I don’t understand why people assume Loki stripped Odin of his powers. Odin says he broke Loki’s spell. What did he break it with if not his own magic? The power of a senior bingo night win? Pudding? His new friend Martha’s dentures? The weight of the enormous expense senior care in the United States is?
And then he just dicks about on Midgard, waiting to die, instead of utilizing Strange’s magic or his own to go back to Asgard. Strange literally says that he chose to stay put. CHOSE. That’s… not on Loki. Why do people continue to say Loki’s in any way at fault for Ragnarok? *buries head in hands*
Pretty obviously, Loki cast the Asgardian version on a Confundus Charm. We know he has some power over memories (which I still think he got through exposure to the Mind Stone). If Odin still had his powers but no memories, for a while he wouldn’t remember how to *use* his powers, but those powers themselves might start to break through the memory spell without his conscious control.
Tom has mentioned during the ACE comic con panel that he has known about the scene for two years.
This was what Thanos said in this test footage: “I got the information that I need, and now I have to break your neck. It’s just the way it is.”
For reference, here’s some stuff from the Avengers: Infinity War director’s audio commentary during the opening scene:
McFeely: We’re starting the script in December, say January of 2016. There’s no Ragnarok script. They’re in in various stages of development, and so the first scene of this movie changed a bunch. And until we figured out that they were gonna end on a trip off of a destroyed Asgard, we didn’t know where Thanos would find Loki.
Markus: We did know we wanted Thanos to come to Loki. And we would find him in any… We have drafts of him in any number of places.
McFeely: It establishes a vengeance story for Thor by taking out his brother and arguably, his best friend.
Joe Russo: Part of what we wanted to do out of the gate was to unsettle you as you’re watching the film. You’re sitting in the theatre thinking, “Most characters in the Marvel Universe have been safe for a decade.” And we wanted to knock you off-kilter and make theaudience understand that the stakes were going to be significant and the cost was going to be very high in the movie.
Markus: And in that regard, this scene does away with a lot of things from the ongoing MCU. That was… The first MacGuffin from the first Captain America movie just got crushed and stuck into a glove.
Anthony: Bye bye, Tesseract.
Markus: And shortly, the villain from the first Avengers movie…
McFeely: Right. Arguably the best villain in the MCU…
Markus: …will achieve a similar end.
Anthony: Aside from establishing… introducing Thanos as our lead and POV in the movie, this scene also heavily kicks off Thor’s arc in the film.
Anthony: The one thing that’s wonderful, one thing we all really responded to about Thor is where he’s left at the end of Ragnarok with the destruction of Asgard… And there’s something fascinating about exporing these people as you strip away who they are and their built-out identities, and find out what’s left. I think we’re going through a very similar process with Thor in this film, especially with this scene, we’re sort of completing the experience that Ragnarok brought to Thor in the sense that we’re taking away the rest of everything away from him.
McFeely: And remember, he (Thanos) had a relationship with Loki even if it was off-screen where he entrusted him with a duty in Avengers 1 and Loki failed, so...
Joe: He’s making him pay.
McFeely: Yeah. Thanos has a long memory.
Anthony: Yep. Fair enough.
Part of an interview with the IW screenwriters:
Stephen McFeely: Hemsworth came to set, and went, “You guys really need to understand that we are doing something different with Ragnarok.” And we knew they were changing it some, but it was so early in the process, so we flew [Ragnarok screenwriter] Eric Pearson and [director] Taika Waititi in and we had long conversations with them. There are at least a couple of jokes in there Taika himself said in passing that we thought were gold. They showed us a few scenes, so we knew that Thor was being re-toned. And we needed to embrace that.
Christopher Markus: But it was also the realization that even in the “funny” one [Ragnarok], his father and his sister die, and that he’s almost becoming comically unlucky at this point, and to follow that to its natural conclusions.
So in summary, Loki’s death scene was decided since two years ago and he mainly died for the following purposes:
Set the tone for the movie by showing Thanos’ cruelty
For shock value
Give place to the new “best” MCU villain Thanos
Fuel Thor’s motivation for revenge, to further Thor’s storyline and character development from where he left off in Ragnarok
Evidently, none of the above reasons has anything to do with Loki’s arc and character development.
In terms of narrative, it was mentioned in the IW commentary that here Thanos was actually punishing Loki for failing to fulfill his duty in the first Avengers film, but IMO that’s just a load of crap. Thanos was already going to leave the ship; it was Loki who suddenly popped up with his butter knife. Also, what Loki was promised in Avengers was this: “You will long for something as sweet as pain.”
But how could death be worse than pain for Loki, when he had already let himself die twice before? (Just in case anyone wishes to protest that he faked his own death in Ragnarok, please read this first)
In TDW he even said this: “If I am for the axe, then for mercy’s sake, just swing it.”
Loki isn’t afraid and does not cower in the face of death, unlike what had been portrayed of his character in Ragnarok, which was just OOC af. Though I’m glad they rectified this part of his character in IW, the way he died was just too needlessly brutal and meaningless, and also stupid. If the writers truly meant for Thanos to punish Loki in the worst possible way like what was foreshadowed in A1, to be honest it would make more sense to kill Thor instead (just saying). But as it is, the directors and writers were just making excuses and don’t actually care.
I assert that this is a direct result of Thor: Ragnarok. Those who don’t follow the Ragnarok discussions may think this is ridiculous, but really, it’s not. This was what I wrote on 20 Apr, before IW was released:
“…when you consider the fact that Thanos arrived right after he said that, and just minutes after he had told Loki ‘Maybe you’re not so bad after all’. It only proved Thor*’s opinion about Loki right–because of course Thor* can never be wrong–that Loki was just never-ending trouble.
And what I’m worried about is that this will be taken into Infinity War and Loki will be made the scapegoat again.I don’t want Thor* to blame him again and make him feel like the only way he’ll be worthy of his brother’s love and forgiveness is to sacrifice himself to make up for his mistake of taking the Tesseract.”
