Loki is the God of Mischief and a trickster of legendary reputation. In both Marvel Comics, and the Marvel Cinematic Universe, he has remained by and large a villain. The movies suddenly took a turn for the unique for Loki when they started portraying the character played by Tom Hiddleston in a rather good light. Slowly and steadily, he transformed from a full-on villain to a lovable anti-hero. We absolutely loved him in Thor: Ragnarok. So when Thanos beat the shit out of Loki, the God of Mischief and literally made his cherry pop in Infinity War, we were all very sad to watch that scene. But he has returned back ladies and gentlemen!! Rejoice for we bring you some good news. Presenting – Marvel Comics Update: Here’s why Loki is back from the dead as a Kid!!!
SPOILER ALERT: The following paragraphs contain MAJOR Spoilers for Asgardians of the Galaxy #2 by Cullen Bunn. If you intend to read it and still haven’t read it, we request you look away…..
In the comic books, it is common practice to see a guy get killed, resurrected and killed again. The concept of life and death is seldom uniform in the colorful pages of the comic book universes. Marvel has always used this trick to great effect. By introducing the concept of time travel and parallel universes, it is not just death that Marvel has found a loophole for. Several versions of the same character exist in the Marvel universe.
Recently, it was Wolverine in The Return of Wolverine series that saw several people assume the title of the ultimate animal. And now it is Loki. Believe it or not, Loki is back into the game and he is a kid now. This is all happening with the real Loki still alive and kicking in the Marvel universe.
That’s right folks. In the comic book pages of Asgardians of the Galaxy, there are two versions of the God of mischief that co-exist simultaneously.
In the last decade, Loki has shown a tremendous amount of character development. He has starred in major comic book storylines and has been of crucial help in turning the tide of battle. In Marvel Comics’ Siege event, he was the one who went toe to toe with the super powerful entity known as the Void and fell prey to the latter’s wrath.
After dwelling in Hel, the Asgardian afterlife for so long, he finally put his trickster skills to good use when he tricked Hela into rubbing away his name from the Book of Hel. He returns back to the world of the living, reincarnated as a kid. When Thor built back Asgard using his magical prowess, he sensed the spirit of Loki in this kid. That kid will forever be immortalized as the childish and playful avatar of Loki known as Kid Loki.
Kid Loki is not what the original evil and older version of his character is. He is a kind and sweet soul who despises his adult self for all the wrongdoings he has done. To correct that error of his ways, he goes as far as to become a hero in his own right amongst Thor and the rest of the Avengers.
In one of the storylines, Kid Loki encounters his adult self in a mystical chamber that contained the reflection of the adult Loki called Ikol. Ikol was trapped in the reflection because Kid Loki, in an earlier incarnation had cursed him to a life of captivity in that chamber. Ikol tries to reason with him by saying that Kid Loki, no matter how hard he tries, will become what he is always destined to be – a villain.
Kid Loki vehemently refuses to accept his sorry fate. It is later found out that Ikol was right. And then there comes the even worse news – the only way to save his loved ones is by Kid Loki wiping out his own existence to stop Mephisto from succeeding in his nefarious plans.
Sorry way to die.
We would later see Kid Loki embrace his past. Ikol takes over his body. But as it turns out, Loki does have a heart of gold after all. He does some good after all when he sacrifices his own interest to save his Young Avengers team. Loki now living inside the body of a child; uses magic to age himself into a team and become the Young Avengers’ personal big brother. Kid Loki now is an agent of Asgard and was doing good work when his past history caught up to him and everything fell apart….again.
By now, Loki is full of guilt and grief over being the one responsible for killing his Kid Loki self. As a result, after admitting to his crimes, he was cast out by the Asgardians. The story does not end there though. In another future timeline, there exists another, even more, older and powerful version of Loki known as King Loki. King Loki has travelled back in time to this moment so that he could rule Asgard where Loki left it. He also takes Kid Loki prisoner and returns him to the same moment of time where he kills his former self.
At this point in time, Loki now has one of two ways – either kill the kid and live the life of a villain or be killed or die a hero. He decides to go for the third option. He kills himself, putting his own body up in flames. Later, he is brought back from the dead as the Lord of Stories in Norse mythology.
But as nature always comes back to bite, Loki returns to his villainous path. He becomes the villain he was always fated to be. He goes after the six Infinity Stones and even manages to dethrone Doctor Strange as the Earth’s new Sorcerer Supreme. He even goes as far as summing the Dark Celestials to call upon the Final Host to destroy Earth. But this is where it gets interesting.
Loki does all this, even though inside, he knows he will lose, with a smile on his face. He knows that taking such drastic steps will surely bring the Avengers back together, who up until then, has been a state of turmoil and distrust. By providing them with a common enemy, Loki has managed to do the impossible. He has united the Avengers!!
Loki has since been hell-bent on destroying Gamora and getting his hands on the Infinity Stones, which he claims will give us some answers as to his dark and mysterious past. While his intentions were subtly pure, his recent actions point the other way. Kid Loki has returned and he will finally shed some light as to why his adult self is acting so crazily right now. In Asgardians of the Galaxy #2, he finally explains the tale of his comeback to the Marvel Universe.
In this issue, Loki explains that he belongs to a team of Asgardian warriors that hail from the tenth realm, the world Angela, elder sister to Thor and Loki hails from. Kid Loki explains that while the adult evil Loki is actually his true form, he is just a ‘figment’. Remember how we talked about Ikol? Kid Loki is actually an echo just like him which has been given physical form.
It gets better.
Loki and Kid Loki are both at loggerheads. Nebula now has her hands on the Naglfar Beacon, a magical artifact that can bring dead Gods back to life and under her command. This weapon was created by Kid Loki in his previous incarnation when he had correctly predicted that the War of Realms was going to happen in the future. Kid Loki now commands the powerful Destroyer armour. After Kid Loki deals with Nebula, he is sure to face to face against Evil Loki. But the question is – which Loki will survive the coming fight???
Loki last appeared in the MCU in Avengers Infinity War. The official film synopsis of the movie reads:
“Iron Man, Thor, the Hulk and the rest of the Avengers unite to battle their most powerful enemy yet — the evil Thanos. On a mission to collect all six Infinity Stones, Thanos plans to use the artifacts to inflict his twisted will on reality. The fate of the planet and existence itself has never been more uncertain as everything the Avengers have fought for has led up to this moment.”
