Thor: Ragnarok was 80% improvised, says director Taika Waititi

Thor: Ragnarok is nicely shaping up to be a Marvel film like no other.

Major credit for that hype goes straight to director Taika Waititi, the New Zealand auteur who's fast climbed the cinematic ranks with indie hits What We Do in the Shadows and Hunt for the Wilderpeople, and who now arrives at the blockbuster's door with zero compromises.

Speaking with MTV News, Waititi stated: "I would say we improvised probably 80 percent of the film, or ad-libbed and threw in stuff. My style of working is I’ll often be behind the camera, or right next to the camera yelling words at people, like, ‘Say this, say this! Say it this way!’ I’ll straight-up give Anthony Hopkins a line reading. I don’t care."

Sure, he's bound to be exaggerating that statistic just a little, but it's still incredibly surprising to see Marvel so seemingly lax with their screenplays, when we always love to paint a picture of the studio as some kind of rigorous puppet master.

It's especially surprising in the light of rumours surrounding Phil Lord and Chirs Miller's departure from the untitled Han Solo film, reportedly due to their similar heavy emphasis on improvisation; Marvel's certainly cemented itself as having a lot more confidence in their vibe as opposed to Disney's Star Wars branch, who are admittedly still in the early days of the revived franchise.

It's only good news, though. Waititi's improv-heavy technique has paid off beautifully in his past movies, which have a looser and more naturalistic feel to their comedy; Marvel's been almost exclusively relying on zingers to provide the universe's humour, so it's certainly about time they try something a little different.

The film's Comic-Con trailer already offered a glimpse at what exactly that means, in a hilarious final moment shared between Thor and Hulk, with the former smirking when the giant green dude refers to himself as "smouldering".

Thor: Ragnarok hits UK cinemas 27 October.