“Remember, Sully, when I promised I wouldn’t make these movie reviews a thing?”
“That’s right, Spoony, you did!”
“I lied.”
Thor: Tales of Asgard is a direct-to-DVD animated film by Marvel Animation. In spite of its name, it doesn’t actually have anything to do with the “Tales of Asgard” back-up feature which ran in several issues of Thor and Thunderstrike (the first volume); rather, this movie doesn’t seem to follow any of Thor’s established continuity, probably to draw in new fans more easily.
Surprisingly for a DDVD film, this is actually a fun adventure movie, as long as you don’t expect too much from it. It stars Thor, Loki and Sif as teenagers and the Warriors Three as young adults on a quest for the Lost Sword of Surtur, but then things quickly go south when they actually find it and they have to save Asgard from an unexpected threat – unexpected, that is, if you haven’t seen a movie since the seventies. Like I said, don’t expect too much from this and you’ll have fun, as long as you usually enjoy adventure movies – and they actually did a very good job with the main villain, he’s an interesting character. The movie does have one huge flaw, though… But I’ll talk about it more later.
Ronal the Barbarian (Ronal Barbaren, in the original) is a Danish computer animation film. It’s a very tongue-in-cheek movie that parodies the “barbariansploitation” movies from the eighties specifically and the whole sword-and-sorcery genre in general: in the world of Metalonia, the Sons of Kron are the strongest and fiercest people of all, when suddenly they’re attacked by Lord Volcazar (voiced by Twisted Sister’s Dee Snider!), who wants to use their blood in a dark ritual to awaken the power of Zaal, the demon lord who was defeated by Kron ages ago; the only one who escaped capture was Ronal, the puniest barbarian of all, and now he (accompanied by Alibert the horny bard, Zandra the Tsundere shieldmaiden and Elric the effeminate Elf) must find the Sword of Kron to defeat Volcazar and free his people.
I found the movie hugely enjoyable, for the most part, but that’s because I’m a fan of the sword-and-sorcery genre and I could appreciate all the parodies; I think the movie won’t be half as funny for others. It also dragged on a bit at times (especially the parts with the horny Amazons) and its “adult” humour was actually quite juvenile, but overall, I liked it very much the first time – but I think I won’t appreciate it as much if I watch it again.
Now, it also has a huge flaw, one it shares with Thor: Tales of Asgard: both movies suck at how they treat women.
“Thor” starts out alright. The whole impetus for Thor’s quest is Sif pointing out that he’s not really the warrior he thinks he is, the other warriors actually go easy on him because he’s the son of Odin; this isn’t portrayed as a shrew or a harridan bringing a man down, but as a guy with a huge ego deservedly being dressed down. (I know, those are some low standards.) However, it all quickly goes downhill: Sif leaves Asgard to train with the valkyries, not because she wants to improve her skills, but because she wants to forget Thor; and the valkyries are all one-dimensional, man-hating crazy “feminists” stereotypes.
As for “Ronal”? I’m not going to touch the tired “tribe of Amazons who can barely even recognize what men are but want to ravish them anyway” cliché other than to say that the writers haven’t done anything new (or at least worthwhile) with the concept here. No, what really bothered me was the character of Zandra. See, she is a kick-ass shieldmaiden, easily the best warrior of the protagonists and arguably the best one of the whole movie (she’s more skilled than even Volcazar, who only defeats her because he can only be harmed by the Sword of Kron); and yet, what’s her motivation? Finding a man who can defeat her, so she can finally get married! Yep, it’s Red Sonja played straight (unlike nearly every other trope, I might add), only without the “rape as an origin story” trope, thankfully. And then, when she’s defeated by Volcazar (thanks to the aforementioned invulnerability) and is forced to serve him, who manages to convince her it’s crazy to let an old, silly custom force her into servitude to a genocidal maniac? Ronal, her love interest, of course! And then, to add insult to injury, when it’s time to kill Volcazar with the Sword of Kron, who does finally plunge it into his black heart? Zandra? No, silly, Ronal, of course! What, did you expect the movie’s sole female protagonist to not be useless during its climax? Madness!
So, yeah. I stand by what I said earlier: both movies are enjoyable (“Ronal” more than “Thor”) within certain limits, but their treatment of the female characters is appalling.
I actually find it somewhat disturbing that that’s a common trend in works that employ the barbarian warrior archetype – even comedic ones, like “Ronal”! What is this cross-cultural notion (a great many sword-and-sorcery works are British, and “Ronal” is Danish) that playing up a certain notion of male empowerment (the aforementioned archetype) must necessarily involve a weakening of the female characters? Why is “male empowerment” so closely linked (at least in these works? But probably also in others?) to “dependant females”?
Huh, guess this review wasn’t that quick after all. Well, what can I say? I lied.