My Super Ex Girlfriend

After the rock'n'roll rowdiness of Ragnarok, THOR: LOVE AND THUNDER promises another reinvention of all things Asgardian, with Natalie Portman getting in on the action as the hammer-wielding Mighty Thor. But, the team behind the Marvel sequel tell Total Film, amid the raucous humour, guesting Guardians, and game-changing new villain, this is a film about love, actually.

- By Matt Maytum

At Marvel Studios, there's a tradition for a film's opening day. President Kevin Feige and the film's key creative team head out to a public screening at a cinema, watch the film play with a crowd, and go out for dinner afterwards. And at that dinner on [Thor: Ragnarok's] opening night, Chris and Taika and I and much of the team sat around, and Taika and Chris immediately started spitballing ideas for the next one, Feige tells Total Film. Many of those ideas that came up on that first discussion, on that opening-night dinner of Ragnarok, are in this movie.

If writer/director Taika Waititi and star Chris Hemsworth were buzzing with the possibilities, that's understandable. Ragnarok was the third solo film for the Asgardian God of Thunder, completely revitalising a character at risk of going stale. Waititi was best known for smaller, idiosyncratic films in his native New Zealand, but he brought his distinct sense of humour to the Marvel Cinematic Universe in a rowdy, vibrantly hued adventure that gave Thor a literal and figurative makeover, teaming him buddy-comedy style with Hulk (Mark Ruffalo) and adopted brother Loki (Tom Hiddleston), and introducing him to louche bounty hunter turned ally Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson).

When TF and Waititi last spoke, he referred to Ragnarok's post-production as a baptism of fire. Is it possible to be baptized more than once? he deadpans of his upcoming sequel, Thor: Love And Thunder, when TF catches up with him again in April 2022. It feels like everything I do, every movie, every project, is a new baptism of fire.