We’ve now reached the half way point of Loki, and finally I am pleased to say…business is picking up! Episode 2 ended with the reveal the Loki variant that Mobius has enlisted Loki to track down is a female version of the God of Mischief.
The good news for me in terms of writing this review and breakdown is that I won’t have to spent much time saying ‘new Loki’ or ‘Lady Loki’ as after a short while the episode clarified that Lady Loki is known as Sylvie. Played by Sophia Di Martino, who upon looking up I realised I recognised from the British hospital drama series Casualty from many years ago, Sylvie is a variant Loki who has developed some different powers to Loki.
She has enchanting powers, and for the first portion of this episode she tries to kill Loki whilst Loki is trying to strike up an alliance. Loki manages to get control of the TemPad gadget which for me was basically the ‘timer’ from Sliders, or Ziggy from Quantum Leap, which is just a hand held device which can go wrong at convenient points meaning our heroes (or in this case villains) now have an adventure to get through! This is a classic formula for sci-fi shows where characters have a mission to fix the broken gadgets needed to get them home.
In the case of this episode Loki and Sylvie find themselves on Lamentis-1, a randomly picked world by Loki who didn’t know that in the case of this apocalypse, no one would survive. So considering that their TemPad is broken, they have to work fast to get a new power source to fix it. This finds the Asgardians on a train heading towards a rocket planned to escape the dying world, where they will take the massive power to power the TemPad.
The train journey is an important point for the relationship between Loki and Sylvie as it gives them a chance to compare notes and find common ground between each other, and not just fight to kill their alternate self. The episode builds upon the file that was previously shown about Loki that confirmed Loki to be gender fluid, and delves more into this to confirm Loki is bisexual. This is something that has been previously explored in the comics, but this is the first time the MCU has explored it on screen. It will be interesting to see if this is Marvel laying groundwork for any planned upcoming stories or relationships with the characters, or if this is just an easter egg to flesh out Loki’s backstory.
It was fun to see the differences between the two Lokis and see that where as Sylvie wanted to keep a clear head about the mission at hand, Loki almost defiantly wanted to drink and ended up getting drunk and thrown off the train which would see the TemPad destroyed beyond use. It was great to see drunk Loki singing what is probably a traditional Asgardian folk song. It was also a nice nod and call back to Thor that upon finishing his drink Loki would smash his glass and simply proclaim ‘Another!’
Loki and Sylvie now had to head to the Ark that was planned to escape the planet and where as this world was a known apocalypse with no survivors, their mission was now to ensure that the Ark would successfully escape and they were on it when it did. This lead to a great action sequence as they tried to push through a crowd to get to the ark, but ultimately the destruction of the planet meant that they didn’t make it in time.
This leaves the episode on the cliff hanger that they won’t escape, but considering we have half the series still to come, we can hedge our bets that they will make it at the start of next week. My prediction is that the TVA lead by Owen Wilson will appear about 6 or 7 minutes into the episode next week just as the Lokis are about to die and they will capture them both. Why 6 or 7 minutes in? Well I expect there will be an opportunity for a Loki-Sylvie heart to heart which will create an unbreakable bond between them so that when they’re captured they will choose to work together no matter what to defat the TVA.
It was revealed by Sylvie that all workers at the TVA are variants just as they are and this opens up possibilities that if they can convince Mobius that he just like them have been taken from his time line they may have an ally to work with and the rest of the season will see the three all work together. We all know that ultimately this will end with the creation of the MCU multiverse and it will be ‘Madness’ to set up Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness.
Conclusion
After a slower and less action packed start to the series, Loki is now delivering the kind of action and plot reveals that we all hoped it would. This episode was a fun filler episode that spent most of it’s time just delaying our villains from getting to their mission with roadblocks, but it was a great excuse to explore their dynamic, and like with past Marvel Disney Plus series we can expect this to ramp up as we head towards the latter half of the show!
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