The Avengers: Loki Sides With Superheroes

we considered the question of how Marvel's upcoming film adaptation of The Avengers would fare with critics. While the initial reviews coming out of the premiere and other fan screenings were absolutely giddy over the film, "serious" critics are less apt to be kind to superhero (or other crowd-pleasing) movies, and they're now starting to get their own screenings and write their own reviews. Well, Tom Hiddleston, who plays the villainous Loki in The Avengers, has some words for those critics: knock it off. Superhero movies like The Avengers, he says, should not be scorned. Surprised to learn that Christopher Reeve had been mocked by his fellow classically-trained actors for his choice to take on Superman, Hiddleston revealed that he idolized Reeve's Superman as a child and has grown up watching the genre attract more and more profound talent. "Some of the greatest actors have turned superheroes into a serious business," Hiddleston wrote. "Michael Keaton and Jack Nicholson in Batman; Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart, the first venerable knights of the X-Men, who have now passed the baton to Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy. In spite of 20 years of mercurial work in the likes of Chaplin and Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, it was his rock-star-charismatic yet somehow humble Tony Stark in Iron Man that helped wider audiences finally embrace the enormous talent of Robert Downey Jr. And Heath Ledger's performance in The Dark Knight quite simply changed the game. He raised the bar not just for actors in superhero films, but young actors everywhere; for me. His performance was dark, anarchic, dizzying, free, and totally, thrillingly, dangerous." Given the question that many fans asked when Thor was in production--how did Hiddleston, Hopkins and Branagh get caught up in the Marvel Universe?--it's interesting and a little inspiring to hear his taken on the matter. Aside from the dizzying spectacle of these types of films, he says, there's value to superhero movies. Superman and Batman help us to explore humanity. The actor elaborates, "Superhero films offer a shared, faithless, modern mythology, through which these truths can be explored. In our increasingly secular society, with so many disparate gods and different faiths, superhero films present a unique canvas upon which our shared hopes, dreams and apocalyptic nightmares can be projected and played out." Yeah...let's have him back for the sequel.