I wanted to write this post since I
watched TR but I wasn’t calm enough for it until now. Even writing so little
about how TR unfairly treated Loki’s character and disrespected him and his
fans in my TR reviews made me angry enough to start shouting in my head and
rendered me unable to write it the way I wanted. Then IW happened and it was
the cause for another wave of rage in me. So it took me a long time.
We always talk about how TR
disrespected Loki and took away a lot of his canon characterizations and
motives and his arc from him. I noticed we never explained it in details and it
caused a lot of misunderstandings about why we hate TR and what we mean. So
this is a detailed explanation of how TR took everything from Loki.
Again, great analysis, and I just have to highlight the conclusion:
“By dismissing Loki’s pain, the narrative paints Loki as someone who is always in the wrong and Thor as blameless in everything. It leads to Thor dismissing Loki’s pain and it leads to disguising Thor and Loki’s imbalanced relationship (Thor as superior and Loki as inferior the way they started in the first Thor movie) as reconciliation and healing.
“You know what all of this led to right? A Loki robbed of his sacrifice, bravery, intelligence and planning skills, his magic and power had no place in IW. He was useless in the authors’ minds. He was healed after all! What else could Loki do except failing at tricking Thanos when he could be outsmarted by Thor and Dr. Strange. What else could Loki do except attacking Thanos with a tiny dagger when that was all the weapons he was left with? At least they gave him his bravery back so his stupid attack makes some sense. In their minds the only way his story could end, and he could completely be redeemed was a true sacrifice (which was pointless since Thanos could still kill Thor) in which he actually dies with no resurrection. This is how they took away Loki from us, by taking away everything from his character first and then when he had nothing left they killed him.”
This is why I’m still so pissed about Loki’s death in IW. Not just because he died – not just because it was unnecessarily brutal and graphic – but because it made him into a plot device rather than a character; because it passed the judgment that he had outlived his interest and usefulness and could only serve as a functionary in someone else’s story. It wasted the potential for a payoff of the connection to Thanos established in The Avengers; it showed that the creators (writers, producers, and directors) did not care enough about Loki’s character to give us that payoff or even tell us what the hell happened with Loki and Thanos. But Loki’s treatment in Ragnarok should have shown us that it was inevitable. Of course Markus & McFeely couldn’t know how thoroughly Taika Waititi was planning to ridicule and emasculate Loki, but if they saw the basic script, they might have had some idea of how his power, intelligence, and complexity were going to be minimized, and how the narrative was going to tie a neat little bow on his “redemption” and “reconciliation” with Thor. And of course these movies have no time for recovery from trauma, except maybe if your name is Tony Stark (and he has RDJ going to bat for him).
I was glad that Loki turned out not to be dead at the end of TDW because I thought he was going to have more time to develop his relationship with Thor and achieve genuine reconciliation, that we might find out what happened with Thanos, that Thor might finally ask what happened, that they might confront the prejudice against Frost Giants that led both of them to kill so many in Thor 1. But now I agree with @lucianalight: I would rather that he had died being noble and clever (turning on the grenade while impaled!!) than live to have everything that made him a magnificent character negated and shat on.
Does anyone know where that page is from? That sounds more like his powers in the comics, so I’m wondering if the description is about the comics rather than the MCU.
People constantly commenting on Sif’s beautiful long straight hair maaaaaay have been a factor in Loki’s choice to start oiling his hair straight and suppressing its natural wild curliness.
Apparently I’m really into headcanons about Loki being a mostly harmless mischievous shit pre-Thor today, so here are a few more:
The usual stuff. Soap that turns hands or hair different colors. Ruining meals by swapping sugar for salt (or more creative food and drink mix ups and mayhem).
He used illusions to make the maids and kitchen staff think their were bug or rat infestations.
He enchanted doors to make very loud, obnoxious noises when they were opened. Sometimes foreign dignitaries would come and doors to banquet halls would be screaming all the time. When Odin would make a grand entrance into the throne room, Loki would enchant the opening doors to sound like mating bilgesnipes.
Odin mentioning the goat not belonging at the banquet table? That’s something Loki did (with Thor’s help–Thor thought of using a goat). Through illusions and potions Loki had one Lord convinced he was courting the most beautiful woman in all of Asgard, but it was a goat. He brought that goat as an escort to one of parties at the palace. Odin wasn’t nearly as amused as Thor and Loki.
Loki steals Thor’s educational tomes and seals them away in pockets of space. This gets their tutors very frustrated with Thor. (On the Statesman these come in handy for teaching the surviving children.)
Loki transforming into Thor and the two of them talking in unison or confusing someone by seemingly being in two places at once. This is, for a while, how they welcome new guards or maids: by creeping them the fuck out until they learn Loki’s a shapeshifter (look, they’re both little shits, ok–Thor laughs about the snakes).
Releasing the horses from the stables and leading them through the streets of Asgard, much to the distress of the stablehands.
He’s used magic to explode the public baths like geysers.
The doors making loud noises became a little too obvious and easy to trace, but when Loki was feeling vindictive, he would enchant a door to make a quiet farting noise. Everyone who opened the door would look surprised and embarrassed and look around furtively.
Also hidden in pocket dimensions: a collection of mismatched socks.
When his illusion magic had become fairly sophisticated, he would enchant mirrors to show some flaw on the face of whoever looked in it: a lock of hair sticking up, a smear of sauce below the lip, a piece of spinach between the teeth. Now matter how much you try to fix it, it won’t go away. This was especially amusing when Thor started spending a lot of time with Fandral… but Fandral eventually figured out what was going on.
Loki is the Philosopher King 