How Bad Dialogue Ruined Thor 4

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It was just kind of jarring to see Christian Bale acting like his life depended on it then cut to Thor's naked buttcheeks the next scene.

In the words of Futurama, “You can’t just have your characters say how they feel! That makes me feel angry!”

"I want to die a warrior's death." "The battle's over." Realization "Well, come on, help me up."

I watched an interview with Taika where he discussed his writing technique which is to write a script then put it away for two years then come back and completely rewrite it with a fresh mind and "only the good parts" from the first draft that he can recall after the two years. While watching this movie all I was thinking was how there is no way marvel would let him do that, especially with all their last minute changes and trying to fit this into the larger mcu. We've seen his other works. we know what he can do. I wonder what this movie would have looked like if he was given the time (and also not just cashing in that marvel paycheck, respectfully).

Not to mention how the jokes basically overshadowed literally everything in the story. Which sucks because you can tell that Christian Bale and Natalie Portman are trying to make this story work. But it just can't.

the worst part about the narration is that it's literally Taika Waititi telling the audience exactly what's happening in the movie HE MADE

As a screenwriter I can tell you there's a real chance the writers originally had these scenes closer to what you describe, but a studio exec may have asked them to bring those emotional sentiments out more, to make them obvious. Removing the subtext may have addressed that note and made the execs happy.

honestly they could have had korg talk about how thor and the guardians went on amazing adventures and talk to us about how it was super fun and epic but what we actually see on screen is Thor getting more and more sad. could have been a cool little thing about how korg idolizes Thor and didn't even realize that Thor was feeling down etc

I think the writers and Taika are aware of this. I think they find characters over explaining things awkwardly hilarious and they are doing it on purpose. The problem is they treat EVERYTHING as a joke, so when the time comes to deliver actual drama or emotion, it fails. Ragnorok balanced this mix much better.

The worst thing is that Taika has explicitly stated how campy, silly, and unrealistic the dialogues sounded in Thor comics, and wanted to make them sound more like 'normal people'. Look where we are now...💀💀💀

There is a reason why "Show don't tell" is one of the biggest principles of filmmaking and story telling.

Rocket’s scene with Thor in ‘Infinity War’ where they talk about what Thor’s been through and his chances against Thanos is perfect: Somber, has subtext, and has character development. Plus it ends with the fake eye bit which nicely cuts the tension.

It feels like Taika thought the idea of characters saying what they feel out loud was really funny, and it can be funny in something that is explicitly parody like Naked Gun, or as a one-off joke for a character like Drax. But for some reason he decided to have all the characters talk like this the entire movie, and it really didn't work. It just struck me that for me, the funniest part of the movie is Stormbreaker, the one "character" that can't speak, the way it just floats into the shot while Thor is gazing at Mjolnir, is way funnier than any of the dialogue.

The saddest part is that beneath all the forced humor, there is a genuenly good story. But they wasted Hemsworth, Bale and Portman, who are genuenly trying to make the script work In fact, Hemsworth in particular has stated his discontent in how Thor's character has been treated lately, which says a lot

That Sif scene's dialogue (and actually a lot of the dialogue in the film) felt like it was taken from the parody play that Loki (as Odin) was watching in Ragnarok.

I actually really loved how you fixed the dialogue and the scene between Thor and Peter, other than it just made it look better, but also we got to see the guardians bonding even more which I love so much since they are my favorite found family

I also hate how every other line in most modern MCU movies has to be a joke. Completely kills the mood in serious and emotional scenes.

"Don't give them 4; give them 2 + 2." That's one of the best explanations of subtext I've ever heard. 👍

Great nod to Wall-e. It's almost a polar opposite to the Thor film, it manages to convey so much through expression and context where so much of the movie is dialogue free. Imagine Taika had access to just a 10th of the skill of those writers.