Thor: The Dark World was another Marvel hit at the box office, but many critics and audiences expressed disappointment with the film’s dark tone and grim, serious story, which departed so dramatically from the God of Thunder’s more whimsical first solo outing and deadpan wittiness in
The Avengers. While a certain level of seriousness has been the order of the day in other superhero franchises, like
The Dark Knight or
Man of Steel, Marvel features have thus far gained a reputation for having a
crowd-pleasing sense of humor amid the action and adventure — making
The Dark World an outlier (however appropriately-titled) in its own franchise.
But
Thor: Ragnarok director Taika Waititi, previously a specialist in comedies like
Eagle vs Shark and the quirky vampire spoof
What We Do in The Shadows, says he has a solution for bringing levity back to the
Thor saga: add more jokes.
In an interview with
The Wrap at the Sundance Film Festival for his well recieved new feature
Hunt For The Wilderpeople, Waititi was asked how he’ll be dealing with an apparent edict from Marvel Studios boss Kevin Feige that the third
Thor film regain its sense of humor. Without missing a beat, Waititi replied that his approach will be to
“Just fill it with jokes.” After earning a laugh from the other assembled actors and filmmakers, the New Zealand-born writer/director elaborated on his intentions — tongue, presumably, planted firmly in cheek:
“Just take what they’ve done before… I’m just going to take the second Thor film and just add some jokes to that.”
