

In the process - and with the help of a serious organizational shift at Marvel - they paved the way forward for even bolder storytelling. Thor: The Dark World took the character to an overly dramatic place with mixed results, and so when it came time to make a third Thor movie, Marvel decided to try something they hadn’t done before: soft-reboot their own franchise. In Thor he’s a Shakespearean figure in The Avengers he’s a concerned brother with a surprising knack for quips and in Age of Ultron he’s a man fond of hot-tubbing with otherworldly beings. But after Avengers: Age of Ultron, there was still one major character who felt a little ill-defined: Thor. The Marvel Cinematic Universe had a couple of creative missteps early on with the troubled productions of The Incredible Hulk and Iron Man 2, but instead of harping on what went wrong, they quietly applied what they learned in making those movies to their future films. A sequel, Thor: Love and Thunder, was released in July 2022.Marvel Studios isn’t necessarily keen on dwelling on - or even admitting, really - mistakes. It grossed $855 million, becoming the highest-grossing film of the series and the ninth-highest-grossing film of 2017. The film received praise for its acting and Waititi's direction, as well as the action sequences, visual effects, musical score, and humor, with many critics considering it to be the best installment of the Thor franchise.

Thor: Ragnarok premiered at the El Capitan Theatre in Los Angeles on October 10, 2017, and was released in the United States on November 3, as part of Phase Three of the MCU. Principal photography took place in Brisbane and Sydney, Australia, with the film also having exclusive use of Village Roadshow Studios in Oxenford, concluding in October 2016. The rest of the cast, including Blanchett as Hela, was confirmed in May 2016, with Pearson's involvement revealed at the start of filming that July.

Ruffalo joined the cast reprising the role of Hulk from previous MCU films, which allowed elements of the 2006 comic storyline " Planet Hulk" to be adapted for Ragnarok. Waititi joined the film as director a year later, after Thor: The Dark World director Alan Taylor chose not to return. The involvement of Hemsworth and Hiddleston was announced that October. A third Thor film was confirmed in January 2014, when Kyle and Yost began work on the screenplay.
