With Loki now streaming on Disney+, it's hard to believe that it's been over a decade since Thor arrived in theaters. It was there Tom Hiddleston made his debut as the Marvel Cinematic Universe's God of Mischief, and for both him and Chris Hemsworth, the movie was their chance to make it in Hollywood.
The actors (who had been described as "nobodies" by some outlets at the time) took Thor and Loki and made them pivotal parts of the MCU. Looking back at his Loki debut in an interview with GQ, Hiddleston admitted that being cast as the iconic villain was a game-changing moment in his career.
"Four months of auditioning, I think, in 2009. A big leap for me from making very small films in the UK and working in the theater, and suddenly in the next Marvel Studios picture. It was a moment of adjustment and I felt like I won the lottery. The whole thing had a very special atmosphere."
"I had worked with Kenneth Branagh before — we had acted in a television series on the BBC called Wallander, and we had also acted together on stage in London in a Chekhov play called Ivanov. This was my first time being directed by him, but we had a kind of understanding as actors and I felt very grateful to him that he was able to somehow support my casting to the studio."
Hiddleston actually auditioned to play Thor before landing the role of Loki, which may have given him an even greater insight into the dynamic between the two Asgardians and their father.
"I could see from the first script, that the story was really two stories, almost," Hiddleston says. "One was on this epic, spectacular canvas — Asgard, a shining city in the sky with a rainbow bridge and a kind of intergalactic energy that transported characters to new worlds, and this was a world of gods and monsters, a world from myth and legend. We knew the film had to deliver on that scale, but inside it was a very small drama about the family, about the father and two sons...that became a very interesting psychological thing to explore about a triangle of Odin and his two sons."
It's too soon to say where Loki's story goes next after his Disney+ series, but the villain does appear to have moved on from worrying too much about his father and brother (no great surprise when he's seen how his story ends and that he ultimately found peace with them in the MCU).
It's fascinating to hear this insight from Hiddleston, though, and he's had quite the ride in the MCU...