“Tell me Captain, do you know where Thor and Banner are right now?”
Listen Secretary Ross, The Marvel Cinematic Universe is a large and busy, er, universe. At the same given time, you can have the Guardians saving the galaxy, Peter Parker acing an algebra test in Queens, the Runaways doing their… running in Los Angeles, and Black Bolt trying on a new suit in Hawaii. So you can’t really blame Thor and Hulk on missing out in the big airport frenzy that ended Captain America: Civil War’s second act.
They’re very busy people, but contrary to what Taika Waititi may have shown you earlier this year, Thor and Bruce Banner weren’t actually hanging out with some dude named Darryl during the Sokovia Accords kerfuffle. Slash Film has the real scoop from a recent set visit:
For all the fans who have been wondering why Thor wasn’t around to get involved with the skirmish in Captain America: Civil War, the events of Thor: Ragnarok hold the answer. When we catch up with Thor at the beginning of the movie, he’s been away on his own for two years, but he hasn’t been sulking. Instead, he’s been trying to track down the puppet master behind some of the recent near-world-ending events, and looking for the Infinity Stones in order to prevent the doomed future he saw for Asgard and his people in Avengers: Age of Ultron. This has sent him across the cosmos on a number of adventures that have branched off from his original quest.
Audiences may have been slightly confused by Thor’s sudden vision quest in Age of Ultron, and it turns out that Thor himself is looking for answers as well. Remember the specifics:
“We are all dead,” Heimdall (Idris Elba) ominously warns. Thor’s own lightning powers (which we see in the latest trailer for Ragnarok) then contributes to destruction within Asgard (“See where your power leaves). Seems pretty apocalyptic, or dare I say, Ragnarok-tic?
Now Thor is on a solo mission to prevent this dire future, and Slash Film mentions that this journey turns our hero into a “more confident traveler of the galaxy, with Earthly sarcasm to spare.” However, he soon ends up in trouble in Muspelheim, which is where we begin in the first Ragnarok trailer, with Thor chained up in some sort of fiery hellscape.
Screen Rant adds that along with taking place about two years after Age of Ultron, Ragnarok kinda sorta takes place “on top of Civil War, on top of Spider-Man [Homecoming]. Somewhere in that ball park.” Timeline fanatics like myself may get antsy after that surprisingly vague answer, so here’s hoping that the chronology of the MCU isn’t further mucked up. Give us that scroll, Marvel Studios.
Also, if none of that sounds cool to you, you can still go on pretending that Thor is arguing about rent money while Ant-Man was riding Hawkeye’s arrow.
What do you think of Thor’s excuse for not joining the Civil War? Surprised by the film’s timeline placement? Let us know!
Source: Slash Film, Screen Rant
