Taika Waititi Promises A “Fresher Style of Humor” And ‘THOR’ “Most Interesting” In RAGNAROK
After giving a surprising status update on its development, Thor: Ragnarok director Taika Waititi talks for the first time about his approach to the Marvel threequel...
While promoting his new critically-acclaimed film, Hunt For The Wilderpeople, at the Sundance Film Festival over the weekend, Taika Waititi has also been pressed for details about his next big project, Marvel’s Thor: Ragnarok. During separate interviews with Crave Online and CNet, the filmmaker explained what he will bring to the God of Thunder’s third solo adventure, and how humor will come into play this time around. Waititi also offered a surprising update on the threequel’s development.
“My strength in this is bringing my style of humor,” said the director, “which is probably a very different style of humor. They've had good jokes in them before, but I think where I come from is maybe a fresher style. It could just shake the entire thing up a bit.” About joining the Marvel machine after helming independent movies, Taika Waititi says, “I’m like the new kid in class! They’re really cool people. I’ve already made some great friends, and everyone wants to make the best story possible. [The development process is] very collaborative, more collaborative than I think people probably expect. It’s not just one person ordering everyone around. It’s people discussing and saying, ‘What if it was like this’ or ‘I don't think it should be like that’, which is very healthy. And it’s actually what I’m used to, coming from theatre and co-ops and collaborating.” When asked if he could give hints about the plot, Waitii said, “No, because I don’t even know. We're still figuring out what characters are in it and how they all interact. We’re very early on in prep, storylining, figuring it all out”
During his chat with Crave Online, Waititi was first asked how much freedom he has on Thor: Ragnarok. “I guess we’ll see once we get on set,” he replied. “I think on set it’s a different story. It’s basically about coming in under budget. [Laughs.] That’s all it’s about. If you come in under budget and on time you can do what you want, really. Just stick to what the idea of the story is. I always do that. And I’ve talked a lot about my style and the way I work on set, which is very improvisational. I make up a lot of shots on the spot sometimes but I always have a plan. I always plan what I’m going to do and then I’ll throw that plan away when I see what the actors want to do, and then we have to come to a common ground and figure that out.” When asked if there’s a danger of making changes on the spot, especially with CGI and a big budget, Waititi said, “There will definitely be that danger, yeah, but as much as possible I like to shoot practically and on locations.” He added, “This will be very different for me but luckily I’ve done a lot of commercials before, some big ones, so I’m used to changing pace on bigger sets. There’s a lot of waiting around, and nobody likes to wait around while they’re setting up green screens and weird CG stuff. But yeah, these movies are so big that they have to.”
Taika Waititi then confirmed that Marvel Studios had approached him and asked him to pitch them his take on Thor: Ragnarok. “They watched Shadows obviously, and they watched Boy,” he explained. “And I think the combination of those two films, you get that I wasn’t just like a crazy comedy director or too dramatic. They wanted to weave a little bit away from that. […] Basically how I pitched it was like, [Thor] just needs to be the most interesting character. If you’re going to call the movie Thor, Thor has to be the best character.” That's something that was missing arguably in both Thor and Thor: The Dark World movies. However, making the God of Thunder the most interesting character might be a challenge for Ragnarok with the Incredible Hulk on board. What do you think?
Starring Chris Hemsworth, Tom Hiddleston, Jaimie Alexander, Ray Stevenson, Anthony Hopkins, and Mark Ruffalo, Thor: Ragnarok is currently being scripted by Christopher Yost and Craig Kyle with Taika Waititi set to direct, and the movie scheduled to release in theaters on November 3, 2017.
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