Marvel's 'Loki' TV Show Will Star Tom Hiddleston, So Fans Can Stop Worrying
Marvel fans were overjoyed to hear that Disney's upcoming streaming platform Disney+ will feature a handful of new original shows following the characters from the Marvel Cinematic Universe that have yet to helm their own films, but one question loomed large: Would these shows still star the actors from the MCU? Although Tom Hiddleston was originally announced as attached to the Loki series, rumors began swirling that his role may be very small. Well, Marvel's Loki TV show will star Tom Hiddleston, Disney's film chief has confirmed in a new interview with The Hollywood Reporter, so fans can rest assured that the new show will give Marvel movie fans exactly what they want.
A few months after Marvel announced a series centered on the Marvel supervillain of Loki last fall, rumors began cropping up that the show may use Tom Hiddleston only sparingly in the series. There were whispers that Loki may transform into one of his various other comic-book forms so a new actor could portray him, or that Hiddleston's Loki may only pop up occasionally or simply narrate the show. These rumors were bolstered by the fact that Marvel fans had just seen Loki die in Avengers: Infinity War.
But thankfully, Disney film chief Alan Horn confirmed Tom Hiddleston would be playing the lead role in Disney+'s upcoming Loki series, saying "we're doing [a series] with Tom Hiddleston playing the Loki character." That statement confirms that Hiddleston's Loki will indeed be the center of this new Loki show, which of course also leads to questions about where this show will fit into the Marvel Cinematic Universe's timeline. Could Loki have actually survived his apparent death by Thanos, or could this show take us back into the mischief god's past? Those are questions that fans will just have to wait to get answers to as Loki moves further along in development.
The confirmation that Tom Hiddleston will be helming the Loki series also creates an exciting expectation that all of the other Disney+ MCU shows will star the actors from the movies. For instance, Elizabeth Olsen and Paul Bettany are confirmed to star in The Vision and Scarlet Witch for Disney+, and Anthony Mackie and Sebastian Stan will co-star in an untitled series centered on their characters Falcon and the Winter Soldier. There are also some rumors floating around that Jeremy Renner's Hawkeye may get his own show on Disney+ as well.
Of course, Marvel has taken to television several times before — the comic-book giant produced Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, Iron Fist, and The Punisher for Netflix, and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. for ABC, Runaways for Hulu, and Cloak & Dagger for Freeform. But these Disney+ series will be very different since they actually have a built-in connection to the big-screen Marvel Cinematic Universe, and much more potential to actually cross over with the movies. Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. is the only one of these Marvel TV shows to star a character who has appeared in the MCU movies, but even that show only very rarely made reference to what was going on in the film universe.
Fans can expect these new Marvel shows to premiere after Disney+ launches in the fall of 2019.
