Who is Loki?
or "what makes a Loki a Loki?"
According to the Loki series, Loki is a narcissist and a villain with a huge ego, the type of person who cares if there is a superior version of himself. Any character described this way is, to me, a shallow character who’s not really interesting and who would make a basic villain.
Perhaps he is a scared little boy, but more than that, he is lost. He is looking for a place in the world, a place to fit in, where he belongs, with people he loves who will love him in return.
At the beginning of the first Thor movie, Loki has a plan in motion to ruin Thor’s “big day” as he believes his brother would make for an ill ruler. Now whether he’s right or wrong doesn’t really matter, that’s not a right thing to do, as a brother or a loyal citizen of Asgard. So what does he want from it? What is the goal?
As events take place, Loki’s plan keeps changing as he has to adapt to the different unexpected results of his own actions. His original plan was to show Odin that Thor is unfit to rule. That he is not ready or yet worthy to become king. That is one belief that Loki has from the beginning, along with the belief that he would make a better king for Asgard than Thor. He didn’t plan for Odin to banish Thor nor did he know at the time that he wasn’t Odin’s biological son.
As Loki finds out who he really is, everything changes. He’s angry. And quite understandably so. “I’m the monster parents tell their children at night”. His whole life he lived in the shadows of Thor. There is a clear need from Loki to prove himself to Odin so that he would receive the same love Thor has been given his whole life. But once he finds out he’s adopted, that he’s a Frost Giant, the son of Laufey, then he thinks he understands now why Odin has never loved him as much as Thor. And so the plan changes again. He has to be better now. He has to be a hero, a savior. Because he is a Frost Giant, he has to prove himself in a bigger, more impactful way.
So Loki is insecure. He’s insecure about his own existence, his place in his family and on Asgard, a realm of which he is a prince. So when he fails, he knows he’s lost everything. That’s why he lets go at the end of the movie.
But when he doesn’t die and is forced by Thanos to take over Earth, he embraces who he thinks he really is: a monster. After all, he is a villain. He’s “always been one for mischief”, he’s plotted against his own brother, his plans have been exposed, he believes his family isn’t his real family and probably are glad he is gone. He has no choice left but to be a monster. That’s what Thanos wants from him, and there’s no escaping that. He has no choice. So he becomes a villain. He becomes the villain. He lies to himself, thinking that’s all he is now, that he can never be anything other than the monster who betrayed his family.
In Avengers (2012), he tells Thor he “means to rule them”. That he is better than them. He is invading Earth on behalf of Thanos, he knows what Thanos will do once the planet is his, he will kill half of the population and perhaps he will keep his word and leave the rest for Loki to rule. That is Loki’s only chance, the only path he can take. So he walks down that path, hoping Thanos will keep his word, that if he succeeds, he will rule over Earth and I believe he has every intention of doing it well. He doesn’t mean to be a cruel ruler. In Thor (2011), he knew he would make a better king than Thor, a king Odin would be proud of. And after Dark World until he is discovered in Ragnarok, he is King of Asgard, which did prosper under his rule. So he knows he is trapped, and if he doesn’t do it, Thanos will just send someone else to do it instead, so he endeavours to take over Earth meaning to rule them and to bring them peace. During his dialogue with Thor after he is captured by Tony, Steve and Nat in Germany, Loki says this: “the humans slaughter each other in droves while you idly threat”. Although we can’t be sure of it since it never happened, there is another scene in Avengers that makes me believe that a peaceful reign was his intentions. Thor and Loki are fighting and Thor asks him to look around and says “you think this madness will end with your rule?” and Loki does look around and from the look on his face he is not too pleased with what he sees. But he knows it’s too late, he knows Thanos will come for Earth eventually. Pretending otherwise will only lead to more pain and not only for him. “Sentiment,” he says as he casts it aside and continues to fight his brother, so he can, perhaps, put an end to “this madness”. Because if he’s not the one to conquer Earth, one of Thanos’ people will.
