Thor: Ragnarok - Trivia, Questions and Fun Facts

[discussimdb]

Fan of Thor: Ragnarok or just want to share your movie knowledge? This topic is dedicated to all trivia and questions related to Thor: Ragnarok

[darrell]

Jeff Goldblum was previously considered for the role of Dr. Bruce Banner/Hulk in Hulk (2003). This is hinted at during The Grandmaster's arena intro of The Incredible Hulk, when he announced feeling a connection to him.

[fred]

The opening scene in which Thor (Chris Hemsworth) fights the demon Surtur (Clancy Brown) is heavily reminiscent of the "mines of Moria" sequence in The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001). Surtur bears a close resemblance to the Balrog the Fellowship fights in the mines, and in addition, swarms of demons crawl down pillars towards Thor in the same way Orcs are shown to do in the Moria scene. Additionally, this scene is inter-cut with Skurge (Karl Urban) on the Bifröst bridge. Urban portrayed Eomer in The Lord of the Rings trilogy.

[bryan]

Skurge (Karl Urban) is called "The Executioner" by Hela (Cate Blanchett). In the comics, he is called "The Executioner", and teamed up with The Enchantress, another foe of Asgard and Thor.

[lonnie]

The Incredible Hulk's line "There is no Banner, only Hulk!" is a parody of the famous line from Ghostbusters (1984): "There is no Dana, only Zuul!" Chris Hemsworth appeared in Ghostbusters (2016).

[kenneth]

Chris Hemsworth plays Thor in this movie, while his older brother Luke played Actor Thor in the movie. Their younger sibling Liam was considered for the role of Thor.

[javier]

Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and Loki (Tom Hiddleston) meeting Odin (Sir Anthony Hopkins), and later Hela (Cate Blanchett), was originally to be set in New York City, but Director Taika Waititi felt the setting wasn't right for a dying Odin, and re-shot the sequence in a field in Norway, which he felt was a better setting for the Norse gods to meet. The original footage (shot in Brisbane, Australia) can be seen in the July 22 "offical trailer" in the second shot of the trailer.

[kristen]

When The Incredible Hulk bounces the ball off the floor and wall, it is exactly the way that Hilts "The Cooler King" (Steve McQueen) bounced the ball when in solitary confinement in The Great Escape (1963).

[ava]

When Thor crashes into Sakaar, and he's talking to the scavenger people, in the background there is the body of a Bilgesnipe that he refers to in the The Avengers (2012) "Large. Scaly. Has big antlers".

[phyllis]

Tom Hiddleston explains that since Thor: The Dark World (2013), "Loki has devoted most of his efforts to narcissistic self-glorification, not so much on good governance. Loki has always tested the limits of his power and the boundaries placed upon him. He doesn't just stick his finger in the electrical plug socket, he burns the house down. And now he has to deal with the consequences."

[toni]

Chris Hemsworth's trainer, Luke Zocchi, revealed that Hemsworth put on twenty pounds of muscle for his role in this movie, taking his weight up over two hundred pounds, by following an "old-school bodybuilding regime lifting a large weight-load for small number of reps." Zocchi revealed Hemsworth's favorite body part to train was his biceps, saying, "We design the workout around the body parts he's gonna be showing off the most, he's gonna have his arms and shoulders showing (through the sleeveless armor), so that's the thing we really focus on building up. He probably bicep curls thirty kilo dumbbells on average, each hand, so one hundred twenty pounds total. We always do seated incline curls, standing curls, and hammer curls. We started lighter and slowly, progressively get heavier." Zocchi said they are trying to deliver Hemsworth's best physique yet for this movie.

[nicholas]

Director Taika Waititi consulted with theoretical physicist Clifford Johnson, who previously consulted on the second season of Agent Carter (2015), on space travel, and allowed Johnson to view early drafts of the script. Johnson felt Waititi was "receptive and super excited" about the information he provided, and Johnson gave him physics ideas that could "wink at some of the classic old Thor stuff."

[francisco]

Natalie Portman and Jaimie Alexander didn't return for this movie. Natalie Portman declined to return as Dr. Jane Foster and announced she wouldn't appear in anymore Marvel comic book movies, and Jaimie Alexander was busy working on Blindspot (2015). Thor mentions Dr. Jane Foster in dialogue and tells Loki that he dumped her. But, Lady Sif's absence in this movie is unexplained, and the character was not mentioned.

[marc]

In this movie, Thor finds himself on a trash planet where he becomes a Gladiator. Incidentally, Kurt Russell who played Ego in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017), starred in Soldier (1998) as Todd 3465, a futuristic commando who is left for dead on a trash planet. Connie Nielsen, who co-starred in that movie as Sandra, starred opposite Russell Crowe in Gladiator (2000) for which Russell Crowe won an Oscar as Maximus, a betrayed Roman General who enters the arena as a Gladiator, as he seeks revenge upon the slain Roman Emperor's evil son who assassinated his father. Russell Crowe and Connie Nielsen entered the DC Extended Universe: Crowe as Jor-El in Man of Steel (2013), and Nielsen as Hippolyta in Wonder Woman (2017), parents of Superman and Wonder Woman, respectively.

[manuel]

Tom Hiddleston describes Loki as dealing with permanence: "It's in Loki's nature to change. He's a mercurial spirit, and the minute you try to define him he changes shape. But events in Ragnarök try and inspire him to change forever. The Goddess of Death shows up, and the stakes are high for everybody, so Loki, perhaps more than ever, is challenged to define himself in the face of that threat. He and Thor are in such an extraordinary situation where everything is so unfamiliar that their familiarity, as family members, becomes important."

[leo]

The Ynglinga saga (thirteenth century) by Snorri Sturluson (1179-1241) depicts the lives, reigns, and deaths of the legendary kings of the House of Ynglings. Hel/Hela appears in the saga to claim the souls of kings who failed to die in battle. When Dyggvi the Brave dies of illness, the saga reports that he becomes Hel/Hela's new spouse.

[jeffrey]

The cast includes three Oscar winners: Cate Blanchett, Sir Anthony Hopkins, and Matt Damon; and four Oscar nominees: Benedict Cumberbatch, Jeff Goldblum, Mark Ruffalo, and Taika Waititi. In addition, with three winners, this movie ties with Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017) in having the most Oscar winners featured in a Marvel Cinematic Universe movie.

[cassandra]

In the "Gesta Danorum" (thirteenth century) by Saxo Grammaticus (1160-1220), Hel/Hela seems to be identified with Proserpina, the Roman goddess of death and the underworld. Saxo called her Proserpina as she prepares to claim the soul of Baldr. Proserpina is typically identified with Persephone, the Greek goddess of death and the Underworld.

[jesus]

The song that plays during the opening and final battles (Led Zeppelin's "Immigrant Song") references Valhalla, the hall located in Asgard where those fallen in battle are carried by Valkyries and laid to rest until called upon by Odin in Ragnarök. In this movie, they are ironically called upon by Hela to begin Ragnarök.

[linda]

In an interview, Chris Hemsworth said he switched to a plant-based diet to lean up for the role.