I couldn’t believe this ended up being exactly what happened in IW, and I hated it so much. While the rest of the audience was laughing, my blood ran cold the moment Thor told Loki “you really are the worst brother”.
By now I think we can all agree that what Loki said—“I hereby pledge to you my undying fidelity”—was meant for Thor. If anyone’s not convinced, here:
‘Undying Fidelity’ was the title of the soundtrack that was playing from the instant Loki started saying ‘I, Loki, Prince of Asgard…’ to the moment Thor collapsed over his body.
Loki was crying when he said that. Assuming those were Loki’s tears (in character), then it was almost as if Loki had been prepared to die, as though his futile attempt at killing Thanos was deliberate. Why?!?!?! Just because Thor changed his mind about saying “maybe you’re not so bad after all” and told him he was the “worst brother”, so he wanted to prove his fidelity using his life??? It was foolish and OOC, is what I think.
But then again, if we consider his character and their relationship in Ragnarok, it might not be that out of character after all… As a case in point, I’ve seen someone say this:
If Loki couldn’t even trick Thor in Ragnarok, what makes you think he can outsmart Thanos?
In Ragnarok, his character was twisted and reduced to comic relief, his sacrifice and redemption in TDW was made to seem like a sham and a joke. A previously complex, multifaceted character was simplified into a misbehaving and terrible brother who would betray his only remaining family for the sake of money(?!). When the God of Mischief was asked whether he had a better idea than “get help”, he answered “no” as though it was supposed to be obvious. The graceful, regal, composed and witty prince of Asgard was played for a fool throughout most of the film. His brother criticized him in a way that made it sound like he had always been incorrigible, even though that’s definitely not true if you watched the previous films. Only when he compromised and became “good” on Thor*’s terms after listening to Thor*’s bullshit of a speech was he deemed redeemable.
In short, Ragnarok “put him in his place”, downplayed his powers, stripped him of his purpose, wits, importance and independence as a character, never gave him the equality and respect he wanted.
The IW writers said this:
“…the first scene of this movie changed a bunch. And until we figured out that they were gonna end on a trip off of a destroyed Asgard, we didn’t know where Thanos would find Loki.”
“We did know we wanted Thanos to come to Loki. And we would find him in any… We have drafts of him in any number of places.”
But with how Ragnarok ended up, it became entirely too convenient. It made him too easy to kill off—they could simply make him sacrifice himself for his brother again, since his sacrifice in TDW was retconned into a faked death anyway.
There wasn’t a need to think of an intricate plot for a character who no longer seemed important—they only needed to put the final nail in the coffin. Since it would serve all their purposes anyway, why not?
Loki was crying when he said that. Assuming those were Loki’s tears (in character), then it was almost as if Loki had been prepared to die, as though his futile attempt at killing Thanos was deliberate. Why?!?!?! Just because Thor changed his mind about saying “maybe you’re not so bad after all” and told him he was the “worst brother”, so he wanted to prove his fidelity using his life???
That suggestion about why Loki apparently deliberately sacrifices himself (to no useful purpose, btw – he knew he couldn’t actually hurt Thanos, and his death did nothing to help Thor’s situation) matches up exactly with @illwynd‘s analysis in this post: that what Ragnarok did to Thor and Loki’s relationship made Loki’s self-immolation the only place left for them to go.
Telling someone who has known trauma around identity and belonging “who you are is as a person is inadequate and I will disown you unless you change to suit my standards” is…
… What Loki needed was to be able to trust in Thor’s love for him: that it wasn’t just circumstantial. That he, as a person, mattered to Thor, and that Thor would be able to re-accept him after his transgressions and would continue to value him. …
But the above scene from Ragnarok, Thor’s ultimatum, would utterly shatter Loki’s trust in all of those things. …
And to me it is fitting, under those circumstances, that Loki would go and get himself killed kinda-sorta on purpose at the first opportunity as well. I mean, last time he was in a similar situation of having been rejected by those he cared about, he threw himself into an abyss. And this time he even got to continue to try to prove himself to Thor while doing it, just like one might feel compelled to do after such an ultimatum.
And the thing is… even if Ragnarok hadn’t done away with Loki’s cleverness and planning ability, it might not be completely OOC for Loki to basically commit suicide in order to prove to Thor that he was good now. After all, Thor* told him that his identity as “the god of mischief” wasn’t valuable; he needed to become someone different, someone straightforwardly heroic. Loki couldn’t trust Thor to trust him, so if he had made a serious effort to do what I think he should have done (and what I think he would have done if Joss Whedon had still been writing…) – namely, insinuate himself into Thanos’s team to “make amends” for his previous failure – he would have feared, rightly, that Thor just thought he was turning wickedly self-interested again, changing his colors to suit whichever way the wind was blowing. Ragnarok would have actually needed to reestablish their mutual trust in order for that gambit to work (as I touched on in this post). As it is… well, as illwynd pointed out, we saw Loki’s response to rejection in Thor 1,when his planning abilities were perfectly intact. (And as usual, anyone who says that was not a suicide attempt, just an attempt to escape punishment, can piss up a rope).
Get it? Cause they’re both blue? And bad guys? I’m hysterical, admit it.
In this meta, I will be examining the similarities between the sibling relationship arcs of Thor & Loki and Gamora & Nebula, from their childhood to their reconciliation (or “reconciliation”, as the case may be).
This meta will be split into two parts: Context and Argument.
The purpose of this meta is to explain why I am dissatisfied with the conclusion to Thor & Loki’s relationship arc. If you’re not a fan of Ragnarok criticism/discussion, this meta isn’t for you, and the tag you should blacklist if you’re following me is “ragnarok discourse”. It’s perfectly fine to tailor your dashboard to your preferences. I do it too. If you aren’t a fan of Ragnarok criticism, but would like to rebut my arguments, you’re more than welcome to do so politely.
Some people who might find this interesting/want to add something… @philosopherking1887, @imaginetrilobites, @lucianalight, @princess-ikol, @illwynd, @incredifishface, and @iamanartichoke (I know Ragnarok criticism isn’t always your thing, but when it comes to the Brodinsons’ relationship we seem to agree). I hate tagging people, but this post was too much work not to. I always feel like I’m bothering everyone. Do feel free to disregard if you would like.
