Thanks to the
Chicago Sun-Times, we now have film critic Roger Ebert's incredibly negative review of Marvel Studios' latest blockbuster,
Thor. Since the review is too long to post into an article, I've taken significant quotes from it and posted them below. You can read the review in its entirety in the above source.
"The failure of 'Thor' begins at the story level, with a screenplay that essentially links special effects. Some of the dialog is mock heroic ('You are unworthy of your title, and I'll take from you your power!') and some of it winks ironically ('You know, for a crazy homeless person... he's pretty cut.') It adapts the original Stan Lee strategy for Marvel, where characters sometimes spoke out of character."
"Thor to begin with is not an interesting character. The gods of Greek, Roman and Norse mythology share the same problem, which is that what you see is what you get. They're defined by their attributes, not their personalities...Thor is a particularly limited case. What does he do? He wields a hammer. That is what he does."
"The Frost Giants spend most of their time being frosty in their subzero sphere of Jotunheim and occasionally freezing their enemies. Thor's brother Loki (Tom Hiddleston) is dark-haired, skinny, shifty-eyed and sadly lacking in charisma. He might as well be wearing a name tag: "Hi! I can't be trusted!" These villains lack adequate interest to supply a climactic battle, so the plot provides a Metal Giant, sends him to the New Mexico town, and has him blast fiery rays that blow up gas stations real good but always miss his targets. He is apparently stopped by a sword through his spine, but why does he need a spine since when his mask lifts we can see his head is an empty cavern?"
"And what about that town? It seems to be partly a set with two interiors (the diner and Jane's office) and partly CGI. It seems to go for a few blocks and then end abruptly in barren desert...Why can't the Metal Giant attack the Golden Gate Bridge or scale a Trump Tower somewhere? Who cares he if turns a 7-Eleven into a fireball?"
"The standards for comic book superhero movies have been established by 'Superman,' 'The Dark Knight,' 'Spider-Man 2' and 'Iron Man.' In that company 'Thor' is pitiful. Consider even the comparable villains (Lex Luthor, the Joker, Doc Ock and Obadiah Stane). Memories of all four come instantly to mind. Will you be thinking of Loki six minutes after this movie is over?"