The Lego Batman Movie

As a spin-off from 2014's surprisingly good The Lego Movie, The Lego Batman Movie had a lot to live up to. The Lego Movie was in many ways a breath of fresh air, a funny, subversive, wholly original film. Following that up was always going to be a challenge, one only made all the more difficult by centering the movie around one of pop cultures most recognisable icons - and yet The Lego Batman Movie is by and large a success, albeit not quite to the same degree that it's predecessor was.

The reason for that success is simple - much like The Lego Movie, there is a sense of purpose to the film that gives it a reason to exist beyond mere corporate interests. The Lego Batman Movie positions Lego Batman not as a distinct version of Batman but as an all-encompassing overview of the character as he has existed in pop-culture for the last eight decades, a conglomeration of all previous canon that allows the movie to act as both a cunning meta-commentary on the Batman franchise and a celebration of the character's many incarnations over the years.

For most of its running time the film has a firm grasp on both of these aspects of itself, resulting in a movie that is practically a must-see for fans of Batman thanks to its fairly comprehensive deconstruction of the character. But that's not to say that those with only a passing knowledge of Batman won't be able to enjoy it - even if you miss half the references that The Lego Batman Movie throws at its audience, it's still very entertaining thanks to some fairly robust storytelling and - more importantly - a great sense of humour. The film's willingness to lovingly poke fun at its own main character is a refreshing change of pace when compared to how seriously he demands to be taken in other films.

Unfortunately, The Lego Batman Movie isn't able to maintain a high level of quality throughout its running time, and as the film progresses the comedy gets broader and the themes are pushed further to the background in favour of an action-packed but ultimately vacuous finale. It's not a bad finale, but it pales in comparison to that which precedes it in a way that can't help but leave a bad taste in the mouth. Most of The Lego Batman Movie is best described as an interesting take on Batman that also functions as a children's film - such a shame, then, that it ends as a children's film that happens to include an interesting take on Batman.

Still, it's hard to grumble too much when most of the film entertains to the standard that it does. It's funny, it's earnest, and it's a blast of geekery that should please anyone with an interest in superheroes.

Thor: Ragnarok

Bringing What We Do in the Shadows and Hunt for the Wilderpeople director Taika Waititi on board was the best decision Marvel made in relation to the third installment of the Thor films. With Thor: Ragnarok, Waititi has taken all that didn't work about the previous films and thrown it straight in the garbage, clearing the table for him to completely reinvent the franchise.

We rejoin the titular God of Thunder two years after the events of Avengers: Age of Ultron, in which time he has been travelling around the universe in an attempt to learn as much about the Infinity Stones as possible. After finding out that it is Loki, not Odin, who sits on the throne of Asgard, Thor confronts his brother and travels with him to Earth in order to find Odin and return him to the throne - but ends up accidentally stranded on the junk planet Sakaar in the process, leaving Asgard vulnerable to attack from Hela, the Goddess of Death.

By pushing the plot to the background for much of its running time, Waititi is able to focus on the bits of the film he's actually interested in, such as the characters and their interactions with one another. It also means that the drama of Thor: Ragnarok is only ever serviceable at best. There's a balancing act going on here that I don't think Waititi executes perfectly, meaning that your enjoyment of Thor: Ragnarok is ultimately going to depend far more on if you Waititi's character direction than on the plot itself. 

Fortunately, I love Waititi. While the film undoubtedly lacks the emotional resonance of his previous films (most likely a by-product of this being the first of his movies that he hasn't also written), his unique voice still manages to shine through thanks to the amount of creative freedom he's clearly been given around the studio-mandated story beats. It's a hilarious movie thanks to the irreverent, naturalistic, quasi-improvisational sense of humour that made Waititi popular and that imbues the film with the kind of energy and originality that some other Marvel films have sorely lacked. As someone who was laughing throughout, I found Thor: Ragnarok to be among the better Marvel Studios films released in recent years.