There may be some discrepancies with several different Marvel villains during many of the different films from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but there was always one villain that fans everywhere hated to love, but loved to hate. And that villain was none other than Loki, The God of Mischief, and Thor's evil adopted brother. Well, he's not evil at first, but he quickly turns that way not long after we first meet him.
It's understandable that fans have always felt conflicted about their feelings towards Loki because Tom Hiddleston really sells the part well. He manages to make you charmed by him and even makes you laugh from time to time, but then the next second you could feel completely enraged by Loki's latest actions against Thor or The Avengers.
Even though we may have a serious love/hate relationship with Loki, and he may be one of the best villains in the MCU, that doesn't mean there aren't a few things about his character that don't make a whole lot of sense. And when I say a few things, it's actually more than that.
But let me just show you everything I'm talking about in my article, the 25 Ridiculous Things About Loki That Make No Sense. Fair warning, there will be spoilers from Infinity War throughout this list, so do not read this article if you haven't seen it yet and don't want to be spoiled on anything.
Okay, now that my PSA is done about spoilers, read on to see all of the puzzling things regarding Loki.
25 Unrequited Brotherly Love
Loki has always been known to be a very complicated and...difficult person, to say the least. He's been known to commit the ultimate betrayals, to use his villainry to get what was never rightfully his in the first place, and he also is known to be a complete jerk to those around him, and that's putting it lightly.
But there was only one person, or God technically, who never gave up on Loki, at least not fully. And that was Thor, The God of Thunder, and also Loki’s (sort-of-but-not-really) brother. But it seems that it doesn’t matter how much effort Thor puts in with Loki since he always picks submersing himself in evil schemes over forming a loving relationship with his ‘brother.'
You’d think after he was abandoned by his father, the Frost Giant, and then eventually was also disowned by his adoptive father, Odin, that he’d be looking for some sort of familial connection and would subsequently fill that wicked hole in his heart.
But instead he’d rather be the mischievous and twisted Loki, even though Thor has, time and time again, forgiven Loki for his crimes - even when they’re against Thor.
So why doesn’t Loki put his nefarious scheming aside and just accept Thor’s love already?
24 His Non-Blue Skin Tone
The God of Mischief has an interesting background that even he was not aware of until he was well into adulthood. See, Loki is the biological son of the Frost Giant King, Laufey. That not only makes him Loki Laufeyson but also a frost giant himself who initially has a blue skin tone.
So when Odin finds him as an orphan, audiences were left to assume that he concealed his identity when he waved his hand over him and cast a spell. It was to mask his blue tint and it clearly worked.
But since Odin’s magic to keep Hela away from Asgard wore off in Thor: Ragnarok after his passing, you’d think that that concealment spell of his on Loki would wear off as well and would, in turn, make his skin its natural blue hue.
Yet, it never did. He was still as pale white as ever, so how does any of that add up? Plus, Loki is supposed to be one of the greatest magic wielders in all of Asgard, not to mention he grew up learning all about Asgardian magic, so how did he not know that same magic was being used on him? He doesn't seem the type to not pay attention to details, especially ones such as those.
23 Thanos’ Empty Threat
I'm giving you guys a *spoiler alert* warning now because we have some important information about Loki in Infinity War in this one.
When Loki connected with Thanos (somehow) between Thor and The Avengers through his servant known simply as “The Other," he was given direct threats from the servant that sounded very dire if Loki didn’t follow Thanos’ orders and complete the mission.
He was told, “You will have your war, Asgardian. If you fail, if the Tesseract is kept from us, there will be no realm, no barren moon, no crevice, where he cannot find you. You think you know pain? He will make you long for something as sweet as pain.”
You’d think after making a threat as serious as that one, there’d be heck to pay after the events that occurred in The Avengers…where Loki clearly failed. Thanos is, after all, an incredibly powerful celestial warlord who has some seriously evil plans that would directly affect everyone in the galaxy's existence as we know it.
But nothing happened to him for several different Marvel films after that, at least not at the hands of Thanos.
Of course, that is until Infinity War came out and Thanos gave him the ultimate punishment.
It seems that Loki's long-running villain status has officially come to an end, with Thanos ending his life and all. But it clearly took Thanos a really long time to accomplish punishing him for what he did in the past, oddly enough.
