Thor: Love and Thunder might be the most exciting MCU movie in production. Taika Waititi’s follow-up to the excellent Thor: Ragnarok will reunite most of the cast, see Natalie Portman’s Jane Foster receiving the powers of Thor, and feature cameos from the Guardians of the Galaxy. We’re also going to see much more of Tessa Thompson’s Valkyrie, who it appears will be getting a big power boost.
We last saw her in the closing scenes of Avengers: Endgame, with Thor appointing her as the ruler of New Asgard. It seems like her new position comes with some new skills. Thompson talked us through them in a new interview with W Magazine, saying:
“She has weird skills, to be honest. She can sense when someone is close to death, and she takes them into Valhalla, which is essentially the afterlife. She can revive people. But when she revives people, sometimes she ends up in their body. It’s a weird thing. It can be quite erotic. And then she has superhuman strength and is essentially God.”
This puts her more in line with the Valkyries of Norse mythology, who had the duty of guiding souls between life and death. The worthy who die in battle go to Odin’s Valhalla, which is basically a 24/7 party of drunkenness, sex, and violence, but where all consequences are periodically erased, so the fun lasts forever. The less worthy go to Freya’s afterlife of Fólkvangr, where things are a little more sedate (though there’s still a lot of beer to drink).
Even so, her ending up in other people’s bodies sounds quite wild, though actors pretending to be one another is a concept seen in multiple Thor movies so should fit in nicely.
Thor: Love and Thunder is now in post-production and will release on July 8, 2022. Let’s hope we get a trailer very soon.
