❝ But don't you understand?
The hunger makes the man.
With all that lies in front of us,
The world looks so ridiculous to me. ❞
— HYENA, by The Editors
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❝ The Asgardians will suffer as we have suffered. I will reclaim the Aether. I will restore our world. And I will put an end to this poisoned universe. ❞
...
What a shitty MCU villain.
I bet this was an unexpected start (you all expected Loki, didn't you?), but it's been something that has bothered me for quite a while now. You see, Malekith was done very dirty on the big screen. They took a character that had so much potential and turned him into a one-dimensional villain. It's a tragedy.
The mistakes lie partially in the director and definitely in the actor, unfortunately. Christopher Eccleston was great as the Ninth Doctor, but I did not care for him as Malekith the Accursed. He was just boring. Instead of giving him some form of a personality, they had him be defined by the objective of the story. Sure, the story must go on, but his character was tossed into a dumpster along the way. He was just portrayed as some weak and whack-ass elf that had a hard on for the dark.
Yeah. But before this spirals into a complete rant, let us take a better look at his character background.
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❝ A B R I E F L O O K . ❞
【 First Appearance: Thor #344 】
Malekith the Accursed is the ruler of the Dark Elves of Svartalfheim. He is considered a master sorcerer, who can manipulate magical forces, which include: teleportation, energy projection, physical malleability, flight (he can turn into mist), and the ability to change the shape and appearance of other beings or objects.
Basically, his repertoire is very similar to our favorite God of Mischief.
Which is understandable, because he is first introduced in the comics working with Loki. However, unlike Loki, he seems to be quite a fancy looking elf, with his long, luscious blonde locks. He essentially looks like the elven version of Fabio.
... Yep.
But uh, technically, he really isn't that exciting in the older comics. His profile is pretty generic: he's a dark elf that is known to be cruel and selfish, to the point that he has turned on his own people (and yet somehow still always manages to get followers). He's not afraid of betraying allies if it serves his purpose. It should be noted that he may have worked with Loki, but neither trusted each other.
Another fun fact — in the original comics, he was the owner of the Casket of Ancient Winters. We can see him utilizing in earlier runs of the comics, as well as in the lackluster animated series of The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes.
If you want to torture yourself, I'd suggest watching the clip on Youtube. Personally, I found it just a bar above his portrayal in Thor: Dark World, which quite frankly, is sad.
But with all honesty, the source material was dull. It did not mean it had to translate as such on the big screen. He had potential for so much more, even with his generic villain background that makes him a cruel and selfish asshole.
It was just a matter of molding and elevating it — and we know that is possible, because Tom Hiddleston did that with Loki. However, Eccleston instead chose to play a one-dimensional character when he had every opportunity to make Malekith his own. But somehow, he decided not to. Instead, he complained that he did not enjoy playing Malekith because of all the prosthetics he had to wear and the fact they cut out a lot of his backstory and motivations. So, as mentioned earlier, Malekith being done so dirty is both the fault of the actor and also the director.
And the movie ruined whatever potential Malekith had. That is until the following year when Jason Aaron decided to take Malekith and turn him into a somewhat more interesting villain in his run of Thor: The God of Thunder and, my personal favorite, The Mighty Thor.
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❝ B I T C H , I ' M F A B U L O U S . ❞
As you can see, his design is based off more of the original comic book version of him—the only thing they seem to have adapted from the MCU is the silvery white hair, which is now lacking a perm like he had in the older version.
He also finally got some kind of a backstory, which is introduced in Thor: God of Thunder (Issue #25). To sum it up, he grew up during the war in Svartalfheim and had 12 brothers (and all of them are dead). His own mother sold him for "two sacks of snake livers and half a barrel of pickled toads" and he was forced to work as a body burner, burning the bodies of all those who died during the war.
