With Hulk Vs. I thought that Lionsgate and Marvel had finally found the perfect voice for their animated feature line. The pair of stories was clearly catered to an older audience (especially in light of the Wolverine half, which featured dismemberment and bloodshed), and the animation was superb. That release stands as genuine highpoint in animated comic book films. With Thor: Tales of Asgard, they’ve regressed slightly from their stellar form and served up a juvenile entry that takes aim once again at a younger audience and fails to give fans a feature they can really sink their teeth into. This isn’t the Thor animated feature fans were hoping for, but even with all its faults it’s at least watchable and a definite step up in animation standards from some of the earlier features of Marvel and Lionsgate’s partnership.
Going back to the teenage years of Thor’s life, Tales of Asgard tells the story of a Thor who has the sudden realization that people of Asgard as merely letting him win in skirmishes lest his public loss in the arena embarrass the son of Odin (Chris Britton). With something to prove, Thor (Matthew Wolf) takes Loki (Rick Gomez) with him on a quest to find the legendary Sword of Surtur in the land of Jotunheim, where the frost giants rule. They stowaway on the ship of the warriors three (Jay Brazeau, Paul Dobson, Jonathan Holmes), discovering that the tall tales they tell are made up in a tavern, prompting them to escort Thor on Loki on their quest. As they venture further into Jutenheim they encounter untold dangers and bring an end to the truce between the icy realm and Asgard. All of this swirls about a hidden agenda which isn’t revealed until the end, for a decently done final battle.
One of the greatest challenges when bringing Thor to life, and indeed one of the greatest obstacles standing between Thor and major public popularity, is the Shakespearean speech patterns. Branagh dealt with it expertly in his recently released live-action Thor, but in that case it had to be scaled back because it’s harder to digest when live people are speaking with such a flourish. The animated feature doesn’t have to dial it back as much, and the voice actors carry it off well enough to let the humorous moments land most of the time and the moments of drama never feel too heavy or slow. Unfortunately, the action pales in comparison to the aforementioned Hulk Vs. features and as the point of the story is to explore Thor’s pre-Mjolnir days, you don’t get any signature hammer throwing fun.
To the credit of the disc, the animation style is quite rich and the Blu-ray’s HD presentation makes the world come alive. The downside of course being that the story doesn’t meet the quality of the presentation, leaving it all feeling flat in spite of the animation’s depth. The audio is decent but again the score for this feature doesn’t hold a candle to what Marvel and Lionsgate concocted for Hulk Vs. In every way, this one is a step backwards.
Blu-ray Bonus Features
The combo set includes the movie on both Blu-ray and DVD, but the extras are the same on both discs. The two feature related extras include dual audio commentaries (the first with supervising producer Craig Kyle and screenwriter Greg Johnson and the second with supervising director Gary Hartle, director Sam Liu and character designer Phil Bourassa) and a “making of” featurette.The two non-related extras include an episode from The Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes and a trailer gallery of the other Lionsgate Marvel films.
"Thor: Tales of Asgard" is on sale May 17, 2011 and is not rated. Action, Adventure, Animation. Directed by Sam Liu. Written by Greg Johnson (screenplay), Jack Kirby and Stan Lee (characters). Starring Clancy Brown, Jonathan Holmes, Chris Britton, Jay Brazeau, Paul Dobson, Rick Gomez, Matthew Wolf.
