I belatedly caught that too, in the wide shot. You can see both brothers, but Loki’s chest is heaving and Thor’s is not. That made me obsessively rewind.
Loki’s as close to crying, proper heaving sobs, as you’ll ever see. He never breaks, because he’s Loki. But yeah. His entire body’s grieving. He’ll never get a chance to go back and feel Odin’s love as it was meant to be.
Unless A4 gets really timey wimey.
Well, guess I’ll be spending this day in tears. Thanks a lot 😭😭😭😭
Also i guess that’s how Tom was playing this scene, and that’s why at the Comic Con he said that line about “realising the love of his father”.
Mhh, I already saw it when I watched the movie for the first time but I still don’t consider this as a real grief for the beloved father. I look at it from a psychological perspective. It’s a normal reaction to cry when you’re coming out of an extremely emotional situation where you found out another family secret, feel guilty cause you did something cruel and became something you never really wanted because then you are no different from the one person you rejected because of that. And suddenly this person seemed to show a kind of affection, something you had wished to get all your life. You don’t know if you’re surprised, deeply touched or just misguided. It’s a common reaction to feel something towards your „abuser“, it’s called Stockholm syndrome.
I don’t consider Loki’s tears as a grief over losing his father. But that’s of course just my point of view.
I’ve never noticed this before! :’O Honestly I’m kind of in between the two ideas, from the way Odin and Loki interacted in Thor 2011, I can kinda see Loki being like, despite everything they still loved each other, but Odin from the Dark World treated Loki like the absolute worst, so I think that would lend itself towards what @motherhela said.
Either way, tho, Loki crying is the worst feeling. 😢
As moving as this is, it’s really confusing when you consider the last time Odin saw Loki.
I’m going to agree with @motherhela. Loki is visibly upset because it’s an upsetting situation.
Loki was just recently ripped away from Asgard…after seeing (and being threatened by) Thor for the first time in years. He spent 30 minutes falling. Then he saw his dad again for the first time in years, only to find out that his dad is dying. Then Loki found out that he has a sister and that Asgard is on the brink of destruction. On top of all that, his cover was blown. So, he knew it would only be a matter of time before Thanos found him, which is probably why he was considering staying on Sakaar. I’d be crying too. Or vomiting. Or both.
As far as I’m concerned Odin’s “evidence of love” for Loki was too little, too late, and frankly only served to make Loki more conflicted (been there) by feeling obligated to return affection to someone who kept him at arm’s length at best for most of his life. Odin used Loki as a convenient chess piece in his extravagantly corrupt game of imperialist conquest. There is no better way to break a people than to take one of their own and assimilate that person into the dominant culture, giving them a case of, once they learn their true heritage, internalized racism that there is no evidence Loki ever got over.
Let’s also remember it’s in the context of Odin conveniently expiring right after telling his sons of yet another problem he swept under the rug and let fester, for them to later clean up with, among other things, their total lack of a sense of personal boundaries from Odin and from each other; Thor’s learned narcissism; Loki’s learned jealousy and paranoia; and a sibling who literally wants to kill them and destroy their world, specifically because she was fed the rhetoric of conquest, and then punished for acting on it too autonomously.
Odin does not deserve forgiveness. I am glad for whatever closure Thor and Loki obtained, but it was not with their father’s help.
Loki is crying here in good part because he KNOWS he will NEVER obtain true closure with Odin. He didn’t get a chance to say a word. And that’s agonizing for Loki, who communicates both intent and emotion with exceptionally nuanced linguistic routes, far more than with action.
And Thor, how Thor mistreats Loki (and vice versa) in the wake of Odin’s death, is ripe evidence of this. Odin’s spirit has barely dissipated before Thor is wrongly blaming Loki for his death: because it’s far less painful a case of cognitive dissonance to blame the “bad” little brother than the patriarch who was “all-knowing and wise” and metonymic of your entire home, society, and values (values that in crisis you will cling too all the more blindly and tenaciously).
