Thor: Love & Thunder Review - 5 Ups & 5 Downs

2. The Lazy, Unimaginative Needle Drops

Taika Waititi had a lot to live up to music-wise after Ragnarok delivered perhaps the MCU's finest needle-drop to date with its inspired use of Led Zeppelin's "Immigrant Song," yet this follow-up ultimately falls massively short of the mark.

Waititi basically takes a more-is-less approach with the music selections this time, inundating audiences with four separate Guns N' Roses songs throughout the runtime.

Yet considering the movie's clear aesthetic and tonal influences from 1980s rock music culture, it's a shame we didn't get a more diverse selection of songs of the era.

No matter how much you might love Guns N' Roses, by the time "November Rain" is being randomly deployed for a fight scene late in the movie, it starts to feel like Waititi basically just picked the songs at random.

Music can elevate a good scene to greatness, but when you're blatantly using it as a crutch to prop up underwhelming action, it seems transparently lazy.