Context
Childhood
Gamora and Nebula both lose everything, Thanos kidnaps them, and they’re trained and mutilated, turned into assassins who travel the galaxy and do his bidding. Thanos pits them against one another in a competition where Gamora always comes out on top. Nebula grew to resent Gamora for winning–that they were in this competition at all since she just wanted a sister–even though Thanos was ultimately responsible/the one at fault for this. Through it all, Gamora remained focused on her own problems, and in so doing unintentionally contributed to Nebula’s (ex: Gamora winning results in Nebula being augmented).
Thor and Loki, compared to Gamora and Nebula, have an idyllic childhood. They’re actually Odin and Frigga’s children. Odin and Frigga are bad/abusive parents, but they are parents. Both Odin and Frigga conceal from Loki his heritage. They allow Thor and others to spout racism against Frost Giants, even in Loki’s presence. They permit Thor’s worst impulses until after someone gets hurt. Odin pits them against one another in a competition where Thor always comes out on top. Loki grew to resent Thor for being the favored son–that they were in this competition at all since he just wanted to be equals–even though Odin was ultimately responsible/the one at fault for this. Through it all, Thor remained focused on his own problems, and in so doing unintentionally contributed to Loki’s (ex: Thor’s own insecurities and resulting arrogance lead to him reinforcing Loki’s insecurities with commands like, “Know your place, brother.”).
Conflict
To summarize the entire active conflict between Thor and Loki (two+ fucking films worth!) would be exhausting, so I’m merely going to enumerate the similarities where I see them.
Both pairs of siblings begin at a relatively equal moral position. Gamora and Nebula have both committed grave crimes against the galaxy at the behest of Thanos and Ronan. Thor and Loki both start firmly convinced of the vileness of the Frost Giant race. Gamora and Thor are, perhaps, worse than their siblings. Gamora easily steals an opportunity from Nebula in GotG. It’s not a stretch to infer Thanos and Ronan favored sending her on jobs, meaning she would have committed more crimes. Thor
has genocidal aspirations, where Loki does not (at first), wanting to destroy the Frost Giants in whole or in part (look at me exercising my knowledge of the U.N. definition of genocide like some pedantic asshole) because of the prejudice he’s absorbed from society and, almost certainly, Odin specifically.
Gamora and Thor both come to the realization that they were wrong. Gamora betrays Thanos and finds a new family, while Thor confronts his greatest flaws and adjusts his behavior and values.
Meanwhile, Nebula and Loki hurt innocent people to achieve their (sympathetic) desires. In Nebula’s case, she helps Ronan attempt to annihilate the Nova Empire in exchange for the opportunity to destroy Thanos, the “father” that’s tortured her all her life. In Loki’s case, he first attempts genocide against the Frost Giants in the midst of a mental breakdown/identity crisis in order to win Odin’s approval, and then attacks Midgard to survive Thanos, get away from the torture, and to lash out at the people he feels did him wrong (Thor and Odin).
At various points, Nebula and Loki attempt to kill their siblings. (I’m not going to list them–you know them.)
Gamora and Thor initially attempt to reason with their siblings, to talk them down from the conflict, but they both, inevitably, give up on them. Gamora gives up on Nebula at the end of GotG. At the beginning of GotG Vol. 2, Nebula is a bounty Gamora means to collect. Thor gives up on Loki twice. First, at the end of Avengers. Second, in Ragnarok.
Argument
You know, looking at the similarities between the sibling arcs, I have to wonder about fandom’s treatment of Nebula vs. Loki. I, for one, have never seen anyone claim that Nebula doesn’t deserve Gamora, despite the fact that both Nebula and Loki try to kill their siblings, lead armies that devastate a city, and attempt genocide/to massacre the people of an empire, not primarily out of a desire to kill (though in Loki’s case there’s certainly a bit of that when it comes to the Frost Giants), but for other reasons (family issues/Thanos issues). Granted, Nebula does both at the same time, whilst Loki spreads these things out, but that doesn’t explain the difference in the fandom’s treatment of these characters and their relationships with their siblings.
It’s a very thoughtful description of the two relationships. To summarize, Nebula and Gamora are independent characters with independent goals who reconcile as equals. Loki is narratively a prop for Thor and he skunks back to Thor’s shadow under the pain of abandonment.
A interesting detail is that Nebula is allowed a clean win in the field where their rivalry was centered (physical prowess). Loki is denied a clean win in the two fields where his rivalry with Thor was at its peak: he’s shown as a very lousy king/leader AND the generally unworthy brother throughout the film.
Not only that, but the movie shows him up in areas where he used to have the upper hand on Thor – manipulation and trickery. If you can call Thor’s hamfisted tactics “manipulation” and not bludgeoning. What next, are they going to make Thor an accomplished sorcerer? Oh wait, they already got Strange to overshadow Loki there too.
That’s a pretty standard narrative/mythic trope, the “trickster tricked.” It happens in the Norse myths, as when Loki turns into a salmon to try to escape punishment for causing Balder’s death and then Thor catches him in the fishnet that Loki had been weaving. (A very literal version of the weaver of schemes being caught in his own net.) We saw a little bit of that in TDW, when Thor handcuffed Loki instead of arming him (“I thought you liked tricks”) and pushed him out of the Dark Elf ship onto the skiff (“You lied to me. I’m impressed”). In theory, I don’t have a problem with that.
What @foundlingmother points to as the problem with their “reconciliation” is exactly right. Unlike GotG2 with Nebula, TR doesn’t even acknowledge, let alone validate, Loki’s perspective on the sibling conflict. Of course the in-story reason Loki doesn’t rebut Thor’s assessment is because he’s paralyzed by the obedience disk… but that parallels the structural narrative situation, too. He’s being silenced, physically by Thor* and narratively by the film’s implied perspective (which basically lines up with Thor*’s). By acquiescing to Thor*’s demands, apparently because he’s responded to the ultimatum, Loki appears to confirm Thor*’s and the film’s diagnosis that all of the problems in the relationship were the result of Loki’s selfish, capricious badness – never mind that 3 previous films made a point of showing that this is not the case.
