takemetothedungeons:

wnnbdarklord:

Thor, I love you to bits, but we need to talk about your definition of ‘in my youth’: 

The Jotuns must pay for what they have done. March into Jotunheim as you once did. Teach them a lesson. Break their spirits so they’ll never dare to try to cross our borders again.

#I remain intrigued by this quote#because like many of the films statements about time and asgardians it makes no goddam logical sense#but meta to the rescue:#I like the idea that this is how the aesir experience time#not as a progression#as we do#where yesterday is recent#last year a while ago#and ten years ago a long time ago#but in epochs and eras#marked by changes in themselves#they don’t age much#not like we do#whether you think they are young for the same-ish time we are and in their prime longer#or if they are still kids at 300+ years old#either way#for them time is purely relative#and nothing changes much#not technology not culture not the people around you#so you judge time by internal markers#thor judges his own maturity as beginning on the day he regained mjolnir and lost loki#so before then he was a youth for all he thought himself a man#for only a youth would court war#and now he knows himself a man#though still battle-hungry#(because it’s THOR c’mon)#but not war hungry#and there is a difference#and it’s about putting others wants and needs and safety before your own#which is what he was lacking in thor 2011 ( amberfox17 )

Can I offer a suggestion? I think that Thor’s style of formal, antiquated language here is the key to deciphering this line, and I think that what Thor is saying here isn’t referring to his youth as a long time ago, like Asgardian time is different, or that he’s lived a lifetime since, but that the phrase in my youth, I courted war is Thor talking about his own immaturity from the point of view of experience. He’s saying, I was/am immature, and fighting was something I sought. The comma is really important, it makes the sentence meaning shift. In terms of a comparison, think of the phrase, ‘in my ignorance, I made an error’.