My whole journey through making Thor: Ragnarok — I knew this was coming. By the end of Thor: Ragnarok, Loki has been accepted as Thor’s brother again. — Tom Hiddleston (x)
That’s Thor realizing he finally made it through his brother, he fucking did it
I’m afraid I have a much less satisfying, much sadder, take on Ragnarok’s events than this: Loki realized Thor is the only family he has left, and Thor made it abundantly clear that the conditions of “reacceptance” were for Loki to mimic his old role of flanking Thor and serving Thor’s ends unquestioningly. So their reunion is, to me, bittersweet, because Loki still defines himself as Thor’s foil, and Thor never once was willing to just say to his brother, “You were to blame for SOME, but not ALL, of what happened to our family and friends, and hey, what exactly DID happen to you after you fell into a wormhole off the Bifrost?”
To me, that speaks of one-sided “reconciliation,” and it’s unfortunate, and frustrating, and sad. Ultimately it goes back to the fact that Thor’s character regressed alarmingly as a person to behavior seen in the first Thor movie. Then, oddly, Thor is back to his evolved, better, kinder self in Infinity War. This blip on the radar will always confuse me as a consumer of media and as a professional writer.
However, the silver lining of this moment is that Loki’s return to Asgard to rescue the remaining refugees–when Thor sees it–is what immediately galvanizes Thor into being able to repel Hela, and gain the upper hand in battle.
For me the real moment that Thor shows he has accepted Loki is when he trusts Loki to resurrect Surtur single-handedly. THAT moment is both touching and rewarding, as is the “I’m here” moment and the off-screen hug.
//Sometimes i imagine like, Loki talking to Tony Stark or someone, and Thor is just standing there, picking at his hair, flicking his ear, flicking his nose, headlocking him, and Loki just kind of smacks his hands away and steadfastly keeps talking, concentration amazingly unbroken, while Thor has this shitty Big Brother Grin™ on his face and continues to be a loving asshole, and Tony just kind of looks askance at Bruce or Pepper or someone and is like “this is why I’m an only child lol” and Loki without missing a beat goes “yes and why I WISH I were” and Thor just bawls with laughter.
Like give me more of that shit Marvel. That shit is why we watch your damn movies, not convoluted plots about magic gemstones.
what seemingly insignificant memories stuck with your character?
Most of Loki’s banal, everyday memories are connected to Thor, because they bunked together as children and were treated as a matched pair, with Loki the “grooming pony” for Thor the champion racehorse, ever at his side to buffer, protect, and “healthily” compete with Thor. So it’ll be things like, how Thor’s hair looked on a sunny day, or how terrible Thor’s armor smelled after sparring practice. Possibly one important memory of Loki’s unique to MY Loki muse is one banquet that would have turned out disastrous for Thor–who, in my headcanons, is mildly learning disabled (dyslexic and attention-deficient)–had Loki not been hiding under the banquet table feeding him lines from a passage of epic poetry about Odin that Thor was meant to recite to the entire table of diplomatic guests. I love this headcanon because it shows the backbone of Thor and Loki’s young relationship, to which Thor often later defaults: Loki, concealed in the proverbial woodwork, but hardwired to protect and support his big brother, who enjoys attention and is seen as the infallible golden child (something that carries its own unhealthy, unrealistic pressures).
what does your character pretend or try to care about?
Loki TRIES to care about NOTHING, even pretending this to deceive HIMSELF (Frigga was right, despite the context of telling him he is “perceptive about everyone but himself,” in that Loki has a peculiar blind spot, partly self-preserving and partly self-thwarting, when it comes to inward reflection), but it never gets him far. In fact it’s usually detrimental to his long-range plans, particularly when Thor, Frigga, or even Odin is involved. What Loki does care about? Self-sufficiency, self-worth, intellectual stimulation and growth (despite Ragnarok!Thor’s strange allegations of “stagnating” and “becoming predictable”), keeping a sharp wit, KNOWLEDGE for its OWN sake, SECURITY (often perceived as synonymous with power, which he doesn’t really want nearly as much as he tells himself), HERITAGE, BIRTHRIGHT, and FAMILY. Loki’s ENEMIES like to pretend that he wants the throne and power, but again, the Throne (capital T) to Loki is equivalent both to being seen as a worthy match to Thor (who is also an archetype for Worthiness in general and for Asgardian Worthiness specifically) and to safety/security/stability. Despite being a chaos-monger and an agent of perpetual fluidity/change, Loki is surprisingly attracted to stability (see myths!Loki’s marriage to Sigyn, Goddess of Constancy).
