer.

Rating: PG-13

Run time: 149 minutes

Genre: Action

Ask Away

Target audience: Folks who've been roped in to the last few entries.

Take the whole family?: This isn't particularly great for the younger kids, with the heavy doses of violence and bad editing creating a less than comforting viewing experience.

Theater or Netflix?: Just don't bother with it.

How good is the cast?: Of a higher quality than expected, although none of them seem to care. It remains strange how many good actors sign up for these movies. Sir Anthony Hopkins, John Turturro, Stanley Tucci, John Goodman, Steve Buscemi, Ken Watanabe, and Tony Hale are the highlights for film five. Add them to alumni like Jon Voight, Kelsey Grammer, Frances McDormand, John Malkovich, Alan Tudyk, and many, many others and there's the making for a really good movie. Even American hero Buzz Aldrin has shown up for one of these movies.

Watch this instead?: Best bet is to find a copy of the animated Transformers movie from the '80s – it has a surprisingly stellar cast, including Orson Welles, Leonard Nimoy, Robert Stack and Judd Nelson – or watch the original animated series. That, or just find your old toys and make up a way cooler story.