Yes, more power to them. I just wish they wouldn’t imply we’re crazy and stupid (and flat out say we’re wrong) for not seeing it as positive… Like, I’m sorry I don’t see Thor leaving Loki with a device meant to keep slaves in line active on him as this sweet moment of brotherly acceptance. (Sorry, lots of posts getting on my nerves lately. Couldn’t help but vent.)
OK guess i lied about not going into any more detail in a public post.
See, a lot of the complaints I have seen about it, and a lot of the derisive responses to those complaints, have been about whether the device itself was cruel. But to me, that’s… missing the point a bit, at least with the way I see it, because I am completely not complaining about the physical pain Thor inflicted on Loki. They can bash the shit out of each other, that’s fine; I’m sure if you tallied up who had hurt who when, they’d both have a long list. I do think it was… reckless, to say the least… for Thor to leave him there helpless without any certainty of who would find him, but I would be able to overlook that as a lapse in judgment under other circumstances.
What bothers me is why. Telling someone who has known trauma around identity and belonging “who you are is as a person is inadequate and I will disown you unless you change to suit my standards” is…
I mean, I know some folks reading this are not gonna hear what I’m saying but are going to hear what they think I’m saying. So let me clarify. I am not saying how horrible Thor is for saying it. I don’t care whether it’s right or wrong, an acceptable or unacceptable action. That is entirely irrelevant. It could be 100% justified… but it would not have achieved the end that the movie claims. What I’m saying is that regardless of whether Loki got out and followed him back to Asgard, and regardless of whether they hugged and made nice with each other, that conversation did the opposite of what needed to happen to heal their relationship, and it may have effectively destroyed any chance of future healing between them.
The fracture in their relationship was around trust—not just Thor’s trust in Loki but also Loki’s trust in Thor. That was something that TDW got very right, for all its other flaws, because it showed that Loki started to come back from the edge when Thor chose to extend trust to him, treated him like his brother, took him seriously, and generally allowed Loki to believe that their relationship was not permanently stained. What Loki needed was to be able to trust in Thor’s love for him: that it wasn’t just circumstantial. That he, as a person, mattered to Thor, and that Thor would be able to re-accept him after his transgressions and would continue to value him. And Thor showing him so through his actions was working to fix their relationship and give them the space to talk things through
with some kind of honesty
and work their shit out. It was working, to the extent that Loki fully intended to die to save Thor. (The fact that Loki took advantage of circumstances when he woke up alive doesn’t change that and is, to my thinking, wholly in line with his character and his need to not let his feelings be used against him. Just died for your brother in a blatant display of love and loyalty? whoop better go and be a dick to fuck that right up!).
But the above scene from Ragnarok, Thor’s ultimatum, would utterly shatter Loki’s trust in all of those things. And, importantly, it would do absolutely nothing to heal Thor’s trust in his brother, either, because… I mean, it was compliance under threat of abandonment. That really doesn’t prove anything about someone’s trustworthiness or whether they have “changed.” All it proves is that you know where their buttons are located.
And that is exactly where the movie leaves it, with trust thoroughly shattered on both sides. Which is the end of any relationship if serious action isn’t taken to repair that trust. But no such action is shown or even suggested. Loki coming to save the day wouldn’t do it; he’d rushed to Thor’s rescue as recently as the previous movie, so that’s hardly new. Them fighting side by side wouldn’t do it; they’d done that thousands of times before. Hugs likewise. And if the issues were deep and serious enough to cause the breaking of a centuries-long brotherly bond, how could they possibly be resolved off-screen, without so much as a hint of how it happened? They couldn’t. It just doesn’t work, narratively speaking.
So to me, that movie ends with their relationship completely broken. They are inhabiting the same space and they are ostensibly on peaceful terms, but any basis for trust has been destroyed. By any meaningful definition, their relationship is deader than a doornail.
And to me it is fitting, under those circumstances, that Loki would go and get himself killed kinda-sorta on purpose at the first opportunity as well. I mean, last time he was in a similar situation of having been rejected by those he cared about, he threw himself into an abyss. And this time he even got to continue to try to prove himself to Thor while doing it, just like one might feel compelled to do after such an ultimatum.
So yeah that’s why I call it a breakup. Because I don’t see any other way I can interpret it.
Thank you so much for saying this publicly. It was talking to you that led me to realize that Ragnarok destroyed the main characters, especially Thor, so thoroughly that I couldn’t make excuses for it, couldn’t keep liking it for bringing Thor and Loki back together even if I was uncomfortable with the way it belittled Loki’s grievances and turned Thor more self-absorbed than he had been at the beginning of Thor 1. Thank you for adding this to the discussion and redirecting it to something that really is more important than the points it has been getting unproductively stuck on. I’ll admit to getting stuck on the obedience disk, too, because one of the things that made me most deeply uncomfortable, even before you convinced me that Thor* was never giving Loki a genuine choice, was how smug, how self-satisfied and even gleeful Thor looked while seeing Loki in pain. But you’re right that that by itself could be explained as the anger of the moment (and I did try to explain it that way in some post-Ragnarok Thorki fanfiction, while also having Loki try to re-assert some independence and Thor actually listen to Loki’s side of things… as if that wouldn’t be too little, too late).
I think this point is especially important and unusual in the discourse:
I am not saying how horrible Thor is for saying it. I don’t care whether it’s right or wrong, an acceptable or unacceptable action. That is entirely irrelevant. It could be 100% justified… but it would not have achieved the end that the movie claims. What I’m saying is that regardless of whether Loki got out and followed him back to Asgard, and regardless of whether they hugged and made nice with each other, that conversation did the opposite of what needed to happen to heal their relationship, and it may have effectively destroyed any chance of future healing between them.