It’s like they pulled out every possible way to make that scene hurt. The fact that Thor is bound and gagged and unable to even express himself at that moment, let alone do anything to help his brother… it’s just too much!
Can I actually just…draw attention to the fact that his gagging device looks a hell of a lot like the one they constructed for Loki back in Avengers Assemble?
I do NOT say this to laugh at Thor’s expense or to suggest that Thor “deserves” to watch his brother die after taking Loki back to Asgard gagged.
Rather I think this is a poignant reflection upon the way that Loki’s entire identity crisis and subsequent tragically misguided behavior–which led to Loki meeting Thanos, which led to Loki spiraling further, which led to the years of estrangement from the brother now watching him DIE TO SAVE HIM–is based on being metaphorically stripped of a voice and a reflection in Asgardian culture, and within his nuclear family dynamic (”You and your father cast long shadows,” Frigga told Thor). Loki was silenced all his life, and he snapped the moment he learned his hated heritage could be an underlying reason for his “unworthiness.”
And it’s a pretty agonizing, yet poetically apt, reminder, that in the very moment that Loki overcomes any kind of selfish, or self-preserving, tendency, forgiving Thor for years of being silenced, and dies in the process, Thor is similarly robbed of his voice.
As if it’s only when Loki commits the ultimate sacrifice that Thor can finally fully empathize with being so totally disempowered.
//I don’t think it’s ever stated except in that Odin says in Thor 1 “My first-born” at Thor’s would-be coronation, and while I’m given to believing this is fact, it doesn’t necessarily mean it is, since, well, Odin lies, a LOT, lmao; we still don’t know if he rescued or stole baby Loki from Jotunheim, as his accounts and Laufey’s conflict, and what’s more, we never new Hela even existed because she was imprisoned presumably before Thor was even born.
Because of my studies in birth-order dynamics, which only amount to an undergrad psychology minor and therefore are not extensive–but give me at least a ROUGH idea of things– I still believe that Thor is the older sibling, but ONLY by the equivalent of a human year, maybe two. He wouldn’t be able to recall anything clearly from that young of an age.
It’s interesting, actually: Thor in some ways acts more like a youngest sibling: less goal-oriented, more socially gregarious, entitled and sheltered from criticism and responsibility. At the same time, Loki acts like a younger sibling in that he feels an anxiety or obligation to diffuse tension with humor and play peacemaker. And the way Thor hazes Loki (sometimes good-naturedly, sometimes not) everything from “know your place, brother,” to “Get Help” to “I thought you liked tricks” to the trope of no one can fuck up my baby brother but me and if you look at him cross-eyed I’ll rip off your arms, is very much big brothery.
I guess what I’m saying is, whether or not Thor is actually, chronologically, older than Loki, both of them THINK he is, and so does the whole kingdom of Asgard, and so everyone has operated accordingly in all the ways that functionally matter since their young childhood.
What confuses me more, and I used to have a theory about this but honestly can’t remember, is how Frigga feigned a pregnancy since one night she didn’t know Loki existed, and then the next, did. The kingdom obviously had no idea of his heritage or he would have learned it before he was an adult.
//Why has no one ever mentioned Thor and Loki in the context of the song “Footprints” by Molly Kate, which I just now heard? I am actually, physically sobbing. Jesus.
“ … brother, you do not know what good it does me when you accept … that blame is shared between us.”
Loki treads carefully; his words, he knows, touch upon sore terrain, and Thor is still Thor: temperamental until the end.
“Thank you.”
Shared blame, making neither of them the villain in this particular moment. Or in this particular regard. “I would hate for you to unduly carry a burden such as this upon your own shoulders, when you alone are not at fault.” He explains. “I am thankful, then, that it does you good to know that we can share in this moment together, neither of us being the solitary beholder.”
