juliabohemian:

saygoodbye-not-thisday:

You know, I get all the criticisms of Ragnarok, I see where they are coming from, I agree with a number of them, and they’re all valid even if I don’t agree with all of them, but…

I just wish there was a little more positivity around the film… for instance, I would love to read some in-depth positive discussion around it, because I personally enjoyed it, I think it did some new interesting things with the direction of Thor and Loki’s relationship and characters and I don’t think it butchered their characterizations. I do think that the style feels like a radical departure from the previous films, and that humorous style in which the narrative was painted jarred at times with the emotions it conveyed.

Most of the positivity I see on Tumblr tends to come from more pro-Thor, anti-Loki blogs (which I care absolutely nothing for) or from shippy blogs. Among the blogs I tend to relate more to (more gen-focused and Loki-supportive) the only discussion I can seem to find is discourse on how bad Ragnarok was. Which, again, I can understand, but at times it’s just a little downing.

I don’t like to be a downer, because I totally understand how it feels to be looking for positivity and coming across negativity instead. I consider myself to be more analytical than negative. Unfortunately, analysis can often result in pointing out the negative aspects of something.

However…I think I can explain why it is that you notice positivity coming from the pro-Thor anti-Loki blogs. Simply put -there’s a reason why people like the things that they do.

Thor appeals to a certain kind of person. More specifically, the manner in which he’s been characterized appeals to a certain kind of person. And that is the kind of person who finds movies like Ragnarok amusing. Thor is not a deep thinker. He’s not stupid by any means, but he’s not introspective. He’s not intellectual. And there’s nothing wrong with that. That’s just who he is. He’s a physical guy, for the most part. He’s a jock. He acts based on gut instinct. He doesn’t look below the surface of things. He sees no need to. He’s ego driven. And thus -he appeals to people who function similarly. The protagonist electrocuting his no good brother? That’s hilarious. Using the no good brother as a battering ram? He had it coming, of course. He’s no good. Duh!

To be perfectly honest, if one doesn’t dig TOO deeply, Ragnarok is a very entertaining movie. It’s visually stunning. The music is great. The dialogue is witty. If you completely disregard the established canon for the characters and don’t think too deeply about the implications of anything they are saying or doing, the movie is great fun. Thor fans are looking for what is explicit and Ragnarok is full of it.

Now -Loki fans are the opposite of that. They are deep thinkers. They take things very seriously. They want to to know the WHY of everything. They are largely made up of people who know what it is to be rejected and despised, or at the very least, to feel different. They see the pain that is unspoken. Behind every one of Loki’s words or actions, they see the contributing trauma. They see more than what is shown. Loki fans are always looking for what is implicit. Give them a film directed by a Shakespearean actor like Sir Kenneth Branagh and they will are happy as a pig in shit.

So, Ragnarok is not without merit. But you’re not likely to find many die hard Loki fans who don’t have at least some criticisms of its treatment of their favorite character.

I think maybe my calling certain blogs “anti-Loki” is a bit strong, through they are definitely pro-Thor. I don’t believe that people who prefer Thor are necessarily more shallow or less introspective, or that people who prefer Loki are deeper thinkers. It feels too much like generalizing and slapping a label on people. I have encountered a number of intelligent analytical people who loved Ragnarok and who also see Loki as a complex character more than a villain and who are pro-Loki AND pro-Thor (What do I even mean by pro-Thor? I guess I mean that they didn’t see Thor’s actions/characterization in Ragnarok as mainly problematic). I wish there were more of those people.

I’m not saying I want to see zero criticisms, I’m saying I want to see some other discussion mixed in as well. A lot of the problems Loki fans on here have seem to be with Ragnarok dismissing Loki’s past sufferings, experiences and depth as a character, when I don’t feel it did that. I feel like Loki changed and grew in this film, as he does in every film he has appeared in. To say that Loki has been moving beyond his past pain and trauma is not the same as belittling those experiences, even if I agree that it is easy to read the film as saying that Loki should “just get over it.” And that is one legitimate interpretation of the film, but it is not the only one, and it is not mine. I take issue with the concept that, if you can move on in any way from your past pain, if you can get better, then your pain and struggles must not have been real in the first place. It’s invalidating. That kind of thinking has got me stuck a long time before. It has got many people who suffer from mental illness stuck.

I appreciate Loki in Ragnarok, because he has clearly done some healing for himself in the interval, has started being willing to discuss some of what he went through (in the play and in his convo with Thor in prison), some of the sharpest pain has worn off, but he is still recovering, still struggling with how exactly to move on from it and who exactly he is in the aftermath. This is not unusual for those who have gone through trauma/mental illness, this is part of the recovery period where they are looking to build their life back.

Loki was afraid to confront Hela, which has been criticized as a cowardly characterization of the character – but I disagree. Fear is not cowardly, fear is a survival mechanism. Loki in the Avengers and in TDW would probably have thrown himself recklessly into the fight, regardless of the odds (and in this case I’m certain the odds are that Hela would have easily defeated them both and Loki KNOWS the odds because he isn’t actually stupid), because he was self-destructive and didn’t truly care about his life. In contrast in Thor 1, before he learns the shattering truth and even before he gives up all hope on the Bifrost, Loki clearly favored non-confrontational methods first, as on Jotunheim when he preferred to placate rather than provoke Laufey. In moving past some of his self-destructiveness, Loki is in a way going back to who he was before. There was nothing to be won from confronting Hela then and there, what he couldn’t account for in his panic was her following.

In my opinion, Loki was seeking his sense of direction in this film. He has overcome some of his past self-destructiveness, but without yet having a clear idea of where to go from here. Like I said, he’s been recovering, it’s a tenuous period where he is rediscovering and redefining himself, he’s going back and looking at his memories and taking back his own narrative – where he was once “the monster that parents tell their children about,” he chooses to be the “savior of Asgard” – but it’s a process and he was just not ready yet to confront Hela and save Asgard.

Loki says “Take US back” which means him AND Thor, and this is key. Loki was trying to get Thor to stay on Sakaar, and I’ve discussed this before, but I personally think Loki’s main, selfish goal throughout most of the film was to keep Thor alive, to not lose the last of his family. On the one hand, I consider this bravery, that Loki seems to have reached a level of honesty with himself, that he does value his family, the family that let him down and hurt him, inadvertently or not, and that could still reject him (see again his conversation with Thor, he had to know that Thor might still reject his help and invalidate his sincerity), rather than simply pushing them away and running from the pain of past and potential rejection.

Ragnarok is not perfect, obviously. The dynamic between the brothers is unbalanced, and Loki might not have returned to Thor’s side for the healthiest of reasons – their relationship will always have a flavor of codependency to me. But for me, this does not invalidate what I consider to be good character development and progress on Loki’s part. Besides, I love that I have a reflection of how messed-up and hurtful relationships can be in real life, even when the other person does love you. I also disagree that the narrative affirms Thor at every turning, he is mocked plenty as well while he flounders in Sakaar at the mercy of Valkyrie and the Grandmaster. The film stops mocking both Thor and Loki once they are back on Asgard working towards a selfless goal, rescuing the survivors on Asgard.

It’s just my opinion. I get most people will probably disagree with me, and that’s okay.

I can’t speak for other Loki fans who have been criticizing Ragnarok, but my problem with its depiction of Loki’s psychology is not that it shows him having “moved past” his trauma; rather, it either ignores it, or actively mocks and minimizes it. A few people who have a negative overall opinion of TR, like @foundlingmother, have decided for the purpose of fanfiction (or avoiding despair) to read the play as Loki’s self-therapy, his attempt to come to terms with his heritage and achieve some kind of catharsis regarding his sacrifice… but that’s an extremely generous interpretation, and I doubt very much that it’s the one the film’s creators (screenwriter Eric Pearson as well as director Taika Waititi) intended. The film doesn’t even acknowledge that Loki’s Jotun heritage was ever a problem for him or for Asgard; if the revelation in the play was intended to show reconciliation of himself and/or Asgard to the idea, it might have alluded to the fact that Asgardians (used to) regard Frost Giants as monsters. It also seems implausible that it’s supposed to help him move past his near-death experience, because the movie never acknowledges that Loki was actually stabbed, whether or not he believed he was going to die. Loki never contests Thor’s claim that he “faked his death” – suggesting that he staged the whole thing – and the movie invites us to think that the only reason he did it was to usurp the throne, and that the only reason he did that was so he could glorify himself and live in luxury, rather than, say, hiding from Thanos and trying to keep the Infinity Stones away from him, or even taking (not totally unjustified) revenge on Odin for his lies and maltreatment.

Someone else pointed out recently that the play has Loki say “I’m sorry about that thing with the Tesseract. I just couldn’t help myself,” and then his next line is “I’m a trickster,” which seems to be intended as an explanation. I guess I can see why he wouldn’t want to reveal to all of Asgard that he was under severe pressure from a bigger supervillain… but he didn’t have to mention it at all. This, and the implied explanation for Loki’s seizing the throne, is a general pattern: TR consistently reduces Loki’s motivation to “I’m a trickster, it’s in my nature” – or, effectively, “I did it for the lulz” – when his motivations in previous films have never been that simplistic. Arguably, letting the Frost Giants in to disrupt Thor’s coronation and goading him into trying to go to Jotunheim might have been partly out of mischief (“to ruin my brother’s big day”), but it was also because he wanted to prove to Odin that Thor wasn’t ready to rule – and he wasn’t wrong about that. His reasons for lying, betraying Thor, and causing destruction throughout Thor are envy and resentment, the desire to prove himself to Odin, and emotional pain over the revelation of his origins. His reasons for invading Earth in The Avengers are ambition, anger at Thor and Odin, and some level of coercion from Thanos.

There are definitely respects in which Loki acts like a trickster in earlier films, weaving complicated schemes, delighting in chaos, and hiding his true intentions; but he always has comprehensible, psychologically realistic motivations for his crimes and betrayals. What’s more, it should be clear from watching the previous movies that he almost never enjoys betraying Thor. FFS, he’s crying while he fights him at the end of Thor; he’s obviously affected, even tempted, by Thor’s pleas for him to come home in The Avengers, he hesitates before he drops the cage, he has tears in his eyes when he stabs Thor on the tower. As I’ve discussed elsewhere, TR ignores all of that and scrapes Loki’s psychology paper-thin, essentializing him as a simplistic version of the trickster archetype who just can’t resist the urge to betray people for shits and giggles.

