Have fans' thoughts on Taika Waititi changed?

I remember Thor Ragnarok being beloved by a lot of fans because of how Taika Waititi reinvented the character. Then he went on to direct Thor Love and Thunder and it seemed like he's not as beloved anymore.

I haven't seen Love and Thunder yet. To those that have, what did Taika do wrong compared to what he did right in Ragnarok?

Voir le contenu lié

Commentaires

urgasmic2025-12-31 22:43

Not mine. I thought it was good albeit flawed

ElectrosMilkshake2025-12-31 22:45

I never liked Ragnarok so the reaction to Love and Thunder felt like everyone else catching up.

The-ghost-of-life2025-12-31 23:07

Feels almost like a cosmic payback or something....

pwhales10112025-12-31 22:45

Nope. I didn’t like Ragnorak and I didn’t like Love & Thunder. Waititi’s brand of humor doesn’t work for me.

DarkSaiyanGoku2025-12-31 22:47

That's fair.

DarkSaiyanGoku2026-01-01 00:08

Okay whoever's downvoting me, fuck off!!!!

The-ghost-of-life2025-12-31 23:03

Same.

pwhales10112025-12-31 23:11

Not sure why I’m getting down voted. It’s not like I undercut every emotional moment with a bad joke.

Think-Ad-73962026-01-06 20:45

You're being downvoted by fake fans who would never have allowed movies like Iron Man or Winter Soldier to exist as they did.

Think-Ad-73962026-01-06 20:42

"I'll ruin your mythos in a minute, baby." - Taika Waititi

dmonkey11342025-12-31 22:46

I loved both, but I can understand people who don’t like funny Thor.

Think-Ad-73962026-01-06 20:41

He's inferior to serious Thor.

"I'll ruin your mythos in a minute, baby." - Taika Waititi

Johnny02302025-12-31 22:46

I've always thought Ragnarok was a good movie. It's comical, colorful, but it's restrained and has some beautiful moments. Love and Thunder overdoes it, overdoes everything it presents.

PiperDon2025-12-31 22:48

This is exactly how I feel about them as well. Nailed it.

DarkSaiyanGoku2025-12-31 22:48

Oh so it's like "if you overdo it, you ruin it"?

Johnny02302025-12-31 22:50

Yes, because you can be poetic and epic even with comedy, but if you don't stick to the content you end up in the grotesque and in parody.

natayaway2025-12-31 23:05

Having read the stories of how L&T’s production was handled, it was more of an issue of design by committee, test audiences, and executive meddling than it was Taika Waititi going off the rails bonkers.

When the rewrites and reshoots ended up bastardizing Gorr’s motivations for vengeance, I think it’s pretty clear that Taika just gave up and let the cards fall where they may...

Johnny02302025-12-31 23:10

I don't know if there were any production issues, but I see Waititi's artistic style, I just think things didn't go as hoped. The humor was too exaggerated and forced, so much so that even the emotional scenes seemed unbelievable, which wasn't the case with Ragnarok.

natayaway2025-12-31 23:30

From what I can piece together, Gorr was a little too reasonable / justified as a villain, so the higher ups meddled as much as they could reining him in.

When those details kept getting rewritten well INTO production, affecting the production schedule where they’d be set to record one draft of the script only to show up the day of shooting and the movie was being rewritten as they were shooting, the only thing Waititi actually had unadulterated control over were the gags.

He couldn’t stop the rewrites (no director for Marvel/Disney can, not even Jon Favreau when he was doing IM2… the Russos were pretty much the only ones that were given more freedom with a 2-parter). And they wouldn’t delay the movie.

So they shot one movie, had it rewritten from under them, with reshoots ordered for the stuff that was changed, and then reconvened in the cutting room floor and tried to rebuild the movie from two half movies.

So, at that point… what are you supposed to do?

I’m fairly certain the whole story-time voiceover with Korg is a patchwork editing room decision.

Nosedive8882025-12-31 23:04

It's more like too much of a good thing.

