Anyways, here's that Infinity War/Endgame/Love and Thunder fixit idea I've been playing around with. It started out with "well how could I realistically get Marvel to keep Loki alive during Infinity War" but then I got too caught up on the idea of killing Thor during the snap and there's no way in hell Marvel would greenlight that BUT it provides too much fun character stuff for me to give up, so.
Infinity War opens really similarly: Thanos attacks the Statesman, uses the Power Stone a bunch, etc. etc., but our big shock-value death here isn't Loki, it's Heimdall - you've got fucking. Idris Elba for the role, might as well use him.
Loki lives and gets sent to Earth with Bruce Banner/Hulk to warn the Avengers that Thanos is coming for the stones
Thor's plotline w. the Guardians and Nidavellir and Vormir etc. etc. etc. is all exactly the same minus any comments about his dead brother bc he knows Loki is at least alive on Earth
Meanwhile, on Earth, this isn't All About Loki - he's there to provide exposition, mostly, and to provide a reason for intra-Avengers tension because this is Loki, what the fuck
He gets a fairly minimal character arc about working with the Avengers and a slightly more important narrative role of "look how Big and Bad Thanos is, even Loki is teaming up with the Avengers to stop him", but he doesn't get a huge role in the battle or in stopping him
Infinity War progresses as expected to the big battle in Wakanda, Thor gets his dramatic entrance and fight with Thanos, "you should have gone for the head", etc. etc., and then we get to the Snap
All the other major Avengers (minus I thiiiiiink Iron Man? I forget what the Big Final Death in the Snap was but Peter Parker definitely had the most impact so I think it's probably gonna be that one as your BFD) get shots of what happens in the Snap first - we do like a pan-across-the-field-of-battle thing and see half of Wakanda's armies collapse, we see all the other four Avengers lose people but be fine themselves, camera spins back around to Thor and Loki and we expect Loki to be the one to get dusted, he's popular, he's not a major Avenger--
but no, it's Thor instead.
aaaaaand smash cut to Endgame!
It's been five years. We're at the original Endgame opening status quo but this time Loki is, at long last, the entirely legitimate King of Asgard - king of a people diminished, but King nevertheless.
He has everything Thor had in the opening of Thor 1 - the kingship, the respect of the people, the friendship (more or less, he did help out in Infinity War) of the Avengers, a new reputation as a hero. Everything he could ever possibly have been jealous of.
He's just. he's so done with everything. he is not going back into the hero business, he is not becoming an Avenger, he doesn't even really want to be King (he will. because Asgard needs him and because it's got no one else). He'd vastly prefer it if all the rest of Earth fucked off forever and left him alone to brood.
Anyways he gets Thor's plotline in Endgame, including the scene with Frigga (though tweaked a little bit), but tbh I don't remember enough of it (and there's no way in hell I'm ever rewatching Endgame) to really get into that so, yeah. he gets Thor's role in the narrative right up to more-or-less the final battle
He does get a character arc about realizing that hey, he doesn't actually want to be Thor anymore. He doesn't want the kingship. Not like this.
He's still very much not the main character of the movie, here - that's Tony and then Steve after that - but that's his arc.
Thor gets an Even Bigger Dramatic Entrance during the portals scene, bc I'll be so fr that's kind of the thing he's best for in Avengers films and gets to do something Really Cool during that battle to make up for him not being in the rest of the movie
Tony still get to wield the Stones, though, bc, well, I get why Marvel gave that to RDJ, it wasn't a great decision but in the context of the MCU it does make sense
and then at the very end of the movie during the whole "what now" sequence Loki gives the throne back to Thor and fucks off
you could even do the whole cheesy, like: hand on shoulder, pat pat "Good luck, brother. You're going to need it" dialogue and then Loki walks off and Literally Disappears while Thor goes "wait, what? Loki, what? What do you you mean, you're going to need it? Loki!" and everyone else laughs. I know it's bad but like. this is the MCU what were you expecting
aaaand then you bookend Infinity War/Endgame with Ragnarok and with your Thor 4 movie
Thor 4, in this version, is still Jane Foster!Thor and still a goofy romcom but it is absolutely not Gorr the God-Butcher, it's something way different.
Thor in this gets to reach back to his Thor 1 2011 roots and be in a bit of a fish-out-of-water comedy: he's been gone for five years and he's taking over a position run by his brother and there's So Much Bullshit that happened in those five years and he has no idea how to cope with this kind of responsibility.
Takes the first opportunity he gets to Go On An Adventure and you get silly space romcom with Jane Foster (if you must) and he gets an arc about accepting responsibility and dealing with the changes and learning to become a good king and his worthiness as a king since he failed to kill Thanos and failed to be there for his people etc. etc. etc.
Loki, meanwhile, is Not Dealing With This Shit - as recompense for getting a main character role in Endgame he gets relegated to the peanut gallery for this film. He gets some funny moments in the beginning and like. a cool action moment in the finale but he's Not a major character
Think like. IDK. Warriors 3 in the first two films. Side Character.
Film wraps on Thor accepting his role, settling down into it - I spent my youth chasing glory, and I did a lot of good, but that's not what people need from me now, and it's why I was unworthy to be king in the first place. I need to focus on Asgard now
BUT (and we're pulling directly from the comics here) there must always be a Thor. Someone has to go out and help and be an Avenger.
and Jane Foster is Mjolnir's wielder now.
so we wrap the Thor storyline entirely on: Thor is King of Asgard with Loki and Valkyrie (and maybe Sif if you can still get Jamie Alexander) supporting him, and that's what he's concentrating on, and Jane Foster is The Mighty Thor, out saving the world
and that's it, that's the last of the Thor movies and the last of their storyline and now if you need a Thor in an Avengers movie it's gonna be Natalie Portman
