It’s a quandary for the ages. On one hand, it’s certainly not my business to tell Thor: Love and Thunder star Natalie Portman—an Oscar winner and the Padmé Amidala—what she deserves. On the other hand...have you seen this most recent Marvel offshoot? Because much like Padmé, Portman’s Thor character, Jane Foster deserves a way better lover than this.
That’s not to say there’s no romance in Taika Waititi’s Thor: Ragnarok follow-up. In fact, Love and Thunder reunites our braggadocious demigod with his deepest love: his mighty, heavenly mallet, Mjölnir.
Of all the original Avengers hero series, Thor’s films might’ve had the roughest start. Thor: The Dark World, which saw Marvel unceremoniously fire Patti Jenkins and replace her with Alan Taylor, was a critical disaster. When Taika Waititi took over for Ragnarok, the story moved on without Jane. Love and Thunder, which reunites the two through urgent (and tragic) circumstances, seeks to heal the messy rift and provide closure. Unfortunately, this is a Marvel movie—which means that goal must take its place in a long list of cinematic-universe plot machinations, shallowly rendered emotional arcs, and self-referential jokes.
At the start of Love and Thunder, we discover that Jane has been diagnosed with a Stage IV cancer. She’s climbing the walls during chemo, desperate to get back to her lab to look for answers and alternatives. Eventually, she hears the siren call of an old friend—Mjölnir, whom Thor once commanded to protect her.
Destroyed during Ragnarok, Mjölnir made a quick appearance in Avengers: Endgame and now returns in pieces, laid out on velvet in New Asgard. Cue the origin story behind Mighty Thor: Jane proves herself worthy of wielding Thor’s punishingly selective hammer, seemingly by picking it up straight out of the display case and taking it home like an interdimensional Nicolas Cage.
One might think Thor would be stunned to see his ex show up in New Asgard in the middle of a battle, just in time to save his ass while dressed like a previous version of himself. Despite some initial confusion, however, Thor seems perfectly happy to fight alongside this bizarro-world blast from the past. Even after things have died down and their enemies lie dead on the ground, the God of Thunder apparently accesses a superhuman patience that previously eluded him and waits several beats before inundating her with only a fraction of the obvious questions that might come to mind in such a surreal situation.
But Jane’s not the only lost love on Thor’s mind; there’s also the hammer she’s spinning around her head just like he used to do when it was his. Sure, he’s got Stormbreaker now, and hey, an enchanted axe isn’t too shabby! But there’s always something about the one that got away—especially when that one was literally forged in the heart of a dying star.
Thor’s wandering eye becomes one of Love and Thunder’s most successful recurring bits; we often catch the existentially plagued demigod pining after Mjölnir only to jump at the sight of Stormbreaker lingering ominously behind him. Consider this Marvel’s entry into the distracted-boyfriend meme canon. But more importantly, Thor also verbally checks in with Mjölnir—and Stormbreaker, for that matter—throughout the film. At times, he seems more attuned to the emotional needs of his phallic stand-ins—errr, weapons—than to those of the real-life human woman fighting in front of him.
Perhaps I exaggerate—a little. But Jane and Thor’s underwhelming romance, even despite Portman and Hemsworth’s charmingly off-kilter chemistry, has ultimately become another example of Marvel’s dysfunctional approach to romance. Apart from Wanda and Vision, whose compelling coupledom felt more like a fluke than a deliberate success in the beginning, MCU love stories have a shocking flop rate when placed center stage. (Remember the time they tried to hook up Black Widow and Hulk? Yikes.)
One would think, at some point, that epic hero stories might also involve epic love. But MCU movies largely prefer sideline flirtation, queer-baiting, and star-crossed romances—avenues that keep all that sappy nonsense contained and out of the way for the stars of the show, fighting, and cheeky humor. (Sincerity? Ew!)
Then again, given how Marvel’s one bona fide sex scene turned out, perhaps it’s worth keeping everyone’s bulletproof spandex on and fully zipped until further notice. (Is that why Love and Thunder goes to great lengths to explicitly tell us that, no, the gay rock guys in this movie do not fuck, but instead procreate by holding hands over a molten lava pit? Your guess is as good as mine on that one!) That said: If anyone at Marvel really wants to make things interesting, I’d highly recommend an alternate-universe series in which Jane and Tessa Thompson’s exquisitely hot Viking warrior character, Valkyrie, become U-Haul lesbians and ride off into the sunset.
