Once again, after leaving an installment of the new Marvel Cinematic Universe, I found myself turning to a friend and saying, “Yeah, that was pretty good!”

That’s basically all there is to be said about “Thor: The Dark World.” It’s a movie that delivers on its promises, but makes sure to not promise all that much.

The original “Thor” was the silliest and least dense in plot of all of the movies from the first “Iron Man” to “The Avengers,” referred to by some as “Phase One” of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The reason for that, frankly, was because it had to be. Its role was to take take an up-till-then scientifically plausible series and makes you accept that magic was about to be fair game.

I think it did this through by being the funniest of those movies. It introduced characters and settings and a lightheartedness that the audience wanted to keep around so they were willing to accept that Iron Man was going to be fighting transdimensional gods and aliens.

Because that service is already done and thus this new “Thor” doesn’t have to be as funny, it’s not as funny. It does still take on a lot of “Phase Two’s” burden of silliness, but it does it in a way you’ll enjoy and which will make it easier for you to swallow the next “Avengers” movie in 2015 when “Captain America” is presumably chucking his spangled shield at Space Samurai riding spaceships that shoot lasers and heatseeking-missles, while the samurais themselves still prefer to use swords and fur armor over, say, guns.

While we’re on the subject of Space Samurai, why do they have Japanese accents but Space Vikings have British accents? That just reinforces my point, however, that these little flaws and questionable parts, even the weaker points of the movie where Chris Hemsworth and Tom Hiddleston are standing in front of a green screen and doing their best to look like they’re piloting a space ship in combat, are easy for the audience to excuse.

The movie has a great pace, likable characters, it’ll probably make you laugh when it wants you to, it’ll make you care what happens next, and it will make you want to see the next movie in the series. In the end, the movie asks for very little out of the audience, just to sit down and want to have fun, so I find it fair enough that what it delivers is just a bit of relatively simple fun.