Thor: The Dark World

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My dear friend and I went to see Thor: The Dark World in the theater yesterday. I thought it was spectacular, as I knew it would be, and it was almost exactly what I expected... plus much more.

As always, Marvel had special effects to impress, characters too honorable not to love, and one character in particular whose changeableness somehow manages to capture my heart. What is is about such a dark and troubled character like Loki that causes this? Is it the charming actor who plays his part coming through bringing the audience to tears, or is there something in the character itself that demands the need for love? In this movie, as much as if not even more than the first Thor, I felt compelled to offer that love, if only I could. I will not give anything away to those who still dearly wish to see this film, but I will say, we all desperately want to see Loki change, become the hero... don't we?

Sadly, there was one part of the movie I did not appreciate at all, and that is crude humor. Sometimes I forget that the world thinks about suchlike dreadful things in the exact opposite manner that I do, but at the same time as feeling this disgust, I was grateful to know that something so awful still disgusted me.

In spite of this minor disappointment, I was a bit impressed with some of the allusions in the movie, especially one at the very beginning when Odin, Thor's father, introduces us to the film's main theme: light verses darkness. Odin says that before light there was darkness, and in a way, he was right. This is a nod to Genesis 1:1-5,

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters. Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light day, and the darkness He called night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day."

As usual, the secular world interpreted this truth differently. In the movie, Odin seems to claim that there was no light at all, only darkness, he does not explain how the light came to be, or any of that (we Christians know of course that God is light, and has always existed, and also obviously created the world and the light and darkness, etcetera, so we know the answers to those questions), but regardless of this confusion, I found it interesting how often, as in this example, allusions to God were made. Having good theological teaching and a proper worldview going into the theater probably helped with this.

Also, the humor was beyond expectation or hope! Ugh... I do not wish to give any of this away either, but Loki especially had the theater laughing out loud!

All I ask of you is this, that if you go see Thor: The Dark World, that you lower your expectations on purpose, in order that you are completely blown away. (I was!)