[Thor] has to threaten twelve year olds playing video games.
Just to share, the line from my youngest daughter on the car ride home was "I'm not sure I like that NoobSlayer69 existing is now canon for the MCU."
Would that work for Cap? Iron Man. Can you imagine if they had decided to just make fun of Captain America continually for the entire movie?
You mean like they already did to Cap in Spider-Man: Homecoming? Where there was the running gag about his gawd-awful PSAs for students that he was decades out of touch with?
All of the MCU movies have humor. Look at how many times things have gone humorously wrong for Tony, in his own Ironman films or in various Avengers.
Thor has been the butt of jokes in his own shows, often because of his brother Loki, who hate gnomish paladins with rapiers .. wait, wrong Loki. *ahem* But Ragnarok came and put Thor in that role again and again ... and it worked. Even Hulk outsmarted him with the shocking door field, plus Grandmaster, Valkyrie, and the whole dang environment. Ragnarok did much better than the other Thor movies - grossing greater than 50% more than either of the first two. ($315mil vs. $181mil and $206mil.)
https://www.boxofficemojo.com/franchises/chart/?id=thor.htm
So yes, they found that, like Starlord ("Who?"), Thor did well as the butt-monkey for jokes to be made at. Trying to say that every character should have an equal amount of comedy should be self-evident as wrong - you can't say "this wouldn't work for Cap so it can't be done to Thor".
He abandons the throne at the end of Dark World. Him taking the throne and leading his people at the end of Ragnarok was character growth. But he's never given a chance to "rule" and then all but abandons his people to sit in a room, getting drunk and playing Fortnite. Having Thor actually assume the responsibility and *act* like a king—to take the job seriously—would have been a decent end to the character.
So what I'm hearing is - if they wanted to get rid of Thor, they had a great way to do it. That's great, but it seems they don't want to get rid of Thor.
Having him bugger off with Star-lord with more adventures is just returning Thor to where he was before Age of Ultron. Without even Jane Foster really. Heck, so he's pretty much the wandering warrior he was at the beginning of Thor.
I'm with you on this - I don't like all the backsliding of his character growth. He's doing what he always did, which would have been in character if he hadn't grown.
Again, I think the writers just had zero idea what to do with Thor as a character. So they decided to just rely on Chris Hemsworth's effortless charm and perfect comedic timing. So rather than make Thor into a character people care about and give people a reason to like Thor—like they did for Captain America and Iron Man—they changed Thor to match the actor.
And because the actor is willing to stick around, he's likely in Guardians 3. Not because he really belongs with that team or has a role to play in the next cosmic story. But because the actor has chemistry with Chris Pratt. Where he will likely continue to be a giant walking joke.
All of this is likely true. If Hemsworth will stay around as Thor, the studio will have him. If Ragnarok did fantastic financially because he has great comedic timing, putting him with one of the two high comedy teams (Ant-Man is the other, btu that's not as natural a pairing) so that they can math the tone of the movies also makes financial sense.
Does what actors want to do, and what brings in profit, always make the best story for everyone? I wish, but it doesn't. If it did, we'd have more Robert Downey Jr.
Hemsworth has draw, is in with an MCU team where he can use his comedic talents, and moviegoers know that the GotG films will have a lot of comedy and if that's not their wish they can avoid them. It's not the best it can be, and lets us down some in that they aren't acknowledging the great character growth he's had over the series. But people will still pay to see the next movie.
