Loki TV series will deal with the trickster’s identity struggles

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

After serving as both friend and foe throughout the past decade of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Loki (Tom Hiddleston) met his end at the hands of Thanos (Josh Brolin) in AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR, but thanks to a twist of fate in AVENGERS: ENDGAME, the trickster has been able to return for the upcoming Loki series on the Disney+ streaming service.

While speaking on the Forever Dogs Podcast, Loki creator Michael Waldron spilled a few details on what fans can expect from the show and this latest take on the character. "I think it’s the struggle with identity, who you are, who you want to be," Waldron said. "I’m really drawn to characters who are fighting for control. Certainly you see that with Loki over the first 10 years of movies, he’s out of control at pivotal parts of his life, he was adopted and everything and that manifest itself through anger and spite towards his family." In addition to Tom Hiddleston reprising the role of Loki, the series is also set to star Owen Wilson, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Richard E. Grant, and Sopia Di Martino. Production on the six-episodes series, which is scripted by Michael Waldron and directed by Kate Herron, kicked off earlier this year, but was shut down due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Last summer, Tom Hiddleston confirmed that the Loki we'll be following in the series will be the 2012 incarnation of the character, who hasn't yet been redeemed, with Hiddleston noting, "That's where he starts."

I feel like I know [Loki], I’ve been playing him for 10 years now, and that’s crazy to me. By the time it’s out, I’ll be 40, and when I was cast, I was 29, which is a great chunk of my life… but the point is that there’s a sense of "I know this character now, I feel the audience knows him." Playing him, and playing him truthfully, but presenting him with new challenges, which then have to change him in different ways, is the most exciting aspect of it. You have his specific gifts, his intelligence, his treachery, his mischief, his magic, and then seeing him come up against more formidable opponents the like of which he has never seen or known. I wish I could tell you what happens, but I can’t.

Loki is aiming for a spring 2021 release, but we won't have to wait that long for the first Disney+ Marvel series as The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, starring Anthony Mackie and Sebastian Stan, is expected to drop in August 2020, followed by WandaVision, starring Elizabeth Olsen and Paul Bettany, in December 2020. Of course, the ongoing coronavirus pandemic may cause those dates to shift.