It’s only because of this denial of Loki’s psychological depth and motivational complexity that TR can set up the bit where Thor “tricks the trickster” and gives that lecture about change. As @endiness (and others, probably) has speculated, the creators seem to have ignored all of Loki’s character development in previous films precisely so that Thor can get all the credit for his “reform” and “redemption.” It’s not at all clear why Loki betrays Thor on Sakaar; again, people trying to rescue the movie’s characterization can speculate that it’s because Loki is pissed at Thor for dismissing him, or maybe to keep Thor from what Loki thinks of as a suicide mission to fight Hela, but I think (and Thor’s little speech strongly suggests) the movie wants us to assume Loki did it for the same reason it claims he went after the Tesseract: “I just couldn’t help myself. I’m a trickster.” It’s really kind of rich that Thor is preaching at Loki about growth and change, considering how much Loki has changed over the course of the films, while TR regresses Thor back to the brash arrogance of the first film – no, worse; it makes him narcissistic and cruel in a way he wasn’t even at the beginning of Thor, as oblivious and insensitive as he could be. Many of the people who condemn TR are people who love Thor (almost) as much as they love Loki, and all of them agree that it ruins Thor’s character even more than Loki’s. I kind of don’t understand how the “Thor stans” can still call him a kindhearted little ray of sunshine in light of his behavior toward Bruce/Hulk as well as Loki… but as I said before, I think they’re motivated to like the movie and the version of Thor that together put Loki in his place.

As I’ve said, it’s possible to give the portrayal of Loki a more generous interpretation than I’ve offered, but part of the reason I seriously doubt it’s intended that way is that if you put the text of the movie, including the mocking tone of the little play, together with Taika Waititi’s interviews and other conduct, you get a picture of someone who is contemptuous of the rest of the Thor franchise, of Loki as a character, of Tom Hiddleston as an actor, and of Tom Hiddleston-as-Loki’s mostly female fans. Of course, people who are more gung-ho than I am about “the death of the author” have a policy of ignoring the artist’s intentions entirely, and that might be a good strategy if you want to stay positive about the movie.

illwynd:

foundlingmother:

illwynd:

foundlingmother:

philosopherking1887:

talxns:

i think about this a lot but how much better would thor 1 be if we got to see thor react to the fact that his beloved brother was a race that he grew up wanting to slaughter?? like was that not an important plot point?? THAT’S a better way for thor to realize that killing just to conquer is wrong, that’s how he should have realized the error of his ways, not just meeting mortals and wanting to protect them, but by hurting someone that he loved because of his arrogant ignorance and prejudice

@foundlingmother, I thought this might speak to you…

I love this for a couple reasons:

It makes Thor and Loki’s relationship the most important in the movie since it’s the relationship impacting Thor’s character arc, and that’s how it should be in a Thor movie.

The people Thor wants to conquer are Frost Giants, not humans. Asgard’s opinion of Midgard is in no way comparable to its opinion of Jotunheim. Learning how nice and cool humans are shouldn’t impact how he feels about Jotunheim. This is why I explain his change of heart in other ways.

The trouble is, I think a small change like, for instance, Thor noticing Loki turning blue when the Frost Giant touches him would change the plot entirely. If Thor had noticed that, he’d have grabbed Loki and noped the fuck out of the battle on Jotunheim. The conversation between him and Odin would have been entirely different. He probably wouldn’t have been banished, which means Loki wouldn’t have been regent.

There’s an interesting fanfic in that idea. (Obviously there are already works that have Thor find out Loki’s a Frost Giant and never get banished, but most of the ones I’ve read are pro-Odin, pro-Asgard, and anti-Jotunheim, and that’s just not my cup of tea.)

Oddly enough, I strongly disagree, because that change would make the movie *less* about their relationship and less compelling as a narrative. This isn’t to say I don’t want it to be addressed (wow, do I ever want a scene where they actually confront that particular revelation between them), but having that take place in Thor 1 would have dramatically weakened the story as a whole.

First, it wouldn’t make sense in terms of Thor’s character as it had been portrayed up till that point (and forward as well). This a character who is extremely kind and generous and good-hearted but also prone to taking too much for granted when things seem fine and whose arrogant streak makes him a bit blind to the perspectives of others. The growth that needs to occur in the first movie is not “learning that killing to conquer is wrong,” even though it takes place in that context. The way Thor needs to grow is to have his perspective get a shaking. He gets knocked down a peg, has to accept help from people he would have considered weaker, finds himself in a situation where all the things he counted on–his own position, his expected trajectory in life, the people he loved and trusted–are gone and he has to figure out who he is in this new situation and reevaluate the choices that got him there. He would not learn those lessons from finding out that Loki was an abandoned Jotun baby that Odin took in after the war. But moreover, the person Thor is at the beginning of the movie has not yet had the growth necessary to respond in any useful way to that revelation. The Thor who yells back at Odin that he’s a old fool for not waging preemptive war on Jotunheim for the vault incident would not have come quickly enough to the right understanding if he had seen Loki’s hand turn blue. He’d have suspected a trick or a curse (as Loki did also), and if those were disproved and he actually learned the truth at that point? Does anyone actually believe this would not have been disastrous? He’d have handled it so badly, and while there could certainly have been an interesting story there (quite a few fics’ worth), it would have very likely been an uglier one and one less focused on their brotherly relationship.

The reason the actual movie was in fact entirely focused on their relationship even though they spent half the movie not even on the same realm is that everything that happens to Thor–from deciding to go to Jotunheim to being banished to (nearly) dying at the hand of the Destroyer–was brought into motion by Loki, and we as the audience are aware of this but, crucially, Thor is not. It is their relationship playing out in shadows and reflections. We can see and understand Loki’s conflict and Loki’s resentment and Loki’s turmoil and the context for it. And at the same time we can see Thor’s growth as he deals with the shock of his changed circumstances. We can see Thor’s better traits shining through in his own trials. And we can see Thor’s blindness to what’s happening with Loki (and Loki’s awareness of Thor’s blindness) and how that mirrors the things that grew Loki’s resentment over the years. We’re able to see both of their stories unfolding at the same time and how completely connected these are even though they are not taking place in the same physical space. And then when they are in the same space–first, Loki visiting Thor on Midgard to lie to him, and then after Thor regains Mjolnir and returns to Asgard–we can watch as their relationship evolves as Thor grows and Loki cracks. Thor pleading with Loki, looking to him as a lifeline, as the most trusted person in Thor’s old life, and Loki turning him away because he can’t, things can’t go back to how they were, and Loki doesn’t trust Thor with this knowledge. And then Thor’s return, grown and changed and having to deal with knowing that something has gone very wrong with Loki but he lacks an understanding of what; in this he is still having to face the ripples of his old arrogance and ignorance, the problems that he had not even been aware of in his relationship with his brother.

And this conflict unfolding at this point, after Thor has had the shakeup of being banished, and after Loki has had time to dig himself well into a violent breakdown–Thor has had the necessary growth to deal with this situation better, but the stakes have gotten higher and the situation has gotten worse and all our hearts break because their goals are fundamentally in conflict so someone has to lose–and we have seen through both their eyes and we know how important their relationship is to both of them, so that means there can be no real winning, either.

I don’t think you’d get that same effect if you formulated the story so that it dealt with that relationship and Loki’s origins head-on.

If the story had been centered on Thor learning a lesson about not killing Jotnar because Loki was one, it would have been very likely to become an after-school special on prejudice.

Dealing with it obliquely, with their relationship reflected in and infused through everything that happens–that makes the story so much more.

I happen to agree with a lot of what you said @illwynd, which is why I specified that I think it would make for an interesting fic. I love the idea of Loki’s heritage being dealt with head-on, but I prefer for the sake of the overall relationship arc between Thor and Loki in the MCU that Thor retain its structure (not least because we have the option to explore these canon divergent AUs, but also diverge from canon in completely different ways at completely different points). That said, I’d still have preferred if they left in the scenes that hinted at Thor’s vulnerability. I think it helps to explain why three days in an insecure position is enough to sober Thor up sufficiently.

Yeah, I guessed that we were at least somewhat on the same page! I was mainly disagreeing with the idea expressed in the OP that Thor 1 would have been a better movie by dealing with that aspect explicitly, and I wanted to go into why I thought so, because there is a bit of a trend lately to discuss Thor 1 (and Avengers and TDW) in what are actually pretty inaccurate ways and I wanted to make sure to give adequate context.

If you mean the deleted scenes, yes, at least most of those I wish they had kept in as well! One of my favorite scenes in the whole damn thing is the deleted/extended version of Loki goading Thor into going to Jotunheim. There’s just so much going on in it, so much hinted history between them. 😀

After reading @illwynd‘s lovely essay above, I completely agree; I didn’t think it all the way through before sharing the original post. The fact that so much of the plot turns on incomplete information and misunderstandings can make it infuriating to watch but also very Shakespearean. Or Attic-tragedian, even. And I absolutely know what you mean about people discussing the previous movies in inaccurate ways: they’ve been reading the Ragnarok retconning of their characters back into previous movies – most notably, by portraying all of Loki’s actions as completely unmotivated and unintelligible, the way they’re framed in Ragnarok; claiming that everything he does, from letting the Jotnar in to disrupt Thor’s coronation to attempting to destroy Jotunheim, was done just because he’s “the god of mischief” and likes to fuck shit up for no reason.

The important thing about Thor’s banishment to Earth is that it represents the “high brought low” trope (an expression that my English prof pal @fuckyeahrichardiii taught me; a literary education is never complete). I came across a strange reblog chain once where people were describing Thor 1 as a case of “meeting the savages,” where Thor’s sojourn on Earth, among people he considered his racial inferiors, was supposed to teach him to respect the Jotnar… I think in general (sorry, @foundlingmother) that there’s been a bit too much reading present concerns about racism and colonialism into the Thor movies; Asgard is a premodern pagan society, and I suspect they really don’t think about other races and cultures the way we do now. It used to be completely normal to utterly crush your enemies (hence the thing in the Old Testament about eradicating the Amalekites, down to their sheep and cattle) and even make their land uninhabitable so they wouldn’t be able to rise up and pose a threat any time soon (hence the custom of sowing fields with salt, as the Romans did to the Carthaginians). Not that any of this is good, just that it seems a little strange to me to approach Asgard with modern critiques of colonialism, which presuppose that the conquerors themselves espouse a basically Christian, post-Enlightenment moral worldview.