22 Unexpected Frenemies
A lot happens to Thor throughout Thor: Ragnarok, including him having to literally fight his biological sister who is planning to take over Asgard for herself. But first, he landed on an entirely different planet and had to figure his way out.
See, when Thor ends up being stranded on the other side of the universe in Sakaar, he is immediately captured and meets The Grandmaster. While the Grandmaster is a very charming, albeit eccentric man, he’s also sadistic in his own way.
He likes to force different beings from different parts of the cosmos who end up on his planet to fight each other…til there is only one fighter left standing, preferably.
Yet, when Thor sees Loki is already there, and in the Grandmaster’s inner circle, no less, it is made very obvious that Loki was not forced to participate in these ‘games.’
The odd thing is despite how charming Loki may be when he wants to be, the Grandmaster typically makes every single person (or being) who comes onto his planet to participate in these heinous games of his. So why did Loki luck out and get himself in his entourage rather than participate in the ultimate fight?
21 Surviving After Being ‘Hulk-Smashed’
Loki may be known as one of the most resilient villains in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but he’s not invincible. And he’s certainly not invincible to a brutal beating from none other than The Hulk himself.
So for those who somehow don’t remember the scene I’m referring to, it’s from the first Avengers film where Loki was the main villain of the world’s greatest heroes. Towards the end of the film, he unleashes Thanos’ army, the Chitauri, onto New York to wreak havoc and cause utter destruction to the city and its population of citizens.
So when Hawkeye sends an explosive arrow his way and it hits him, it knocks him right into Stark Tower where he comes face to face with The Hulk. After exchanging words where Loki basically is taunting him by saying he’s nothing compared to him, Hulk does what he does best: Smash.
So, after Loki was beaten pretty much within an inch of his life by The Hulk, how in the world would he actually survive something of that magnitude?
I realize that since this is a work of fiction, and a superhero film, that pretty much anything can happen.
But even Loki looked pretty bad after that “fight” scene. Not sure how he’d leave Stark Tower still breathing, but okay…
20 Gender-Swapping
In the comic books, Loki at one point turned into a woman. Which I suppose isn’t a shock if you are an avid comic book reader, but for those who are more into the films, you’re probably scratching your heads at the moment.
The “reason” behind this gender switching was a bit of a doozy, I’ll say that. It all started after the events of Thor: Ragnarok (the comics’ version) when Loki had succeeded in “leading Asgard’s enemies into the realm to destroy it once and for all.” Of course, this had a bit of a domino effect and ended with Loki’s demise once Thor fulfilled his own destiny. That destiny is to end the cycle of Ragnarok which leads to the other demises of Asgardians and many others throughout the Nine Realms.
After all of that, Loki eventually returned (as he always seems to) and came back with Doctor Doom…but as a woman.
It gets better, though. He “used the body of Thor’s lover, Lady Siff” to pull off his wicked scheme. A little problematic, since Thor is his brother and all.
Plus, that’s quite the interesting way to execute your plans, but it still doesn’t make a lot of sense.
19 It Runs In The Family
Anyone who is a fan of the Marvel comics, and in turn, Thor comics, knows all about Hela and Loki's relationship. She is his daughter and is just as gloriously evil as he is. She is much like Loki in the sense that she's a constant "thorn in the side" of Thor and Odin. She wants to take over Asgard and spread mischief everywhere.
All of that is understandable being that she is Loki's daughter. And it also makes perfect sense for Hela and Loki to look alike in the comics being that she is his biological daughter, but it just doesn’t make nearly as much sense in Thor: Ragnarok (the film) since she is Odin’s daughter, as well as Thor’s biological sister. That means she is only Loki’s sister because he was adopted by Odin. In other words, there's no blood relation here.
So why do they look almost identical in every aspect of their appearances? They both have long, flowing black hair. They are both ruthlessly evil. And they even share the same color preference (green). And not to mention, they each have a pointy helmet to make their looks really pop.
All I can say is maybe the Marvel Cinematic Universe heads should have noticed she looks too much like Loki when they’re not actually related in the MCU version, and maybe made her look more like a She-Thor.