And, he fails, again, and is brought back to Asgard, where Odin sentences him to life in the dungeons. He’s not just a villain now, he’s an enemy of Asgard. After getting his mother killed, he falls into depression. And then he fights alongside Thor and saves Jane, and then tricks his way back to the throne of Asgard. He is able to do that because he’s smart and cunning and knows (and has enough) magic to enchant the AllFather and traps him on Earth (in New-York, of all places). He traps his father, but does not kill him. And I do believe that if he was able to do one, he could have done the other just as easily (if not more easily).
After Dark World, Loki is back to his unapologetic mischievous ways while not entirely being a villain like he was in the Avengers movie. It took great magic and trickery to pretend to be Odin for so long. But he did not do so to be evil. In fact, all he’s done wrong is replace Heimdall who was the only threat to his plan. (worthy to note that he was strong enough to run him away.) Asgard did not fall under his rule, nor were the inhabitants unhappy. Otherwise, Loki does say himself that Asgard is prospering, he just let the other realms fend for themselves, which led Thor back to Asgard.
So as an insecure, lost and scared little boy, his main goal was to find a place he belonged and that place was non other than Asgard. As King, as Odin, he was loved and respected, and he took care of Asgard and its people. I won’t talk about Ragnarok Loki as I believe it is a twisted version of the character and I talk about it here, but what I will say is, either he wasn’t happy as Odin (who would be happy being someone else) and/or he was content not to be Loki anymore, after all he had done, being Loki, especially on Asgard, would have been hard, even if, as Odin, he had managed to elevate himself into a hero.
(Also Ragnarok Loki seems happy so... perhaps he was content as King, and why wouldn't he be, his people were thriving.)
Throughout the movies, Loki displayed magical abilities (such as illusions) and a great intellect. He was cunning enough to plan out all the events of Thor (2011), take Odin’s place and pretend to be his father for years (I personally believe he was such a great king nobody thought to question Odin’s bizarre behavior), but he’s also managed to show his heart. After all, Asgard is home, and Thor is all the family he has left. It’s such a shame his redemption arc was limited to “I’m sorry, here, let me die real quick to show you I’m really good now”.
"What makes a Loki a Loki" is such a bizarre question in this series where there are so many different versions of (allegedly) everyone. But if they’re different enough to have been born a different gender, a different race or a different species, then they’ve also been through different experiences that would make them completely different from one another. I would say cleverness and ambition makes a Loki a Loki. Sylvie would have never known that sense of betrayal Loki experienced when he found out he was adopted as she already knew that. But as she was taken away from the TVA, she had to be on her own from a very young age and learn everything herself, but she is still clever and ambitious. She was clever enough to understand how the TVA works as well as the nexus events and that hiding in apocalypses would keep her hidden from them. She also figured out they were all variants once before they were made agents of the TVA. She was clever enough to teach enchantment to herself. And she was clever enough to plan the bombing of the timeline, and as Loki did in Thor (2011), she planned it all with one goal in mind, get to the Time Keepers. And she was ambitious enough to want to take them down.
Another thing they have in common is they both are, or were at some point, villains, to a certain point of view.
So "what makes a Loki a Loki?" - I find it ironic the series asked that question. They don't even know themselves.
Not only is Sylvie the better Loki in the show, but Loki isn’t even a Loki. He has ambition, yes, he, too, wants to take down the Time Keepers (although for a different reason) but there’s nothing clever about his actions in the show. The only time we see him be smart is when he figures out the variant is hiding in apocalypses. But that’s it. For the rest of the show he is restrained on a leash, beaten up and taken down, tortured and humiliated. He’s been stripped of his elegance, subtlety and cunningness, and by no way of character development but just bad writing and a bad understanding of what makes Loki Loki. His trauma is used to bring him further down and is never addressed in anyway. He is being bullied and harassed and called a villain, a bad guy who will die alone and sad, who doesn't deserve love. Loki is hurt and insecure, he is not a narcissist. Loki is strong. Loki is magic. Loki is a survivor. He’s been through shit, and yes he’s made all the wrong choices, but he is more than just a pitiful prankster, he is more than just a basic villain. And the MCU, so far, has treated him as a way to elevate other characters into greatness, but the Loki show was supposed to elevate him into glory. And they took the wrong direction at every single turn.