It seems like a lot of the disagreement between the Loki fans (myself included) and the Thor* stans has been about whether Thor* was justified in doing what he did. The Thor* stans insist that Loki was a terrible brother, constantly stabbing and betraying Thor, so he deserved to be punished and needed to be told that Thor* wasn’t going to put up with his shit anymore; and the Loki fans have probably spent too much time arguing that before Thor 1 Loki hadn’t given Thor any reason to mistrust him, and since then he’s had reasons for all of his betrayals. I think some of us have also added that punishment and ultimatum aren’t the means to real reconciliation, but it’s probably focused too much on whether or not Thor* is being physically, psychologically, and/or emotionally “abusive,” with all the baggage that word carries with it.
You’re emphasizing exactly the right issue that everyone invested in Thor and Loki’s relationship, whether sexual/romantic or just brotherly, should care about, regardless of which character they favor and independent of the moralistic language that people on Tumblr love to weaponize (and I don’t exempt myself here).
Telling someone who has known trauma around identity and belonging “who you are is as a person is inadequate and I will disown you unless you change to suit my standards” is…
The fracture in their relationship was around trust—not just Thor’s trust in Loki but also Loki’s trust in Thor. … What Loki needed was to be able to trust in Thor’s love for him: that it wasn’t just circumstantial. That he, as a person, mattered to Thor, and that Thor would be able to re-accept him after his transgressions and would continue to value him. …
But the above scene from Ragnarok, Thor’s ultimatum, would utterly shatter Loki’s trust in all of those things. And, importantly, it would do absolutely nothing to heal Thor’s trust in his brother, either, because… I mean, it was compliance under threat of abandonment. That really doesn’t prove anything about someone’s trustworthiness or whether they have “changed.” All it proves is that you know where their buttons are located.
OK, now all I’m doing is quoting you, but that’s because I really like the way you put it and it’s really, really important.
The thing that really strikes me about this picture is how it’s similar to this one:
Right before Thor’s coronation.
Odin used his own daughter as no more than a weapon for his bloody wars. He was the mastermind, the brain, and Hela was the brawn. And he brought up his two sons to fit this exact image. Thor was supposed to be the symbol of Asgard’s physical power and Loki the advisor, the strategist. Thor was the brawn and Loki was the brain. It’s interesting how Hela and Thor, who were the muscles, both hold Mjolnir, a hammer. Odin holds Gungnir, a scepter and we know one of Loki’s preferred weapons is a scepter.
The kings wear red, the weapons wear green.
The weapons are on the right side of the kings.
The kings have wings on their helmet, the weapons only have horns.(Another interesting detail is how Odin’s helmet is the combination of Thor and Loki’s. He gave his wings to Thor and his horns to Loki)
It’s also another parallel that when the weapons get out of the kings’ control, they were cast out.
(As a side note I think I should mention that when I say Thor and Hela are the brawn I don’t mean they are stupid. They both are quite intelligent. I mean they are the stronger fire power and physical fights are what they are best at. Odin and Loki are both physically strong too but they are best at mind games and planning. Remember Hela told Loki “You sound like him?”. Because he does. He learned those skills from Odin)
The second most irritating thing a person can say in regards to Loki is that that he faked his sacrifice in TDW. Bonus points if they’re a fan of Ragnarok, which goes out of its way to point out how Loki’s illusions are not solid. THEY ARE NOT SOLID. They become distorted when touched. So how the fuck did Loki fake being stabbed? And when he nearly got sucked into a black hole grenade saving Jane, was that part of his master plan to take the throne of Asgard, too? What about offering said throne to Thor? Ugh!
The most irritating thing a person can say in regards to Loki is that he faked his death/suicide in Thor. I have no words for these people. They render me speechless.
Logic? Consistency? Attention to the content of previous canon? What are those?
Moral complexity? A person who loves the hero but doesn’t always do exactly what he wants? What is that?
I’ve been told that there were people who claimed even before Ragnarok came out that Loki threw himself into the black hole at the end of Thor to escape being held accountable for his actions. If there are such people, I suspect that they started advocating this view as part of the backlash against the “Loki apologists,” so called, of “Loki’s Resistance,” who at the extreme end claim that Loki does not deserve blame for anything he has done, and instead lay all the blame on Odin’s terrible parenting, Thor’s bullying and alleged abuse, and Thanos’s brainwashing and/or full-on mind control. The reaction of Thor’s defenders has been to insist that Loki deserves unmitigated blame for everything and to undercut anything that appears to make Loki deserve our sympathy – including his suicide attempt. You might *think* Loki suffers from severe mental illness and profound self-loathing, but no: he was planning genocide even before he learned that he was Jotun (I have seen people claim this), and what looks like a suicide attempt was just slithering out of punishment.
Ragnarok has exacerbated and given canon legitimization to this tendency by trivializing the issues of Loki’s heritage and his attempted suicide. At a party on Sakaar, Loki tells a story that ends with him hanging over a rift in space, and “at that moment I let go.” Everyone laughs, including him. People have offered all kinds of explanations for why this isn’t as unbelievably insensitive as it seems: we all make light of our trauma to keep it from overwhelming us, of course Loki would do the same; or maybe he’s gone through a course of therapy through theater and has recovered from all his issues and moved on. But the other obvious explanation for why Loki might be laughing about letting himself fall is that it was never a suicide attempt; it was just him being his incorrigible trickster self, cleverly faking his death to get away with mass murder.
I’m confused about a non-criticism/analysis detail, as it impacts continuity for fanfiction.
Where in Ragnarok does it depict his illusions as unsolid & weren’t they already depicted as dissolving when touched? (I am a fan so I’m extra confused—lol)
I thought we saw this in Thor (2011), and definitely did in Avengers and with Frigga’s early in TDW.
You’re a fan of “Ragnarok”? Then you must have noticed that it thematizes the non-solidity of the illusions: on 3 occasions, Thor throws things at Loki to determine whether it’s really him or just an illusion. When it’s an illusion, the pebbles he throws cause glitches in the illusion and go through.