The point of Thor’s banishment, from Odin’s POV as well as that of the film, was to humble him by making him helpless and forcing him to rely on the hospitality of others (and so much the better if they’re weaker and beneath him in station!), not to teach him respect for other cultures (clearly, as we see in TDW, Odin doesn’t care about that). Thor’s practical humility, so to speak, does come along with a measure of epistemic humility: he learns to question the things he used to take for granted, to question his own perspective, and therefore to give more consideration to the perspectives of others. Importantly, he learns to question what he’d always believed (indeed, been taught by Odin to believe) about his own worth relative to others, including Midgardians, Loki, and (to some degree) Frost Giants.

I thought this part of illwynd’s commentary was especially insightful (and heartbreaking):

And then when they are in the same space – first, Loki visiting Thor on Midgard to lie to him, and then after Thor regains Mjolnir and returns to Asgard – we can watch as their relationship evolves as Thor grows and Loki cracks. Thor pleading with Loki, looking to him as a lifeline, as the most trusted person in Thor’s old life, and Loki turning him away because he can’t, things can’t go back to how they were, and Loki doesn’t trust Thor with this knowledge. And then Thor’s return, grown and changed and having to deal with knowing that something has gone very wrong with Loki but he lacks an understanding of what; in this he is still having to face the ripples of his old arrogance and ignorance, the problems that he had not even been aware of in his relationship with his brother.

What’s so heartbreaking is that Loki, at this point, has no reason to trust Thor with the terrible secret of his birth, no reason to trust that he’s changed and become more open-minded and sensitive to Loki’s feelings and perspective. I’ve remarked before on how Thor’s apology to Loki after he sends the Destroyer to Midgard – “Brother, whatever I have done to wrong you, whatever I have done to lead you to do this, I am truly sorry” – is kind of a non-apology, because it’s hard to truly repent (which is to say, rethink, reevaluate) something you don’t know you did. So you can’t entirely blame Loki for not trusting that apology or taking it seriously; but at this point you also can’t entirely blame newly matured Thor for not knowing what immature arrogant Thor did, because immature Thor was too blind and self-centered to really be aware of the ways he was neglecting and belittling Loki and how much it hurt him, and mature Thor doesn’t really have any more information, just a new willingness to listen. So their confrontation has the kind of inevitability you want from a good Shakespearean tragedy: just one little bit of information shared at the right time could avert the whole thing (I’ve even written some little AU vignettes along those lines), but the urgency of the situation and the heightened emotions means there’s no real opportunity for that information to be exchanged.

Definitely planning to write fic where Thor and Loki actually discuss the Jotun heritage thing… but set after Thor’s long trajectory of maturation (and ignoring TR’s reversal of that trajectory, while accepting the broad outlines of the plot as canon).

talxns:

i think about this a lot but how much better would thor 1 be if we got to see thor react to the fact that his beloved brother was a race that he grew up wanting to slaughter?? like was that not an important plot point?? THAT’S a better way for thor to realize that killing just to conquer is wrong, that’s how he should have realized the error of his ways, not just meeting mortals and wanting to protect them, but by hurting someone that he loved because of his arrogant ignorance and prejudice

@foundlingmother, I thought this might speak to you…

juliabohemian:

kaori04:

latent-thoughts:

philosopherking1887:

Have the people calling Thor the biggest Loki stan/apologist actually seen “Ragnarok”? Because Thor basically spends the entire movie calling Loki a horrible person except for when he does exactly what Thor wants him to because he gave him an ultimatum and electrocuted him.

This baffles me too. Because, in order to be his stan or even apologize on Loki’s behalf, Thor must, on some level, sympathize with him?

Which is not the case in Ragnarok, as you pointet out. It’s completely the opposite way. Thor not only can’t understand Loki at all, he doesn’t even try to.

I sometimes wonder if it’s an instance of projection, where these people project their own thoughts and emotions on to Thor or Loki and try to normalise their relationship in their head so much that it digresses from what actually happened in the movie.

I sometimes wonder if it’s an instance of projection, where these people project their own thoughts and emotions on to Thor or Loki and try to normalise their relationship in their head so much that it digresses from what actually happened in the movie.

The movie exuses Thor in his behaviour (or probably “encourages" is a better word), plus the movie is highly enjoyable and therefore appealing to the majority of an audience, plus no one watches Marvel movies to think deeply into it => people are likely to embrace what film frames as “normal”/”healthy” as

normal/healthy.

It’s very hard to doubt something that you liked that much and what brought you a joy. (That’s why I wish TW would use his talent more thoughtfully, it’s a very powerful tool in influencing people’s minds)

I feel like Thor started roasting Loki in the first Thor movie and hasn’t stopped since. “I must apologize for my brother. He’s a fucking idiot. Also he’s a adopted. And a terrible person…go team Avengers though, amirite???”

Obviously it’s fine for people to add their own opinions once I’ve put this post out in the Tumblr ether, but I want to make clear that I make a categorical distinction between the Thor of the first 4 movies we see him in (Thor 1, The Avengers, TDW, and AOU) and the Thor of Thor: Ragnarok. Following a philosophical convention, let us call these, respectively, Thor and Thor* (because I don’t really want to acknowledge that the person they call “Thor” in TR is even the same character).

I do not hate Thor. I am not comfortable saying that Thor was “abusive” to Loki. He was often insensitive and neglected Loki’s feelings, but the early movies acknowledged this as a flaw, connected with the immaturity and arrogance that he was working on getting over in Thor 1 and The Avengers. (I don’t completely buy the criticism that Thor was supposed to have miraculously become perfect in 3 days; I think The Avengers was deliberately showing that he still had some growing up to do.) In TDW and AOU, he still has some anger issues, and often has the impulse to take out his anger physically, but he’s generally more level-headed and is working on being sensitive to other people’s feelings. He obviously loves and cares about Loki, even if he doesn’t understand him and his very complicated emotions and isn’t always great about showing his love in the ways Loki needs.

If I took Thor* to be the same person as Thor, I might have to rethink my opinion of Thor’s character and I might hate him. I definitely hate Thor* and the fact that he has replaced Thor in the minds of much of the fandom, including the people who claim to be his biggest fans. I think Thor* is a dimwitted bully and buffoon who can lay claim to a kind of low cunning, but not much else. Thor* does not appear to care about Loki at all, certainly not about his inner life and motivations. He simply wants Loki to behave in the way Thor* considers virtuous and resorts to emotional manipulation and physical punishment to get his way. He is also manipulative and insensitive to Bruce and Hulk, despite his claim to be their friend.

I could certainly see Thor circa AOU being a Loki “stan”/apologist and defending Loki to the other Avengers after his heroic death. The phenomenon I was objecting to in the original post is people saying it specifically about Thor* post-Ragnarok. I’ve even seen people saying that the “I think everything is going to work out fine” line was his promise that he would protect Loki from the other Avengers and from any human attempts to hold Loki to account for his attack on Earth. I think it was pretty clear from the context – i.e., when Loki expresses concern, Thor* gives the obtuse, self-absorbed response “Earth loves me” – that he just hasn’t given much thought to what might happen to Loki on Earth.

foundlingmother:

philosopherking1887:

buckeed:

Thor: The Dark World || Thor: Ragnarok

#this is an interesting difference between the brothers #thor refuses the even give loki an answer #and only comes to loki because he needs him for the plan #loki comes and shares their grief #and offers to help thor #despite him being unnecessary for loki’s plan #thor loves loki #i don’t dispute it #i think he works really hard to stay mad at loki #and he tries really hard in avengers to bring loki back #but he also sometimes acts like a massive thoughtless dick to loki #and i think it’s that same malformed view of loki that i’ve spoken of #thor conceptualizes loki as a bad person who needs to be fixed or managed #and it’s much more complicated than that #and he’s going to feel horrible about everything #when he realizes that (via @foundlingmother)

I think the relevant difference between these two scenes is that in the first, Thor is still hurt and bewildered and angry at Loki over what happened in The Avengers (and probably toward the end of Thor 1, too), while in the second, Loki isn’t shown as having any particular reason to be mad at Thor. (He probably should be mad at Thor for blowing his cover and potentially allowing Thanos to discover where he is, but the movie doesn’t even acknowledge that as a reason why Loki was pretending to be Odin. Or any reason other than “mischief, hur hur.”)

Maybe there is more continuity between Thor’s thoughtlessness toward Loki in earlier movies and in Ragnarok than I’ve acknowledged, but earlier on it seems more complex and well-motivated.

I don’t think I would say that Thor consistently “conceptualizes Loki as a bad person who needs to be fixed or managed” before Ragnarok.

Thor’s callousness in TDW seems put-on, deliberate, and painful even for him; in Ragnarok it’s just a matter of course.

In my experience hurt doesn’t work that way. They’ve never dealt with their issues, so I’m pretty sure it’s all festering. I think they’d both still be holding on to a lot of pain that relates to one another (and Odin, that gets attached to one another unfairly).

You know, I think that brings up something I hadn’t considered. Maybe the problem with how Thor acts towards Loki in Ragnarok isn’t the actions (at least most of the time *glances at that one scene that is too ooc*) or words themselves, but the feeling behind it. See, what I mean when I say that Thor sees Loki as a bad person, I think it’s, 1. pretty forced on his part and something he has to keep reminding himself of, and 2. something he sees as a new and hopefully temporary (though he tries not to hope) insanity Loki’s experiencing. It’s painful for him how far he feels Loki’s fallen, and he wants his brother back.

Ragnarok just kind of makes him mad at Loki, and you don’t feel the love that’s tangible even under the anger in the previous Thor movies and Avengers.

Honestly, I don’t feel like I can take any of Loki’s (or Thor’s) actions in Ragnarok to shed light on preexisting aspects of their character. Would Loki share Thor’s grief even while being (justifiably) mad at him? I think so, but Ragnarok is just so blatantly OOC all the time that I don’t think it counts as evidence in favor. Rather, the evidence is that throughout his three movies, Loki never disregards or dismisses Thor’s feelings. He’s very attentive to them, whether he wants to flatter him, soothe him, provoke him, or outright wound him.

Of course I think Loki has a lot of reasons to still be pissed at Thor, but Ragnarok doesn’t frame it that way. It presents all of Loki’s grudges and resentments as childish and insignificant, things he just needs to grow up and get over. So the scene doesn’t present him as comforting Thor in spite of his hurt and anger; it presents him as trying to mend fences when Thor is still (justifiably, yes, but not as righteously as the movie makes out) pissed at him.

