Tom Hiddleston reveals how playing Loki “changed the course of his life”
Loki star Tom Hiddleston recently expressed how playing the god of mischief changed his life and made him proud of the Disney+ project. Hiddleston was with his co-stars Owen Wilson and Sophia Di Martino during Deadline’s Contenders TV event on Saturday, April 13, when he said,
"Playing Loki has changed the course of my whole life, no question. And I feel so proud of where we've ended up in Season 2. It was very creatively fulfilling to bring something full circle."
Tom Hiddleston has been applauded for reprising the conflicted role of the god of mischief. The Marvel character, who is Odin's adopted son and Thor's foster brother, started his journey as an antihero. Over the course of various movies and series, Odin-son has made a more important place for himself in the MCU than most of the superheroes.
Tom Hiddleston has played Loki for about 15 years
While speaking to Contender's TV about his character's future beyond Loki season 2 on Disney+, Tom Hiddleston reminded the audience that he has been playing the trickster for almost 15 years after being cast as early as April 2009.
He explained how the twists and turns in the character's journey caused emotional upheavals. The character's complexity and range of emotions avoided sameness in the god of mischief.
The actor also gave a brief sketch of how he perceived the character as a broken soul who got another chance to find his purpose. However, the hurt initially made him an antihero.
"I always saw him from the very first film as a broken soul with a shattered heart who felt like he didn't belong...all that grief hardens into grievance...And the grievance is what drives him to become a villain in the Avengers and the Thor movies," Tom said.
The actor further explained the change in the master trickster through his relationships. While Loki and Sylvie bonded over grievances, Mobius gave him the opportunity for catharsis.
"This second chance that he's given by Morbius to rediscover that glorious purpose that he feels he's always been burdened with...it comes in a shape he would have never recognized and would never have anticipated. And it gave him a kind of catharsis that he wasn't ready for," he explained.
What was Loki's journey in the MCU?
Tom Hiddleston's Loki started his MCU journey in 2011 in the Marvel Studios film Thor as the supervillain for the titular god of thunder. He followed this in 2012's The Avengers and 2013's Thor: The Dark World. Later, in 2017, the god of mischief appeared in Thor: Ragnarok, followed by 2018's Avengers: Infinity War and 2019's Avengers: Endgame.
In 2021, Disney+ created a series on the complicated antihero Loki. Presenting a new side of the god, who was both soft-at-heart and insolent, the show received a good response. It was renewed for another season as the representation deserved closure for the character's arc.
The second season arrived in October 2023 and completely changed the position as well as the image of Odin-son in the MCU. At the end of the series, the god of mischief had to give up his newly found friends to take up the responsibility of keeping the TVA under control as his purpose of being. Whether there will be more portrayals of the iconic character in the future of MCU remains to be seen.
How did Hiddleston prepare to portray the trickster till the end?
While speaking to Little Gold Men in March 2024, Hiddleston revealed that he had read up on the character after being cast in 2009. He had perused Marvel Comics and Scandinavian stories on Norse mythology while researching the character's representation in Jim Carrey's The Mask and Richard Wagner's The Ring Cycle.
While the actor has tried to keep the reprisal interesting over the years, the character has also evolved. Besides making Loki's transformation look realistic, Hiddleston contributed to the last dialogue the character was supposed to say, which connected to the first movie that introduced him to MCU fans. Hiddleston was also one of the executive producers of the series.