Ragnarok is one of the more funny MCU movies but he balanced it really well

With L&T pretty much everything is a joke. Even in the final fight when a minor character uses a very impractical item as a weapon (keeping it vague coz you haven't seen it)

But the opening fight scene may as well have been a parody sketch for MTV movie awards or a Jimmy Fallon skit...it's THAT bad and it just keeps going in that vain non-stop

Think-Ad-73962026-01-06 20:33

"I'll ruin your mythos in a minute, baby." - Taika Waititi

Detective_Vendetta2025-12-31 23:05

Im from NZ so i actually grew up on his films, Boy was a big hit with my group of childhood friends and i loved Ragnarok except one scene. I think Korg joking as Asgard was destroyed really took away from the ending.

Thats something he carried over into Love and Thunder. To much comedy and forgetting to let the emotional moment hit.

Dismal_Ad53792025-12-31 23:40

Thats exactly how I feel. Love Ragnarok, except for Korg's comment as Asgård is being destroyed

NrFive2025-12-31 22:47

As I just posted in another thread. I enjoyed it.

They announced in advance that it was a rom-com and the movie starts with Korg saying “let me tell you a story…” so it is from his pov which has its embellishments!

Edit:

Also from the BTS, they have used impressive new tech for some of the action scenes. If you enjoy that kind of stuff.

Cautious-Hedgehog6352025-12-31 22:49

I hated Love and Thunder honestly, had nothing to do with Lady Thor and everything to do with the Villian and flat comedy for me. It was too unserious and not funny when it tried to be

joseph220022025-12-31 23:23

Yeah, I kinda agree, gorr is a super serious villain, to put him in a more comedic movie feels wrong

Think-Ad-73962026-01-06 20:34

"I'll ruin your mythos in a minute, baby." - Taika Waititi

Caciulacdlac2025-12-31 22:49

I loved Ragnarok and liked Love and Thunder. The problem with the latter was that it was too comedic.

ujanmas2025-12-31 23:47

Trying to be comedic - some jokes are cringe

Think-Ad-73962026-01-06 20:35

"I'll ruin your mythos in a minute, baby." - Taika Waititi

SparkSh0wer2025-12-31 22:49

Love and thunder is extra silly for the folks that weren't fans of ragnarok. The biggest problem was wasted potential for what we got from Gorr, and Natalie Portman can't improv as well as the other actors. Shes great in scripted scenes, but very stiff and uncomfortable when trying to join the improv scenes.

The movie is fun and is worth the watch.

FrankReynoldsCPA2025-12-31 23:48

Korg was also criminally overused in Love & Thunder. He's good in very small doses. Very small. We got way too much in L&T.

hansuluthegrey2025-12-31 22:49

Ragnarok is pretty good but love and thunder is genuinely a terrible movie.

Dagglin2025-12-31 22:50

You could watch the movie, read reviews, or search previous threads

axJustinWiggins2025-12-31 22:51

Ragnarok is like 85% silly, 15% heart. Love & Thunder is like 98% silly, 2% heart.

I love stupid comedies, Christian Bale and Guns n' Roses (who do the Love & Thunder soundtrack), so I enjoy both of these movies, but I completely sympathize with the seemingly many fans who wanted a more serious take on the material.

bythewayne2025-12-31 23:02

I disagree. There's two of the biggest emotional scenes in MCU (your mother is calling me / are you the god of hammers?)

I'd concede 25% heart

DoctorLudnik_7172025-12-31 22:53

I still feel the same about him. He's a very talented director who has a great eye for comedy--but that doesn't mean he's going to be the right fit for certain stories (particularly anything involving the scale of Gorr).

ZaneJulien164832025-12-31 22:58

Thor: Ragnarok has a lot of comedy, but the film's tone balances between comedy and action. Thor: Love and Thunder went overboard with the comedy and wasted the chance for good adaptations of two incredible Thor stories: God Butcher (with Gorr) and Mighty Thor (with Jane Foster).

Think-Ad-73962026-01-06 20:34

"I'll ruin your mythos in a minute, baby." - Taika Waititi

danohaggard2025-12-31 23:00

Thor has 2 good movies, and 2 bad movies.

RubFun63992026-01-05 07:26

I would say 1 great, 1 good, 1 alright, 1 terrible

Think-Ad-73962026-01-06 20:35

Yep, the first two.