Your last point – “Ragnarok just kind of makes him mad at Loki, and you don’t feel the love that’s tangible even under the anger in the previous Thor movies and Avengers” – seems exactly right. Some of it surely is the words and actions themselves (it’s hard to believe he would say or do some of those things to someone he loves), but a lot of it is also the affect. Thor consistently has an air of “done with Loki’s shit” that’s supposed to show that he’s wised up, he has Loki’s number, he’s nobody’s fool anymore (pick your cliché), but all it says to me is that he’s given up on understanding Loki as a person and now just wants to control/manage him (as you said). And this might make sense if we were to accept Ragnarok’s retcon of Loki’s character as a capricious trickster who does bad shit just for the hell of it… but in light of the complexity of Loki’s emotions and motivations as shown in previous films, it just seems inexcusably cruel and obtuse (which also serves as an apt description for the entirety of Thor’s character in TR…).

P.S., on the subject of Thor figuring out how complicated Loki actually is, have you read my fic Starting Over, which is basically my fantasy version of Thor and Loki’s post-AOU reunion conversation (+ sex)?

buckeed:

Thor: The Dark World || Thor: Ragnarok

#this is an interesting difference between the brothers #thor refuses the even give loki an answer #and only comes to loki because he needs him for the plan #loki comes and shares their grief #and offers to help thor #despite him being unnecessary for loki’s plan #thor loves loki #i don’t dispute it #i think he works really hard to stay mad at loki #and he tries really hard in avengers to bring loki back #but he also sometimes acts like a massive thoughtless dick to loki #and i think it’s that same malformed view of loki that i’ve spoken of #thor conceptualizes loki as a bad person who needs to be fixed or managed #and it’s much more complicated than that #and he’s going to feel horrible about everything #when he realizes that (via @foundlingmother)

I think the relevant difference between these two scenes is that in the first, Thor is still hurt and bewildered and angry at Loki over what happened in The Avengers (and probably toward the end of Thor 1, too), while in the second, Loki isn’t shown as having any particular reason to be mad at Thor. (He probably should be mad at Thor for blowing his cover and potentially allowing Thanos to discover where he is, but the movie doesn’t even acknowledge that as a reason why Loki was pretending to be Odin. Or any reason other than “mischief, hur hur.”)

Maybe there is more continuity between Thor’s thoughtlessness toward Loki in earlier movies and in Ragnarok than I’ve acknowledged, but earlier on it seems more complex and well-motivated.

I don’t think I would say that Thor consistently “conceptualizes Loki as a bad person who needs to be fixed or managed” before Ragnarok.

Thor’s callousness in TDW seems put-on, deliberate, and painful even for him; in Ragnarok it’s just a matter of course.

shine-of-asgard:

juliabohemian:

apocalypticwafflekitten:

lucianalight:

juliabohemian:

lasimo74allmyworld:

mosellegreen:

ameliawilliams:

You think you could make Loki tell us where the Tesseract is?

Shit I hate it when I notice new things about these movies.

We’ve covered how conceited it is of Thor to assume, incorrectly, that this is about him. But what else can we expect from this spoiled brat.

And we’ve covered that this is Fury proposing torture. Asking a man to torture his own brother. Anyone who still thinks Fury is one of the good guys… he’s not.

But Thor says “There’s no pain would prise his need from him.”

Thor knows that pain won’t make Loki knuckle under.

Which means he must have tried it. Before Loki was officially designated a villain. When he was just the younger prince of Asgard, Thor’s loyal brother and comrade in arms.

Thor knows that torture won’t work on Loki from experience.

Shit. Did they think about what they were putting in these fucking movies at all?

The more we analyse the movies, the more we discover that the bad guys are the ones with shining armour and boosted egos.

Really, the painful truth I read above breaks my heart.

I also think it’s interesting that Thor assumes Loki coming to Earth is about him. It had nothing to do with Thor at all, but Thor never finds that out. Here’s hoping Infinity War will bring some shit to light, but I’m not holding my breath.

Also the thought that Thor knows Loki has an incredibly high pain tolerance kind of makes me cringe.

“Which means he must have tried it. Before Loki was officially designated a villain. When he was just the younger prince of Asgard, Thor’s loyal brother and comrade in arms.

Thor knows that torture won’t work on Loki from experience.”

Before TR I would never believe that Thor would ever torture Loki, or put him through any kind of serious pain. So what I understood from Thor’s line in Avengers was that Thor had seen Loki going through torture and didn’t break. Not that he had done it himself. I mean they are princes, any kind of voilence could have happened by their enemys. But damn TR and that scene with obedience disk makes me question everything now.

@mosellegreen

@lasimo74allmyworld

@juliabohemian

@lucianalight

Alrighty. I know I’m late, but upon coming across this, have things to say. Don’t know if you’re going to like or agree with them, but here we go.

Im not going to get into Thor’s vanity, because that’s a topic for another time, but here we go on Loki and abuse:

I can NEVER belive that Thor would EVER torture Loki. He wouldn’t abuse him, or experiment on him because he loves his brother. I mean, look at the ENTIRE elevator scene in Ragnarok. Thor literally says in a morose, and reminiscent voice: “I thought the world of you. I thought we’re were always going to fight side by side.” (Something along those lines. Sorry if the quote isn’t correct.)Personally, I would never beat anyone if I thought the world of them. I wouldn’t wish to fight by their side if I hated them enough to beat them.

And it goes back to before then even. Look at TDW. The scene where Thor is asking for Loki’s help? He states that he used to belive that there was a glimmer of goodness and redeemability in Loki.

DO YOU KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS?!?!!??!? It means that he wanted to save his brother! If youre abusing someone, why would you wish to save them?

Granted, he does say that that is/was gone, but we never see him abuse or beat Loki after that. And then theres all the other things Loki did for Thor in that move.

He agreed to help him in the first

Saved/Protected Jane.

Twice

Didn’t actually betray him at all until he “died”

And, my personal favorite

LEFT THOR WITH THE THOUGHT THAT HIS FATHER WAS ACTUALLY A GOOD FATHER BY TELLING HIM SOMETHING KIND AND DEEP. SOMETHINGBHE NEEDED TO HEAR SO THE HE DIDNT ABSOLUTELY HATE HIS FATHER; HIS IDOL SINCE HE WAS A SMOL LIGHTNING BOLT WHILE DISGUISED AS ODIN

You don’t do things like that for people you hate.

Then there the first Thor movie. Did you see any of the scenes before it was revealed to Loki what his heritage was? The two were close. Look at the deleted scenes. Loki says something similar to: “I admit that there have been times when I was envious, but never doubt that I love you.” Why would Loki say he loves Thor if his brother abused him? I hear y’all saying “Well it could be a show!” “He’s faking!” “Thor threatened him!” But look at the deleted scene mentioned earlier in this paragraph. The two are completely alone. Loki is smiling, and it’s genuine. There are creases by his eyes from his cheeks lifting. (That’s the physical cue that a smile is genuine) Loki’s body language in that scene doesn’t show any sort of discomfort or fear. He’s comfortable around his brother.

And then there were the scenes in Jotunheim in the first Thor. Loki is insistant that they go home (and that they not go at all, calling it suicide)because he doesn’t want to see his brother or ever his brother’s friends hurt or worse.

Oh, and this little gem: “I love Thor more dearly than any of you.”

If you look at the body language of someone whose been beaten while they’re around the person they are beaten by, you’ll see slouched shoulders, a tense body, constant glances to anywhere but their abusers face, clammy hands, hands in pockets (a cue that the person is trying to hide something) and just a general feel of unease and unrest. Fear and terror.

You see NONE of that body language when Loki and Thor are together. Look at Ragnarok. They’re fighting together to end Hella. They don’t hate each other. Loki isn’t afraid of Thor. He’s just so used to being in Thor’s shadow and he’s sick of it. He wants to be recognized.

When the two are alone at the end of Ragnarok, you don’t see Loki tense, or avoiding eye contant. He’s looking strait at Thor withought any glint of fear.

He’s comfortable.

Oh, and the line “I’m Here.”

And “Maybe you’re not so bad.”

Im gonna bring up a thought now.

They. Are. Norse. Gods. And. Brothers.

That means battles, and fighting side by side. Seeing each other take hits and blows, stabs and cuts. Seeing them push themselves to their limits. Thor knows that Loki won’t stop no matter the pain because he’s seen it in his brother in battle. He’s seen that fight in Loki’s eyes. He knows his brother’s ambitious nature.

“So how does Thor know that pain won’t stop Loki?” I hear you ask.

Well my friends. All you have to do is look at the ending of the first Thor film.

Loki is hellbent on destroying Jotumheim. So hellbent that he would fight his own brother to do it. Sure, Loki was angered and confused because of what he had recently learned, and he didn’t belive Thor to be his brother, but it had to hurt to fight his brother. I mean, it would hurt me to fight my brother.

At this point, Loki has discarded pain for his ambition and let it consume him. He didn’t care that he had to fight Thor. He didn’t care that destroying Jotunheim would have awful reprocussions. He just wanted to prove himself to someone, *cough cough* his father *cough*

And at the end you see Loki showing that he care for Thor. When Thor is destroying the Bifrost Loki yells at him: “But if you destroy the Bifrost you’ll never see her again!!!”

I don’t know about you, but to me, that screams that Loki cares about Thor’s wellbeing and interests. He cares about his brother’s happiness despite feeling estranged and ostracized because of what he is.

That’s not typically seen in someone who is abused. The care for their abusers wellbeing.

So no. I don’t think Thor would ever abuse Loki. They’re too close. They’ve been through too much together. Thor does NOT deserve that kind of belittlement. He has fought to save and protect his little brother since the beginning, and that ain’t gonna change.

@

apocalypticwafflekitten

Let me just preface this by saying that I have studied psychology, child development and trauma/abuse recovery at great length and for many years. I don’t usually bother responding to posts like this, simply because I don’t have the time, but given that your argument is based on some disturbingly false premises, I feel like I owe it to other Loki fans to construct a reply. You seem very young and sweet, so I’m going to do my best to be kind.

Tagging a few peeps here to see if they would like to chime in: @mosellegreen @lasimo74allmyworld @lucianalight @lokiloveforever

“I can NEVER believe that Thor would EVER torture Loki.”

I LIKE Thor and I have zero trouble believing this at all. Thor left Loki being electrocuted by the obedience disk. Thor had no idea how long Loki would lie there, or how much he could withstand. He didn’t know if Loki would be rescued, or if he’d be found by someone who was going to simply execute him…and they were on a planet where people were executed regularly (and painfully) for ridiculous reasons. In fact, Thor witnessed an execution, so he knew this for sure. And Thor didn’t JUST leave Loki there, he did so gleefully. So even if his comment to Nick Fury about knowing how much pain Loki can withstand doesn’t mean anything, the scene in Ragnarok leaves very little to the imagination.

