Like goddamn I really made myself upset thinking about how the entire trajectory of Loki’s arc could have been altered if Odin and Frigga had been slightly more comfortable expressing verbal and physical affection? As in, expressing it at all?
NOT GOOD ENOUGH PLS TRY AGAIN
God look at his face, this is the face of someone who is confident that he is loved by his family. A+ parenting, no hugs required.
*kicks down door of my own post*
AND ANOTHER THING.
God just. Look at how blank his face is. How he’s hiding all the fear and turmoil and anger he unleashed on Odin. He doesn’t trust her anymore, after such a huge betrayal. How can he? But he’s also probably afraid of pushing her away by being angry at her, so he just shoves it all down. What the fuck kind of damage does it do to be betrayed by someone so close to you, but they’re still basically the entirety of your emotional support system? Ugh still crying about Thor 2k18.
Nope, not bothering me, and I will get to your other question eventually…
The reason I don’t talk much about Alan Taylor is because I don’t really think of him as an artist with a distinctive voice or vision, the way Kenneth Branagh, Joss Whedon, and Taika Waititi are. That might be unfair to him, but I only really know him as one of a rotating cast of directors on Game of Thrones, where the writer and the director are almost always different people, and the “voice” of the series, if there is one, belongs either to George R.R. Martin or to Benioff & Weiss (especially in the last season… what a mess of disappointing clichés).
Now, it’s also true that the writer and the director of Thor 1 and Thor: Ragnarok were separate people: Thor 1 was written by Ashley Miller & Zack Stentz; Ragnarok was, in theory, written by Eric Pearson. However, by all accounts TR was about 80% “improvised,” which is to say, Taika Waititi suggested/shouted things to say instead of what was in the script… and Jeff Goldblum came up with his own shit. One of the more egregious examples of directorial departure from the original screenplay appears to be the infamous bit where Loki plans to betray Thor to the Grandmaster and then Thor outsmarts him by putting the obedience disk on him, gives him a smug little lecture about growth and change while he’s convulsing in pain, and then leaves him there incapacitated and defenseless (which I still think is unbelievably cruel, negligent of Loki’s safety, and OOC). According to people who have read the novel version (which I haven’t but maybe should) – @whitedaydream might be the person I got this from, or @lucianalight – that entire sequence was completely absent from the novelization. And we seem to have some evidence that they filmed a version without it: in some of the trailers: Loki shows up on the Bifrost with the rest of the Revengers rather than arriving later with the big ship. So even if the outlines of the plot were provided by Eric Pearson’s screenplay, the tone and character of the movie – its “humor,” if you liked it, or its soulless flippancy and cruelty (to both characters and fans), if you didn’t – indubitably came from Taika Waititi.
Thor 1 adhered more closely to the screenplay – which is available on IMSDb, if you’re interested – so I consider Miller & Stentz to have more of a role in its creative vision than Pearson did with TR. Stentz has even commented on Twitter about the theme of internalized racism; and that writing team also did X-Men: First Class, in which you can see some of the same themes and also the (totally unintentional…?) homoerotic tension between the two main male characters. That said, you can definitely see Kenneth Branagh’s distinctively Shakespearean sensibility in the way some of the important confrontations are presented – and that’s a major part of what gives that movie its overall tone and emotional power. (Also, as this post notes, Branagh & Hiddleston made some notable departures from the acting instructions in the screenplay that contributed to its tragic and also gay-incestuous vibe.)
The Dark World, as much as I loved it for its Thorki fic realness and ANGST, was kind of a creative mess. Patty Jenkins was supposed to direct it, but then backed out for reasons I’m not completely clear on, and Alan Taylor was brought in kind of last-minute. The screenplay was mostly written by Christopher Markus & Stephen McFeely, who wrote the Captain America movies, Infinity War, and Avengers 4, and whom I am fond of calling dimwitted hacks because that’s what they are. (The First Avenger was fine; The Winter Soldier is massively overrated and frankly kind of boring and confusing IMO; Civil War was a disaster of muddled, unsympathetic characterization and missed opportunities for interesting philosophical exploration; Infinity War was similarly disastrous, and showed us exactly why dimwitted hacks should not be attempting to explore philosophical issues.) I say “mostly” because Joss Whedon was brought in as a script doctor (one of his original jobs in Hollywood) to rewrite some scenes that weren’t working, including an “emotional” scene between Thor and Jane (not sure which one), the notorious Thorki bro-boat scene (and you can definitely see the hallmarks of his writing in that one), and Loki’s shapeshifting scene. Loki’s trial scene at the beginning was also a late addition, inspired by a TDW prelude comic; I honestly don’t know who wrote that scene, but the comic seems to have been written by Craig Kyle and Christopher Yost. The upshot is that TDW was most definitely a horse designed by committee, so it’s hard to identify whose creative vision it was expressing. I can identify Alan Taylor’s influence in the dark, grungy Game of Thrones-esque aesthetic, but I’m not sure where else to find him.