Then one day, trolls kidnap and imprison him. While in prison, he meets a wizard and they both help each other to escape. Following that, it should be no surprise that he becomes this guy's apprentice. He learns magic (note: keep this in mind in the future), but the two would eventually clash in beliefs. The wizard was a very peaceful man, but Malekith could not get behind that, "because he felt that any peace would mean that the war which forged him would have been pointless, making his existence something which wasn't meant to be."
It shouldn't come as a shock that he killed the wizard as a result, but not before his face is scarred by his teacher—thus why half his face is black. Oh, and following all that, Malekith decides to kill his mother too. Granted, she had it coming for a while.
Now fast forward—because I'm not about to reveal the entire comic book plot—he at some point cuts off Thor's left arm (sound familiar?) and this all leads to a very complex and confusing plot involving Roxxon, Jötnar, and more (I still am confused by the logic of it all).
Which reminds me—sometimes I'm surprised how often they mention Roxxon in the MCU, but have yet to actually utilize them in any significant way (except in the TV series). This is totally something I will cover at a later point.
But anyway, what a charmer, right? Here he is introducing himself to Lady Thor (aka Jane Foster!) while he has Thor's arm draped over his shoulder. You can pick up a lot on his character from this page alone and it is vastly different than how he was portrayed in the MCU.
So, with this new establishment in character development, we can now say his personality is sadistic, chauvinistic, over-the-top, sassy, and manipulative — he's also a complete asshole, but what else is new? And to elaborate on all this, he later down the road uses some kind of spell to enchant Queen Aelsa Featherwine (of the Fay) to become his bride. He marries her so he can be the king of Alfheim and do some wicked things to the realm and it's inhabitants. Immediately following their vows, he locks her up in a tower to use as a bargaining chip.
Again, what a romantic.
But, at least now there is some form of a personality. He's still driven by his desire to rule (a running theme with villains) and he is willing to do anything to get there. However, as serious as his goals are to him, he tries to have a good time doing them and quite frankly, I can appreciate this little shit's aptitude.
And to be frank, if I was to sum him up, I would say that he was given Loki's original comic book role (though he's a bit more of a dapper douchebag—with a flair for the dramatics), while they evolved Loki and made him someone who is beyond just evil. Malekith is the type of baddie that has not an ounce of remorse in his bones. There is no moral compass for this dark elf. Loki on the other hand, at least with more recent versions, has a conscious.
So, now where does this entire thing lead me to? Well, if I was to take all this information and give the MCU Malekith a rework...
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❝ R O B E R T C A R L Y L E . ❞
He may be a little too old to play Malekith now, but the way he plays Rumpelstiltskin (aka Mr. Gold) in Once Upon a Time, definitely has the kind of finesse, flair, and delivery I would expect out of this updated version of Malekith (the one created by Aaron) — at least how I saw Mr. Gold portrayed in the first season. I haven't watched beyond that, just so you're all aware.
And if I was to do a re-haul of Dark World, the script would be a mixture of the existing script and off of Patty Jenkins' vision: "The director's initial plan for her "Thor 2" was a Romeo-and-Juliet-esque space opera that hinged on the separation of Thor and Jane Foster."
To elaborate on that: her idea was to have Jane stuck on Earth and Thor stuck where he is. He has been forbidden to return to Earth, because it doesn't matter (according to Odin). It's unclear what Jane would have done, but she would have gotten into trouble causing Thor to break the rules in order to save her. Along the way, they find out that Malekith hid the Aether inside the Earth because he knew Odin would not care to look here. And that was all that was revealed in the interview with Mrs. Jenkins.
This plot, over here, has some holes—but some of it is interesting to the fact that it may have given both Malekith and Jane (don't get me started on how much they wronged this woman) larger roles in the MCU. To be frank, Dark World was literally made to showcase Loki. While I loved every minute that he was on screen, it didn't change the fact that the overall plot of the movie was overshadowed by it. In order to find a happy medium between the two, I would have to seriously think it over and re-examine the movie and a few comics again. So, for now let us keep this all in mind.
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But, before I conclude this let me ask:
• What are you thoughts on Malekith?
• Do you have an idea of what could have been done to salvage him?
• Anything else?