Thor 2: The Dark World Weekend Release and Movie Review

My handsome hubby and I made Thor and Lady Sif cosplays last year for the midnight release of The Avengers on May 4, 2012. We were one of the lucky few that managed to nab tickets to to the official Disney premiere at The El Capitan Theater in Hollywood, California where Stan Lee was present showing off his mega-Marvel collection.

It was our first time working with eva foam for the armor elements of the costume, and at the time we started on our project, there weren’t any existing blueprints or pepakura files for Thor’s armor. So while a lot of costume aspects were rendered from scratch and thrown together last minute, we were super thrilled with the outcome… and Jonathan even placed second in the cosplay contest!

The costume contest at The Avengers midnight release. Jon and I are on the far end. The contest was by selection only… you couldn’t enter, they had to tap you for eligibility. Even so, there were a lot of amazing costumes that DIDN’T come up on stage, while some lame-o ones made it up.

Jon and I with our friends Will and Houkje. We pretty much stole these photos off of The El Capitan Theater website, haha.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5E57r3N9ow]

You can see us at 30 seconds, 47 seconds, 54 seconds and you can my handsome friend Will cosplaying as Tony Stark at 2 minutes 18 seconds. ^_^

At the time of The Avengers release, when we were still high on the crack of Marvel superheroes coming together into one orgasmically epic film, we had made plans to redo most aspects of Jonathan’s costume to make it more realistic and sturdy. Buuuuuut, then Jonathan joined the Navy. And we knew he’d be in A School during the release of Thor 2. Since there were too many unknowns – where will we be, will he be able to go with his schedule, will there even be a strong cosplay crowd, etc., etc. – we decided to forget about any plans to cosplay to the opening weekend. *sniffles*

BUT! Then we met up with this crazy awesome group of cosplayers, the Pensacola Costumers Guild, and we knew we had to get in on the fun. A dozen frenzied calls to my mother pleading for cosplay care packages and a couple weeks later, we received Jonathan’s Thor costume in the mail, just in time for this weekend release! Oh, and we had to buy him a wig since the Navy chopped off his luscious locks of hair. *sobs*

Which brings us to last night and the opening of Thor 2: The Dark World! We met up with the guild at Books a Million for some geekery and nerdtastic fellowship – with lots of costume show and tell and prancing around for photo-ops. I went sans costume since I had the baby and I’m pretty sure my costume wouldn’t fit. But I got to play camera girl, which was a nice change!

The costuming guild took up the entire lower section / back two rows of the theater.

SO!! Enough with the chit chat! On with the movie review!

Omg omg omg omg!!!! KJNSDFUISNAFKNkjbfiusnbsadn!!!!! After leaving the movie theater I kept trying to gather my thoughts into some kind of cohesive dialogue so I could give at least the semblance of an intellectual review of the movie, but every internal monologue on the film just sounded like an Herbal Essence commercial.

Yes. My mind was sexually assaulted by this movie. And I liked it.

I can only really put it into perspective by saying it is WAY better than Thor 1. But it is not quite as good as The Avengers. (Which, as of right now, is the best movie in the universe.)

The only remotely negative comments I could conjure for this film is that Darcy had a lot of screen time, she dominated almost every scene she was in, and her relentlessly dry humor and quirky comments got a little overbearing at times. That’s not to say that I dislike her character or her lines. It just seemed a little too much for some scenes. But then awesomeness would ensue and all of her forcefulness would be forgotten.

My other complaint is the dry(ish) romance. I did like the subtle love triangle aspects they planted seeds for with Lady Sif and Thor and I wonder what kind of rivalry they’re gonna conjure up there for following movies… and how closely they’ll stick to the comic book storyline? But the only think I don’t like about these movies is that the Thor / Jane romance is a little empty. I mean, I enjoy it, don’t get me wrong. It’s just that freaking Edward and Bella from Twilight seem to have a better relationship build up and much more of an engaging romance than these two. Again, I’m not complaining. But it could be BETTER, I think.

So that’s the summary of my negative comments, review-wise.

Now for the good stuff! I loved, loved, LOVED the humor in this movie. It’s so much more in step with the overall Avengers theme and franchise now, that all of the movies – Iron Man, Thor, Captain America – appear to be taking on a solid form of being the “same story” in the same world, while simultaneously being totally apart, unique and stand-alone.

I noticed on Rotten Tomatoes that people were actually complaining about that. “They kept mentioning Shield. They kept mentioning Captain America. They kept referencing the other superheroes.” Seriously? This movie embraces continuity and builds on a brilliant tapestry of superhero synergy.. and that’s a BAD thing??? Uhhh, okay. That makes sense…. NOT. Those movie reviewers suck.

The Avengers references were AWESOME, the action was engaging, the imagery was stunning, the story wasn’t epic but it certainly was thrilling, and most importantly, they gave us a shirtless Thor scene.

So in my book, Thor 2 was a ten. GO SEE IT IF YOU HAVEN’T ALREADY!!!!!!!!!