[ SECRET POST #2069 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #2069 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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[The City of Dreaming Books]


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[Teen Girl Squad]


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[Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind]


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[Avengers]


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[The Monkees]


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Notes:

Important: I'm really sorry about this, but I accidentally clicked the wrong thing and deleted the submission post from last week instead of saving it. Managed to save the first page (25) of secrets, but the rest (a bit over 100) are gone.

If you submitted something last week (Aug 26-Sept 1), please resubmit it here and it will still go up this week.

The submissions post for next week is linked below as usual.

Secrets Left to Post: 00 pages, 000 secrets from Secret Submission Post #296.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[intrigueing]

"it seemed clear"?

Yes, it was so clear from the way so much time was spent carefully fleshing out Loki's inner thoughts and emotions and personality and sense of megalomania and petty sadism and the complexity of his interactions with Thor and how the narrative clearly treated him as a crazy evil psycho who hit the characters where it was personal and the Avengers were meant to defy and defeat and prove wrong and totally humiliate while the audience laughed their asses off and cheered, that he was actually just mind-controlled the whole time!

Man, it's a movie. He's fictional. He's not a real person and the Avengers is not an incomplete documentary about what happened to him that is there to give you evidence that you can analyze to figure out what "really" happened. If he was mind-controlled, there'd be some hint that he was mind-controlled. No one would make an entire gigantic summer blockbuster movie about a villain who was mind-controlled the whole time without making that mind-control part of the movie. Allow me to direct you to Spider-Man 2 for comparison.

Of course, they could do an ass-pull and say "oops, he was mind-controlled the whole time!" but that would be really crappy writing because of how his character was treated by the narrative of The Avengers.

[(Anonymous)]

Huh? Avengers didn't exactly spend a lot of time fleshing out Loki's inner thoughts and emotions here. Thor did a bit more of it, but even in that movie, Loki wasn't treated like a crazy evil psycho sadist.

IDK why you're telling me that it's a movie. Clearly it's a movie. Obviously it's fiction. No need to be condescending.

You think it would be crappy writing. I don't. Obviously. I also don't see any reason why Loki's beatdown being used for humor means that he couldn't have been influenced at all either. The Hulk smashed Thor pretty good a few scenes before that and that was also treated as humor. It didn't mean that Thor was a totally evil bad guy because we can only laugh when totally evil bad guys get smacked by the Hulk.

Spider-Man 2 was a crappy movie, s2s. Things can be done in multiple ways. I don't see a need to break out every single point for the audience. It's possible to read between the lines. It's also possible to set it up so that something can be read multiple ways. There's a lot of subtext that makes it conceivable that Loki was being mind controlled in some form or fashion in the movie. Subtext means that they can pick that up in sequels if they want or they can do something else if they prefer. It's left open.

You seem to be missing my entire point that while Loki in Avengers was characterized as differently than in Thor, Loki in Thor was still not a nice guy. Thus, if he was being controlled somehow, once he's snapped out of it (via physical force, like with Clint) he's not going to automatically become a sweet and gentle woobie who cries a lot and never would have hurt anyone. Fuck no. He'd be a bitter, still half crazed, violent demi-god with a bloodlust and craving revenge. He'd be willing to use the Avengers as a tool to obtain said revenge, but on doing so, he'd be happy to stab them in the back and go right on with being a villain.

Man, the OP was right. Woobie Loki apologists are freaking annoying but people like you are so much worse.

[intrigueing]

Thus, if he was being controlled somehow, once he's snapped out of it (via physical force, like with Clint) he's not going to automatically become a sweet and gentle woobie who cries a lot and never would have hurt anyone. Fuck no. He'd be a bitter, still half crazed, violent demi-god with a bloodlust and craving revenge. He'd be willing to use the Avengers as a tool to obtain said revenge, but on doing so, he'd be happy to stab them in the back and go right on with being a villain.