"I'll ruin your mythos in a minute, baby." - Taika Waititi

Derron_2025-12-31 23:03

I think Love and Thunder is an example where not saying no to a director can hurt a movie. It felt like Taika got told that he can do what he wants after Ragnarok's success and he just didn't find the heart in this movie so it's got all of the humour and little of the emotion

zeroxray2025-12-31 23:04

what I disliked about Ragnarok was that it ignored Thors best friends and hardly in Asgard. That said its pretty damn entertaining just missing the dynamics that made thor 1 pretty great

The-ghost-of-life2026-01-02 10:36

I love how they retconned it later in Infinity War to Heimdall being his best friend. No he wasn't, he was very important to Thor as an important figure in Asgard, but he was never his best friend. Were the Warriors Three offensive to anyone, that they had to remove their existence from the movies? What the hell.

Big_Epsilon2025-12-31 23:05

I don’t know the ins and outs, obviously, but it felt like one was a guided project he got to add his sparkle to, and then the other was Marvel giving him more control because of his success. Equally, he might have taken more swings cos the first one had gone well, and taken too many

Realmfaker2025-12-31 23:06

Ragnarok is an awfull Thor movie imo, nothing like him.

Love and Thunder is also an awfull Thor movie.

But looking at them as just "movies" and not "Thor movies". Ragnarok is a fun movie, as well as Love and Thunder.

So to me, they are both bad Thor movies, but fun movies. But as fun movies I like Love and Thunder more, never understood the Ragnarok hype.

Loved Thor in his original 2 movies as well as the 2 first Avengers movies. Disliked him immensly in Thor 3 and 4 and thought he was okay to good in the 3rd and 4th Avengers movies.

x14loop2025-12-31 23:07

If the head of Disney could publicly criticize The Marvels director under the bus for the way that movie was, then Taikia should have similarly been publicly criticized. But he wasn't. Eeek.

eagc72025-12-31 23:49

I think the reason they didn't threw Taika under the bus is because Thor 4 still made some profit even if it was less compared to Ragnarok, while The Marvels outright bombed hard, maybe if Thor 4 had made like 100-200M, that is when they would be looking at to who to blame

Affectionate_Past_392025-12-31 23:08

Yeah, people have already hit the nail on the head, but Thor: Ragnarök was balanced. Had heart, levity, truly touching scenes (such as Odin and the boys), but Love and Thunder massively swung too far in the comedy direction for my taste.

And Christian Bale was CRIMINALLY underused, somehow.

cyprinthedeathwitch2025-12-31 23:09

Ragnarok was fun, Love and Thunder was too much fun and not enough story. Taika is a good director, one of my newer favorite movies is Jojo Rabbit, but Love and Thunder took everything several steps too far and we didn't get a satisfactory villain at all. And that's the end of Jane Foster too, I guess.....

bythewayne2025-12-31 23:14

The solo genius is a myth. Ragnarok was those moments were everything came into place.

He just needs to dial down the humor and have a good team of writers.

I think Kyle and Jost were involved with the first drafts of Ragnarok, I don't really know how much of their input was left there but they're top names at least in comics / adaptations.

But what you heard is true. Before Ragnarok Thor was too stiff

FrankReynoldsCPA2025-12-31 23:46

The best interpretation of the Thor character is somewhere between Ragnarok and Infinity War, which are easily his best films.

Those 2 + Endgame show that Hemsworth does have range with good writing and directing.

Chaoticgood7902025-12-31 23:16

Love and thunder somehow took a good villain (and actor) and failed to use him nor make him terrifying. Made too many jokes bc they saw we liked the comedy and went overboard

Opening_Track_12272025-12-31 23:22

>I haven't seen Love and Thunder yet.

Go see it then tell us what you think he did wrong compared to what he did right in Ragnarok

DarkSaiyanGoku2025-12-31 23:24

Will do. 👍

eagc72025-12-31 23:25

Basically in fandom if you do one bad film you are enemy number 1 and they no longer want you nearby beloved franchises, i mean look at Patty Jenkins, she delivers a great Wonder Woman movie, she's beloved........then she does Wonder Woman 2 and now she's hated and everyone acts as if she'll only make bad films from here onwards and so on.