His head bows, in reverence. “Aye, you are welcome.”
Loki gauges Thor just as his brother’s head dips. There is deference and openness. Excellent. Perhaps now is the time to speak words. more difficult than Loki can ever remember.
“ … brother, I. Am about to say something that will concern you, but you must listen to every syllable, without interruption.”
“Sometime … sometime in the future, I know not exactly when… . I will need to go away.”
He cannot bring himself to say “I will leave you.” There is too much chilling permanence in those four words, and Loki, a wordsmith, for whom every letter is a weapon, cannot wield such a killing blow upon the one person who yet believes in his goodness.
“I will need to do things that will seem, to you, to be wrong, and wicked, and hurtful. I will seem to have abandoned all that we have rebuilt. I am asking you to not press me for more knowledge of what I do. And I am asking you for something more difficult still.”
Loki clasps the side of Thor’s head, and Loki pierces Thor with an unwavering, if watery, jade stare.
{ “Trust me.” }
He presses their foreheads together.
Oh, my brother. Mirror of all that I have been and have dreamt of becoming.
My only true kinsman. My conscience, and my courage. My catalyst to greater things. Everything that I am not.
Monster-slayer. Me-slayer.
My jealousy and my drive. My hero and my best friend.
Please look into our childhood and see that I have always loved you, and always will.
Never doubt.
“Trust the one called Liesmith. Wait and know that all that I do is for a greater purpose. Do not believe your eyes or your ears, but believe me.”
“And in time, you will have your answer.”
Thought I may not be here to give it to you, you will have it. You will.
//I DID like it, in the visceral sense, but the longer I thought about it the more I was irked by the unequal efforts to reach that reconciliation. You know? I feel like Loki repeatedly asked Thor throughout Ragnarok to talk to him about their misunderstandings and Odin’s lies being the source of their estrangement, but Thor shut him down petulantly every single time, which is what DIRECTLY led to Loki saying, as they were “escaping” Sakaar together, that “communication has never been our family’s strong suit.” Then he reverts to duplicitous behavior because Thor has convinced him that there is no way to salvage their sibling bond anyway and they should just go their separate ways. Which Thor in turn expects and uses as an excuse to punish Loki, but for all the wrong reasons, not seeing how the ways he shut down Loki’s attempts to compromise and talk contributed to them still having such friction.
It’s such a missed opportunity because by now Loki has been recovering psychologically and physically to the point that he is capable of joking about his trauma, and he has no pressing need to rule Asgard (or anywhere else) except as a self-protection policy. He is basically a neutral, even benign, agent now, with all that hostile attribution bias I’ve talked about before (perceiving everything as more unkind and threatening than it really is, a product of PTSD) diminished. It’s the perfect moment for Thor to lay his grievances before Loki and for Loki to respond rationally and sensitively. But (and STAY WITH ME HERE, I do NOT mean this to sound like “Thor-bashing”) Thor doesn’t take that opportunity.
Why? I think it’s because Thor hasn’t had Loki (or Frigga, or Sif, or Jane), all interestingly feminine-coded forces, around to check his fallback coping behaviors for tragedy (anger, resentment, self-entitlement, arrogance). So oddly enough in Ragnarok, when Loki is on his best behavior, Thor is on his worst. Thor has hit the rock bottom Loki hit two films ago, and, as a character, has regressed to the EXACT behavior he exhibited before falling to Earth in Thor 1. But Thor has no self-reflection whatsoever. He externalizes his hurt as impulsive action and reckless optimism (”It’ll all turn out fine” / “I make grave mistakes all the time!”) which come across initially as endearing teddy-bear quirks but are actually pretty destructive.
So he can’t see his PARTIAL culpability in all this. And that’s all Loki really wants at this point. For Thor to SHARE the blame, and say, “yeah, that was a dick move, sorry, brother,” so they can move forward.
Thor fails this test miserably, as the electrocution with the punishment disc and all the nonsense about Loki being the one to “never change” shows, so what does Loki do?
Loki gives up.
Loki resigns himself.
