Can I just draw your attention to Loki’s face in the last gif? Look at him. He’s crying. He was trying to do something right, to impress his father and make him proud by destroying the enemy, even though technically he was one of them. Yes, he was greedy and lied to Thor, but can you blame him? He was jealous of his brother who his father favoured. Thor got everything and Loki got next to nothing. And now he’s failed once again to impress his father and finally decided to leave.
WHY WOULD YOU THINK IT WOULD BE OKAY TO POST SUCH A THING?!
I feel like this entire phenomenon of “SHUT UP LOKI NOBODY WANTS TO LISTEN TO YOU”, besides the sort of mean chuckle at his expense that makes me feel guilty, is fascinating. With giant angst potential that explains a lot about how Loki looks at himself and why he snaps.
No, seriously. Imagine that this sort of thing has been going on for hundreds or thousands of years. Whenever Loki opens his mouth to speak, or share an opinion, or make a suggestion, or voice an objection, there’s a good chance he’ll basically get told he’s insignificant or irrelevant or reprehensible or just flat out wrong. Stop talking. Yeah, he’s a manipulative little shit, but seriously. His words are his biggest source of power. He’s not an up front fighter—his forte lies through persuasion and the ability to reason people into the decisions that suit him. And he’s perpetually being told “YOUR ABILITIES ARE WORTHLESS, GTFO WE DON’T WANT YOU”. So even the thing he thought he was good at is being undermined.
Extra bonus points if you incorporate canon mythology and the “sew his lips up” punishment. I mean just DAMN. Physical pain and the approval of his father in that sentence aside, that literally, physically denies his right to assert or defend himself. He completely loses his voice. He’s basically having it hammered home that people would rather not hear him at all, would rather pretend he’s not there, and he can’t even count on his family to disagree.
It’s just unbelievably fucked up.
SHIT. I hadn’t consciously made the connection between the fact that Loki is always overlooked and ignored when he speaks and the fact that he’s put in that muzzle at the end of Avengers. I always thought that bit was a link to the bit from Norse mythology where he had his mouth sewn up as punishment for teasing some dude (details elude me right now). But this. This makes sense. And makes so many more feels. It’s like the ultimate insult to him.
THIS. RIGHT. HERE.
No wonder he turned out the way he is. He was already an outsider in his family before he had even discovered that he was adopted.
#so let’s talk about this #this is loki’s big opening number #this is how he introduces himself to the new realm of earth #his opening volley #his brash declaration of war #’i am loki of asgard’ #except you’re totally not loki #and you’re the only one in the room that knows it #so what are you trying to prove loki? #who are you trying to convince? #why claim your home here and now when no one is around to notice? #because no matter how much loki hates his family #no matter how much he hates his realm #no matter how much he hates the æsir #he hates not being one more #he hates being jötunn more #therein is loki’s most childish and saddest fault #he tried so desperately to remain an æsir #he killed his own father in a hopeless futile scheme to make it not so #he razed jötunheimr to try and scour their stain from his body #being a jötunn was so foul to his mind that murder and genocide became viable courses of action #he clings desperately to his æsir identity before turning around and denying thor as his brother with his next breath #so long as no is around to see it he cleaves to his title of loki of asgard #but never to his brother’s face #because then thor wins #again #thor is right again #and loki would rather be alone than be wrong again
Okay, we have to add on to this. Because is the thing about Loki in the Avengers that really gets us. See, he’s incredibly intelligent. He’s a trickster; he has to be. He had to know, right from the start, what the probably outcomes of this whole thing were. He had to. Maybe he tried not to, maybe he lied to himself, but somewhere deep down, he had to have known. But he went ahead and did all this anyway, so why?
‘Because I am the monster who parents tell their children about at night,’ he said. He was one of those children. He truly believes he’s a monster; he will look back on his life, on his childhood, and twist every memory, every action and outcome, in order to prove this to himself, because that’s what the brain does sometimes when we’re afraid and hurting. Loki hates himself; in his mind he is a monster, ruining all he touches, unworthy of his brother’s love. Not capable of being ‘fixed.’
Loki spends the entire film pissing off as many powerful people as he can, especially Thor. He probably knew that dropping Thor wouldn’t kill him, and that knife he stabbed him with? Too short to do any real damage. He knew Thor would survive. So why do it? Because he wants Thor to hate him. Because it’s easier. Because Thor caring for him hurts too much, even though he wants it too.
Because we don’t think Loki was counting on surviving this whole escapade and because Loki figures that as long as he’s going to die anyway it might as well be at the hands of the brother he loves so much, in spite of everything.
Because then Thor could be the martyr, the king who sacrificed everything, even killed his own beloved brother, in order to protect his people. And Loki would be free.
This.
aaaaaaaaaagh
this is why we can’t have anything nice
i hate tumblr sometimes why do you all have to be so CRUEL yet so RIGHT