18 Ultimate Disguise
At the end of Thor: The Dark World, Loki meets his end and passes away in Thor's arms. At least that was what we were made to believe, at the time. But somewhere between Thor: The Dark World and Thor: Ragnarok, Loki made it back to Asgard and took over the throne. But instead of taking the throne rightfully, he cloned himself to look exactly like Odin and took over his entire life.
He solidified his future there when he banished his father elsewhere and continued to carry on living his best life in Asgard…only under false pretenses.
What is truly baffling about all of this is that all Loki has ever wanted is to be fully and truly accepted and given validity for being Asgardian royalty. He also always wanted to be on that throne because he took it for himself, but while still retaining his own appearance so everyone would bow down to Loki. Not Loki who is actually disguised as Odin so everyone is still basically bowing down to Odin. Just seems like a completely uncharacteristic action of Loki, if you ask me.
Not to mention that this little scheme of his didn't even last long in the end, but we'll get to that later.
17 Heroic Actions
This is where I have to tell you to turn away if you haven’t seen Infinity War yet and want absolutely no spoilers before you do. Have you turned yet? Okay good.
So at the beginning of Avengers: Infinity War, we see Thanos on Thor and Loki’s ship full of Asgardians. Most of them have already met their end, but when Thanos threatens to then end Thor if Loki doesn’t tell him where the Tesseract is, it seems as if Loki is just going to let him do as he pleases - until he suddenly changes his mind and provides it for him.
A few other things transpire after that, which eventually leads us to Loki’s final decision: to be a hero. He pretends to be pledging his allegiance to Thanos (again) and gives him his “undying loyalty," all the while he has a blade hiding behind his back, ready to defeat Thanos once and for all.
Of course, when he goes to plunge the blade into Thanos, Thanos immediately stops it using his Infinity Gauntlet.
After that, he ends Loki pretty brutally. But what is truly mystifying is the fact Loki sacrificed himself for the greater good. Or at least to save his brother, Thor. It was completely out of left field when looking at his past actions.
16 Impulsive Decision
Speaking of the God of Mischief’s sacrifice, why did he do it in the first place? I say that not because of his past actions this time, but because of what he witnessed a mere minute before that.
Thanos is known for being someone you never want to cross. He is an intense, unforgiving warrior who now has two Infinity Stones under his belt (or in his Infinity Gauntlet) at this point, which makes him even more powerful. Because of all that, when The Hulk attacks Thanos after Thanos and Loki’s conversation about the Tesseract, we all had a pretty good feeling that The Hulk was not going to succeed in this attack.
The altercation between two of the strongest and worst heroes and villains, respectively, turned into an all-out brawl that ended with The Hulk being battered and bruised, to say the least. Luckily, Heimdall used the last of his strength to transport him back to Earth before his own end came, but that takes us back to the original question: Why would Loki decide to take on the ruthless Thanos after witnessing the freaking Hulk get nearly smashed to bits?
Seems pretty impulsive and reckless, even for Loki.
15 His Survival In Thor 2
At the end of Thor: The Dark World, Loki meets his end - at least we think. He was blatantly stabbed, leaving a devastating wound and Thor witnessing his last moments while holding him in his arms. Yet, somehow, Loki appears just fine and dandy when he shows up in Thor: Ragnarok…so how exactly did that happen?
Some have argued that it was one of his holograms that took the fall for him at the end of Thor: The Dark World, and he was never actually harmed in the first place. But even that makes no sense since we have seen that no one is actually able to touch Loki’s holograms or even hit him with an object.
So how was his hologram impaled and also touched by Thor when that doesn’t add up with the other rules we know about his projections? Also, if we're going with the hologram logic, why wasn't any of that explained in Ragnarok at any point in time?
I'm not sure if this was just an accidental mistake made on the writer's parts, or if this was an intentional way to leave us guessing on how Loki ended up in Asgard healthy as a horse once again.
14 Mom/Dad Hybrid
The writers all throughout the Marvel Cinematic Universe are usually on their A game and make little to no mistakes. But sometimes they do.
For instance, it seems that either the MCU pulled a really good prank on us, or they got their information about Norse mythology seriously mixed up when it came to Loki. But maybe I should back up first.
