If you’re someone who firmly believes that Tom Hiddleston is the best thing about Marvel’s Avengers franchise, then we have some good news for you.
In the grand tradition of fan edits like Star Wars: The Phantom Edit, an enterprising Marvel Studios fan has edited together a feature-length movie with Loki as the protagonist. At 135 minutes long, it consists of every piece of Loki footage from Thor, The Avengers, Thor: The Dark World, and various deleted scenes and DVD featurettes.
But Loki: Brother of Thor isn’t a perfect chronological edit of all of Loki’s appearances in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Instead, it’s about his journey as a character.
On Vimeo, the fan editor explains, “The opening scene of my edit is a flash forward to a contemplative, imprisoned Loki, spliced with footage from Tom Hiddleston’s screen test when he auditioned for Thor’s character, aptly capturing Loki’s jealousy (the duality between them is really the meat of this film, hence the title Loki: Brother of Thor). Then there’s a bit of a scary awakening from the character that *probably* haunts Loki’s dreams.”
Loki: Brother of Thor from Loki Odinson on Vimeo.
Loki is an ideal choice for this kind of fan edit, thanks in part to Tom Hiddleston’s performance but also to the range of character development we see over the course of three movies. At the beginning of Thor, he’s a puckish, slightly angsty young prince, but by the time we reach The Avengers, he’s transformed into a full-blown supervillain. In Thor: The Dark World alone, we see him go from bored prisoner to grieving child to machiavellian antihero.
In the world of superhero movies, where supervillain character arcs are often overly simplistic, this makes for a refreshing change. Loki: Brother of Thor will make for good prequel viewing in the run-up to Thor 3.
Photo via Marvel