“And it goes back to before then even. Look at TDW. The scene where Thor is asking for Loki’s help? He states that he used to belive that there was a glimmer of goodness and redeemability in Loki.”

The thing is, this is actually an awful thing to say. Like many of Thor’s comments towards Loki, it’s an insult disguised as a compliment. Thor has a lot of balls asking for help at that moment, in the first place. Loki does it because he loves his mother and wants to avenge her. The problem is that you are interpreting this from the POV that Loki is a villain who needs to be redeemed, instead of someone who has feelings and motives for his behavior, just like Thor.

Interestingly enough, I’ve noticed that people who tend to defend Thor’s actions are people who share the view that he and Loki are not actually equals.

“DO YOU KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS?!?!!??!? It means that he wanted to save his brother! If youre abusing someone, why would you wish to save them…You don’t do things like that for people you hate.”

First of all, no one has said that Loki hates Thor. For the record, I don’t think that Thor hates Loki either. Abuse victims don’t usually hate their abusers. In fact, many would openly claim to love them. Abuse victims also absolutely do defend their abusers, do things for their abusers and feel loyal and/or indebted to their abusers. It’s actually more common for abuse victims to feel this way, than not. That’s pretty textbook. Extreme versions of this are known as Stockholm Syndrome.

Loki is consistently desperate for Thor’s approval and validation, as well as that of his father’s. He even says as much. “All I ever wanted was to be your equal…” Loki’s motives can be summed up, almost entirely by that quote alone. He tries to kill himself when he realizes that his dad isn’t going to give him that approval. Let’s take a moment to recognize what a devastating act that is. It’s not the sort of thing someone does when they are secure in their position in their family. That’s the act of a desperate person, who just wants to put themselves out of their misery.

Did you see any of the scenes before it was revealed to Loki what his heritage was? The two were close. Look at the deleted scenes. Loki says something similar to: “I admit that there have been times when I was envious, but never doubt that I love you.”

Yes, I have seen all of them, many times. Loki says he loves Thor and Thor says…thank you. That’s got to be the absolute worst response a person can offer to someone who is telling them that they love them. And once again…abuse victims tell their abusers that they love them all the time. It’s very, very common. Abusers also withhold love and affection in order to control their victims. They might -for instance- refuse to say the words I love you, even when those words are said to them.

“Well it could be a show!” “He’s faking!”

No, it’s not a show. Loki believes what he is saying when he tells Thor that he loves him. He is sincere. Loki loves Thor, whatever that means for Loki. He doesn’t need to be faking for it to be evidence of an unhealthy relationship. It is possible for someone to be a victim of emotional abuse and to feel like they love someone or to feel that they are happy in their relationship. They can laugh and smile and hug and even make love to their significant other, because they are not aware of the dysfunction they are living in. Because of that dysfunction, their perception of what it means to love someone is skewed and disordered.

“If you look at the body language of someone whose been beaten while they’re around the person they are beaten by, you’ll see slouched shoulders, a tense body, constant glances to anywhere but their abusers face, clammy hands, hands in pockets (a cue that the person is trying to hide something) and just a general feel of unease and unrest. Fear and terror.”

I mean no disrespect when I say this, but you either have no firsthand knowledge whatsoever of what an abusive relationship is like OR you are in one and are deep in denial about it.

I say this as someone who has worked with many people who recovering from various types of abuse. Loki’s body language towards Thor is fairly consistent with someone who feels inferior and who is desperate for approval. When Loki is not in Thor’s presence, he actually stands taller and speaks more confidently. And I recognize that such a thing doesn’t necessarily imply physical abuse, but it definitely implies emotional abuse. It implies a disparity in their relationship that isn’t healthy.

And “Maybe you’re not so bad.”

Oh my, this is another terrible thing to say. It’s another insult, disguised as a compliment. Who said he was bad in the first place? This, once again, comes from the premise that Loki is someone who needs to be redeemed and Thor is not.

“I don’t know about you, but to me, that screams that Loki cares about Thor’s wellbeing and interests. He cares about his brother’s happiness despite feeling estranged and ostracized because of what he is.That’s not typically seen in someone who is abused. The care for their abusers wellbeing.“

I have no doubt that Loki cares for Thor, because we have seen plenty of evidence of that. I believe that Thor only cares for Loki conditionally. Thor loves Loki as long as Loki is the person Thor thinks he should be, but he doesn’t really seem to KNOW Loki at all. I find it tragic that Loki has become okay with this. I had hoped that Ragnarok would end with Thor apologizing for not trying harder to understand his brother. Instead, Loki has embraced that he will never be understood and that the only way he’s doing to have Thor in his life is to accept that he will never be regarded as an equal.

Thor’s attitude towards his brother is evident with lines like “know your place” and “your imagined slights.” Thor does not see Loki as his equal, so in his mind it is totally reasonable for him to disregard Loki’s feelings. This is not entirely his fault. He was raised to see himself as better, as superior. Loki appears to know, even before his Jotun origins are revealed, that he is somehow less than his brother. This is not a perception that comes out of thin air.

Let me rephrase that -Loki’s slights are not “imagined” simply because the protagonist says they are. This is a common mistake people make when digesting fiction. They accept the hero or good guy’s POV as reality, instead of what it is…that one person’s POV. This is especially evident when you have characters who are larger than life like Captain America or Han Solo or Harry Potter.

What’s amusing is…Loki cares openly about Thor’s feelings. He acknowledge’s Thor’s loss when Frigga dies, and again when Odin dies. He even pats him on the back when he is reminded that Jane broke up with him. These are the actions of someone who has accepted that his feelings do not matter, but the other party’s do. This is actually a very common dynamic in abusive or codependent relationships.

You mention Thor’s line in Ragnarok. “I thought the world of you. I thought we’re were always going to fight side by side.”

Except that…we’ve seen zero evidence that Thor EVER thought the world of Loki. We’ve seen plenty of evidence that Loki thinks the world of Thor. Granted he says some negative things about him too -but he does so bitterly. Thor treats his brother as a pest in the original film. He talks down to him almost consistently, throughout all 4 films they are in together. In Avengers, Thor doesn’t even ask what Loki is doing on Earth or suspect something might be wrong (he’s suddenly trying to invade a planet he previously had no interest in). Thor makes one brief attempt to appeal to Loki, but it’s only so he can put an end to the battle and cart him off to prison. He shows no interest in finding out why Loki did what he did and we learn in TDW that Thor doesn’t even visit Loki in prison.

“Personally, I would never beat anyone if I thought the world of them.”

I believe you! I wouldn’t be able to beat anyone, even if I couldn’t stand them, but since these characters are not based on you or me, that’s not really useful information.

Do I know for sure that Thor has tortured Loki? Outside of the scene in Ragnarok, no. But do I think he’s capable of it? Absolutely. And that’s all this post is really about…whether Thor is capable of such thing. I’m amused that people are threatened by that notion. It’s almost as though they think that Thor’s motives are all good, simply because he has been cast as the hero.

Do I think Thor is a terrible person? No. He’s a character that is flawed, just like all the other Marvel characters. Thor is a product of his childhood and his family, just like Loki. They were both set against one another from the get go. They are both flawed and deeply messed up and that’s what makes them interesting.

Here’s the thing, though. While I believe there is evidence to support the fact that Loki’s relationship with Thor is imbalanced and dysfunctional…I don’t think it was the intention of the MCU writers to portray it as such. I think it’s just poor and inconsistent writing. I think it’s also a result of the fact that comic style writers tend to subscribe to the notion that anything the hero does is okay, simply because they are the hero and anything the villain does is not okay, simply because they are the villain. Which is a shame, but we take what we can get.

@juliabohemian Thank you for the in depth and lovely meta. It certainly puts many things into perspective. Sadly, I agree that such a rich interpretation wasn’t intentional and came about through a combination of cliched writing and Tom Hiddelston’s method acting, which is why we will see no acknowledgement of these issues and no resolution on screen. But it’s still important that the audience interpret what’s onscreen critically, and this includes judging the heroes by their deeds and not by their words.

I also appreciate @juliabohemian‘s meta, because it very neatly punctured the idea that the points the previous reblogger (not tagging because I don’t want to get into it with them) raises are evidence against abuse. It’s actually kind of hilarious how bad an argument it is for the intended conclusion, especially considering that some of the evidence offered (Thor’s claims that Loki “still has some good” in him or “isn’t so bad”) is actually evidence for the exact opposite.

That said… I absolutely did not draw the conclusion @mosellegreen did from that line in The Avengers. I think we were supposed to think, as @lucianalight suggested, that Thor knows Loki can hold up under torture because of experience with their common enemies during one of the many campaigns they’ve fought in together. And even after Ragnarok, I still think that, because I do not consider it legitimate to read Thor’s character as presented in Ragnarok back into the earlier movies. It’s so different, so discontinuous, that it provides absolutely no insight into his character in the other movies. The Thor of TR gleefully inflicts pain on his brother to “teach him a lesson”; the Thor of the earlier movies would not do that.

Yes, Thor probably “beat up on” little brother Loki in the way that siblings do, and Loki probably gave as good as he got, both in physical fights and in obnoxious pranks. (Forget the story about Loki “trying to kill” Thor by stabbing him when they were 8… that makes no damn sense for a lot of reasons. If Loki stabbed Thor with anything, it was probably the equivalent of a pair of scissors.) If their relationship was “abusive” in Thor 1 and before, it was just a matter of Thor being one of the “cool kids” who dismisses and sometimes bullies his tag-along uncool little brother… and of accepting the superiority that Odin has convinced both him and Loki that he (Thor) possesses. But that, I think, is better described as a situation where both Thor and Loki are victims of Odin’s crappy parenting, albeit in different ways (which seems to be the conclusion @juliabohemian reaches as well). I’m definitely bothered by the ways in which Thor shows, pre-TR, that he doesn’t care about Loki’s feelings (dismissing him, not asking him WTF happened in the year he was gone, assuming invading Midgard was All About Him, not visiting him in prison…), but I can accept that because Thor 1 acknowledges that its hero is flawed, and both that movie and The Avengers show him as improving but still a work in progress. He is getting better in TDW, and their brotherly dynamic is kind of adorable; he still says some pretty cringe-y things, but you can also see genuine respect and affection there. TR just ignores and/or reverses all the growth we’ve seen in Thor’s character and presents him as a self-absorbed, manipulative asshole who’s willing to punish and “train” Loki with severe pain while smiling smugly and speechifying at him, and then blithely leave him vulnerable in a hostile world, because he just kind of doesn’t care how anyone else feels or even, apparently, regard Loki as a full person.