Imagine being Heimdall and having a spirit so generous that you could sincerely say “welcome home” to the individual who once turned you into an icicle and is now showing up 15 minutes late without Starbucks to the apocalypse that he sort of started.
That’s because Heimdall knows that he himself was a traitor and deserved it. He also sees that Loki is more loyal than he has to be. Oh yeah, and his brother Thor was the one that told him to go start Ragnarok in the first place.
Heimdall commited treasons TWO times. The second time Loki-as-Odin pardoned him. Heimdall still was the gatekeeper in Avengers: AoU (2015).
OP is so willingly blind and petty? Loki showed up with an evacuation vessel to help a place he didn’t own any loyalty or debt to. As for “icicling” Heimdall, lol Loki would have been in his right to kill him if he wanted, seeing as he was King at the time.
Also? Heimdall only saw Loki cause Loki allowed him to, so guess who was being magnanimous in that scene? Yep, Loki.
And let’s not forget that Heimdall went for the kill, and Loki in response just froze him.
Yeah, that was a weird bit of writing in Thor 1, which is in most respects a very well-crafted movie. Why did Heimdall (apparently) attempt to kill Loki after Loki pronounced a banishment sentence? Was it revenge for having let the Frost Giants into Asgard, resulting in the deaths of two Einherjar? Did he believe Loki posed an immediate threat to the safety of Asgard? Also, why did Loki let Heimdall see him coming back from Jotunheim previously, and why did he admit to letting the Jotnar in before Thor’s coronation? He still had plausible deniability at that point.
I certainly don’t hate Heimdall, but he does seem inordinately hostile to Loki in Thor 1, and is suspicious of him – to the point of disobeying both Loki’s orders and Odin’s by sending the W4 to Asgard to retrieve Thor – before he has any good reason to be. I wonder if Heimdall’s hostility to Loki is a subtle allusion to the fact that in myth, they’re prophesied to kill each other at Ragnarok
Interesting point about Heimdall still being gatekeeper in AOU – that hadn’t occurred to me. So Loki must have banished him later… maybe it took him a while to figure out that it was Loki in disguise? If so, that’s a really impressive masquerade on Loki’s part; he must have been wearing the Odin glamour at virtually every moment, even when alone and/or asleep. Alternatively, Heimdall might have been aware but kept it to himself because after TDW, he knew that Odin wasn’t a fit ruler anymore. But then he might have threatened to reveal Loki’s identity because Loki did something he didn’t approve of, whereupon Loki banished him.
We first see Heimdall in Thor 1 when Thor and his merry band are approaching Heimdall for travel to Jotunheim. Loki speaks first and Heimdall cuts him off & harshly tells him “Enough.” Just another example of an Asgardian commoner treating an Asgardian Prince with disdain. Moments later, as “the Team” heads inside for transport, Volstagg walks past Loki and insults him saying, “what’s the matter, Silver Tongue turn to lead?” No one, at this point, knows that Loki gave info to Laufey that allowed a few Frost Giants to enter the Weapons Vault during Thor’s coronation. I’ve always been angered at the lack of respect Loki received at the hands of non-royal Asgardians from the beginning of the film.
Actually, Heimdall interrupts to say “You’re not dressed warmly enough,” Loki starts to say “I don’t know what you mean,” and Thor cuts him off with “Enough.” The upshot is that non-royals don’t show him deference and Thor reinforces that behavior rather than discouraging it. The deleted scene in which the servant laughs at Thor’s “Some do battle, others just do tricks” quip both establishes that dynamic and provides a presumed explanation: Loki’s use of magic is disdained, in keeping with the attitude in historical Norse culture that male practitioners of seidr are shamefully unmanly.
@tracheometry First, Loki didn’t think the Jotuns were his people because: 1. Odin brainwashed him to believe Jotuns are a race of despicable monsters. 2. Odin told him he was abandoned to die by the Jotuns when he was a baby. (It probably was a lie but that’s another topic.)
