It's hard to imagine any film with a billing of Cate Blanchett, Mark Ruffalo, Tom Hiddleston, Idris Elba and Chris Hemsworth having a lack of supervision, but that's exactly how "Thor: Ragnarok" director Taika Waititi described the production.

The indie darling was handed a bit of a wildcard when he signed on for the third installment of the Thor arch. The film's predecessor "Thor: The Dark World" left much to be desired, both with fans and at the box office. Thor's upcoming co-star The Incredible Hulk has flailed in two previous attempts at stand-alone films, both of which failed to perform artistically and financially. In "Ragnarok," Waititi was given the task of revitalizing two of Marvel's struggling bench-warmers.

Speaking with press at the film's Sydney premier, Waititi says the most surprising thing about his experience is how much freedom he's been afforded to right the ship.

"It's been working in the style that I'm used to," Waititi told Newshub. "Just like with all my mates back home. Improvising and being very lose. I think everyone who goes into this system is scared that it's just going to be very rigid and they're not going to be able to be creative or that the studio is going to control you. But Marvel has been amazing to me. They kind of let me do whatever I want.

"There was a day when Mark Ruffalo came up to me and goes, 'How come we haven't been fired yet? Why are they letting us do this? This is so weird. It's like making a weird, student, indie film where we're making it up as we go along.' That's a credit to Marvel and those guys. They were very supportive of how we wanted to make the film."

It sounds like that freedom was maintained through the entire shooting process.

"Every day I was surprised and asking, 'Where are all the producers? Why are they not reigning us in? Why are they not controlling us? Maybe they had bigger fires to put out."

Thor: Ragnarok opens November 2, 2017.