After Chris Hemsworth's Thor assembled with the rest of Earth's Mightiest Heroes during 2012's The Avengers, the God of Thunder went back to Asgard alongside his (adopted) brother Loki in 2013's Thor: The Dark World.
Directed by Alan Taylor, the MCU sequel followed the story of Thor as he tried to save Natalie Portman's Jane Foster from being infected by the Aether while also going up against the Dark Elves. While The Dark World performed well at the box office, it is still one of the poorly-reviewed entries in the Marvel Cinematic Universe considering that it has a 66% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
Many would agree that this was mainly due to the serious tone of the sequel combined with the presence of a lackluster villain in the form of Malekith. Despite that, the Thor franchise managed to get back on its feet due to the arrival of Taika Waititi and his colorful brand of humor in 2017's Thor: Ragnarok.
Now, new comments have emerged from the film's director, shedding some light on what really went down behind the scenes.
THOR 2 DIRECTOR OPENS UP ABOUT MCU SEQUEL
Thor: The Dark World director Alan Taylor sat down with The Hollywood Reporter to talk about the MCU sequel starring Chris Hemsworth and Tom Hiddleston.
Taylor shared that The Dark World changed radically during postproduction and reshoots, saying that his early cut included "more childlike wonder" and "a slightly more magical quality:"
“The version I had started off with had more childlike wonder; there was this imagery of children, which started the whole thing. There was a slightly more magical quality."
Taylor then pointed out that the convergence plot point of the film "allowed for some of these magical realism things" while also sharing that there were major plot differences that were "inverted in the cutting room:"
"There was weird stuff going on back on Earth because of the convergence that allowed for some of these magical realism things. And there were major plot differences that were inverted in the cutting room and with additional photography — people [such as Loki] who had died were not dead, people who had broken up were back together again. I think I would like my version.”
A BETTER VERSION OF THOR 2?
This isn't the first time that Alan Taylor has reflected on his directing experience for Thor: The Dark World.
In the months leading to the premiere of the MCU sequel, Taylor confirmed, via Collider, that The Dark World underwent major changes during the post-production phase of the project, and a major part of it involved Tom Hiddleston's Loki:
"We're doing full scenes, scenes that were not in the movie before. We're adding scenes, creating scenes, writing scenes for the first time. The one [involving Loki] was a fun connective scene... We realized how well Loki was working in the movie, and we wanted to do more with him. So it was that kind of thing, it was like, 'Oh, we could do this, we could jam this in here' because he's such a wonderful guy to watch do his stuff."
Taylor's latest remarks about the postproduction shenanigans could hint that it was a huge aspect where his vision didn't materialize, thus eliminating the "magical realism" concepts that he pointed out in the interview.
It remains to be seen how these concepts would've translated on-screen in the Chris Hemsworth-led sequel, but it's reasonable to assume that adding more of the director's vision would've likely improved the film.
In addition, Taylor's comments also suggest that he originally intended to cement Loki's death in his own version of the film as well as the split between Thor and Jane Foster at the tail-end of the sequel. Loki's death being finalized in The Dark World would've changed the landscape of the entire Infinity Saga.
That said, many would agree that Marvel Studios' decision to fake the God of Mischief's demise in the film generally improved the franchise as evidenced by the rousing success of Loki on Disney+.
Thor: The Dark World is available to stream on Disney+.
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