I know you talked about the elevator scene before, but what are your thoughts on Thor’s point of view? I thought he accepted Loki by choosing to let him go instead of chasing him and trying to force him to change or come home. That he was acknowledging who Loki wanted him to believe he was, and was choosing to do what was best for himself/his people despite loving Loki. It seemed like Thor chose to change first by stepping back from an unhealthy relationship instead of continuing to force it??

foundlingmother:

philosopherking1887:

When I first watched Ragnarok, I saw it much the way Anon did… mostly because I was trying to be optimistic. But the more I thought about it and discussed it with people (especially you and @illwynd), the more I realized that Thor is just trying to manipulate Loki into doing and being what he wants, and does not in any way “accept” him for who he is. It’s not only due to Loki that the relationship is unhealthy, and Thor completely fails to acknowledge any part he may have played in contributing to Loki’s unhappiness, or any way in which the relationship was perniciously unequal. His speeches to Loki, in the elevator and while electrocuting Loki, indicate that the only way he sees himself as being at fault is in continuing to extend Loki his trust and affection. He doesn’t seem to entertain the idea that Loki might have legitimate grievances that motivate his actions, even if they don’t excuse them. You’re quite right on this point:

What he sees is someone throwing a fit, baiting him to pay attention, and betraying and hurting him all over (and maybe he thinks that’s a bit his fault because he’s showing Loki love when he’s not being “good”).

Well, part of why the pat on the back seems knowing is that that’s when Thor puts the obedience disk on Loki. Of course he can’t suppress a smug little smile for his oh-so-clever scheme.

Oh, interesting point about Loki helping Thor by exiling Odin… and saying something nice to him when it doesn’t seem to have been necessary for maintaining the ruse. (Though maybe he thought buttering him up was the best way to keep Thor satisfied with his decision to abdicate?)

You may be right that Thor’s complete inability to see things from Loki’s perspective, understand his depth, or think of Loki as having motivations that aren’t centered around him (Thor) is actually not such a departure from Thor’s characterization in earlier films… but I guess I thought he had matured since Thor 1 and the beginning of The Avengers, and it was a real disappointment to see him regress that way. On the other hand, Thor is still pretty obtuse about Bruce’s feelings in AOU when he starts going on about the Hulk’s accomplishments in battle, even if he’s perceptive enough to get something out of his visions.

Regarding Thor’s “plans to bring Loki back to a planet that hates him and just force them to accept that’s what’s happening”: I don’t think that’s meant to be a sign of Thor’s affection or respect for Loki… the self-absorbed “Earth loves me,” plus the fatuous tone in which he delivers the line, makes me think he’s just being an arrogant moron again (as he has been for the entire film) and disregarding Loki’s legitimate concerns for his own well-being. Of course, when we’re trying desperately to make Ragnarok consistent with the rest of canon, we can say it’s because Thor cares so much about Loki that he’ll face down the rest of the Avengers and the International Criminal Court and what have you to protect him.

foundlingmother:

I see it very differently.

Thor wants his brother back. He wants to redeem Loki the Villain. He loves and misses Loki. We know this because he challenges Loki to be more than the God of Mischief (which is a challenge to follow him to save Asgard) and saving Asgard kind of hinges on Loki bring reinforcements (and I think Thor knows that), but I also get the vibe from the way he behaves in the elevator. That pat he gives Loki when he says “that’s what you always wanted” seems so knowing. He knows that he’s pissing Loki off. Well, he’s actually upsetting Loki, but he’s aiming for irritated. He’s really, really bad at seeing/accepting Loki’s side of things and emotions. That’s why Loki’s redemption has to happen on Thor’s terms in the end. When Loki reaches out to Thor, Thor doubts it’s genuine, or can’t conceptualize it as Loki reaching out. Often times the ways Loki ends up helping Thor, thereby showing how much he cares about his brother still, aren’t obvious or nice/affectionate. The obvious help he gives, sacrificing his life, Thor now believes to be a trick (it isn’t by the rules canon outlined for Loki’s magic). When Loki puts Odin in a care home, he saves Thor again (Thor expects Odin to banish him and take away Mjolnir). It’s not an affectionate or traditionally heroic action, but it’s hardly devoid of love. He even fucking tells Thor, as Odin, how proud he is of the man Thor became. You think Odin would ever have said anything like that? No.

Thor thinks his brother’s pretty petty. From his perspective, Loki attacks Midgard because of “imagined slights”. I imagine he also doesn’t get why discovering he was adopted upset Loki so much. If Odin hadn’t adopted Loki, he would have died. Loki betrays and hurts Thor. We know that Loki has reasons, and that it’s difficult to even classify everything he’s done as a betrayal (Thor probably sees Loki not letting anyone know he was alive the first time as a betrayal, but we know shit went down). Thor doesn’t know anything about Loki’s feelings or issues. He’s ignorant of Loki’s depth. What he sees is someone throwing a fit, baiting him to pay attention, and betraying and hurting him all over (and maybe he thinks that’s a bit his fault because he’s showing Loki love when he’s not being “good”).

Previously, Thor’s tried to entice Loki into returning home or to his side by expressing his love and how much he’s mourned him. He does so poorly, to be sure, and he’s a hothead who loses the plot quickly, but it’s genuine. I mean, he sneaks some affection into his elevator speech. He does think the world of Loki. At the end of Ragnarok, he essentially plans to bring Loki back to a planet that hates him and just force them to accept that’s what’s happening. That’s a big fuck you to Midgard. The affection approach doesn’t work on Loki, either because of Loki’s insecurities, or because he’s got to keep acting like an obedient servant to Thanos, since he fears him. From Thor’s perspective, it just doesn’t work. So, new plan. This time he’ll not give Loki attention. This time he’ll act disinterested and outsmart him, call him predictable, and then challenge him not to be. This forces Loki to do good, reminding him that he can, and allowing Thor to once more express his love and trust in response to Loki’s goodness. Some might think I’m giving Thor a lot of credit, but I don’t think it’s that brilliant a plan.

Here are the steps (according to Thor):

Irritate Loki. Don’t give him attention. Just agree with him. Act like you’re fine that he does his own thing (though you’re not).

Loki will try and betray you. That’s what Loki does (when he feels slighted).

Stop him.

Call him predictable (oh, the God of Mischief will really hate that).

Challenge him not to be.

Leave him on Sakaar.

Pray he follows.

Truly, Thor Odinson is a mastermind.

(It should be noted, this causes Loki a lot of emotional pain (and physical pain… that’s the one of the reasons I would rewrite the scene to function differently), and it’s something that should have been addressed (and that I would address in fics, since I know the MCU never will). Thor, once again, unknowingly preys on Loki’s insecurities. However, since the director didn’t particularly care about/recognize Loki’s depth either, it’s all about Thor. Loki’s pretty shallow in Ragnarok. Also, it’s stupid/cruel and ooc for Thor that leaving him on Sakaar means that he leaves him defenseless.)

@philosopherking1887 This feels relevant to what we were discussing about Loki’s betrayal, so I’m @ing you. Also, if you haven’t, I’d be glad for you to read this and let me know your thoughts/how you’d do things.

You may be right that Thor’s complete inability to see things from Loki’s perspective, understand his depth, or think of Loki as having motivations that aren’t centered around him (Thor) is actually not such a departure from Thor’s characterization in earlier films… but I guess I thought he had matured since Thor 1 and the beginning of The Avengers, and it was a real disappointment to see him regress that way.

In one of TDW’s deleted scenes, the one with Frigga and Thor, he seems pretty unable to see Loki’s perspective. He doesn’t understand why Frigga even visits him. That, to me, resembles slash and burn justice. I love Thor, but he doesn’t get Loki. I think it’s less to do with immaturity, though that’s a part of it, and more to do with… how do I put it? Sometimes you’re so close to someone you don’t see them, just the idea you have of them. Thor’s idea of Loki is poorly conceptualized, and fed by Odin (and Loki, who never defends himself). Add Thor’s relative immaturity (he’s trying, but he’s not 100% by any means), and it’s just a mess. That’s why I always say I think Odin’s the biggest obstacle to their reconciliation. Thor needs to have the entire bedrock of his way of thinking shaken, and to stop idolizing his father. Ragnarok, at least, allows me to imagine that happened.

Also, all my meta should come with a warning that I’m completely disregarding the intentions of the director, and I’m going to fix the mess they made so that the characters are consistent.

Ugh, you’re right. P.S., “Sometimes you’re so close to someone you don’t see them, just the idea you have of them” is a very Proustian point, and one that he makes specifically about people you love/ are in love with 😛 Usually that’s a matter of idealizing them, but it also includes thinking that their entire world revolves around you and thinking that all their motivations must somehow be about you.

I was just thinking about interpretation and authorial intent recently, and it occurred to me that with a good work of art, you can explain all its features with reference wholly to reasons internal to the artwork itself, whereas bad works of art force you to look outside the work for explanations (in the mental state or external situation of the creator). It’s heroic of you to try to interpret Ragnarok in a way that’s consistent with the rest of the films, but I think that’s going to involve some really bizarre contortions because (at least as a successor/conclusion to the other films) it’s just so bad. Some people seemed to think the same of The Avengers with respect to Loki’s characterization; part of my goal with Abyss was to show that that wasn’t the case, not least because I trust Joss Whedon’s instincts as a writer (at least when it comes to male characters) and he seemed to genuinely appreciate what Branagh and Hiddleston had accomplished in Thor. So my task wasn’t/isn’t nearly as difficult as yours. In my fanfiction I’ve decided to be semi-selective in which parts of Ragnarok I even accept as canon, or anyway to present interpretations of Thor and Loki’s actions and character drastically different from the ones the film invites.

I know you talked about the elevator scene before, but what are your thoughts on Thor’s point of view? I thought he accepted Loki by choosing to let him go instead of chasing him and trying to force him to change or come home. That he was acknowledging who Loki wanted him to believe he was, and was choosing to do what was best for himself/his people despite loving Loki. It seemed like Thor chose to change first by stepping back from an unhealthy relationship instead of continuing to force it??

