'Thor: Love and Thunder' brings back a fan favorite, but painfully underutilizes them in an overblown cameo

• Warning: There are major spoilers ahead for "Thor: Love and Thunder."
• Jaimie Alexander reprises her role as Sif in the new "Thor" sequel.

After sitting out 2017's "Thor: Ragnarok" and a minor cameo in "Loki," Jaimie Alexander makes her big return to the Marvel Cinematic Universe in "Thor: Love and Thunder."

Unfortunately, if you're hoping to see her character, Sif, with a lot of screentime in the sequel, you'll be sorely disappointed. At the film's world premiere, Alexander told Marvel she didn't need to train for the role and it's clear why after watching the movie.

Sif gets two minor scenes in "Love and Thunder" and is frustratingly sidelined for the majority of the movie, which may make you wonder why Marvel even bothered bringing the actor back.

How Sif returns in 'Thor: Love and Thunder': Thor finds her after a losing battle

While traveling with the Guardians of the Galaxy, Thor (Chris Hemsworth) learns about a mysterious figure, Gorr the God Butcher (Christian Bale), who, as his name suggests, is killing gods and causing havoc throughout the universe.

Thor spots his friend Sif among the brutal attacks by Gorr and splits off from the Guardians to check on her.

When Thor reunites with his friend, for the first time on-screen since 2017's "Thor: Ragnarok," Sif is badly injured. She lost an arm in a duel with Gorr off-screen.

It's presumed that Thor takes her back to New Asgard (on Earth), but we never see this occur. Thor appears to land in New Asgard without his friend. Instead, the next time we puzzlingly see Sif isn't until the film's very end when she's training with kids on Asgard.

Why Sif was missing from 'Thor: Ragnarok': A scheduling conflict

If you're wondering why we haven't seen Sif since 2013's "Thor: The Dark World" on the big screen, Alexander previously told Yahoo she sat out "Ragnarok" due to a scheduling conflict with her lead role on NBC's "Blindspot."

"I was asked, but the timing of when they were going to shoot and when 'Blindspot' was gonna shoot — it was pretty much the same time," Alexander told Yahoo in 2017 of "Ragnarok" filming on another continent.

"I was hoping for more of a notice from [the studio] so I could make it work, but it was a short notice thing," Alexander said, adding that she "was bummed" she couldn't be in "Ragnarok." "They called and said, 'Hey, by the way, would you come do this?' I said there is no way I can make that work that fast."

That was probably for the best as the rest of Thor's friends were quickly and brutally killed off one by one in the 2017 sequel.

'Thor: Love and Thunder' sidelined Sif for no reason. The film had a huge opportunity to make waves with her character.

It was exciting to hear Alexander was reprising her role as Sif. A strong, confident, kickass woman in a movie that's already celebrating strong, kickass women in the form of Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson) and Natalie Portman's Mighty Thor? Sign us up.

So it's mind-boggling that Marvel wouldn't take the opportunity to highlight three recognizable warriors side-by-side in "Love and Thunder" or showcase her confrontation with Gorr. Audiences strangely never see Sif interact with Valkyrie or Portman's Thor and it feels like a massive missed opportunity.

Was Marvel worried about having too much estrogen on screen by having three female heroes alongside Hemsworth's Thor in this sequel? Was this a constraint of the pandemic?

Maybe there's some deleted footage showcasing Sif's off-screen confrontation with Gorr or highlighting an exchange with Portman — but these are moments that should have appeared in the final film to pay due to a franchise character who otherwise seems to exist in the film for the sake of appearing in it or to meet a quota for female representation.

The natural expectation was that Sif would go on the film's adventure with Thor, Jane, and Valkyrie to hunt down Gorr on "another classic Thor adventure."

But that's not what happened at all.

Instead, for whatever reason, the film sidelined Sif by unnecessarily chopping off one of her arms. This writing choice would've made some sense if the film was trying to deliver some commentary on disabled superheroes, but it didn't do that at all.

The film ditched Sif until its final minutes.

The audience is supposed to assume she was "healing," but there was no reason for the film to cut off her arm if it only planned to sideline her.

Sif's gross underutilization in "Thor 4" is extremely disappointing after years of waiting to see her return to the big screen. It's not like Marvel doesn't know how to handle the return of a long-missing fan favorite.

Comparatively, "Love and Thunder" does right by fixing Jane Foster's narrative after Portman previously parted ways with the MCU after 2013's poorly received "Thor: The Dark World."

For a movie that's so big on female superheroes, Alexander received the short end of the stick.

Maybe the MCU has grander plans for Sif, but in "Love and Thunder," there was little reason for Alexander to reprise her role and that's a shame. Don't simply add more female heroes and characters into a movie if you have nothing interesting for them to do.