Avengers (Spoilers)

[Alkaloid]

I imagine he did it just to tweak Thor. Sure turning Colson is a better plan but it isn't like Loki is an entirely rational actor at this point.

[Ted C]

Damn it the more I think about it the more I realise Loki's main mistake. Instead of stabbing Coulson he should have just mind controlled him (he was jabbing him with the stick anyway, might as well gain a trooper). The team wouldn't have been as galvanised and who knows how much havok Coulson could have wrought as a sabotouer?

Loki presumably found it more amusing to make Thor watch Coulson die.

It also strikes me that a second explosive arrow, like the first that crippled the rotor, could have easily been put in place on a second rotor to guarantee a crash. Just wait til you're ready to leave before detonation.

Wouldn't be surprising if the plan was to take out a second engine when they were leaving, but they did need to rescue Loki and recover his staff and some data before crashing the helicarrier.

I still want to know how Loki got his staff back.

He probably just went down there and got it when his cell was opened. Or one of his goons got it and brought it to him.

[Simon_Jester]

Damn it the more I think about it the more I realise Loki's main mistake. Instead of stabbing Coulson he should have just mind controlled him (he was jabbing him with the stick anyway, might as well gain a trooper). The team wouldn't have been as galvanised and who knows how much havok Coulson could have wrought as a sabotouer?

Loki presumably found it more amusing to make Thor watch Coulson die.

I think the "he's holding a big gun and I don't know what it does so I'd better put him out of action" explanation is more probable.

In the scene where he mind-controls people at the beginning, we see normal bullets basically bounce right off him- he doesn't consider them to be much of a threat, so he can afford to take his time with mind-controlling people who aren't armed with anything more dangerous than that.

Coulson is armed with something powerful enough to batter him around, so he has to pay attention to that.

[Ted C]

think the "he's holding a big gun and I don't know what it does so I'd better put him out of action" explanation is more probable.

In the scene where he mind-controls people at the beginning, we see normal bullets basically bounce right off him- he doesn't consider them to be much of a threat, so he can afford to take his time with mind-controlling people who aren't armed with anything more dangerous than that.

Coulson is armed with something powerful enough to batter him around, so he has to pay attention to that.

True enough. Coulson did say, up-front, that the gun he had was derived tech salvaged from the Destroyer, which would be something for Loki to worry about.

[YT300000]

So I just saw the film for the second time, and while I didn't see Coulson in the background on the Helicarrier at any point, I did catch the scene of Loki being freed. Hawkeye was not carrying the staff, and Loki was not holding it when confronted by Coulson. However, when he re-appeared behind Coulson, he stabbed him with the staff. So either he can teleport the staff (and had no reason to do so while in the trap, and no energy/focus to do so after being floored by the Hulk), or it's a continuity error. But the former makes perfect sense in the context of the film.

Also, when Loki is in full horned regalia, the extended and golden staff very much resembles Odin's sceptre from the Thor movie. Perhaps an affectation stemming from his desire to be ruler of Asgard.

[Lord Revan]

well it could just be that they're both ceremonial spears but considering Loki never tries to use the casket of ancient winters (or what ever it was called) and still uses the look and armor of asgargian prince rather then assuming his jotun form.

[Kojiro]

I like Broomstick's idea: concussion from getting your head slammed into reinforced concrete by the Incredible Hulk until you leave a crater makes it hard to cast Loki's Instant Summons.

There's a condsiderable amount of time between when he loses the spear fighting Thor and when he meets Hulk there. More than enough to summon, if possible, the spear. Hell even if he can't summon it it's not preposterous to suggest he might actually go back for it once it's clear. It just seems like a silly thing to leave behind especially if he can summon it.

Basically if he can't summon it, someone had to fetch it during the assault, which would be difficult at best and warrant some scene to show it occured. If he can summon it there's no good reason to abandon it on Stark Tower and go about catching arrows from Hawkeye.

As for Coulson being a threat, I doubt Loki's arrogance wouldn't override that. He's happy to engage Thor in melee, getting the drop on Coulson gave him all the time he needed. The hologram does persist a few seconds and as soon as he touches someone they lock up. Perhaps though it's only possible from the front (given Starks immunity) which is odd, but so be it.

edit- fix tags

[Lord Revan]

Well Thor was holding back most of the time when fighting Loki (and Loki probably knew that) Coulson on the other hand had neither the desire nor the capability to hold back (he had no idea what the gun was capable of).

[Tsyroc]

Has anyone read the trivia section on IMDB about The Avengers. It suggest that the stone in Loki's spear isn't linked to the tesseract at all but is actually Spoiler

The mind gem, one of the Infinity Gems. Supposedly the blue color gives it away. I haven't paid that close of attention to what color the various Infinity Gems are, except that Adam Warlocks soul gem always seems to be green. I'm not sure how inclined I am to believe this trivia but it does sort of link in with Thanos' appearance during the credits. Otherwise I'm thinking complete ass pull by some really hopeful fan boy.