When I first watched Ragnarok, I saw it much the way Anon did… mostly because I was trying to be optimistic. But the more I thought about it and discussed it with people (especially you and @illwynd), the more I realized that Thor is just trying to manipulate Loki into doing and being what he wants, and does not in any way “accept” him for who he is. It’s not only due to Loki that the relationship is unhealthy, and Thor completely fails to acknowledge any part he may have played in contributing to Loki’s unhappiness, or any way in which the relationship was perniciously unequal. His speeches to Loki, in the elevator and while electrocuting Loki, indicate that the only way he sees himself as being at fault is in continuing to extend Loki his trust and affection. He doesn’t seem to entertain the idea that Loki might have legitimate grievances that motivate his actions, even if they don’t excuse them. You’re quite right on this point:

foundlingmother:

I see it very differently.

Thor wants his brother back. He wants to redeem Loki the Villain. He loves and misses Loki. We know this because he challenges Loki to be more than the God of Mischief (which is a challenge to follow him to save Asgard) and saving Asgard kind of hinges on Loki bring reinforcements (and I think Thor knows that), but I also get the vibe from the way he behaves in the elevator. That pat he gives Loki when he says “that’s what you always wanted” seems so knowing. He knows that he’s pissing Loki off. Well, he’s actually upsetting Loki, but he’s aiming for irritated. He’s really, really bad at seeing/accepting Loki’s side of things and emotions. That’s why Loki’s redemption has to happen on Thor’s terms in the end. When Loki reaches out to Thor, Thor doubts it’s genuine, or can’t conceptualize it as Loki reaching out. Often times the ways Loki ends up helping Thor, thereby showing how much he cares about his brother still, aren’t obvious or nice/affectionate. The obvious help he gives, sacrificing his life, Thor now believes to be a trick (it isn’t by the rules canon outlined for Loki’s magic). When Loki puts Odin in a care home, he saves Thor again (Thor expects Odin to banish him and take away Mjolnir). It’s not an affectionate or traditionally heroic action, but it’s hardly devoid of love. He even fucking tells Thor, as Odin, how proud he is of the man Thor became. You think Odin would ever have said anything like that? No.

Thor thinks his brother’s pretty petty. From his perspective, Loki attacks Midgard because of “imagined slights”. I imagine he also doesn’t get why discovering he was adopted upset Loki so much. If Odin hadn’t adopted Loki, he would have died. Loki betrays and hurts Thor. We know that Loki has reasons, and that it’s difficult to even classify everything he’s done as a betrayal (Thor probably sees Loki not letting anyone know he was alive the first time as a betrayal, but we know shit went down). Thor doesn’t know anything about Loki’s feelings or issues. He’s ignorant of Loki’s depth. What he sees is someone throwing a fit, baiting him to pay attention, and betraying and hurting him all over (and maybe he thinks that’s a bit his fault because he’s showing Loki love when he’s not being “good”).

Previously, Thor’s tried to entice Loki into returning home or to his side by expressing his love and how much he’s mourned him. He does so poorly, to be sure, and he’s a hothead who loses the plot quickly, but it’s genuine. I mean, he sneaks some affection into his elevator speech. He does think the world of Loki. At the end of Ragnarok, he essentially plans to bring Loki back to a planet that hates him and just force them to accept that’s what’s happening. That’s a big fuck you to Midgard. The affection approach doesn’t work on Loki, either because of Loki’s insecurities, or because he’s got to keep acting like an obedient servant to Thanos, since he fears him. From Thor’s perspective, it just doesn’t work. So, new plan. This time he’ll not give Loki attention. This time he’ll act disinterested and outsmart him, call him predictable, and then challenge him not to be. This forces Loki to do good, reminding him that he can, and allowing Thor to once more express his love and trust in response to Loki’s goodness. Some might think I’m giving Thor a lot of credit, but I don’t think it’s that brilliant a plan.

Here are the steps (according to Thor):

Irritate Loki. Don’t give him attention. Just agree with him. Act like you’re fine that he does his own thing (though you’re not).

Loki will try and betray you. That’s what Loki does (when he feels slighted).

Stop him.

Call him predictable (oh, the God of Mischief will really hate that).

Challenge him not to be.

Leave him on Sakaar.

Pray he follows.

Truly, Thor Odinson is a mastermind.

(It should be noted, this causes Loki a lot of emotional pain (and physical pain… that’s the one of the reasons I would rewrite the scene to function differently), and it’s something that should have been addressed (and that I would address in fics, since I know the MCU never will). Thor, once again, unknowingly preys on Loki’s insecurities. However, since the director didn’t particularly care about/recognize Loki’s depth either, it’s all about Thor. Loki’s pretty shallow in Ragnarok. Also, it’s stupid/cruel and ooc for Thor that leaving him on Sakaar means that he leaves him defenseless.)

@philosopherking1887 This feels relevant to what we were discussing about Loki’s betrayal, so I’m @ing you. Also, if you haven’t, I’d be glad for you to read this and let me know your thoughts/how you’d do things.

What he sees is someone throwing a fit, baiting him to pay attention, and betraying and hurting him all over (and maybe he thinks that’s a bit his fault because he’s showing Loki love when he’s not being “good”).

Well, part of why the pat on the back seems knowing is that that’s when Thor puts the obedience disk on Loki. Of course he can’t suppress a smug little smile for his oh-so-clever scheme.

Oh, interesting point about Loki helping Thor by exiling Odin… and saying something nice to him when it doesn’t seem to have been necessary for maintaining the ruse. (Though maybe he thought buttering him up was the best way to keep Thor satisfied with his decision to abdicate?)

You may be right that Thor’s complete inability to see things from Loki’s perspective, understand his depth, or think of Loki as having motivations that aren’t centered around him (Thor) is actually not such a departure from Thor’s characterization in earlier films… but I guess I thought he had matured since Thor 1 and the beginning of The Avengers, and it was a real disappointment to see him regress that way. On the other hand, Thor is still pretty obtuse about Bruce’s feelings in AOU when he starts going on about the Hulk’s accomplishments in battle, even if he’s perceptive enough to get something out of his visions.

Regarding Thor’s “plans to bring Loki back to a planet that hates him and just force them to accept that’s what’s happening”: I don’t think that’s meant to be a sign of Thor’s affection or respect for Loki… the self-absorbed “Earth loves me,” plus the fatuous tone in which he delivers the line, makes me think he’s just being an arrogant moron again (as he has been for the entire film) and disregarding Loki’s legitimate concerns for his own well-being. Of course, when we’re trying desperately to make Ragnarok consistent with the rest of canon, we can say it’s because Thor cares so much about Loki that he’ll face down the rest of the Avengers and the International Criminal Court and what have you to protect him.

writernotwaiting:

philosopherking1887:

yume-no-fantasy:

shine-of-asgard:

2oppositesidesof1coin:

luxury-loki:

kaori04:

shine-of-asgard:

luxury-loki:

From the director’s commentary of ‘Thor: Ragnarok’ (2017) // This film really is about them, and they resolve their differences. It’s so much better than the other two films where the main relationship was between Thor and Jane.

I’d have really loved to see this alternative version of the film. A script where Thor and Loki BOTH resolve THEIR differences, as opposed to a script where Thor reaffirms his view of what Loki should be, do and feel in order to be considered worthy by Thor’s standards. Alas, it was not to be.

I would say two other films (yes, with Jane) were like million times better in depicting brothers relationship and in developing them. Just absence of Jane won’t help you to do better job with that.

I have to disagree. I think Thor wants Loki to learn about being a trustworthy brother, and to stop this streak where he always feels the need to make a sneaky exit/betray the people trying to help him. Plus, I think in the second film, we think we’re seeing great character development for Thor and Loki, and after Loki’s death we think “Oh wow he actually died to save his brother!” but then we clearly learn he’s just pretending so that he can have the throne of Asgard. I love Loki, but we can’t for one second believe his aims in Thor: The dark world were actually good, where as in Ragnarok he actually STICKS AROUND. He helps save the day, and by the end of the film we see a Loki who’s actually proved to himself that he can be more than the god of mischief.

I do understand where you guys are coming from, but you have to remember Loki isn’t meant to be an inherently good person, if he was left to just be himself he would literally just cause non-stop trouble. Thor helps him be a better person, and he helps him in that rough/brotherly way which happens with all siblings. I know my elder sister would never sit me down nicely and tell me I was being ass hole, she’d fucking do something about it hahaha.

Anyway, I do respect your opinions and I hope you’ll respect mine, just wanted to say my piece!

I won’t be reblogging this again, but feel free to add any opinions x

I get where your coming from too and I agreed to a point. But I also agree that Loki changes based on Thor’s idea of worth. Loki never does it because he wants to and it never feels like it comes from a decision within himself. Maybe Infinity War will rectify that because I get the feeling that we will have more Loki without Thor. Also, Takia acts like he did so well with this but personally we had more interaction and them discussing family problems in the dark world then we did in Ragnarok. Remember the boat scene from the Dark World after Frigga’s death. I wanted the humor to stop for two seconds so that could happen. But no. They don’t come to any terms. Thor just let’s Loki cause Ragnarok and that’s the end of it.

This is a very good commentary, especially the distinction of the growth being self-driven as opposed to forced from the outside. It feels like Loki ends up behaving in Ragnarok because Thor essentially threatens him with disowning him as a brother once and for all (and Loki believes him). Which is worryingly enough the reason Loki was somewhat well behaved up until Thor 1. He wanted to belong and he went along with Odin’s and Thor’s wishes. So for me, in Ragnarok he circles back to being a well behaved and overshadowed second in command with a high potential of his resentment growing over years and spilling into confrontation once again. So what’s the arc? What’s his internal decision? That despite satisfaction not being in his nature and him explicitly wanting Thor’s respect he’ll now be happy with being told “maybe he’s not so bad after all”? Hmmm…

To be fair it might’ve been the only way to get through to Loki, given his wilfulness… This was the part of the script I had a problem with, though:

“I trust you, you betray me. Round and round in circles we go. See, Loki,
life is about… It’s about growth. It’s about change. But you seem to just
want to stay the same. I guess what I’m trying to say is that you’ll always be
the God of Mischief, but you could be more.“

What bugged me was how Thor said it as if every time Loki betrayed him it had
been out of mischief, even though that clearly hadn’t been the case at all. If
we run through the ways in which Loki had “betrayed” Thor in the previous film–

1) Ruined Thor’s coronation by secretly letting the frost giants into Asgard
because he had thought Thor unworthy of the throne (which was true in
hindsight)
2) Lied to Thor about Odin dying, told Thor he could not come back to Asgard
and sent the Destroyer to attack Thor on Earth after he had learned of his heritage from Odin
3) Wreaked havoc on Thor’s precious Earth
4) Faked his own death, exiled Odin and took over the throne

–to me it was clear that each time Loki betrayed Thor there
was an understandable reason for it, whether it was jealousy or hurt or spite. He
was jealous of Thor, he was hurt and heartbroken and angry at being lied to
about his true heritage and birth right, he was mad, he was full of hatred for
Odin… Everything he did above was hardly attributable to his nature as the
“God of Mischief” at all, yet Thor had dismissed him as such, never
acknowledging any of the hurt and betrayal he had experienced to cause him to
turn malicious in the first place. It was just like at the beginning of the
Avengers film where he had dismissed Loki’s resentments as “imagined slights”,
and evidently this gross misunderstanding still hasn’t been resolved in this
film.

