Chris Hemsworth is in press tour mode of late, doing the rounds to promote his current Nat Geo/Disney+ documentary series Limitless. (Which, tragically, is not about what would happen if someone gave Hemsworth that pill.) The ensuing slate of interviews has had revelations both somber and not—including Hemsworth revealing he carries a genetic trait that’s linked to a heightened risk of Alzheimer’s disease, and that he intends to take more time away from work to spend with his family.
But it’s also, naturally, had a whole bunch of Thor talk, including a recent appearance on Josh Horowitz’s Happy Sad Confused Podcast [h/t Screenrant] in which Hemsworth pretty bluntly stated that he’s done with the more comedic version of the character that appeared in Thor: Ragnarok and this summer’s Thor: Love And Thunder, both directed by Taika Waititi. “I don’t know if I’m even invited back,” Hemsworth hedged, echoing comments he’s made about his uncertainty with the franchise at the moment. (Love And Thunder posted a perfectly respectable $760 million at the global box office, but drew middling notices from both audiences and critics.) “But if I was, I think it would have to be a drastically different version in tone, everything, just for my own sanity…”
As Hemsworth himself notes, the reinvention of Thor has been built into the franchise at this point; it’s not for nothing that both the most brutal, and the most goofy, versions of the character appeared in Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame, after Ragnarok had already shored up the character’s comedic bona fides.
Meanwhile, Hemsworth has also talked recently about his experiences filming on George Miller’s upcoming Mad Max: Fury Road prequel Furiosa, praising Miller and saying that working with him has shaped how he wants to proceed on any future project. This is per that Vanity Fair interview he gave last week:
I’m just at the point of my life where I’m meeting with different directors and [people say] “Oh yeah, look, he’s a mad genius. He’s mad, but he’s a genius and he’ll make great films.” I’m like, “Is that who I want to spend my days with?” Four months, five months of shooting and then you’ve got press and possible reshoots and so on.
By contrast, while calling Miller “a genius,” Hemsworth said,
But not the mad type. One that is very aware of how his energy affects others, and how he has the power to make your day fantastic or shitty, and chooses for it to be a positive experience. The whole crew, everyone is in a better mood. It baffles me that some people in that position don’t understand that.
Some people, understandably, have seen Hemsworth’s comments in that interview in the context of his professional relationship with Waititi. (Despite the fact that, as far as we can tell, he’s never said a negative word about their time together, and that he was only talking about future projects in that snippet of the conversation.) The best indicator in that department, obviously, will be to see if the two men end up working together again—although it sounds like the Thor franchise won’t be the most likely place for such a reunion.