See, dude, I'm not saying that he's automatically a woobie. I'm saying that that would be a complete ass-pull and phenomenally crappy storytelling, because there's nothing about The Avengers that makes that fanon remotely plausible. It's even directly contradicted — the Other threatens Loki. Did Loki threaten Selvig or Clint? There's a difference. Even if Loki remains evil like he was in Thor, I would be going "But....but...but...why? Why have him be mind-controlled? What point could it possibly serve? What narrative purpose does it possibly have? Just....why?" That's what my problem with that plot would be.

+1

[(Anonymous)]

Pulling shit out of thin air is bad writing. That's pretty much it.

[(Anonymous)]

And I don't see it as an asspull. I saw a major shift in motivation between Thor and Avengers and a dramatic change in the way Loki behaved. The Chitauri having any sort of mental influence over him would explain that away. It gets rid of bad writing, IMO.

Loki didn't have to threaten Selvig or Clint. He's also not human. If he were under some form of influence, it wouldn't necessarily have the same impact on him that it did on Selvig or Clint and so threats might have served a purpose with him that they wouldn't with the humans. Who knows.

Why have him be mind controlled? IMO because it makes him a much more interesting character and because it bridges the gap in characterization between his two films. I don't see that it detracts anything. I don't think it over-complicates the films.

Besides, this is Joss Whedon we're talking about. He once popped a glowy ball of energy into human form to give Buffy a kid sister five seasons in. He likes stuff like this.

[intrigueing]

Okay, okay, I see that we're definitely not going to agree if we're arguing about what constitutes an asspull and whether or not his characterization can't be explained away by his drifting through space and experiencing god-knows-what. But I would much, much, much rather see a film about Thor and Loki going from the end of the Avengers, and Loki showing complexity and sympathetic traits (for example, maybe he could've wanted to accept Thor's offer to join him and fight the Chitauri, but he was too afraid of what the Other would do to him; or maybe he could display a far deeper lack of understanding that humans =/= ants) without any mind-control shenanigans.

It just makes far more sense and feels far more organic and straightforward and emotionally resonant than the mind-control idea. That idea could be interesting if this was a TV show like Buffy, but I just think it would be a terrible idea, story-wise, in a film franchise, and wouldn't be able to get the treatment and exploration a story like that would deserve.

[(Anonymous)]

It's something we'll have to agree to disagree on. Frankly, I don't see Loki as redeemable at all if he wasn't somehow under the influence of the Chitauri. Not that he's particularly redeemable in my preferred version either, but he'd be far more interesting to me that way. I'd see it as an asspull if he'd been doing the things he did of his own free will and the Avengers were willing to trust him or work with him at all.

As for whether it could have the handling such a concept deserves, well, maybe it would and maybe it wouldn't but they've surprised me in a good way so far with their handling of a lot of other concepts I wouldn't otherwise think they had the time to do in movie format. I think they could pull it off.

[intrigueing]

I suppose that makes sense. After all, no one thought Marvel studios could pull off this multi-movie world-building sequel idea either, but they did it. So maybe they could figure something out. It's nothing I think of as remotely canon and nothing care to see and I seriously doubt they'll go in that direction, but I'm open to being pleasantly surprised.

Also, while I think Loki doing a Heel Face Turn would be awesome, I sure as hell don't want to see any of the Avengers other than Thor ever forgiving him or trusting him or wanting to be around him or working with him.

[(Anonymous)]

Exactly!

And on the flip side, I could buy them doing a good job with something like you're suggesting, where Loki wasn't controlled at all but works with them anyway and only Thor wants anything to do with him. They've been skilled enough to surprise me before, they'll almost certainly surprise me in the future.

[(Anonymous)]

DA

Also, while I think Loki doing a Heel Face Turn would be awesome, I sure as hell don't want to see any of the Avengers other than Thor ever forgiving him or trusting him or wanting to be around him or working with him.

This so fucking much. That's why I dislike so much of the fic and art produced in this fandom, the rest of the Avengers working with Loki, being friendly and hanging out with him just makes me want to punch my computer screen.

+1

[(Anonymous)]

I'm not that big on Loki, but the other Avengers going out-of-character and betraying the people Loki has hurt and murdered just to pat his butt and make his fans feel good would make me truly angry.