Avengers #6 OR Really? Like, really? R e a l l y ?
Pertinent Scenes:
SCENE 1: Whomst the fuck is Donny Cates???
SCENE 2: Loki tries to communicate with the reader
SCENE 3: Plot twist--Loki was the Joker All Along
This. This after that solid B- work in the Thor arc. Where does that even place these stories in terms of timeline? Thor first? Avengers first? Is the Filibuster of Realms still going on? It doesn’t matter in Jason Aaron Land! I mean...
Look, I’ve tried to be as objective as I could be with this. Not super well, considering Loki in all their incarnations are very close to my heart. Gillen and Ewing crafted beautiful individual tricksters and story arcs to go with them, fun and tragic and triumphant by turns. I love those Lokis. While few to none have lived up to the God of Stories seen at the end of Agent of Asgard, I’ve warmed up to a few post-AoA Lokis too. Vote Loki was alright. The Loki who pops up in The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl is fantastic. Donny Cates--in spite of the great big Sigh of a ‘twist ending’--did a very heartfelt job with Loki: Sorcerer Supreme.
And, in the very, very beginning, back when Jane ‘Thor’ Foster was fresh on the page and the War of Realms could have been a decent two-arc event, Jason Aaron put out a Loki I tried to warm up to too. I felt for that Loki when he saw the knife-in-the-back as the only way to save Freya. I felt for him when he seemed to play villain just enough to nudge Dario Agger into a trap of hubris and throw the Elf Queen into range of Mjolnir for a rescue.
I thought we would get to see this Loki reveal to Jane that he was working to dismantle the villains from the inside. I thought we would get to see Freya and Odin face consequences for the still-loose threads that was their collusion with King Loki and the murdered Midgard of the future they’d have permitted for a predestined perfect Asgard. I thought we would get to see Loki gleefully caper out from under the dark elf’s thumb and back into the role of God of Stories, Free and Unfettered, seeding Mischief rather than Mayhem.
What have we gotten instead? Shit. Rambling, meandering, backtracking shit with specks of fool’s gold sprinkled in for pizzazz.
I hate saying that. I hate feeling that. I hate not being able to find a way to hope, to hold out, to keep telling myself Aaron is doing his best, that maybe he’s being strong-armed into repeatedly shoving Loki back into the God of Lies box because Marvel’s bigwigs have some Grander Arc Event in need of a nefarious Classic Villain (c). I can’t do it anymore. I can’t buy my own bullshit. Which means I can’t buy his.
Other writers, like Ryan North, like Donny Cates, like the folks behind Infinity Wars and Vote Loki and a smattering of others kind enough to squeeze a cameo in, don’t do this to Loki. None of them. They make Loki fun. They make Loki happy. They make Loki puckish and chaotic and winsome and strong and stealthy and ultimately out to have a laugh and get up to tricks. And when he makes a mess it was made to avoid a catastrophe. Or for a giggle. Or both.
Only Aaron is deciding to spit on Loki’s growth. Aaron wrote that Loki designed the Black Bifrost that has been enabling Malekith to prolong the War of Realms and slaughter hundreds. Aaron wrote that Loki sparked the pointless scuffle with the Shi’ar gods and Jane. And now?
Now Aaron has written that Loki conspired with the Dark Celestials to do the one thing he committed burning, bodily, spiritual suicide to prevent in the future. Aaron wrote a Loki who calls humanity pestilence. Aaron wrote a Loki that would see the human race murdered. Aaron wrote a Loki who spewed the same vitriol that King Loki offered so blithely to King Thor from a throne of corpses.
And to what end? There is no proof, no hint, no foreshadowing that this was all to cover up some covert scheme. Nothing that connects to the Loki we saw in Legacy #1 where he first started hunting Infinity stones and then met the buried Celestial, supposedly looking for power to do [INSERT NEVER-MENTIONED GOAL HERE]. All we get is the last scene, with Loki cackling in pride (???) that the Avengers are back together, looking as MCU synergized as can be.
‘Oh!’ I’m supposed to say. ‘That was the secret extra special chaotic neutral goal all along! To get the band back together! Loki’s Greatest Hit (Remix)! Because the only way to get all these heroes back together for whatever secret extra special reason was to nearly murder the entire fucking Earth! How inspired! How tricky! Got us again, Aaron!’
But you know what, Aaron? Friend? Buddy? My guy? I’m done rewriting your fucking tripe to make it palatable. I’m done pretending the caricature you keep slapping a pair of horns on is in any way the God of Stories.
The closest you’ve come to attempting to pretend to do right by them was the opening arc for Thor and company in Helheim. Which was both clearly a fluke and bound to never result in the long, long, long, long, long overdue payoff of betraying Malekith that everyone had their fingers crossed for a thousand years ago. (But hey, maybe we’ll be forced to see Freya “”””forgive”””” Loki and give him a hug in the future. Cannot wait to see how you manage to squeeze in how her farts are perfume and birds sing every time she scratches her hallowed ass. If anyone can do it, it’s you)
I’m done with this. Truly, sincerely done. I have to be, because I’m tired of hoping. Tired of throwing money at a writer who paces an arc like a crippled tortoise sprints. Tired of forcing myself to choke down a cruel, sneering, parody of a character that’s meant so much to me and is shown worlds more respect by other writers.
Goodbye, Aaron.
It was mediocre while it lasted.
