Am I no fun, like Captain Marvel?
I've come to expect more from What if...? than Episode 7 could deliver.
The Short Take:
Episode 7 is amusing enough, but silly and shallow relative to its predecessors.
Image Credit: Den of Geek
The Long Take:
[SPOILER ALERT: This is a Thor-centric episode, so anything Thor-related is on the Bacchanalian banquet table of spoils.]
Out of all the Thor films we’ve gotten to date, Taika Waititi’s energetic and quirky Thor: Ragnarok (2017) is, for me, leagues ahead of the others. The excitement on Chris Hemsworth’s face when he sees the Hulk show up in the stadium still delights. And the soundtrack can’t be beat; I can listen to those 80s pop synth tunes all day.
This episode of What If…?, which posits what the universe would be like if Thor grew up as a ne’er-do-well only child, desperately wants to get back to the magic of that film. The bulk of the episode takes place on the Las Vegas strip, where Thor has decided to throw the most thunderous party Midgard has ever seen. The very premise of the episode is designed to invite viewers to tag along for a good time. And many of the characters from the film show up: most notably Jeff Goldblum’s Grandmaster and Corg, the hapless Cronan Warrior voiced by Taika Waititi himself. Several characters from the Guardians of the Galaxy show up as well. Most of these appearances, however, are fleeting cameos and nothing more. The sheer volume of them created more of a party atmosphere, and I think that was the point.
I did laugh. A steady stream of chuckles and guffaws permeated my viewing. But, by the end, I wondered what it had all been for. In order to run with the Party Thor bit, the episode has to simplify Thor to a teenager who’s afraid of getting busted by his mom, Frigga. This, in turn, makes the storytelling and humor in general more juvenile. And as a character, Thor is simpler, in intelligence, personality, and emotional depth. This is especially noticeable on the heels of Loki, which very thoughtfully interrogated how Loki has been defined by his relationships and potentially pigeonholed by them. Here, the Watcher shows our Thor and Loki together and alludes to them defining one another, but when Frost Giant Loki shows up, all he really does is fist bump Thor a bunch. I wanted more identity exploration, but all I got was a tall, slushy alcoholic drink that I can’t finish.
To be fair, I might expect too much, because the purpose of this episode may just be to key up Waititi’s return to the MCU, Thor: Love and Thunder (2022). Based on the cast list, it looks like this film will continue the Thor/Guardians of the Galaxy team-up that started in Avengers: Infinity War (2018), which explains why we see Rocket passed out in a sink in an Easter egg referencing Bradley Cooper in The Hangover. I get it. Good vibes and MCU hype only, please.
Surprisingly, my favorite part of this episode was…Captain Marvel. While I originally loved the idea of there being a female Marvel hero with her own story, the execution of the 2019 film Captain Marvel disappointed. So it was great to see her being unleashed on this episode, no holds barred. Her grit and determination here, along with witnessing her sheer power as she throws down with Thor made me look forward to seeing her more in the future.
The continent-spanning fights between them addressed the common comic book hero problem of awkward power rankings in a way I enjoyed. It’s hard to pit an Average Joe archer, for example, (no offense, Hawkeye…well, maybe a little) against a Norse god, but Captain Marvel went round for round with Thor, and it was a joy to watch. Though, I did have a hard time believing that she wouldn’t catch on to how Mjolnir works. As funny as the “hammer-ang” joke was, I don’t think it was worth making her look oblivious.
The past few episodes of What if…? have ended with very abrupt cliffhangers, but the sudden appearance of what I can only describe as a Vision-Ultron-Thanos hybrid is by far the most confusing and random. There was zero set-up for this in the episode. My bigger complaint about these cliffhangers, though, is that they will likely never be resolved. What can we call that — a hanging cliffhanger? A suspended cliffhanger?
(…See how annoying it is to have random, unresolved issue brought up at the very end?)