Taika Waititi Would Love To Resurrect Thor’s [REDACTED] From The Dead

** Warning: Spoilers for Thor: Love and Thunder ahead. 

He breathed new life to a tired franchise with 2017’s Thor: Ragnarok, and brought back Jane Foster (Natalie Portman) after a nine-year absence from the series, so if there’s one thing New Zealand director knows how to do, it’s to rejuvenate.

But how about resurrecting the dead, especially in the massive successful Marvel Cinematic Universe? Well, Taika Waititi has some ideas, and he would like to bring back one of his favourite Thor character from the dead.

The death of characters in comic books have always been more of a revolving door, where characters come and go as they wish, but in the case of the MCU, things have been tricky. Some characters perish off-screen and are later revealed to have survived, while others have cheated death. In the case of Nick Fury (Samuel L Jackson) and Loki (Tom Hiddleston), it’s been about faking their deaths numerous times. 

Others, including Tony Stark (Robery Downey Jr.) and Natasha Romanoff (Scarlet Johansson), die and are never seen again, though they are always referenced and remembered in the movies and TV series that come after it.

But if you’re an Asgardian God or warrior, death is only the beginning for in their mythology, as those who die a honourable death are brought to the halls of Valhalla, where they live forever in paradise.

Thor: Love and Thunder establishes that Valhalla is not just legend or myth, as the film’s second post credits scene shows Jane (Natalie Portman) entering Valhalla, and greeted by none other than Heimdall (Idris Elba), a beloved character that died in Avengers: Infinity War. 

Wait, but it doesn’t show the other cast of Thor characters who’ve died and should be standing alongside Jane or Heimdall, including Loki, Frigga (Rene Russo), or Odin (Anthony Hopkins) himself. Does it mean….

Well, the movie doesn’t indicate either way, but when asked which Thor character he’d love to do a spin-off series on, Waititi shared that Heimdall is actually on his list, alongside Korg and a bunch of other characters that have died in Endgame and Infinity War.

“Other characters who I’ve really enjoyed from that universe is Heimdall – this character I really love. Also, characters that have died in Infinity War or Endgame,” reveals the director, who has indicated that were he to return and make another Thor movie, it would have to be with leading man Chris Hemsworth. 

But aren’t the likes of Heimdall and those who died in the earlier films well, dead? 

“There are still ways of bringing them back. I’d love to see something with that because I really love working with them,” said Waititi in an interview with Geek Culture. 

Resurrecting a dead character is something Marvel Studios has actively dabbled in – and this is not including the “resurrection” of Captain America or Vision, because getting the man out of ice is part of his origin story, and Vision was and still is dead regardless of Wanda’s magic and trickery – possibly because it may complicate the MCU even further 

But now that the multiverse has been introduced with the recent Spider-Man: No Way Home and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, plenty of fans might see this as an opportunity to bring back dead characters.

Whether this is the route Waititi is looking at taking is unclear, but since Waititi has brought back Heimdall and Jane Foster, albeit in Valhalla, it does establish that their spirits do exist somewhere, so maybe this makes it easier to bring them back.

That said, it would be lovely to see Heimdall once again. And if not, we’re excited to see his son Axel take after his father and continue the legacy. 

Thor: Love and Thunder premieres on 7 July 2022.