Second, Heimdall not only welcomed Thor back but even committed treason to bring him back. And Thor at that time was a murderer for hundreds of lives, who would have committed genocide if his daddy had not arrived and stopped him in time.
Third, in fact after Ragnarok Loki wanted to reconcile with Heimdall and explain everything to him, but Heimdall was unmoved and uninterested. From Avengers Infinity War prelude novel:
Bold of you to assume that people who comment on a post that we’re “delusional” are actually open to entertaining evidence or arguments to the contrary. Or trying to understand the nuance of a villain who is presented as sympathetic, not because his actions are supposed to be justified or excusable, but because we can understand the circumstances and the troubled mindset that led him to commit them. The contempt and mistrust Loki receives from other Asgardians feed into the insecurity, self-loathing, and hunger for approval that eventually push him into attempting genocide. He desperately feels he needs to prove what a good, loyal Asgardian he is not only because he’s found out he isn’t one by birth, but because his valor and masculinity – which Asgard prizes above all – are constantly being questioned, and he wonders whether his biological heritage is part of the reason he’s never seemed good enough.
The excerpt from the prelude novel paints a curious picture. Heimdall doesn’t hold Loki’s actions against him – but he still refuses to reconcile or establish friendly relations. I guess he has reason not to trust Loki, but if he really doesn’t still blame him, it’s not clear why he’s being so dickish.
Imagine being Heimdall and having a spirit so generous that you could sincerely say “welcome home” to the individual who once turned you into an icicle and is now showing up 15 minutes late without Starbucks to the apocalypse that he sort of started.
That’s because Heimdall knows that he himself was a traitor and deserved it. He also sees that Loki is more loyal than he has to be. Oh yeah, and his brother Thor was the one that told him to go start Ragnarok in the first place.
Heimdall commited treasons TWO times. The second time Loki-as-Odin pardoned him. Heimdall still was the gatekeeper in Avengers: AoU (2015).
OP is so willingly blind and petty? Loki showed up with an evacuation vessel to help a place he didn’t own any loyalty or debt to. As for “icicling” Heimdall, lol Loki would have been in his right to kill him if he wanted, seeing as he was King at the time.
Also? Heimdall only saw Loki cause Loki allowed him to, so guess who was being magnanimous in that scene? Yep, Loki.
And let’s not forget that Heimdall went for the kill, and Loki in response just froze him.
Yeah, that was a weird bit of writing in Thor 1, which is in most respects a very well-crafted movie. Why did Heimdall (apparently) attempt to kill Loki after Loki pronounced a banishment sentence? Was it revenge for having let the Frost Giants into Asgard, resulting in the deaths of two Einherjar? Did he believe Loki posed an immediate threat to the safety of Asgard? Also, why did Loki let Heimdall see him coming back from Jotunheim previously, and why did he admit to letting the Jotnar in before Thor’s coronation? He still had plausible deniability at that point.
I certainly don’t hate Heimdall, but he does seem inordinately hostile to Loki in Thor 1, and is suspicious of him – to the point of disobeying both Loki’s orders and Odin’s by sending the W4 to Asgard to retrieve Thor – before he has any good reason to be. I wonder if Heimdall’s hostility to Loki is a subtle allusion to the fact that in myth, they’re prophesied to kill each other at Ragnarok
Interesting point about Heimdall still being gatekeeper in AOU – that hadn’t occurred to me. So Loki must have banished him later… maybe it took him a while to figure out that it was Loki in disguise? If so, that’s a really impressive masquerade on Loki’s part; he must have been wearing the Odin glamour at virtually every moment, even when alone and/or asleep. Alternatively, Heimdall might have been aware but kept it to himself because after TDW, he knew that Odin wasn’t a fit ruler anymore. But then he might have threatened to reveal Loki’s identity because Loki did something he didn’t approve of, whereupon Loki banished him.
We first see Heimdall in Thor 1 when Thor and his merry band are approaching Heimdall for travel to Jotunheim. Loki speaks first and Heimdall cuts him off & harshly tells him “Enough.” Just another example of an Asgardian commoner treating an Asgardian Prince with disdain. Moments later, as “the Team” heads inside for transport, Volstagg walks past Loki and insults him saying, “what’s the matter, Silver Tongue turn to lead?” No one, at this point, knows that Loki gave info to Laufey that allowed a few Frost Giants to enter the Weapons Vault during Thor’s coronation. I’ve always been angered at the lack of respect Loki received at the hands of non-royal Asgardians from the beginning of the film.