FrankReynoldsCPA2025-12-31 23:52

Meanwhile Rian Johnson made what IMO is one of the best films of 2025.

I really don't get people who turn on a director because of one movie.

I didn't really care for Dunkirk, but Nolan is still one of my favorite directors.

Think-Ad-73962026-01-06 20:37

"I'll ruin your mythos in a minute, baby." - Taika Waititi

comineeyeaha2025-12-31 23:27

Ragnarok was a good movie that was also funny, L&T was a mediocre movie that thought it was hilarious. I was fully prepared to love that movie, but the more just didn’t land for me. There’s a good story in there, it just felt like some exec misunderstood what people liked about Ragnarok. It’s crazy to me that Taika made 2 Thor movies and they’re one of my favorites and one of the worst.

RadSkeleton8082025-12-31 23:33

In addition to what others said, I think the Guardians bit was far too long. A lot of that screen time could have been used to establish Gorr more.

Unlike Hela, Gorr felt like there was no stakes behind him. All the stakes were said, not shown.

Maven36792025-12-31 23:34

It’s just cause it was too much slapstick
Watch the movie as though Korg is narrating it via his viewed perception

Maven36792025-12-31 23:34

Btw I enjoy the goats

CartographerOk79482025-12-31 23:34

I still think there's a lot of good stuff in Love and Thunder, but I completely get why people weren't overly impressed with it.

Taika is a funny writer, and an interesting director. The trouble is, he doesn't seem to like taking anything seriously. With Ragnarok, he was able to work his magic on someone else's script. Bit of Waititi flair and Hemsworth improv on top of a solid script. He wrote LaT himself, and it's just a bit too much of him in something that generally works best as a collaboration.

James Gunn pulls off writing/directing well, but I do wonder if responses would be different if the Guardians had started out with a different director and tone before he took the reigns. I suspect he'd still do pretty well tbf, but hard to tell if everyone would feel the same

FrankReynoldsCPA2025-12-31 23:55

The wild thing is the he proved he CAN balance humor and a serious topic with Jojo Rabbit, which he wrote and directed.

Why he didn't do that with L&T I don't know.

CartographerOk79482025-12-31 23:56

He doesn't come across as respecting the material in interviews at all. I do think caring a little bit definitely helps. It's good to take a new take on the characters, but I think it really shows when writers aren't interested in the original work

Own_Giraffe_69282025-12-31 23:36

What Taika did wrong with L&T is that he didn't give a shit.

He's been very upfront about how he never wanted to do Ragnarok, but he needed the money. He won't admit it, but I also think there was a desire in him to prove himself, to prove that he could work within "the Hollywood machine" and put out a *really* good movie. Plus there's the fact that Kevin Feige was probably breathing down his neck and making sure he gets it right, vetoing Taika on the more controversial aspects (like showing Odin as a crazy old homeless man and demanding he die with dignity).

For L&T, all that was off the table. Taika still took the movie just because he wanted the money, and probably as an excuse to make out with Tessa Thompson [(yep, that happened)](https://www.reddit.com/r/Fauxmoi/comments/njhqna/picture_excl_rita_ora_and_taika_waititi_get_cosy/). He no longer needed to prove himself because he knew he neither wanted nor would be given another big movie after this. As for Feige, he was stretched far too thin to supervise his filming. The result was a complete mess, with a final movie that I'm certain is completely unrecognizable from the initial script (if there even WAS a script).

That's what infuriates me the most about it. Not that it's bad - who cares, it's not the first bad MCU movie, it's not even the first bad Thor movie. It's that it *could* have been good, but Taika just didn't give a shit. He went there to have a fun vacation for the cast and their kids, to make out with cute girls, and to take Marvel's money. Not to make a good movie. It shows.

DarkSaiyanGoku2025-12-31 23:51

Kevin Feige hasn't been as involved with the MCU that much.

The-ghost-of-life2026-01-01 15:36

And that's why I left the MCU after Ragnarok. Waititi should have never gotten the position of a director of a Thor movie. He clearly has no passion for this character and for superheroes and comics in general. It's not like they didn't know that when they hired him. He has never hidden it. He openly scorned the source material, he bragged about reading barely one issue of Thor for this role before deciding he can do it better. They took him not despite knowing this, but *because* of it, it seems. They just wanted to make Thor's character more popular and the movie to make more money, doesn't matter the cost to the integrity of this character and what would happen with it afterward. And yeah I get that they want to make their movies the most profitable they can be, but I believe that if the cost is changing an already established character and basically throw away everything that was built around it before, you just don't do it (it's not like they were struggling. The MCU was extremely successful and rich at the time).

