The latest entry in the saga of Loki, season 2 episode 2, made a lot of interesting connections to Iron Man, of all characters. However, there’s one moment that clearly draws a strong parallel between Tom Hiddleston’s God of Mischief and Robert Downey Jr.’s Tony Stark that you may have missed.
Though Loki seemingly expressed some regret to Owen Wilson’s Mobius for throwing Iron Man off of a roof at one point, during the events of 2012’s The Avengers, that is far and away not the worst thing the trickster god has done in that same movie. For example, he used the Scepter to brainwash the likes of Jeremy Renner’s Hawkeye and Stellan Skarsgard’s Erik Selvig, among many others. Not only that, but Loki was also responsible for the deaths of dozens of innocent humans during the Battle of New York.
These events were apparently not lost on Rafael Casal’s Brad Wolfe, AKA X-05, in Loki‘s newest episode. Though the Time Variance Authority agent went rogue, prompting Loki to confront and interrogate him, Brad pointed out that he had read the adopted Asgardian’s file. Due to learning all about Loki’s past misdeeds, Brad essentially deemed it a laughable notion that the long-haired brother of Thor would try to consider himself a hero. As he tells Loki in a memorable monologue that weirdly had Taylor Swift vibes at one point:
“Oh you’ve got some nerve. ‘There are lives at stake.’ Everyone here knows what you’re doing, you know? You’re just trying to make up for all the terrible, awful shit you’ve done in your life, you pathetic little man.”
Iron Man: From warmonger to peacekeeper
This is actually a remarkably similar bit of dialogue to another movie that predates Loki’s first appearance in the MCU, 2010’s Iron Man 2. In that movie, Mickey Rourke’s Ivan Vanko holds a grudge against the Stark clan for not recognizing the contribution his father made to one of the inventions of Tony’s father, Howard Stark. When Tony confronts Ivan in jail after the film’s most memorable scene, in which Ivan uses electric whips to nearly demolish Tony on a racetrack, the sorely underutilized villain seems to put the billionaire playboy’s ego in check:
“You come from a family of thieves and butchers, and like all guilty men, you try to rewrite your history, to forget all the lives the Stark family has destroyed.”
The similarity between these two bits of dialogue from two very different Marvel projects highlights just how similar Loki truly is to Iron Man. You see, Loki’s current bid for redemption for his past bears a striking resemblance to Tony’s origin as a weapons manufacturer in the first-ever MCU movie, 2008’s Iron Man. Like Loki, Tony has arguably also been responsible for many lost lives through the devices of warfare he created. As a testament to this, the explosion in Afghanistan from the caravan scene in Iron Man that sees Tony held prisoner in a cave ends with him realizing one of his own missiles was being utilized by the terrorists themselves.
Sins of the past
Sure, we find out later in Iron Man that Tony’s business partner, Obadiah Stane, was the real culprit behind selling the weapons to the bad guys. However, as a testament to Tony trying to change his ways, he gave up the weapon manufacturing business by the end of the film. In fact, Tony trying to make up for the sins of his past is a consistent theme throughout his entire MCU arc, such as agreeing to sign the Sokovia Accords in Captain America: Civil War because he felt guilty for the innocent casualties that occurred during the Avengers’ confrontation with Ultron.
Similarly, you could contest Loki’s culpability for his actions in The Avengers because it was made canon on Marvel’s official website at one point that he, too, was being brainwashed by the Scepter to do all these bad things and didn’t realize it. However, that is a bit of a disputable point, a retcon that was retconned, due to Loki describing to Mobius how he lost control on an emotional level when he threw Iron Man off the roof rather than recognizing the Scepter made him do it.
Regardless, you could definitely argue that Loki is on a long and winding redemption arc in the MCU that strongly parallels Tony’s. Again, it is seemingly to make up for the sins of his past. Even before his solo Disney Plus spinoff, who can forget Loki’s heroic turn in Avengers: Infinity War when he tries to assassinate his former boss, Thanos, only to die at the Mad Titan’s hands?