Here’s Why ‘Thor: Ragnarok’ Cut Out the Romance

Thor: Ragnarok introduced a ton of new things into the Marvel Cinematic Universe – but a romantic subplot between two of its stars wasn’t one of them.

In a recent interview with Yahoo News, Ragnarok co-writer Eric Pearson revealed what did and didn’t make it into his script of the film. And as he explained, the draft from Craig Kyle and Christopher Yost originally included a romance between Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson).

“But we didn’t want to start from that place,” Pearson explained. “It was like, Let’s give Valkyrie her own story that connects with Thor … and if it makes sense for them to get together, then great.”

In the comics, Valkyrie and Thor periodically have a romantic fling, but their relationship is almost always complicated by some sort of outside force. It sounds like Ragnarok‘s screenwriters had a less apocalyptic outlook on the relationship, and simply cut it from the film to fully establish Valkyrie as a character.

“You’ve got two really good-looking people who can fight and who’d probably be [good together] if the story went there, but it just didn’t.” Pearson added. “It became more about the mutual respect, and also dealing with her PTSD. She’s someone who’s drowning her sorrows in the bottle, and I just thought that was such a cool thing that you don’t often see in these movies: somebody dealing with extreme guilt and shame in a colorful, Taika Waititi[-directed] hilarious background.”

Thor: Ragnarok currently has an 84.58 ComicBook.com Composite score, the eighth highest composite score of any comic book movie.

Thor: Ragnarok also has a 4.10 out of 5 ComicBook.com User Rating, making it the 10th highest rated comic book movie among ComicBook.com users. Let us know what you thought of Thor: Ragnarok by giving the film your own ComicBook.com User Rating below.

Thor: Ragnarok is now playing in theaters. Other upcoming Marvel Cinematic Universe movies include ;Black Panther on February 16, 2018, Avengers: Infinity War on May 4, 2018, Ant-Man and the Wasp on July 6, 2018, Captain Marvel on March 8, 2019, the fourth Avengers movie on May 3, 2019, the sequel to Spider-Man: Homecoming on July 5, 2019, and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 in 2020.