[The Imperator]

Has anyone read the trivia section on IMDB about The Avengers. It suggest that the stone in Loki's spear isn't linked to the tesseract at all but is actually Spoiler

The mind gem, one of the Infinity Gems. Supposedly the blue color gives it away. I haven't paid that close of attention to what color the various Infinity Gems are, except that Adam Warlocks soul gem always seems to be green. I'm not sure how inclined I am to believe this trivia but it does sort of link in with Thanos' appearance during the credits. Otherwise I'm thinking complete ass pull by some really hopeful fan boy.

That makes total sense

[Ted C]

Has anyone read the trivia section on IMDB about The Avengers. It suggest that the stone in Loki's spear isn't linked to the tesseract at all but is actually Spoiler

The mind gem, one of the Infinity Gems. Supposedly the blue color gives it away. I haven't paid that close of attention to what color the various Infinity Gems are, except that Adam Warlocks soul gem always seems to be green. I'm not sure how inclined I am to believe this trivia but it does sort of link in with Thanos' appearance during the credits. Otherwise I'm thinking complete ass pull by some really hopeful fan boy.

That makes total sense

Well, in that case, it would make sense if the Tesseract were actually the Spoiler

Power Gem

(or a container for it, at any rate).

[YT300000]

Has anyone read the trivia section on IMDB about The Avengers. It suggest that the stone in Loki's spear isn't linked to the tesseract at all but is actually Spoiler

The mind gem, one of the Infinity Gems. Supposedly the blue color gives it away. I haven't paid that close of attention to what color the various Infinity Gems are, except that Adam Warlocks soul gem always seems to be green. I'm not sure how inclined I am to believe this trivia but it does sort of link in with Thanos' appearance during the credits. Otherwise I'm thinking complete ass pull by some really hopeful fan boy.

That makes total sense

Well, in that case, it would make sense if the Tesseract were actually the Spoiler

Power Gem

(or a container for it, at any rate).

That seems too complicated, for them to combine so many story elements together. The Tesseract is pretty clearly the Cosmic Cube, particularly given the Hydra connection in Captain America, and Thanos' plan to obtain it in exchange for allowing Loki to rule Earth in The Avengers.

[Slybrarian]

That's actually a damn good point. Some air support could have made a huge difference, and could be show in just a couple shots without detracting form the Avenger's efforts in any way.

Not really.
A: All the deck fighters that were prepped for launch were tossed off and and probably quite a bit of the deck crew. It is a logical assumption that many of the below deck fighters were heavily damaged as well as well as the crew down there being injured.
B: Fury obviously doesn't have sole command and loyalty of SHIELD as there were people on the HC that immediately obeyed commands to ignore him. The idea that he had command back fully and before the battle was over is a stretch at best.

Adding to this, a battle in downtown Manhattan is roughly the worst place ever to try to fight with modern fighter jets. Unlike Iron Man, they can't dogfight between buildings and they won't have an angle to fire their air-to-air missiles, assuming they can get a lock at all on those flying chariots. The space whales are almost certainly invulnerable to modern missiles as well, given that missiles rely on shrapnel and the whales were tanking much heavier fire. Maybe an A-10 or attack helicopters could do some good, but even they'd be horribly vulnerable to RPG-equivalent laser fire while trying to strafe down a street. It'd be like the Death Star run, only with a few million screaming civilians you can run into when you get shot down.

[Ted C]

That seems too complicated, for them to combine so many story elements together. The Tesseract is pretty clearly the Cosmic Cube, particularly given the Hydra connection in Captain America, and Thanos' plan to obtain it in exchange for allowing Loki to rule Earth in The Avengers.

How many infinite power sources do you want to have in one setting? Keeping adding more and they lose their impact. It might simplify things to have one simply be an interface to another.

We've seen something resembling the Infinity Gauntlet in Odin's weapon vault, so it's not a stretch to see it become a future plot device. It would keep threads a little more neat if the Gauntlet needed the Tesseract to work properly. That might also explain why the Asgardians didn't store them both in the same place.

[Kojiro]

Well Thor was holding back most of the time when fighting Loki (and Loki probably knew that) Coulson on the other hand had neither the desire nor the capability to hold back (he had no idea what the gun was capable of).

I would have to say that's demonstrably not true by simple virtue that Coulson didn't immediately open fire on Loki. Instead he gave a quite polite instruction, which I would say is pretty much the definition of restraint.

But yeah, it probably was more about winding up Thor than anything but it's still a miscalculation on Loki's behalf. Momentary gratification that had unintended consequences.

[The Imperator]

That seems too complicated, for them to combine so many story elements together. The Tesseract is pretty clearly the Cosmic Cube, particularly given the Hydra connection in Captain America, and Thanos' plan to obtain it in exchange for allowing Loki to rule Earth in The Avengers.