Actually, Heimdall interrupts to say “You’re not dressed warmly enough,” Loki starts to say “I don’t know what you mean,” and Thor cuts him off with “Enough.” The upshot is that non-royals don’t show him deference and Thor reinforces that behavior rather than discouraging it. The deleted scene in which the servant laughs at Thor’s “Some do battle, others just do tricks” quip both establishes that dynamic and provides a presumed explanation: Loki’s use of magic is disdained, in keeping with the attitude in historical Norse culture that male practitioners of seidr are shamefully unmanly.
Imagine being Heimdall and having a spirit so generous that you could sincerely say “welcome home” to the individual who once turned you into an icicle and is now showing up 15 minutes late without Starbucks to the apocalypse that he sort of started.
That’s because Heimdall knows that he himself was a traitor and deserved it. He also sees that Loki is more loyal than he has to be. Oh yeah, and his brother Thor was the one that told him to go start Ragnarok in the first place.
Heimdall commited treasons TWO times. The second time Loki-as-Odin pardoned him. Heimdall still was the gatekeeper in Avengers: AoU (2015).
OP is so willingly blind and petty? Loki showed up with an evacuation vessel to help a place he didn’t own any loyalty or debt to. As for “icicling” Heimdall, lol Loki would have been in his right to kill him if he wanted, seeing as he was King at the time.
Also? Heimdall only saw Loki cause Loki allowed him to, so guess who was being magnanimous in that scene? Yep, Loki.
And let’s not forget that Heimdall went for the kill, and Loki in response just froze him.
Yeah, that was a weird bit of writing in Thor 1, which is in most respects a very well-crafted movie. Why did Heimdall (apparently) attempt to kill Loki after Loki pronounced a banishment sentence? Was it revenge for having let the Frost Giants into Asgard, resulting in the deaths of two Einherjar? Did he believe Loki posed an immediate threat to the safety of Asgard? Also, why did Loki let Heimdall see him coming back from Jotunheim previously, and why did he admit to letting the Jotnar in before Thor’s coronation? He still had plausible deniability at that point.
I certainly don’t hate Heimdall, but he does seem inordinately hostile to Loki in Thor 1, and is suspicious of him – to the point of disobeying both Loki’s orders and Odin’s by sending the W4 to Asgard to retrieve Thor – before he has any good reason to be. I wonder if Heimdall’s hostility to Loki is a subtle allusion to the fact that in myth, they’re prophesied to kill each other at Ragnarok
Interesting point about Heimdall still being gatekeeper in AOU – that hadn’t occurred to me. So Loki must have banished him later… maybe it took him a while to figure out that it was Loki in disguise? If so, that’s a really impressive masquerade on Loki’s part; he must have been wearing the Odin glamour at virtually every moment, even when alone and/or asleep. Alternatively, Heimdall might have been aware but kept it to himself because after TDW, he knew that Odin wasn’t a fit ruler anymore. But then he might have threatened to reveal Loki’s identity because Loki did something he didn’t approve of, whereupon Loki banished him.
SHIT. I hadn’t consciously made the connection between the fact that Loki is always overlooked and ignored when he speaks and the fact that he’s put in that muzzle at the end of Avengers. I always thought that bit was a link to the bit from Norse mythology where he had his mouth sewn up as punishment for teasing some dude (details elude me right now).
I feel like this entire phenomenon of “SHUT UP LOKI NOBODY WANTS TO LISTEN TO YOU”, besides the sort of mean chuckle at his expense that makes me feel guilty, is fascinating. With giant angst potential that explains a lot about how Loki looks at himself and why he snaps.
No, seriously. Imagine that this sort of thing has been going on for hundreds or thousands of years. Whenever Loki opens his mouth to speak, or share an opinion, or make a suggestion, or voice an objection, there’s a good chance he’ll basically get told he’s insignificant or irrelevant or reprehensible or just flat out wrong. Stop talking. Yeah, he’s a manipulative little shit, but seriously. His words are his biggest source of power. He’s not an up front fighter—his forte lies through persuasion and the ability to reason people into the decisions that suit him. And he’s perpetually being told “YOUR ABILITIES ARE WORTHLESS, GTFO WE DON’T WANT YOU”. So even the thing he thought he was good at is being undermined.
