Joss Whedon has reasserted that Loki will not return to "Avengers: Age of Ultron."
The news had been previously confirmed, but Whedon has elaborated on why he chose to leave out the antagonist from the film despite his reappearance in the upcoming "Thor: The Dark World."
"Every movie is going to be a different villain," Whedon said, according to IGN. "Loki's awesome, and he is awesome in 'Thor 2.' But The Avengers is a different thing. I worked with Tom more than any other actor [in the last film], because he was the only villain and there were six heroes. And he was as great as anyone I've ever worked with, and I get why people loved the character. But it's an Avengers movie."
The news had been previously confirmed by actor Tom Hiddleston.
"He's not in it," said the 32-year-old actor in an interview with Entertainment Weekly. "Here's the thing: I don't think there's anything else Loki could contribute to The Avengers, narratively. Joss [Whedon] gave me so many wonderful things to do in that first film that we'd only be trying to repeat ourselves, and probably less well in the second one."
At the end of the first film, it was revealed that Thanos was behind all of the damage done in New York. However, Ultron is slated to be the villain of the new film and Thanos will likely be saved up for the third installment.
"Avengers: Age of Ultron" is slated for release in 2015 and will start production in early 2014.