It’s not that Thor: The Dark World is a particularly brilliant film – the indifferent reviews put an end to that kind of talk – but probably the lack of meaningful competition that mean this weekend will be Marvel-centric. Chris Hemsworth and his chums should clean up.

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Chris Hemsworth as Thor with Anthony Hopkins as Odin

The plot takes place after the events of Marvel’s Thor and Marvel’s Avenger’s. Thor is trying to restore peace across the cosmos, but an ancient race – lead by Malekith – have other ideas, and intend to restore the universe to its previous state of darkness. Thor must unite with his brother Loki (Tom Hiddleston) – who is serving prison time for war crimes on modern day earth, to save literally everything.

The reviews have seen the critics disagree. Some couldn’t tolerate Marvel’s latest offering; Joe Morgenstern of The Wall Street said “This action-adventure sequel from Marvel soon turns so dumb and 3-D-murky that it hurts.”

Michael O’Sullivan of The Washington Post said: “If I'm spending that much time studying Odin's grooming, there's something wrong with the story, which is kind of slow to get going and features too many undeveloped threads.”

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Natalie Portman and Chris Hemsworth star in Thor: The Dark World.

The reviews weren’t all negative though. In fact there were some calling this the best Marvel film ever made. CoomingSoon.net were moved to call it “a bombastic sequel which celebrates everything the first film did well while still not knowing what to do with its poor mortals.”

R. Kurt Osenlund of Slant Magazine reckons “Superhero movies aren't going anywhere, nor is their standard, on-to-the-next-fight structure, so it's heartening to see a gem that grandly and amusingly fills in the blanks.”

But there’s an underlying miscommunication between reviews and box office success. Often, films defy their naysayers by dragging in audiences off the street, and Thor will be no different. An army of Marvel fans combined with a slew of converts to the franchise will be lapping it up. Expect somewhere near the $80m mark come Monday’s box office roundups.

Check out the trailer for Thor: The Dark World