Thor: Love and Thunder director, Taika Waititi, has taken huge inspiration in terms of cinematography and story from Marvel Comics.
With the inclusion of Jane wielding Mjolnir and her cancer storyline, lifting scenic shots from the comics and pasting them onto the screens, and even bringing Thor’s rival Hercules from the comics to the MCU, Waititi has done his research on Thor’s adventures in the comics.
Borrowing from another comic creation, Thor: Love and Thunder introduces the Shadow Realm into the MCU. In the film, the Shadow Realm is where Gorr the God Butcher resides after he was chosen by the Necrosword, the only weapon in existence with the power to kill gods.
The Shadow Realm in the movie is another dimension separate from ours where no light can enter, and all color is leached, leaving behind a bleak and barren existence. Love and Thunder is the first MCU film to explore the Shadow Realm, but it has existed in the comics since the 1960s.
Similar to the movie, the Necrosword was created in The Shadow Realm, drawing its powers from there. The part about no color and an absence of light is also the same as in the comics. The two-dimensional being borne from shadows on Gorr’s command also exists in the comics.
But of course, Waititi has only taken inspiration from the way The Shadow Realm works in the comics, and the actual story behind this other dimension is much different in the Marvel comics.
In the comics, The Shadow Realm was a two-dimensional world below ours where a race of Soul Masters had consumed all life to make their empire. The comparison between this different plane beneath ours can be compared to that of the Upside Down in Stranger Things, complete with a scary monster who rules this other world.
According to the comics, Knull, a Soul Master bent on adding other realms to his shadow dimension, vowed to rid the universe of all creation and light and thus created the Necrosword to slay all the gods and Celestials and lay waste to the worlds.
The Shadow Realm in the comics was nearly impossible to enter and was under Knull’s rule. But in the movie, The Shadow Realm is shown as a separate realm where no light or color can exist, and it lies in space and not under our dimension.
Gorr is practically invincible in the Shadow Realm, for he wields the Necrosword and controls the shadow monsters of the dark dimension, and that’s why Valkyrie, Thor, and Mighty Thor barely escaped him there.
The MCU film has not linked Knull to the Shadow Realm. But keep in mind the similarities between Gorr’s powers and his mission to kill all gods, Knull’s Necrosword used by the God Butcher to call upon the shadow monsters, and the enactment of erasing the pinpoints of light in the universe.
In the film, a disembodied voice seemed to call out Gorr to take on the mission of killing gods, emitting from the Necrosword itself. We can presume that it was Knull’s power luring Gorr to take on his role of destroying light and creation.
This theory makes sense as Love and Thunder has shown the Celestials in the same standing as gods, as we had seen a few of them present in Omnipotence City, the refuge city of the gods. Hoping that Thor is to return after this film, we can also assume that more details will be revealed about this new dimension in the future.
About Thor: Love and Thunder
Thor: Love and Thunder is a MCU movie and the fourth installation in the Thor series. It is directed by Ragnarok’s director, Taika Waititi, and will show Chris Hemsworth and Natalie Portman reprising their roles as Thor Odinson and Dr. Jane Foster.
The movie will be based on The Mighty Thor comics in which Thor Odinson loses the ability to lift Mjolnir, and Jane Foster takes on the role of Mighty Thor. After the events of Avengers: Endgame, Thor teams up with The Guardians of the Galaxy for a short time, leaving Valkyrie as the ruler of New Asgard. But Thor returns to team up with Korg, Valkyrie and Jane’s Mighty Thor to take down Gorr the God Butcher (Christian Bale) – before he takes out all the gods in existence.
Chris Hemsworth and Tessa Thompson return for Watiti’s second go, while Russell Crowe and Natalie Portaman join Taika’s project for the first time. The movie is out on July 8, 2022.
Source: Marvel
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