We all know just by what we’ve seen so far from this list that there are plenty of things that don’t make a whole lot of sense when it comes to Loki. But this one is truly puzzling and makes you wonder if it was meant to be this way or if it was an honest mistake.
The ‘mistake’ in question has to do with Loki’s biological parents. His father in the film is shown to be a very “masculine” Frost Giant by the name of Laufey. We first see him in Thor, where he’s shown to be the king of the Frost Giants. But according to Norse mythology, Laufey is actually “a female and the mother of Loki”.
It goes even further when we realize that Loki’s mother, Farbauti, is actually a male who is supposed to be his father.
So what’s with the confusion here, Marvel?
13 Disappearing Powers
I think we can all agree that Loki is usually way ahead of his opponents in most of the MCU films he shows up in. But there are times when it seems that skill, or power, of his just suddenly goes away.
There are actually two different instances in The Avengers where Loki should have predicted what was going to happen next, and only one instance where he actually did.
The first instance is when Loki had locked up his brother, Thor, in his previous jail, of sorts. While Loki and Thor are engaged in a heated conversation for quite a while, Agent Coulson takes this opportunity to sneak up on Loki and shoot him.
Unfortunately, Loki knew all along that he was coming and conjured one of his holograms instead, which is what Coulson actually shot at. This leads to Coulson’s own end, but it all begs the question of how Loki accomplished this in the first place since he had apparently been using this hologram for quite a long time while he was using the computer at the same time.
The second instance was when The Hulk “smashed” Loki towards the end of the film right after Loki had goaded him during the attack on New York. You’d think if Loki’s always ten steps ahead like he was with Coulson, he would’ve easily seen that coming, no?
12 Opportunity Missed
We've all heard the phrase that two heads are better than one. So I have to think that same logic applies to evil villains who want to take over the world for themselves.
So even though Hela and Loki were not technically related in Thor: Ragnarok, which means she also was certainly not his daughter like she was in the comics, it seems like they still should have teamed up in destroying Asgard, given the evil tendencies they both share.
Yet, that thought isn’t even mentioned once all throughout Ragnarok. Sure, Loki gives his brother up to the Grandmaster pretty quickly in Sakaar, and he was problematic in terms of actually helping Thor all during their misadventures, but he never actually devised a truly evil plan to help Hela in her twisted schemes.
This makes little to no sense being that they are brother and sister, even if not by blood, and are also both clearly the epitome of evil.
So why not try and see if dear old sis would like to take over Asgard together?
Or better yet, play nice and then betray her later to take the throne for himself. That sounds way more like Loki to me.
11 Sibling Rivalry
In the original Thor film, Loki completely starts to hate his brother, Thor, when he finds out he’s adopted and they are not actually related. Meaning Loki was never going to become King of Asgard since he’s not a rightful heir to the throne.
But it seemed that before that, they got along fairly well. So it was a little disconcerting that he had harmful intentions towards his brother before he even knew that little fact about their family tree.
In Thor: Ragnarok, Thor begins to talk about his childhood with Loki, which certainly didn’t sound like a walk in the park. He starts out by talking about the time he turned Thor into a frog, and how they were constantly at odds.
But things got a little more interesting when he said, “This one time when we were children he transformed himself into a snake, and he knows that I love snakes, so I went to pick up the snake to admire it, and he transformed back to himself and he was like MBLEGH it's me! And he stabbed me… we were eight at the time.”
It is a little comical and a lot frightening but still doesn’t make a lot of sense with the way Loki and Thor’s relationship was portrayed at the beginning of the first film.
10 A Lack Of Trying
All throughout the Thor films, we’ve seen Loki use his superpower he’s most known for, which is creating illusions of himself to fool his foes…and his brother. He uses this little trick of his pretty often, and it comes in handy for him when he does.
So when he goes to end Thanos in Infinity War, his only trickery is pledging his loyalty to him while secretly hiding a blade he planned to plunge into his neck. So why on Earth didn’t he just clone himself and come up behind Thanos, in reality, to try and end his life that way?
I’m not saying even that would’ve worked, but it at least would have given him a higher chance of succeeding in his plan to save himself and his brother…as well as the universe in the process. But it seemed like maybe Loki wasn't thinking straight in this instance, because not only was that plan ridiculous since he knows better than anyone how powerful Thanos is, but he ended up sacrificing himself for basically nothing.
