Thor: Ragnarok director is ‘ignoring’ the rest of the Marvel Cinematic Universe

Taika Waititi was a fairly unexpected choice to take the helm on ‘Thor: Ragnarok,’ the third solo movie for Chris Hemsworth’s mighty god of thunder, as his existing films ‘What We Do in the Shadows’ and ‘Hunt for the Wilderpeople’ are pretty far apart from the Marvel movies in terms of tone, scale and content.

And now, in news that may come as a surprise, Waititi has admitted he’s largely unfamiliar with the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

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In a Reddit Ask Me Anything session, the New Zealand actor-writer-director confessed, “I honestly know NOTHING outside of what I’m doing. I’m trying to ignore the rest of the universe and just make my own awesome movie.”

Elsewhere he said he “made an effort to ignore the fact that there are other ‘Thor’ films,” and could not comment on a fan’s question as to how the film would compare to ‘Captain America: The Winter Soldier,’ as he admitted he hasn’t seen ‘The Winter Soldier.’

Even so, Waititi declared that ‘Thor: Ragnarok’ will be “one of the most adventurous and most “out there” of all the marvel movies. It’s a crazy movie.“

He also confirmed the film will have something of a 1980s vibe (“and more”), as suggested by the very retro logo.

Doubtless some Marvel fans will be aghast at this revelation, wondering how a director can make what will be the 17th film in an ongoing series without knowing all that went before. However, with Kevin Feige producing and the whole Marvel team behind him, surely someone would tell Waititi if he went too far off course.

In any case, the idea of ‘Thor: Ragnarok’ working as a standalone film will surely be music to the ears of less fanatical Marvel viewers. Certainly one of the reasons ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’ proved such a success was that, beyond the presence of Thanos, it largely stood apart from all the Marvel movies that came before it.

Nor is this the only ‘Guardians’ connection in ‘Ragnarok,’ as Waititi also revealed in the AMA that he had hoped to bring back John C Reilly’s Rhomann Dey in the movie, but “there was no real way to pull it off.”

‘Thor: Ragnarok’ is due in cinemas on 27 October 2017, topping off what will be a busy year for Marvel with ‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2’ in April and ‘Spider-Man: Homecoming’ in July.

Picture Credit: Marvel, WENN