The following contains spoilers for Thor: Love and Thunder, now playing in theaters.
Thor: Love and Thunder is a film of many disparate tones coming together to form an entertaining blockbuster. However, many of these tones end up clashing in numerous unexpected ways throughout the film. It results in a movie that definitely earns its laugh-out-loud moments but doesn’t quite manage to balance them with the heart and sincerity the film also wants to have.
The main plot point of the children of Asgard getting stolen away by Gorr the God Butcher feels like it’s riffing on the Child Catcher from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. This culminates in a finale where Thor temporarily gives the children his powers for the final battle. It’s a joyous sequence filled with a childlike sense of wonder and sensibilities. Because of this, it seems like Thor: Love and Thunder is aimed at audiences slightly younger than typical Marvel fare.
This is why it’s very strange that during the sequence in Omnipotence City, Zeus openly talks about having an orgy with the gods. He then threatens to renounce Thor’s invite to the orgy before making good on this threat. It’s odd because it’s not really a joke, nor is it that subtle. It’s just said frequently in the hopes of getting a laugh from its adult audience. But it fights against the tone of the rest of the film.
Normally, when adult jokes are made in films aimed at younger audiences, they’re subtle. The joke is euphemistic so that it goes completely over the heads of the children watching but makes the adults chuckle. Then, when these kids grow up, they can re-watch these films and get a newfound appreciation for the jokes they missed as a child. It’s a tried and true formula that’s worked in films for decades.
That’s why it’s so weird that Thor: Love and Thunder just has the word orgy used as a punchline in a manner that’s more befitting of a Deadpool film. It would have been more interesting and funny if they tried to find a way to describe an orgy without using the word, building and building with more ridiculous descriptions, trying to explain the least family-friendly idea in the most family-friendly way possible. This approach could have been quite fun.
Thor: Love and Thunder’s problem with tone goes way beyond this one scene. However, this is probably the best illustration of the two different movies it wants to be. Thor: Love and Thunder wants to be a family blockbuster and an adult comedy, but by aiming for both, it doesn't fully succeed at being either.
To see the two sides of Thor's tone battle it out, Thor: Love and Thunder is now in theaters.