It was very profitable so I guess they are happy about it. I personality decided I am not going to invest emotionally in MCU characters anymore. The Guardians are the exception, Gunn insisted on keeping these characters and their stories consistent and developed them in an organic manner, that's why it works for me, my emotional investment in these characters and their story had been paid off.

Own_Giraffe_69282026-01-01 15:40

The Russos also had 0 passion for Captain America when they were hired to do Winter Soldier. Same goes for Gunn with Guardians. You should've quit the MCU then. Also, what are you doing on the MCU sub if you haven't seen an MCU movie in nearly a decade?

The-ghost-of-life2026-01-01 21:36

A YouTube video with some funny scenes from the first Guardians came up in my feed a few weeks ago. I watched it and it made me want to watch the movie again. I watched it, then followed with the second and then the third. It was amazing. And it got me back to MCU, sorta. Watched Infinity War and Endgame too. Didn't particularly liked what they have done to the Guardians there, hated what they have done to Star Lord. It evoked feelings that were long forgotten, for example my bitterness and resentment about what Ragnarok did to Thor and the way people reacted when I expressed my feelings about this movie - telling me aggressively to shut up and dismissed my feelings, basically.

Gunn and one of the Russo brothers are life long comics fans (the other Russo brother read less comics than his brother, but still read some). As far as I know, Gunn also read some the Guardians issues back in the days. They may not have being particularly passionate about the specific characters whose movies they asked to direct when they agreed to direct these movies, but they definitely developed passion for them later. Both Gunn and the Russo brothers love and care about their characters (the Guardians and Cap, respectively), this much is very evident.

In Gunn's case, he made a lot of changes to the characters compared to the comics, so he made him his own in a way, and he directed all the Guardians movies. He clearly love these characters and care about their depiction, their developments and arcs. They are his "babies" and he criticized some of the choices that were made in Infinity War regarding Star Lord, because he actually cares. As for the Russo brothers, I actually like the Russo brothers as directors less than most but the character of Captain America is one of the areas in which they excel. The character was already established in previous movies, yet the transition of this character from the previous movies to the second Cap movie is seamless. Their Cap is written better than he is written by Whedon (it is apparent especially with the second Avengers movie). Cap is clearly the character they care most about, that's actually one thing I criticize them about their Avengers movies, it seems they only really care about the characterization of Cap, Tony and to some extant Natasha I guess, and don't care much about the other characters.

Waititi is not and never has been a fan of comics. That by itself maybe isn't so bad, but he also seems to be pretty contemptuous about them. He regards the source material inferior. I can't even credit him for the creation of this new Thor, this was Hemsworth doing, he just rolled with it because funny is good and who cares. It's also [Hemsworth playing himself basically](https://youtu.be/T8bxSJtrE6U?&t=131). He doesn't care about the character or the world-building. He just wanted to make a fun comedy and have a good time. In Ragnarock he at least seemed to care about the set design and how the cameras were shot and other things like that. In Love and Thunder, he doesn't care even about that.

Think-State302025-12-31 23:40

He needs to take his movies more seriously.

Think-Ad-73962026-01-06 20:38

"I'll ruin your mythos in a minute, baby." - Taika Waititi

Mrbeankc2025-12-31 23:41

Taika Waititi is a gifted storyteller but doesn't know how to have restraint. His film JoJo Rabbit suffers from the same issues as love and Thunder. An event in the film 2/3 of the way through has a tramatic effect on JoJo (I won't say anything specific beyond that). The film starts to take a dramatic turn and then we go back to it being played for laughs.

People end up dancing and laughing which doesn't fit where the story was going. I like the film but Waititi much like he stepped all over Jane's death with the comedy did the same with JoJo Rabbit.