Yeah, I figured it was the cosmic cube, too. It makes way more sense than being the Spoiler

Power Gem

[Ted C]

But yeah, it probably was more about winding up Thor than anything but it's still a miscalculation on Loki's behalf. Momentary gratification that had unintended consequences.

You almost make that sound like it would be out of character for Loki.

[Rossum]

Well Thor was holding back most of the time when fighting Loki (and Loki probably knew that) Coulson on the other hand had neither the desire nor the capability to hold back (he had no idea what the gun was capable of).

I would have to say that's demonstrably not true by simple virtue that Coulson didn't immediately open fire on Loki. Instead he gave a quite polite instruction, which I would say is pretty much the definition of restraint.

But yeah, it probably was more about winding up Thor than anything but it's still a miscalculation on Loki's behalf. Momentary gratification that had unintended consequences.

Regarding Coulson not firing immediately, it could be that he knew Loki could make hologram duplicates (and thus the Loki he was aiming at could be a decoy) and didn't want to risk missing, damaging the ship needlessly, or using up a shot he might not be able to reload before the real Loki shows up. So he was counting on the real Loki making an appearance so he at least had a chance at a shot.
Spoiler

Also, there's the possibility that was an LMD that got killed in which case it took the above argument and decided that getting stabbed in the back was worth getting a shot at Loki and motivating the Avengers.

[Nephtys]

I figured Colson didn't know what the gun would do (as he said), and was stalling for backup personally. It makes the most sense. That gun looked so ridiculous, phase 2 was experimental, and he had said he didn't know what it does.

[Grandmaster Jogurt]

Loki was just about to press the button to drop Thor. Coulson deciding to bluff and hope for the best makes the most sense by far. If he'd known how to use the gun from the beginning, why not keep Loki from dropping Thor by shooting him away from the console? It'd be a lot more sure than talking and hoping he engages you first.

[Darmalus]

What is this LMD people keep mentioning? Something from the comics, I assume.

[Ted C]

I figured Colson didn't know what the gun would do (as he said), and was stalling for backup personally. It makes the most sense. That gun looked so ridiculous, phase 2 was experimental, and he had said he didn't know what it does.

He knew it had been developed from Asgardian technology recovered from the Destroyer. I'm not sure that he knew if or how well it would actually work. Better to retain the threat value: if it works great, he can still pull the trigger when necessary; if it's not strong enough to affect an Asgardian, best not to let the bad guy know immediately.

[Ted C]

What is this LMD people keep mentioning? Something from the comics, I assume.

Marvel comics has "Life Model Decoys" that are artificial duplicates of people that might be targeted for assassination.

[Kojiro]

Regarding Coulson not firing immediately, it could be that he knew Loki could make hologram duplicates (and thus the Loki he was aiming at could be a decoy) and didn't want to risk missing, damaging the ship needlessly, or using up a shot he might not be able to reload before the real Loki shows up. So he was counting on the real Loki making an appearance so he at least had a chance at a shot.

I doubt he knew of the hologram ability as Loki's never displayed it (at least not the teleporting version). If he did though- say he'd just watched him go from the cage entrance to the railing where he taunts Thor (hilarious) that would have been the ideal time to shoot. Note that when Loki does that trick he's mobile, then briefly freezes up (and someone goes through him). It seems like it's a short range teleport that leaves behind a final image. Indeed after Loki stabs him the same 'image' is there for a second and fades out after Coulson is stabbed.

While I'm sure he didn't know exactly what the weapon would do it's safe to assume he knew it wouldn't wreck the carrier. That part of it- designed to hold Hulk- I'm guessing is about as resistant to damage and far from any critical systems as possible. I could be wrong though, perhaps they put the Hulk chamber right next to something very important but I doubt it.

I missed the bit where he said the gun is made from Asguardian tech, I only recall him saying it was started after the Destroyer showed up. Granted though the opening barrel and orange beam are reminiscent of the Destroyer and with the Bifrost gone Asguard would have no way to retrieve it so it would have been left behind.

As for LMDs I'd find it highly unlikely they bleed, become incapacitated or expire like that. It's a bit Cylon-ish for my liking and in the comics they're pretty much robots. More importantly none of the Avengers are present for the conversation between Fury and Coulson, where Fury shows genuine concern and Coulson apologises. If that was a LMD Fury wouldn't have cared. Or he didn't know but that seems unlikely.

[SylasGaunt]

I missed the bit where he said the gun is made from Asguardian tech, I only recall him saying it was started after the Destroyer showed up. Granted though the opening barrel and orange beam are reminiscent of the Destroyer and with the Bifrost gone Asguard would have no way to retrieve it so it would have been left behind.

ALso if you listen carefully it makes a very similar noise when fired.