This actually differs from the way the non-solidity had been shown in “The Avengers” and TDW, in which the illusions dissolve on contact. It was slightly different in “Thor”: when Loki uses an illusion to trick a Frost Giant into running off a cliff, the giant runs through his projection, but the projection stays there until Loki dismisses it with a hand gesture.
The point was not that “Ragnarok” revises canon on illusion solidity; on the contrary, it’s surprising that it agrees with previous canon on that point, considering that it’s pushing the narrative that everything about Loki’s apparent death in TDW was faked and he deserves no credit for getting himself impaled to save Thor and avenge Frigga. But how could he have faked it? Considering that Ragnarok itself affirms that Loki’s illusions aren’t solid, wouldn’t Kurse have noticed that Loki’s body provided no resistance to the blade?
Yeah, Thor 100% has the capacity to understand Loki’s grievances, he just didn’t get a chance to because he wasn’t even in Ragnarok, Thor* was. Heimdall might not be a saint, but I think it’s wrong to assume he saw Loki with Thanos. It seems unlikely he would have mentioned none of that. As for Loki pulling a double-cross… while I get the appeal of this, it seems like such an unrealistic culmination of Loki’s arc even ignoring Ragnarok.
I’m not sure I think it would have been Whedon’s angle.
I mean, I know that Thanos behaves kind of stupid in GotG, but I feel like having him accept Loki as his ally with all that happens… would have undermined him as a villain.
Right… I wasn’t completely on board with all of @juliabohemian‘s analysis on my other post. She and I seem to fundamentally disagree about Thor’s moral character and disposition toward Loki as shown in previous films: I think the character called “Thor” in Ragnarok is a radical departure from Thor as we’ve seen him in previous movies, which is why I refer to him as Thor*; she, and many other non-Thorki-shipping Loki fans, think that Ragnarok amplifies Thor’s previous tendencies toward self-absorption and insensitivity, but is not completely discontinuous with the character. I don’t see us coming to full agreement on that issue anytime soon, and that’s fine.
As to the issue of the double-cross being “an unrealistic culmination of Loki’s arc”… I actually disagree with you there. If you just mean it would have been unrealistic for Thanos to accept Loki as his ally, I do see where you’re coming from there, but there are ways around it. The idea of having Thanos take Thor as a hostage is one way. That way Thanos wouldn’t have to trust Loki; he would just have to trust Loki’s unwillingness to allow harm to come to Thor, which given what Thanos knows about him he absolutely would and should. I think that would appeal to Thanos for a couple of reasons:
(1) Good old-fashioned sadism. Whedon’s Thanos clearly wasn’t into any of that pseudo-benevolent Malthusian bullshit; the reference to “courting death” in the Avengers tag scene indicated that Whedon was picturing a Thanos obsessed with Lady Death like he is in the comics. No attempt would have been made to make that Thanos sympathetic. That Thanos is a creepy fucker who would have gotten a kick out of torturing Thor physically (just a little) and torturing Loki psychologically with the knowledge that a step out of line would mean pain and/or permanent damage to Thor. Ooh, maybe he would have cut off a finger or a toe when Loki made a decision to undermine Thanos that he was just barely able to pass off as an incompetent fuck-up. And Loki would have known that… and wouldn’t have hesitated to trade his own pain, but when it’s Thor’s it’s so much worse. (Should I be worried about myself, coming up with this shit?)
(2) It would mean that Loki wasn’t a completely wasted investment. If Thanos were a good economist (which clearly he isn’t…), he wouldn’t buy into the sunk costs fallacy, and he’d be perfectly happy cutting his losses and cutting Loki loose… but I think he’s into narrative neatness (OK, this is just “Abyss” Thanos now, never mind what Whedon would have done) and he would like the idea of making Loki useful after all. Plus, there must have been a reason he thought it was a good idea to trust Loki with the Tesseract retrieval mission – and the Mind Stone! – in the first place; he must think he’s good at some stuff.
If by “unrealistic culmination of Loki’s arc,” you mean it wouldn’t be a realistic place for Loki’s character progression to go, then I definitely disagree. Part of what was so objectionable about Thor*’s treatment of Loki in Ragnarok was that he was effectively demanding that Loki become a different person as a condition of maintaining a relationship with Thor* (classic sign of an abusive relationship, btw). Of course, that demand was also based on the faulty premise, assumed by Ragnarok but by none of the previous films, that Loki’s basic nature or “essence” was the “god of mischief” who betrays people out of hedonistic self-interest or just because he thinks it’s fun. I mean, it’s not unreasonable for Thor to demand that Loki stop betraying him, but when you’re working on the assumption that that’s what Loki has been doing their whole lives, instead of just for the past 6 really shitty years out of 1000+, and that it’s just in his nature to do that, then you’ve really gotta wonder why Thor put up with it for as long as he did… and also you don’t give an abusive “change fundamentally or I’m leaving” ultimatum; you just fucking leave.
One of the best parts of TDW, which totally got me the first time I watched it, was when Loki makes a show of betraying Thor to trick Malekith into drawing the Aether from Jane. That was absolutely brilliant because it was Thor and Loki, together, taking advantage of some of Loki’s most distinctive features – illusion magic, acting ability, and a reputation for treachery – to achieve a good aim they shared. Having Loki pull a long con on Thanos would be that gambit writ large. And ideally, this time – in order for it to represent a progression from the incident in TDW rather than just a replay – Thor would not be on on the plan… but he would indicate, perhaps while conversing in a dungeon with one of Thanos’s other unfortunate prisoners, that he believes Loki is still on his side and is planning to double-cross Thanos in the end. He doesn’t know; he harbors some doubts; but he believes. That would represent character growth for both Thor and Loki: Thor is forced to trust Loki for a long period of uncertainty; and Loki is, on some level, trusting Thor to trust him. That, too, would be a source of anguish for Loki – wondering whether Thor thinks that Loki has betrayed him again, more grievously than ever – but he hopes, and maybe even believes (William James will-to-believe style, because it helps), that Thor believes Loki is doing the right thing, in his indirect, strategic way.
