#but like. i don't think there's much danger of me watching. [googles] dear god 136 episodes of it

[tyrannuspitch]

okay okay aos asgard thoughts.

episode 8:

number one confusing thing to get out of the way - i knowww it's just reminding the audience of some exposition, but skye's comment in the opening scene seems to suggest that like... it isn't common knowledge... that asgardians are aliens? what else do people think they are??? like i know they know the chitauri are aliens. they know loki wasn't summoning ghosts or demons in new york. but they look at loki himself and they're like sure you can be a fundamental force of nature i guess? and you can still get beaten up by a guy on steroids??

ANYWAY. the berserker staff is an interesting artefact! it's a very self-destructive mechanism - i know they don't quite present it this way, but if you take it at all literally and accept that the added strength comes from the rage and adrenaline the staff causes... in real life, that additional strength comes from pushing past your limits, right? pushing through pain and mental blocks that are there for good reason? even asgardians have those, and even with asgardian healing, making a career out of getting those injuries is not going to be great for you. it's not as bad as the dark elves and the kursed, but it's getting up there. but 1000 years ago was a time of major changes for asgard - conquest of jotunheim, end of the valkyries... - so i wonder if asgard still has berserkers either. either way, it is very telling that the berserkers recruit from ordinary people, and not the nobility.

when randolph isn't being a creep, i like him. he's funny! he's kind of mean! it's refreshing to meet an ordinary asgardian! i also enjoy how (iirc) he conspicuously doesn't mention why he, an asgardian soldier, was sent to earth to begin with, and no-one asks him. how do they keep getting away with this!!!

i can't quite work out what's going on with the "paganist" group. (if there's even a reason for that -ist?) they seem to revere the inanimate powers of asgard, but hate asgardians themselves and fear that asgardians are trying to reassert power over humanity? which makes them like... the very rough pagan equivalent of satanists? "we recognise these gods, but we don't see their power as legitimate." which is an interesting angle to take for social fallout of loki's shenanigans... but still, it does feel a bit status-quoy, somehow. personally i would be more concerned about the standard asatru groups who think they're the gods' favourites etc etc. asgardian power IS sinister. if we were in a thor movie we wld understand this.

episode 15:

sif's characterisation is interesting! this is the most screentime she's had in anything (it might actually add up to more than all her other screentime) but she spends all of it in mission/crisis mode, so it's a very particular side of her. an interesting mix of formal, grave, blunt and dramatic. there's definitely an edge of warrior entitlement to it, but also, like... she clearly isn't nearly as comfortable in that entitlement as, say, thor. even when thor was in evil-dead-brother crisis in the avengers, he didn't read as stiff in the way sif does here. potentially because she isn't familiar with midgard, and/or doesn't want/enjoy mortals' attention? or just because sif has had to fight for status (esp military status) in a way thor has not, so she holds onto it a little too tight...

i'm not sure how i feel about lorelei. i suppose it makes sense for her to want an army if she wants to stay free when asgard are looking for her, so motive isn't a huge concern, but still... as it stands, she doesn't really interest me as a character. but i will say that her prison sounds pretty nightmarish. odin is good at that.

also quite funny to think that shield was in fact unknowingly working with loki at this point. top five things for thor to never ever tell them <3