Think-Ad-73962026-01-06 20:46

"I'll ruin your mythos in a minute, baby." - Taika Waititi

PraiseRao2025-12-31 23:41

So in Ragnarok the comedy is just to cut the tension. It's used for character moments. In Love and Thunder everything is a joke. The bad guy is a joke. The hero is a joke. The side hero is treated as a joke. It's joke here joke there a naked Thor just cause. It's all jokes.

Just to put into prospective. Gorr the God Butcher one of the darkest stories Marvel gave Thor at the time and turned it into a joke. They took Jane being Thor throws out why she does what she does and just have her as a joke.

magvadis2025-12-31 23:42

They were both fun. Don't get the hate. Not sure what he is up to.

Feels like L&T got blasted for being part of the post-endgame backlash as a whole.

Think-Ad-73962026-01-06 20:38

"I'll ruin your mythos in a minute, baby." - Taika Waititi

The hate is justified. Just like it would be justified if it turns out Doomsday is comedy/musical.

FrankReynoldsCPA2025-12-31 23:42

Ragnarok is one of my top 3 MCU films.

I don't hate Love & Thunder, but it isn't nearly as good. The editing was off, Gorr was great but underutilized, Korg should have been left out or severely reduced, and the Guardians really didn't need to be involved. The goats gag should have ended as soon as they left the planet they got them from.

The Mighty Thor stuff worked(except Jane seemed to have suffered an IQ loss at some point? I know chemo can fuck your head up so maybe that can explain it). The gorr stuff worked, but we needed a lot more of it.

Thor seemed to match his intelligence to the people he's surrounded with. He was with the guardians at the beginning and was essentially on Drax's intellectual level. Then he gets split off and ends up Jane and Valkyrie and his intelligence returns throughout the movie.

I still love Taika and look forward to seeing more projects from him, but L&T was not a great example of what he's capable of.

lrbikeworks2025-12-31 23:47

I don’t know. I kind of liked love and thunder. I feel like it balanced comedy and seriousness pretty well. The ending was a little too pat, but it wrapped everything up nicely.

I totally agree ragnarok was better by far. Love mad thunder kind of came in a period where marvel has been a little lost after endgame, and I definitely feel like love and thunder suffers from trying too hard. But I don’t think it is deserving of hate.

crimsonf1sh2025-12-31 23:49

I think he overdid it with the jokes. That being said, I don’t think it takes away from how well he did with Ragnarok.

Filmmaking-wise, he had a really solid streak with Hunt for the Wilderpeople, Ragnarok, and Jojo Rabbit. He had a couple misses in a row with Love & Thunder and Next Goal Wins. I think because of recency bias (and potentially overexposure?), he’s fallen out of favor with a lot of people, but I don’t doubt he’ll eventually make another solid movie and get back in everyone’s good graces.

Monsoon_Magic2025-12-31 23:51

I hated Ragnarok so I’ve been in the minority of folks that never liked Taika since the beginning. But at this point, I don’t care what Marvel does. I don’t watch their movies anymore in theater.

Think-Ad-73962026-01-06 20:40

Good.

"I'll ruin your mythos in a minute, baby." - Taika Waititi

MX24192026-01-01 00:08

Just way too over the top with the comedic aspect. I had my hand on my head the entire movie in shock on how this movie got approved. The only things I liked was the action scenes and a certain character introduced. Otherwise Taika is an ok director. I liked Jojo's Rabbit. If he were to come back he should direct a Squirrel Girl Special Presentation.

Wooden-Radish-90082026-01-01 02:24

Media illiteracy killed Love and Thunder

ReddiTrawler20212026-01-01 19:21

You should probably see Love and Thunder.

I found that film to be lesser than Ragnarok was.

pinkishgrayman2026-01-02 07:56

He made like one or two good movies. People only like ragnarok because its funny and has a lot of action when you look a bit under the surface you'll see how ragnarok ruined the potential for a world War hulk la movie for some shitty jokes even though its a beloved ip, reduced a interesting character to a generic villain with zero depth merely to exist as a antagonist, its incredibly bad at balancing serious moments and comedic ones, completely undermines the journey thor already went on, treats loki like a joke there's a lot and people only noticed when those issues carried over larger into love and thunder. He cant do a serious scene for 10 minutes without being undercut by a cheap laugh