Loki may have done some pretty messed up things during his long life, but that doesn't mean he deserved to have his life ended in not only a brutal way but also in an idiotic way.
9 The God Of Mischief
In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Loki is descended from the Frost Giants, where he was the biological son of the king of the Frost Giants.
Knowing this, that means he has no lineage to the gods. But for whatever reason, he garners the title of “The God Of Mischief.”
We know that Thor actually is descended from the gods, which I’m sure is why he is known as the God of Thunder. And also why he gets to wield the Mjolnir.
So Thor’s title makes complete sense due to his family of gods, but Loki’s makes no sense at all since he’s adopted and has no way of claiming he is a god at all, let alone the God of Mischief. Of course, he could just be taking on this title to feel included in Asgard and become Asgardian royalty one day. But it seems like maybe he just prefers the title itself and what comes with it rather than being a part of his adopted family.
Especially since he seems to despise pretty much everyone in Asgard at this point. This means we have to assume he took on that role all on his own, creating himself to be a god.
8 An Ill-Advised Plan
In Thor: Ragnarok, as previously discussed, Loki disguises himself as his adoptive father, Odin, and takes the Asgardian throne for himself. This makes no sense for a multitude of reasons, but the main one is the fact this plan of his would not last for long.
The first mistake was making it look like Heimdall committed treason by becoming a deserter. It made absolutely no sense because he’s been nothing but loyal for thousands of years. Why would anyone even entertain the idea that he betrayed Odin and Thor after all of this time?
The second mistake was setting up the new executioner to replace him and giving him the task of warning him if Thor returned. This is not only because the new executioner seemed incompetent, but he also had no means of getting to Loki before Thor could. Plus, all of this still doesn’t explain how Loki planned on fooling his brother who is pretty impervious to his trickery at this point.
It was a half-hearted plan at best and was executed poorly. That alone is very unlike Loki. He may be The God of Mischief, but just because he's a trickster does not mean he is a dumb one.
7 The Wrong Pick
This is another one of those instances where you'd think Loki's super intelligent mind would have made a better decision.
What I'm talking about is in the first Avengers film, when Loki starts putting his evil plans into motion by infiltrating the S.H.I.E.L.D. compound “through the Tesseract portal”. This is where he then starts to use mind control on two pivotal members/associates of S.H.I.E.L.D.
The first person that he decides to mind control with his scepter is Hawkeye, who he uses for protection against the other Avengers and S.H.I.E.L.D. agents. But then he also uses his scepter to control Dr. Selvig, this way “he can create the portal to the Chitauri,” a.k.a. Thanos' army.
The thing that is truly baffling is the fact that he didn’t think it would be beneficial to take over the mind of Nick Fury, the man in charge of the entire organization and therefore, The Avengers.
That could have single-handedly brought down the organization, The Avengers, and the world for that matter.
And since Loki seemed to have plenty of knowledge about S.H.I.E.L.D., you’d think he’d also know just who was in charge of his enemies, but instead, he just took the two people he deemed to be “necessities” to his plans and left Fury there. Not your best move, Loki.
6 An Unseen Threat
When we saw the end of the first Thor film, we assumed that when Loki let go of Thor’s hand on the Bifrost Bridge, he just went into the abyss below and that was that. Apparently, though, all was not what it seemed to be.
Because then, when we see him again in The Avengers, we learn that he apparently was transported to The Sanctuary where he met none other than Thanos himself, as well as the Other, who is Thanos' servant. That seems pretty coincidental that he would land in the greatest place possible, for him, when he could have ended up pretty much anywhere.
That is what is the odd thing about these circumstances. I mean, Loki just happened to end up in a place that would make all of his wildest dreams come true. What was the reason for that happening? It is as if he literally made a wish upon a star and got to put all of his evil schemings into action.
Plus, we can’t really figure out why Heimdall wasn’t able to see where Loki ended up before he unleashed his wrath on Earth? Heimdall is literally described as being "all-seeing" and "all-hearing" all throughout the Nine Realms. So what happened to his powers when it was truly needed?