Looks great but in the end doesn't really deliver

Rating: 5/10 (27 April 2011)

The sets, special effects are just what you would expect form a major Hollywood movie. It looks great. In particular I loved the ice giants they were the best thing in the movie.
What I struggled with was a mythical god-like being, if not actually a god, who grins a lot, is rather polite and lacks all presence apart from his muscular development which on its own doesn't carry it. I don't think it is because Helmsworth can't act. But the fellow is meant to be Thor, that is THOR!!!!! Not someone who might ask if you want fries with that.
A little bit of grimness, perhaps a little bit of age might have helped. Shouldn't he be a few thousand years old at least? He does start off a bit rash but his big character change occurs, seemingly, because he had a single beer with a fellow of Scandinavian origin. Certainly there was nothing in the Natalie Portman relationship that engendered any interest of need to reassess his approach to life. In fact the gorgeous Natalie was rather irrelevant.
The Asgardians themselves were good whilst in Asgard but out of that context they looked rather ridiculous and with entirety of the Earth action all taking place in what looked like a back lot we really needed to get back to Asgard asap.
So yes it looks great (mostly) and there is plenty of action, if that's what you want but when it was finished I was not looking forward to the sequel. I really didn't care although if they bring back the frost giants I'd watch them. In fact secretly I was cheering for them all along. They had the menaces and gravitas that Thor lacked.