@fuckyeahrichardiii, @illwynd, @incredifishface, @seidrade, I’m bringing y’all in on my harebrained IW do-over ideas because I’m curious to know what you think. (I’m never writing this as a fic, because I’m not that good at plot details, but just the outline.)
This is such an interesting contrast in reactions between Loki and Thor with the context of Odin’s quote, because you can tell that while Loki is taken aback, shocked, and even saddened by these words, Thor is still reeling from the revelation of Hela and impending Ragnarok and it doesn’t seem like Odin’s words even really register to him.He knows and has always known that Odin loves him; he’s never been made to doubt it and he has no reason to react with anything other than the barest acknowledgement while his head is still spinning with this new truth he must face.
Loki, however, is much more preoccupied and consumed with the verbal acknowledgement of Odin’s love, and the issue of Hela is little more than a footnote to the conversation for him. He knows much better than Thor how deceptive Odin is, and while initially he’s somewhat surprised by the reveal of Hela, he’s not bowled over in astonished shock the way Thor is.
Loki expects Odin’s lies and is far more bewildered by Odin’s love, while Thor expects Odin’s love and is stunned by Odin’s lies. There’s something incredibly straightforward in that, expressed in each of their reactions, that really just drives home the dichotomy between Thor and Loki in general.
Friendly reminder that Loki never showed any general ill-will toward Asgard or intent to destroy Asgard and that usurping Odin at the end of TDW didn’t necessarily have to bode ill for Asgard’s fate, as we had no reason to believe he would rule poorly. That Ragnarok revealed his “evil plan” being community theatre shouldn’t be much of a surprise – by which, I mean I didn’t expect the community theatre part, but I didn’t expect to see Asgard in tyrannical ruins under Loki’s rule, either. Loki has always proven himself sensible, analytical, and highly intelligent. He would have absolutely nothing to gain by using Odin’s form to run Asgard into the ground. Despite what Thor says about the Nine Realms being in chaos, I’m pretty sure things were fine and were always going to be fine under Loki.
And the other thing is… that line about the Nine Realms being in chaos – which has encouraged everyone to trash Loki as a terrible king and paint his usurping Odin as another horrific crime for which he deserved any maltreatment Thor subsequently decided to inflict on him – is an example of just how half-assed Ragnarok’s “critique of imperialism” really is (as @foundlingmother and I have discussed at length). So conquest is bad, but non-interventionism is equally bad? Sudden withdrawal from protectorates that have been left in no condition to protect or govern themselves is certainly not great, but it’s a complicated issue exactly what kind of aid or training withdrawing conquerors should provide. (Is it “weaning” away from dependency, or just extending the period of dependency? Doesn’t “teaching” self-governance involve a kind of cultural imperialism, as the conqueror generally ends up teaching the ex-protectorate how to imitate its own system of government?) It’s understandable that a comic book action movie isn’t going to explore those kinds of issues in depth (and boy, did Civil War massively fail on that score – though Black Panther did a pretty good job wrestling with it), but… if you’re going to bring it up in the form of a ham-handed allegory, you can’t also have this glaring (at least apparent) inconsistency and not address it.
This appears to be another example of the film dropping the ball on its otherwise worthy anti-imperialism message when it comes to Loki – probably deliberately, considering the lack of sympathy and respect the film and its creator show for Loki in just about every other context. As I’ve also discussed at length, Ragnarok missed, or simply passed on, an obvious opportunity to address Loki’s place in Asgard’s imperialist history, as the child of a conquered people raised in ignorance of his heritage and with such contempt and hatred toward his own kind that when he discovered he was one of them he tried to wipe them out. I’m going to excerpt the most relevant part of that old post:
Loki’s story could have been used to flesh out the narrative about colonialism. Recall Hela’s dismissive remark about bogus “peace treaties” commemorated on the redecorated walls of the throne room: that might have been an allusion to the one-sided “treaties” that Britain and the U.S. signed with American Indian nations and then trampled all over. Loki could have been one of those stolen indigenous children raised among the colonists and taught to scorn the people to whom he was born. But for some reason Waititi and the writers didn’t make the connection, or didn’t want to tie Loki in to that aspect of the story. … maybe it was just because Loki has been a villain and they didn’t want to draw a connection between a (part-time) villain – or anyway, a character they just don’t like – and the oppressed of colonialism (though making him queer is OK, I guess). For whatever reason, they wanted to keep Loki firmly coded as White (which makes him easier to ridicule!) and gloss over the part where he’s only white-passing (literally; he’s actually blue).
And I’m not the only one; @endiness put it nicely:
the movie features asgard’s ‘past’ history of imperialism and colonization as a major plot point… but then it excludes loki from the narrative when he easily has a place in it. like, how could he not when he’s the adopted (kidnapped) son of the leader of an enemy nation left in ruin after losing to asgard? and when odin literally admitted that he took loki for political purposes? but, again, nothing about any of this at all. (actually, even worse than loki and his heritage and the circumstances being entirely excluded from the story, it isn’t; it’s brought up but only in the context of humor explicitly at loki’s expense to make a mockery of the emotional complexity and depth of his character in the previous movies.)
So the upshot seems to be: hammer in your anti-imperialist message except when Loki might appear to be on the oppressed rather than oppressor’s end of the equation, when the issue threatens to give him more depth and complexity and make him remotely sympathetic. Condemn Hela and Odin (but only sometimes; Thor can still appeal to him for strength at the end) for being imperialists, but condemn Loki for failing to be imperialist enough.
