As predicted last week, this week saw the God and Goddess of Mischief about to face obliteration from the apocalypse they were unable to escape last week, only to be captured by the TVA time cops with just a moment to spare. You have to wonder why the TVA and their ability to go anywhere in time would leave it until there is just seconds to spare to initiate their rescue, but I suppose this would be when the Lokis would just accept capture as the alternative was death. That and it’s also more dramatic this way.
This episode started with a flash back to when Sylvie was a little girl and was taken by the TVA for being a variant without there being an obvious reason why she was taken at this moment. This would come up later in the episode when Sylvie confronted Ravonna Renslayer who it turned out was the time agent who captured her. The answer to why she was taken will no doubt be a mystery that will be answered in episodes to come, but it will be one of many, as this episode raised lots of questions!
Loki was able to convince Mobius that the TVA is a lie and he and everyone else there are variants themselves who have been ripped from time and enslaved to carry out the Time Keeper’s bidding…expect that leads to the next mystery. Who are the Time Keepers?
Mobius had highlighted that he’d never met the Time Keepers before and this episode brought about their requesting him to attend a meeting where the Lokis would be wiped out, and unfortunately due to his believing Loki and being caught stealing Ravonna’s Ziggy device (I actually forget it’s actual name so Ziggy will do) Ravonna has Owen Wilson wiped out to everyone’s collective gasp of ‘oh no’.
Would this mean that Owen Wilson is done is the series? Could it be that from this point on the only time we’ll see Mobius again is at the end of the show when we see another version of Mobius with the jet ski that he desires? That would be a shame as it certainly feels like Owen Wilson would be good to keep on in the MCU in some form or fashion.
Taken down to the Time Keepers the Loki get an assist from time agent B-15 who earlier had been enchanted by Sylvie and saw the truth that she was a variant taken from her life. This lead to a fun battle, although not perhaps the best battle we’ve had recently in the MCU as it was very standard lets talk and get attacked by one baddie at a time kind of stuff.
From here the Time Keepers were killed and revealed to be androids which gave this a very Wizard of Oz vibe. It definitely seemed that Ravonna wasn’t surprised to see that the Time Keepers weren’t real, and before we start to think that she will be revealed to be the man behind the curtain as in Oz, it should be noted that the flashback to her capture of the child Sylvie showed her to be a lesser Time Agent who has clearly climbed up the ranks.
With only tow episodes of the show left it did feel a bit disappointing that this made three out of three Marvel Disney Plus shows where the reveal of who the big bad is won’t be until the end of the series. In Wandavision we only learned that Agatha was the villain right at the end (even though we obviously could tell), and in Falcon and the Winter Soldier it was the same deal that the main villain of the show wasn’t revealed until the end.
It’d be good to see Marvel just show us the villain straight away so there is the opportunity to build up a real war or hate relationship between the heroes and villains. It works in the movies to reveal that Jedediah Stain is a villain to Tony Stark near the end of Iron Man as it’s a 2 hour movie, but when the story is spread over 6-10 episodes you have more room to build up a true supervillain that could equal Thanos or even Loki himself.
Perhaps the oddest part of the episode and the elephant in the room is that Disney are actually going with the story that Loki has fallen in love with Sylvie, which on the surface is funny as of course the only person Loki could truly love is himself…or another version of himself anyway. Where this gets into territory that you perhaps don’t want to spend too long thinking about things is that what are the implications of the potential relationship here? Is this truly the same being as Loki, or in some way should be considered his sister…yeah I won’t go too much further onto this one, as a post credits scene may have shed light on the answer without disturbing your mind too much.
The post credit scene showed several variant Lokis and also gave hope to Mobius and others wiped out by the TVA to come back. Loki was about to profess his love to Sylvie when Ravonna wiped out Loki, but we learn that rather than death this instead would teleport Loki (and presumably others) to some other place. Loki finds himself confronted by multiple other Lokis.
There are 4 new Loki Variants whom are being dubbed as Classic Loki, Kid Loki, Boastful Loki and Crocodile Loki. For me this suggested that the true big bad of the series will possibly turn out to be another Loki, and for all we know everyone at the TVA could turn out to be a Loki Variant. I lean away from that theory, but we now know that not only can Loki be both male and female, but can also be a different ethnic background (although to be fair as an Ice Giant he was originally blue), can also be different ages (both younger and older) and can actually be a different species as we saw with Crocodile Loki!
Boastful Loki was interesting as he seemed to be holding a very Thor like hammer. Perhaps in his reality he is worthy and that is why he was deemed to be a variant. Kid Loki looks very much like what we’d expect for a younger version of Tom Hiddleston to be cast as.
It was also brilliant to see Richard E Grant who has been cast as Classic Loki, and I think people would agree he would have been a perfect choice for Loki if the MCU has been made 15 years earlier. In a great nod to fans of the comic, Classic Loki is seen wearing a comic accurate costume and looks like someone you would have happily accepted seeing fight Adam West’s Batman in the 1960s. The giant yellow underpants over the tights is perhaps a first in the MCU and will help validate DC for removing the red pants on Superman.
Conclusion
This was the best episode of Loki yet, and although there are a few thoughts and quibbles that can be raised this episode certainly delivered in making you want to keep watching to see the next mystery or plot twist unfold.
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