Editor’s Note: This review contains heavy spoilers for “Thor: Love and Thunder”

Five years after the last Thor film, Marvel fans were more than ready to see the fourth installment of the superhero’s story, and this one did not disappoint. Even if you haven’t seen the other Thor movies, the plot stands on its own, and viewers can follow along easily.

It can be difficult to keep up with the massive collective storyline contained within the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). This film picks up where “Thor: Ragnarok” left off with the citizens of Thor’s home planet, Asgard, safely living in a new town on Earth. This leaves Thor without a mission to conquer as a superhero for quite some time. 

This aimlessness leads him to search for inner peace and possibly romantic love outside of superhero work. With the last Thor film lacking a romantic plot thread, I think this was the perfect opportunity to reintroduce love into Thor’s life. 

The story also presents a new villain, Gorr the Godbutcher, who is on the hunt to kill all gods, including Thor. Gorr kidnapped Asguardian children from their new town in order to lure Thor to him. His look is one of the scariest I’ve seen within the MCU, resembling something you would see in a horror film.

Although Thor has a new signature weapon called Stormbreaker, his original hammer, Mjolnir, returns after being broken into pieces in the last film. This time, it chooses the returning character and Thor’s ex-girlfriend, Jane Foster, as its new-worthy owner. This makes Jane the new Mighty Thor and an essential part of Thor’s team as he tries to defeat Gorr and bring the children home.

Thor and Jane, along with Valkyrie and Korg, go to Zeus’s planet to find other gods to join them. Zeus refuses to help them, so they are left to defeat Gorr on their own. This component of the movie opens up countless new characters to be incorporated into future MCU films.

The humor was important amongst the more serious aspects of the story such as Jane dealing with stage four cancer amidst the conquest. I feel like Marvel always does a good job of trickling in light humorous moments throughout their films, especially in the last two Thor movies. 

The ending will definitely warm your heart, with loss and new-found love portrayed in an unexpected way — Asgardian children are saved and even take part in the fight against Gorr. Plus, the plotline shifts the characters’ relationships with one another. Gorr is able to bring back his deceased daughter through a portal he opened with Thor’s Stormbreaker, but dies from his own illness.

However, before Gorr dies, he asks Thor to take care of his daughter for him. Thor agrees despite the bad blood between them, and the movie ends with them living a new life together. 

A much more heartbreaking death comes from Jane, Thor’s former flame. After receiving a terminal cancer diagnosis at the movie’s beginning and Mjolnir along with it — perhaps implying the hammer has some sort of human-like memory — Jane is transformed into a powerful superhero in ability as well as character, fighting alongside the likes of Thor and his crew.

However, Mjolnir takes several years off of Jane’s life every time she uses it, culminating in her emotional on-screen death in Thor’s arms. It’s the combination of Mjolnir’s life-draining tendencies and Jane’s terminal cancer that brings her life to an untimely end — although, the movie’s post-credits scene suggests there might yet be hope for Natalie Portman’s character.