For many fans, something seems to be missing from the latest installment of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor: Love and Thunder.
Don’t get us wrong, the film is still beloved by many, dutifully entertaining enough, and has enough visual panache to make it stand out as a solid excuse to munch on some popcorn for a couple of hours.
But following the revelation from actor Christian Bale, who played Gorr the God Butcher in the film, that Taika Waititi filmed some rated-R scenes that were ultimately left on the cutting room floor, it was enough to make the most die-hard Marvel fanatics question whether a more mature take on the movie would have been better than the PG-13 version we got.
A post by the Reddit user u/patient-Spring-4 on the r/MarvelStudiosSpoilers subreddit shared an article from Inverse in which Bale confessed to filming R-rated scenes, promptly causing discussion among viewers of the film whether the movie was made weaker by excluding them.
Bale told Inverse in his interview:
“With Thor: Love and Thunder, [director] Taika [Waititi] and me, we kind of knew that some of the stuff we were doing probably wouldn’t end up in the film, but we wanted to just push it and see. Ultimately, it is and should be a film that all the family can go and enjoy. And Chris Hemsworth, a couple of times he looked at me it was like, Dude, that’s a little too far. I don’t think anyone’s gonna want to see that unless it’s an R-rated film. but it was a great joy to give it a shot. And we had a lot of fun in there doing certain scenes and takes on certain scene choices, even if they didn’t end up in the final cut.”
As a refresher, though Bale is quite chilling in the finished film, he is used sparingly in it. For example, contrary to the character’s name, Gorr only makes one on-screen slaying of a God in the entire movie, with the remainder of the killings happening off-screen.
“All the stories of stuff they couldn’t include in the final cut just bum me out at this point, especially since I didn’t really love the final product,” one fan wrote.
Another Reddit user agreed, saying the end result was partially “way too much Korg,” the computer-generated imagery-rendered rock creature voiced by Waititi himself, despite the film having a great number of intriguing storytelling elements to work with.
“So much potential with the character of Gorr, the source material, and Christian f–king Bale.”
Another Reddit user pointed to too much “improv comedy” and an unnecessary runtime limit of two hours that contributed to the film’s disappointing reception.
“I still enjoyed it a lot, but man. There’s a lot that got cut that makes it seem like there’s a better movie just waiting to be edited together.”
“I’ll die on the rock saying somewhere in all the footage shot is a great movie,” another commentator agreed.
You heard the fans, Marvel. When it comes to Thor: Love and Thunder, it’s time to #ReleaseTheGorrCut.