Loki: Agent of Asgard 1

Okay, let’s be honest about this – this comic would not exist were it not for Tom Hiddleston. His performances as Loki  in Thor, Avengers and The Dark World have significantly added to the character’s popularity, exploiting to the full the appeal of the charming mass murderer.  Al Ewing’s script makes no bones about this.  Every word of Loki’s dialogue is easy to hear in Hiddleston’s voice, the Avengers seen in this issue are the same as those seen on screen, and one line of dialogue lifts directly from Whedon’s movie.

There is, of course, nothing wrong with this.  Attracting fans of the Marvel Cinematic Universe into reading the comics is a good thing.   Giving them the Avengers they know so that they are less disorientated is a good thing (after all, Marvel did the same with the Avengers Assemble book).  The amount of time spent on a lovingly-drawn nude Loki in a shower is also a good thing – it is almost as refreshing to have a shower scene here as it is not to have any in Black Widow, Ms. Marvel or She-Hulk.  If I objected to any of this, I would be a gate-keeping idiot, and I like to think I’m not.

Of course, for Loki to sustain his own title in the context of the mainstream Marvel list, there have to be some differences.  It is hard (though not impossible) for him be the villain (or even the anti-hero).  Instead, we are presented with the Loki of recent Journey into Mystery and Young Avengers, the god who died because he was trapped as the evil being everyone thought of him as being, and, now reborn, is desperate not to fall into the same traps, and to reinvent himself not just in his own eyes, but in other people’s.  Mischievous, yes; evil, no.

Actually, my favourite panel of Thor 353 isn't the one Ewing mentions, but this final page, where the shared reaction of Thor and Loki to Odin's death is indicated by the single word balloon.

Ewing here is consciously drawing upon one of the more subtle past portraits of Loki, that of Walt Simonson,* in what is arguably the best period of Thor since Kirby left.  In a text piece at the end, Ewing singles out a moment from Thor 353, where Odin and his sons stand together against Surtur.  All through the Surtur saga, Simonson had been showing that Loki, for all that he machinates to rule Asgard himself over the claims of Odin or Thor, isn’t going to sit back and let some fire-giant with a big sword trash the place.  It’s not as far a step from that to Ewing’s Thor as you might think.

The other thing about Loki: Agent of Asgard is that it’s really quite funny.  Maybe not constantly laugh-out loud hilarious, but there is a quiet sense of humour running through this story, from the cheeky appropriation of another rather famous comic’s title through the comic spin on a Fraction-esque depiction of Hawkeye.

Lee Garbett’s artwork is nice, unfussy, and smooth.  It tells the story well, and Garbett does well with various facial expressions.

Okay, probably the best gag (unless you're really taken with the fanfic reference), but the rest of it's pretty much up to this level.

Coming out the same week as Ms. Marvel is a bit unfortunate, as there is no way that Loki is anything like as good.  But it is a pleasant, fairly light-hearted superhero comic that manages to tell a good story.  This sort of tone has been too rare in the genre since Dark Knight and Watchmen told us all that we had to be gloomy and serious about this stuff.  Batman aside, the movies have largely stepped back from souch darkness (and MCU, please don’t cock this up in Winter Soldier and Age of Ultron), and it’s good to see we have more and more comics that do the same.  Loki: Agent of Asgard is not essential in the way that Ms. Marvel is, but it’s recommended.

* Though given that it was Female Creators Appreciation Week over on tumblr last week, do you believe that Simonson’s Thor didn’t, at least in part, emerge from discussions with his wife, highly-experienced editor and soon-to-become-a-writer-herself Louise Simonson? Because I don’t.