In a recent appearance on the Smartless podcast — hosted by Jason Bateman, Will Arnett and Sean Hayes — director Taika Waititi admitted that he never initially had any interest in creating any films for the Marvel Cinematic Universe [via The Wrap].
According to the director, when he was first offered the opportunity to direct the third film in the franchise, Thor: Ragnarok, Waititi initially wanted to turn it down, saying he had "no interest in doing one of those films," but ultimately reconsidered when he realized it would be an incredibly lucrative project to take on.
"It wasn't on sort of like my whole plan for my career as an auteur. But I was poor and I'd just had a second child, and I thought, 'You know what? This would be a great opportunity to feed these children,'" said Waititi.
The director also discussed being approached by the film studio in the first place, claiming that he felt as though Marvel must have been out of options when they decided to offer the project to him.
"I think there was no place left for them to go with that. I thought, 'Wow, they've called me in, this really is the bottom of the barrel," said Waititi.
The director wasn't afraid of bringing on the thunder during the interview either. He was brutally honest when sharing his thoughts on the MCU — and his disdain towards Thor specifically — admitting that he was never particularly interested in Marvel's god of thunder's story growing up.
"… Let's face it, it was probably the least popular franchise. I never read Thor comics as a kid. That was the comic I'd picked up and be like, 'Ugh.' And I did some research on it, and I read one Thor comic or 18 pages, or however long they are. I was still baffled by his character," said the director.
Waititi is among the ongoing list of actors and directors who have voiced their distaste for Marvel's constant, never-ending stream of movies hitting theatres and streaming services every year, most notably the likes of Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford Coppola, Quentin Tarantino and many more.
According to the director, when he was first offered the opportunity to direct the third film in the franchise, Thor: Ragnarok, Waititi initially wanted to turn it down, saying he had "no interest in doing one of those films," but ultimately reconsidered when he realized it would be an incredibly lucrative project to take on.
"It wasn't on sort of like my whole plan for my career as an auteur. But I was poor and I'd just had a second child, and I thought, 'You know what? This would be a great opportunity to feed these children,'" said Waititi.
The director also discussed being approached by the film studio in the first place, claiming that he felt as though Marvel must have been out of options when they decided to offer the project to him.
"I think there was no place left for them to go with that. I thought, 'Wow, they've called me in, this really is the bottom of the barrel," said Waititi.
The director wasn't afraid of bringing on the thunder during the interview either. He was brutally honest when sharing his thoughts on the MCU — and his disdain towards Thor specifically — admitting that he was never particularly interested in Marvel's god of thunder's story growing up.
"… Let's face it, it was probably the least popular franchise. I never read Thor comics as a kid. That was the comic I'd picked up and be like, 'Ugh.' And I did some research on it, and I read one Thor comic or 18 pages, or however long they are. I was still baffled by his character," said the director.
Waititi is among the ongoing list of actors and directors who have voiced their distaste for Marvel's constant, never-ending stream of movies hitting theatres and streaming services every year, most notably the likes of Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford Coppola, Quentin Tarantino and many more.