Loki realizes that if Thor has regressed to an old role, so must Loki. Loki rushes to Thor’s aid, and plays the role of quirky vain Trickster, and stands again, if not in Thor’s shadow, then in a murky in-between space where there’s neither sun nor shade.
Yes, they have peace, and yes Loki has accepted Thor by the end of Ragnarok.
But it’s not acceptance because he’s proud of his brother’s “growth” as a king.
It’s acceptance because Loki has no family or friends left aside Thor, Loki knows Thor cannot even function without Loki, so Loki, a survivor, goes into survival mode. And on some level, because Loki loves Thor dearly.
I don’t think Taika Waititi et al even intended this reconciliation to be so bittersweet; I think they believe this was a wonderful tale of redemption and reunion. But for me, analyzing the whole narrative, it feels very much like a victory at too steep a cost.
But then again, maybe “satisfaction is not in my nature.” 😉 And maybe that’s a good thing.
Might be over analysing, but I think it’s really significant that Loki comes in last to this scene. After so many years of jealousy, resentment and anger, he is finally joining Thor’s side (hopefully for real this time), and is taking his place as Prince of Asgard. He’s finally home.
It’s definitely not an over analysis from my POV! And I’m an art historian so I basically specialize in analyzing the visual 😀
I’m gonna put aside all my concerns with the narrative being unfulfilled in terms of Thor and Loki doing EQUAL work toward reconciling. Instead I’m gonna comment on this purely in a visual way.
So I felt the same way as you when I watched this scene. We were all kind of chomping at the bit, wondering, “where’s Loki, and did he escape the blast since he was way down in the Treasury (where his own life initially unraveled, as another fan pointed out!) to resurrect Surtur?” And we wait and wait as person after person among the refugees joins Thor in his inner circle of court.
And then finally there is his brother, his mirror opposite, his antithesis and best friend all in one being. Literally standing ON HIS RIGHT HAND, meaning his “right-hand man” or most crucial and influential counsel (and we know that’s Loki to Thor: Loki completes Thor, and vice versa). It’s the same place that Loki, Sif, and Frigga stood in the big golden idyllic coronation scene in Thor 1:
And think of the amazing compositional poignancy of that. They don’t replace the fallen on each side of Thor in the coronation on the refugee ship. They just leave a space and keep the person still left alive among them where he once was. And he stands perhaps a little closer to big brother now, because Frigga’s counsel, and Sif’s, are missing now, and Loki will be needed even more than ever.
This is brought to further fruition in the after-credits scene when Loki and Thor are the ONLY TWO standing looking out at the stars. It directly reflects that they stood shoulder to shoulder before the Coronation that Loki intentionally botched. But this time Loki believes Thor is ready, and does nothing to forestall his brother’s crowning.
They are older and uncertain now, rid of all the silly ceremonial pomp of their helmets and armor, but still the center of each other’s orbit, facing forward at the immediate test or crisis in their future, and on EQUAL footing.
So yes. Of course Loki comes in last. Nobody is more important to Thor than Loki. And it is Loki’s approval, and complicity, that Thor needs in order to feel confident.
After all, when Thor faced Hela, it was not until Loki arrived with the refugee ship from Sakaar that Thor was able to channel his lightning and really bring the fight.
In reality, Thor needs Loki WAY MORE than Loki needs Thor. It’s tragic because even Loki believes the opposite, which is why he gave up after being lectured at and then electrocuted for hours, so he goes to Thor to please him, thinking he has no one else, and no other way to define himself except as a foil to Thor, but Loki has always done better alone than Thor has. Always. Thor backslides into a state of arrogant defensiveness without Loki (we certainly see that in Ragnarok), whereas Loki without Thor lives in relative emotional peace and seems to have psychologically healed; he is able to talk about his traumatic experiences, such as his fall off of the Bifrost Bridge, with humor, rather than dread and shame.
But will Loki always come for Thor, when Thor finds he needs his foundation again?
As this scene at the end of Ragnarok shows us, with Loki trailing into the camera’s view last, yes. Yes, he will. For better or worse. An in-character Loki is, ultimately, not capable of betraying Thor.
icyxmischief 