The return of Mjolnir, Jane Foster, and the birth of Mighty Thor. The trailers for
the fourth Thor movie seemed to give a lot away – but you have no idea how much about
the movie they were really hiding. Warning – spoilers ahead for "Thor: Love and Thunder."
"Thor: Love and Thunder" brings Chris Hemsworth's Asgardian hero back to the
big screen for his fourth solo movie, which sees him struggling to stop Gorr
the God Butcher from slaughtering all the deities throughout the universe.
In case his name didn't make it clear enough, Gorr the God Butcher is out for revenge on the gods
after the death of his family, which he blames on his own deities, who didn't step in to help.
Thankfully, Thor isn't alone on his quest to save the various pantheons;
he has rookie hero (and ex-girlfriend) Jane Foster along to help and distract him in equal measure.
Although Thor's hammer Mjolnir was destroyed by Hela in "Thor: Ragnarok," the object has
been mysteriously reassembled and deems Jane worthy enough to wield the powers of Thor.
The first trailers for the 2022 sequel teased the heroic transformation, as well as Thor's
shock over her newfound abilities, but the footage never reveals how the iconic hammer gets reforged.
It's quite simple really: It calls to her and reassembles on its own because Thor asked
it to always protect her in a flashback, and she proves worthy enough to wield it.
During a press conference for the movie, director Taika Waititi teased that Mjolnir's return
leads to a surprising love triangle. The filmmaker said of Thor's dilemma,
"Look, it's hard to see the ex-girlfriend turns up dressed as him, that's a shock. And all the
sudden the weapon that he held so dear, and so on, for so many years now belongs to someone else.
And then he has Stormbreaker who starts to sense a little jealousy there. You know?"
This isn't the only time the "Love and Thunder" trailers lied to us about the God of Thunder's
fourth solo outing, either. If you only saw the trailers,
you might assume "Love and Thunder" is a movie primarily about Thor teaming up
with the Guardians of the Galaxy to fight a bunch of alien marauders. This would make
sense given that he leaves New Asgard with the gang at the end of "Avengers: Endgame."
But the film's opening montage -- hilariously narrated by Korg -- reveals
that Thor's adventures with the Guardians only reminds him that he feels empty inside,
largely because of his breakup with Jane. So after saving a peaceful race of blue aliens
from a furry band of raiders, Thor and Korg part ways with the Guardians. That's right.
If you were looking for the next chapter of the Guardians' story,
you'll have to wait for James Gunn's "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3" because this ain't it.
It's a little disappointing, since there was plenty of chatter about the cosmic
heroes returning for the "Thor" sequel, with fans understandably expecting them to have a sizable
role simply because of the time and effort it takes to get the ensemble cast in for filming.
Unfortunately, once Thor starts hunting Gorr, the Guardians
don't appear at all in the rest of the film. It's a shame, but this is Thor and Jane's story,
and it's probably for the best that all the big personalities
on Peter Quill's crew don't take it over The trailers also don't touch on Jane having
cancer at all. Instead, they just show us that she has Thor's powers in fight scenes set in New
Asgard and Omnipotence City -- and her wicked Asgardian costume to boot. It's obvious why
Marvel Studios kept this out of the marketing, because her poor health is a key emotional
plot point of the story -- as well as being a drastic development for Jane's arc. The movie
wastes no time in explaining that Jane has stage 4 cancer and that she's going through chemotherapy.
Let's not forget that Portman actually clarified that the film uses the storyline in Jason Aaron's
"Mighty Thor" comics back in 2020 in an interview with Yahoo, so it's not like it
was a secret – just something that didn't need to be in the trailers. The star vaguely touched
on the cancer storyline when speaking to Variety recently, saying that the "duality" of being a
hero "might give [someone] a different perspective on [their] human life." Taika Waititi added,
"Part of why [Natalie] wanted to play that character is that she has a dilemma in the book."
The health element obviously affects how Jane acts as Mighty Thor, while also changing Thor's
perspective on the universe. Plus, using her cancer in the marketing would definitely feel
grim, placing this plot element at odds with the light, exciting tone the trailers tried to convey.
In the final battle with Gorr, Jane decides to become Mighty Thor for a final time to stop him
from killing all the gods using the Eternity altar. Although Gorr makes it to Eternity,
Jane's sacrifice and Thor's decision to be with her in her final moments makes the villain change
his mind about what to do with the universe. So basically, it's a good thing Marvel didn't
include Jane's health in the trailers, even if it was a bit deceptive.
The trailers also did a grand job of hiding Christian Bale's Gorr aside from a few moody
shots of him snarling threats to the gods as he wields the Necrosword. To be fair, with a name
like Gorr the God Butcher it doesn't take a genius to figure out what his goals are in the sequel,
so Marvel didn't need to explicitly reveal his full plan. But what is a complete surprise is
the fact that he kidnaps all the children from New Asgard as a way of luring Thor
and Mighty Thor into the Necroverse. The gambit works as expected in the
film -- which means he can focus on his true goal to steal Thor's Stormbreaker axe. This is all
so he can get to the altar of Eternity, a place which would let him resurrect his own daughter.
It says a lot about Gorr that he isn't afraid of using other kids to get her back,
and Taika Waititi is clearly toying with themes about encouraging children to be better people
than their parents. That becomes even clearer when Thor agrees to look after Gorr's daughter
as the villain dies, and raises her as a hero. Thor's Dad-God status is a huge change for the
hero going forward, but it's such a central element of the story in "Love and Thunder,"
it's kind of amazing we don't even get a whiff of it from the trailers.
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