Extra bonus points if you incorporate canon mythology and the “sew his lips up” punishment. I mean just DAMN. Physical pain and the approval of his father in that sentence aside, that literally, physically denies his right to assert or defend himself. He completely loses his voice. He’s basically having it hammered home that people would rather not hear him at all, would rather pretend he’s not there, and he can’t even count on his family to disagree.
It’s just unbelievably fucked up.
(Addendum: he had his mouth sewn shut for making a fraudulent bargain with some dwarves.)
[…. “When I’m king, I’ll hunt the monsters down and slay them all. Just as you did, father.” Child!Thor in Thor 2011, starting 6 minutes and 51 secs and ending at 6 minutes and 59 seconds.
And later, as an adult, “Father! We’ll finish them together!” Adult!Thor in Thor 2011 at 26 minutes and 19 seconds.
It is true that Thor also spoke of ‘breaking the Jotuns spirits’ so they would ‘never dare threaten’ Asgard again, but that does not sound too pleasant either, does it?
So, I am afraid your memory isn’t quite on point with this. So yes, Thor was on a similar tract with Hela, but in a different fashion driven more by hubris and power and arrogance, and he did think wiping out all the Jotun was just A okay. So it isn’t much wonder A. Loki felt he was a monster when he discovered he was the same race that his brother literally wanted to slaughter and B. he did not think wiping them out was much of a problem either.]
Apparently people are trying to say that we shouldn’t take what Child!Thor says seriously because he’s changed between that scene and when we see him again as a young man… a few seconds later in movie time. That argument makes no damn sense because the entire point of that scene with Thor and Loki as children is to establish (1) the way Odin fosters competition between them and (2) the basic character traits and dynamic that will continue into their adulthood. And that is, in fact, what we see: Thor remains outspoken and belligerent; Loki follows his lead, but is more hesitant and reserved, and seems always to be playing catch-up. It would be pointless and misleading to introduce them as kids if they’re going to be importantly different at the age when most of the movie takes place.
Also, how does “Father! We’ll finish them together!” NOT sound like suggesting genocide?
P.S. I want to make clear that I do not hate Thor and I do not think he is morally worse than Loki. I do think we should acknowledge that he has done some things that are comparable in severity to Loki’s worst crimes. If we are good readers, we will not take this to be a problem; Thor 1 makes it pretty clear, for those who are paying attention, that its hero is flawed and its villain is sympathetic. What makes Thor the “hero” and Loki the “villain” is primarily the direction of their change: Thor improves while Loki deteriorates. The fact that we’re watching Thor’s ascent makes him functionally the protagonist, and the fact that Loki ends up in conflict with Thor as they try to achieve their respective goals makes him functionally the antagonist. Wherever people got the idea that “hero/protagonist” necessarily means “morally blameless” while “villain/antagonist” necessarily means “morally worthless,” they need to drop that right now. (Although interestingly, I haven’t seen people have as much of a problem with this regarding Black Panther… which might just be because I’m not in a fandom specific to that movie, just indirectly through the MCU, so I see a lot less commentary on it in general.)
“Thor was beginning to think he might be happy in Midgard. Not yet, of course; not while the news of his father’s death and his mother’s rejection was still so fresh, not while he could still feel the ache in his muscles from straining to lift Mjölnir, in vain. But someday. He would court Jane slowly, as befit a lady of her standing and education. Selvig, who seemed to stand in place of a father for her, had given his implicit permission.
“So it came as a complete surprise when Lady Darcy called from the front room of the Midgardians’ strange abode, ‘Thor? There’s someone here for you… she says she’s your mother?’
“Thor’s hesitant spark of hope was instantly smothered. What could she be here for, but to let him feel the full measure of her fury and disappointment?
“He emerged from the room where he had been reading one of Jane’s texts of Midgardian physics (a wondrously bizarre way of viewing the world) with his head bowed, bracing himself against the onslaught. But when he dared to raise his eyes, Frigga’s expression seemed wrong; it was worry, not anger, that creased her brow and tightened her lips.”
@shine-of-asgard‘s giveaway fic is now completely posted on AO3, Parts I and II as Chapter 1 (Paradise Lost), Parts III and IV as Chapter 2 (Paradise Regained). It’s probably easier to read there than as 4 parts on Tumblr…
Loki is the Philosopher King 