To be honest it was odd that Thor should say that Loki “just seemed to want to stay the same” like he regarded Loki’s betrayal in this film as just
some same old mischievous behaviour that could be easily likened to his previous betrayals, because the motivations behind Loki’s actions had not been so shallow

in any of the previous films

and surely should not be generalized or written off as such. He spoke
as if Loki had always been lawless and incorrigible, when in fact he should
know full well that Loki hadn’t been like that at the beginning and just how
much Loki had changed from the baby
brother he once knew, as well as what had triggered the change–Loki most certainly didn’t turn bad for no reason.

Even though his words were meant to be used as some kind of reverse psychology
to get through to Loki, I feel like they had severely downplayed everything Loki had
gone through, which simply didn’t sit well with me because it wasn’t fair to Loki’s
character. It would’ve been nice if Thor could just acknowledge his and Loki’s
differences without belittling Loki’s values/imposing his own sense of
righteousness on Loki, like:

“Loki, I thought the world of you. I thought we were going
to fight side-by-side forever, but at the end of the day you’re you and I’m me
and… ~~Maybe there’s still good in you but~~… let’s be honest, our paths
diverged a long time ago.”

I would’ve liked to see him make it clear to Loki that he cared
and understood what it was that had led to Loki doing what he did, and that he respected Loki’s point of view and decisions (even if he did not approve of them), before proceeding on with the reverse psychology thing where he would let Loki know that from now
on he would no longer force him to adhere to his expectations nor try to stop him from
going anywhere he wanted. Then it’d be up to Loki to decide whether he wanted to
stay by Thor–if he chose to do so it’d entirely be out of his own accord,
as an equal and only because he cared;
not because Thor told him that he could be more, talking as though he knew better just because he stood on the moral high ground. The part with Loki abruptly betraying Thor and getting tased afterwards and the whole “God
of Mischief” talk should just be scrapped altogether, thank you very much. It was completely misleading the audience into having the impression that Loki was just a frivolous God of Mischief who liked to betray Thor for the sake of it, when his character and motivations had never been that simple and trivial.

Having said all that, I did appreciate seeing Loki returning to Thor’s side at the end and finally accepting Thor as a worthy king
after everything. Though I wasn’t exactly satisfied with how they got there, I did
have the biggest smile on my face when I was watching the “I’m here”
scene. It’s cute how Loki kept trying to push Thor away, but when Thor showed a
willingness to discard him he immediately felt wounded by it. At least they both
learnt a little something from this—for Loki it was to be more honest and to stop taking the person he cared
about and who cared about him for granted, and for Thor, well, I think the clichéd saying
goes, ‘If you love someone, set them free; if they come back, they’re yours’…

I completely agree with @shine-of-asgard and must strenuously disagree with @luxury-loki‘s analysis – as well as Taika’s utterly disingenuous commentary. I’ve said this before, but @yume-no-fantasy articulates and explains very well the way that Ragnarok completely changes Loki’s character (or should I say “character”?) so that he becomes “lawless and incorrigible” rather than acting badly and villainously, yes – I am emphatically NOT claiming that Loki is “an inherently good person” – but from identifiable, comprehensible motivations.

The part with Loki abruptly betraying Thor and getting tased afterwards and the whole “God of Mischief” talk should just be scrapped altogether, thank you very much. It was completely misleading the audience into having the impression that Loki was just a frivolous God of Mischief who liked to betray Thor for the sake of it, when his character and motivations had never been that simple and trivial.

Thank you, thank you, thank you. This is a beautiful way of putting it.

(@illwynd, I thought you might appreciate this too.)

I want to point to and rebut this claim from @luxury-loki in particular:

Plus, I think in the second film, we think we’re seeing great character development for Thor and Loki, and after Loki’s death we think “Oh wow he actually died to save his brother!” but then we clearly learn he’s just pretending so that he can have the throne of Asgard. I love Loki, but we can’t for one second believe his aims in Thor: The dark world were actually good

I think this is what Taika Waititi and Eric Pearson want you to think, but I absolutely do not believe this was what the creators of TDW (Markus & McFeely as screenwriters, Alan Taylor as director) had in mind. It is not clear in TDW whether Loki intended to fake his death from the time he was freed from prison, or whether he believed when he was stabbed that he was going to die, fortuitously survived, and took advantage of the opportunity. Regardless, he still acted to save Jane’s life several times; maybe he did that just to stay on Thor’s good side, but it’s still a good thing he did, and apparently the desire to stay on Thor’s good side is worthy enough to make his turnaround in Ragnarok count as a redemption. And in keeping with @yume-no-fantasy’s point about Loki’s motivations in earlier films: I believe that Loki had some comprehensible reasons for usurping the throne at the end of TDW, even though I fully acknowledge that it was not a morally good thing to do. I think he did it partly because he was pissed at Odin for lying to him, threatening to execute him, and then imprisoning him for life without once asking why he did what he did; partly because he believed, like Thor, that Odin was no longer a competent ruler (and we’ve seen Loki take action, again morally flawed but comprehensible, on that conviction before); and partly because he thought it was the best way to protect himself from Thanos (hiding in plain sight, shielding himself behind Asgard’s might, and using his position to control the disposal of the Infinity Stones). But Ragnarok completely ignores all of these explanations and decides that Loki did it just for power, self-aggrandizement, and mischievous shits and giggles. This is a bad, shallow retcon and I will never regard that interpretation as canon.

No, Taika, Thor and Loki do not reach any sort of “understanding,” because Thor never seeks to understand why Loki does what he does; and if they reach a “resolution,” it is only because Loki surrenders and resigns himself to a subordinate position.

Thor just ignores Loki when he brings up the issue of having been lied to his entire life about who and what he was. He never gets past pseudo-apologizing at the end of Thor for “whatever I have done to wrong you” and dismissing Loki’s “imagined slights” in The Avengers. He never asks Loki to explain why he felt like he’d been living in Thor’s shadow, why he felt slighted and underappreciated, or what happened in the year between Thor and The Avengers that led him to come back and try to conquer Midgard. They never talk about how traumatic it must have been for Loki to find out he was a Frost Giant. And that’s because the writer and director of Thor: Ragnarok just decided that none of that matters; Loki is just a malicious mischief-maker who needs to be put in his place, taught through painful punishment that Thor the Unfailingly Virtuous will no longer tolerate his unreasonable behavior.

One addendum.

Loki did not fake getting stabbed through the chest in TDW. Loki’s illusions are not solid—please note Thor tossing things at Loki to test whether he’s really there or not. Yes, Loki allowed Thor to believe he died from his wounds, but he most definitely was impaled in the process of saving Thor’s life. Loki’s usurpation of the throne was a betrayal against Odin, not Thor. And frankly, at that point, Odin had proven himself in dire need of an enforced vacation.

Loki’s actions in the second half of Thor I and in The Avengers were clearly unhinged, and murderously psychotic. His redemption arc, though, genuinely began in TDW, not Thor III. I was surprised that none of that got addressed in Ragnarok. At the same time, however, as much as I prefer the character development in TDW, the storytelling was a bit of a shitshow—very disjointed—and it wasn’t nearly the commercial success it could have been. The storytelling in Ragnarok is tight with a clear arc, and it made money.

It would be lovely to have a Thor/Loki movie with the quality character develop and tight storytelling that we get from Winter Soldier, but since that’s totally never going to happen, I’m going to drown myself in fan fic.

Right – I was assuming that the stabbing was real. The way it would have worked if he was planning to fake his death is that he deliberately stood in exactly the right place so that when Kurse grabbed him and impaled him, he didn’t hit anything vital. Loki does stand there a little too long – an ordinary sense of self-preservation would tell him to get out of the way – but there are other possible explanations, including (1) a sort of deer-in-the-headlights implicit death wish, and (2) an honest-to-god suicidal death wish (which we’ve seen Loki exhibit before). This explanation would also imply that Loki was willing to endure a lot of pain in order to fake his death, which I hope would suggest to people that he had better reasons for doing it than “mischievous shits and giggles.” The desire not to go back to prison, which Thor did promise he would make him do (“…and afterward, this cell”), is also a pretty good reason… and one that doesn’t make Thor look great, IMHO.

I agree that TDW was, on the whole, a narrative mess. The main villain and conflict were flimsy and pointless, and it didn’t deal well with the human characters. But it did a lot of interesting stuff with Loki… much of which was added in reshoots because the film was, frankly, boring without him.

I have never denied that Loki’s actions in Thor and The Avengers were “unhinged and murderously psychotic” (and I know you know that; I’m responding to the fact that you feel like you have to say it). The reasons he has for those actions are not good or sufficient reasons; they explain, but do not excuse – let alone justify – his actions. It annoys the crap out of me that we have to point out that we know that every time we want to criticize Loki’s portrayal in Ragnarok as doing an injustice to his character. Guess what – there are Loki fans (actual Loki fans, who find his character complex and interesting, not just ridiculous and amusing) who know that Loki is a villain and that many of his actions are morally bad and he is morally culpable for them. I know that there are Loki stans (the “apologists” or rather unconditional justifiers) who think he is a pure victim who cannot be blamed for any of his actions, and I know that they make up a large proportion of the people who are criticizing Ragnarok for its treatment of Loki’s character. But they are not the only ones, and I am not one of them, though of course it’s easier to dismiss the criticisms if you assume they’re coming from people who have proven themselves to be bad interpreters of character.

Tag: thor meta

No, Taika, Thor and Loki do not reach any sort of “understanding,” because Thor never seeks to understand why Loki does what he does; and if they reach a “resolution,” it is only because Loki surrenders and resigns himself to a subordinate position.