I’d add that they deny Thor having a role in this at all. So, hammer in your anti-imperialist message except when Thor might appear to be on the oppressor’s end of the equation. Let me be clear: I don’t think Thor’s at Hela or Odin’s level whatsoever, but he’s the crown prince of an imperial power. He did benefit from and participate (unknowingly) in this imperialism. And that isn’t explored. It’s sort of like Thor and Loki exist in an entirely different Asgard than the one Hela did, rather than an Asgard that’s still defined by its history. Very frustrating how muddled the critique becomes when it could have been so, so strong and interesting. Better even, in some ways, than Black Panther’s, because Black Panther avoids insulting white viewers to the extent it would be appropriate to do so. The discussion focuses on how Wakanda, a country that avoided colonization, should respond to the plight of their fellow Africans and people of African descent. The wrongdoings of white people exist on the periphery, but they are not the focus. If Ragnarok’s critique weren’t so muddled, it would have been a critique of white imperialists. It would have been a condemnation of erasing history and the uncritical thinking that allows people who benefit to rationalize their relative good fortune. There’s such a strong critique somewhere in this movie that reminds me a lot of the critiques I’ve read by Native Americans and other indigenous peoples (no surprise given Taika Waititi’s Māori), but I guess other elements of the movie were prioritized. Like making Thor a flat, quippy badass, rather than a growthful, ultimately altruistic badass.
Yeah, I dunno… if they wanted to talk about how Odin’s imperialist attitudes are the reason Thor rushed into Jotunheim with guns blazing, that would have been great – but that would involve talking about the Frost Giants as victims of imperialism (or, you know, talking about them at all), which might threaten to make Loki more sympathetic. And it would also involve acknowledging actual bad things that Thor himself (as opposed to his relatives) had done, which is not the Ragnarok way.
If it’s just about the fact that Thor benefited from the spoils of empire, I think that was made reasonably clear, and I’m not sure how it would help to see him doing a whole lot of breast-beating about it. The Nietzsche quote I just posted might indicate that you and I have different attitudes about how to regard past injustices, and possibly about the default moral status of descendants of the conquerors vs. the conquered. Or to put it differently: the crimes of the past can never be undone; the best approach is not to try to make things the way you think they would have been if they had never been committed (since you have no idea what that would look like anyway), but to approach compensation in a forward-looking manner that avoids perpetrating further injustices.
Friendly reminder that Loki never showed any general ill-will toward Asgard or intent to destroy Asgard and that usurping Odin at the end of TDW didn’t necessarily have to bode ill for Asgard’s fate, as we had no reason to believe he would rule poorly. That Ragnarok revealed his “evil plan” being community theatre shouldn’t be much of a surprise – by which, I mean I didn’t expect the community theatre part, but I didn’t expect to see Asgard in tyrannical ruins under Loki’s rule, either. Loki has always proven himself sensible, analytical, and highly intelligent. He would have absolutely nothing to gain by using Odin’s form to run Asgard into the ground. Despite what Thor says about the Nine Realms being in chaos, I’m pretty sure things were fine and were always going to be fine under Loki.
And the other thing is… that line about the Nine Realms being in chaos – which has encouraged everyone to trash Loki as a terrible king and paint his usurping Odin as another horrific crime for which he deserved any maltreatment Thor subsequently decided to inflict on him – is an example of just how half-assed Ragnarok’s “critique of imperialism” really is (as @foundlingmother and I have discussed at length). So conquest is bad, but non-interventionism is equally bad? Sudden withdrawal from protectorates that have been left in no condition to protect or govern themselves is certainly not great, but it’s a complicated issue exactly what kind of aid or training withdrawing conquerors should provide. (Is it “weaning” away from dependency, or just extending the period of dependency? Doesn’t “teaching” self-governance involve a kind of cultural imperialism, as the conqueror generally ends up teaching the ex-protectorate how to imitate its own system of government?) It’s understandable that a comic book action movie isn’t going to explore those kinds of issues in depth (and boy, did Civil War massively fail on that score – though Black Panther did a pretty good job wrestling with it), but… if you’re going to bring it up in the form of a ham-handed allegory, you can’t also have this glaring (at least apparent) inconsistency and not address it.
This appears to be another example of the film dropping the ball on its otherwise worthy anti-imperialism message when it comes to Loki – probably deliberately, considering the lack of sympathy and respect the film and its creator show for Loki in just about every other context. As I’ve also discussed at length, Ragnarok missed, or simply passed on, an obvious opportunity to address Loki’s place in Asgard’s imperialist history, as the child of a conquered people raised in ignorance of his heritage and with such contempt and hatred toward his own kind that when he discovered he was one of them he tried to wipe them out. I’m going to excerpt the most relevant part of that old post:
Loki’s story could have been used to flesh out the narrative about colonialism. Recall Hela’s dismissive remark about bogus “peace treaties” commemorated on the redecorated walls of the throne room: that might have been an allusion to the one-sided “treaties” that Britain and the U.S. signed with American Indian nations and then trampled all over. Loki could have been one of those stolen indigenous children raised among the colonists and taught to scorn the people to whom he was born. But for some reason Waititi and the writers didn’t make the connection, or didn’t want to tie Loki in to that aspect of the story. … maybe it was just because Loki has been a villain and they didn’t want to draw a connection between a (part-time) villain – or anyway, a character they just don’t like – and the oppressed of colonialism (though making him queer is OK, I guess). For whatever reason, they wanted to keep Loki firmly coded as White (which makes him easier to ridicule!) and gloss over the part where he’s only white-passing (literally; he’s actually blue).
And I’m not the only one; @endiness put it nicely:
the movie features asgard’s ‘past’ history of imperialism and colonization as a major plot point… but then it excludes loki from the narrative when he easily has a place in it. like, how could he not when he’s the adopted (kidnapped) son of the leader of an enemy nation left in ruin after losing to asgard? and when odin literally admitted that he took loki for political purposes? but, again, nothing about any of this at all. (actually, even worse than loki and his heritage and the circumstances being entirely excluded from the story, it isn’t; it’s brought up but only in the context of humor explicitly at loki’s expense to make a mockery of the emotional complexity and depth of his character in the previous movies.)
So the upshot seems to be: hammer in your anti-imperialist message except when Loki might appear to be on the oppressed rather than oppressor’s end of the equation, when the issue threatens to give him more depth and complexity and make him remotely sympathetic. Condemn Hela and Odin (but only sometimes; Thor can still appeal to him for strength at the end) for being imperialists, but condemn Loki for failing to be imperialist enough.
Loki is the Philosopher King 