This article will contain spoilers from Loki seasons 1 and 2.
Loki, the Disney+ original production, achieved an astounding 92% of approval from the Rotten Tomatoes critics and 90% from audience score by the ending of its first season. This numbers show that the series is Marvel’s most successful and well received work since the beginning of the MCU (Marvel Cinematic Universe) 4th phase. It is even bigger than WandaVision, that inaugurated the series format for the universe and managed to keep the whole world gripped with fan theories and online debates throughout the whole nine episodes.
Consequently, it also means that the public’s expectation for this sequel was extremely high, considering that the last couple of works put out to the world by the studio did not fulfill any minor expectation from the fans. This season two is a chance for Kevin Feige, Marvel Studios’ president, to redeem himself and make the public fall in love again with the world that they’re building.
SEASON 1 WRAPPED
To catch up with the new episodes, here’s what’s most important to remember from season one:
This Loki (Tom Hiddleston) is a variant. Back in 2012, in the events of the first Avengers movie, he does something that originally was not supposed to happen – catching the Tesseract – so he ends up being arrested by the TVA agents. The Time Variance Agency is presented to us as an organization that exists outside of space and time of Marvel’s main timeline (“The Sacred TimeLine”), kept and ruled by the Time-Keepers. In order to not being disintegrated, he accepts helping the agent Mobius (Owen Wilson) to capture Sylvie (Sophia Di Martino), that latter which we will later get to known as a variant of Loki himself.
Loki and Sylvie join forces and run away together, determined to understand what’s behind the TVA that does not feel right, and in this process they make Mobius and the hunter B-15 (Wunmi Mosaku) start distrusting their leaders too. They end up being taken back and forced to face the Time-Keepers, just to find out that they were nothing but animated figures. In a fight to escape, they’re disintegrated by Judge Renslayer (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) and sent to the Void. At this point we are at the end of time, and they encounter together the citadel where “He Who Remains” is, and just like this, we’re introduced to the next big villain of the franchise.
Kang (Jonathan Majors) knows everything that happens until that point in time, he’s been controlling the timeline and cutting off any variation to protect this universe from his own variants (that, in his words, are more dangerous than him) and the multiversal war that they’re bringing. The final battle ends up with Sylvie sending Loki back through a TVA portal and killing He Who Remains. We have a glimpse of the timeline uncontrollably branching in new variations, and Kang gives a warning that we will definitely see him again someday.
what’s been delivered on the first 3 episodes:
1. OUROBOROS
What I immediately need to point out is how great it feels to watch a production with an original plot again! A lot, and I mean A LOT, of theories have been created on the internet since 2021. The one that grew stronger into the fandom was that Loki was sent to a different universe after the final battle, so that would explain why everything’s different when he returns to the TVA in the last scene. The exciting thing is, this episode came and broke this assumption within minutes. We got half an hour of an unpredictable storyline, and that’s already a good sign straightaway.
It starts right from where we left two years ago. The first sequence is a direct continuation from the dialogue that Loki and Mobius were having when we last saw them, and that really contributes to the feeling of watching an interconnected and non-stop story, which I loved. Honorable mention to Tom Hiddleston and Owen Wilson’s performance, they really constructed one of the best duos dynamics that we ever watched in the MCU history. This duo is incredibly funny and genuine while together, it’s a very beautiful friendship that the show is cultivating, and makes you remember why Loki made such a huge success at first: the characters.
A new name is also presented to the story, Ouroboros (Ke Huy Quan), or OB, and even though he’s being portrayed as a comical relief, I do believe that his abilities with constructing machines and technology knowledge will be more important than we expect until the end of this season.
The general feeling was of a happy surprise. As an action show, it fulfills the role of keeping you curious until the end, and makes you feel that the story is walking towards a point of change in the universe. Until now, we thought that the timeline didn’t work, or at least, that it didn’t reach the TVA, and we were just proved wrong. They also used the chapter to let us know that Kang is not a villain that you want to underestimate, and I’m excited to see what will be developed for him in this project. A total of 10,9 million people watched this episode in the whole world in its first three days of being released!
2. BREAKING BRAD
Even better than the first one, this episode gave us whole long and intense scenes of Loki using his magical powers for the first time in the season. You get so entertained with how charismatic the character is that when they do build the tension to remind us that he’s still a god it makes it ten times more electrifying.
They are focused on finding Sylvie, and during this search we get a few deeper and emotional moments, in a way that includes extensive and well developed dialogues – in a very Loki style that we’re already used to by now, which were very present on this week’s episode.
The episode’s title is inspired by the hunter X-5 (Rafael Casal) , who is living his real life down in the timeline, answering by Brad Wolfe. That, plus Sylvie finally having something closer to a normal life and Mobius not wanting to know what he left behind to join the TVA, makes you wonder what will be their destiny once the season is over. The paradox is that it was already said that they need the Time Variance Agency to face whatever is coming in their way, but at the same time it is not fair that they don’t have a free will to live the life they’re supposed to. I really hope we get to see what Mobius’ life looked like in the next few weeks.
In this episode, we understand a little bit more of what will be the big climax for the story. With the potential danger of the Sacred Timeline collapsing, and the now explicit plan that Kang and Renslayer have going on, the show is confirming one more time that he is vicious and did not come to play.
3. 1893
Leaving two more new questions for each answered one, this episode was really the definition of mindblowing. This time we’re back in time looking for Miss Minutes (Tara Strong) – yes, she’s finally back – and Ravona Renslayer. Loki and Mobius storyline for this one, as much as fun to watch, it’s almost secondary compared with the tons of information thrown at us. It was very exciting to see Kang’s origins story (at least the one that he planned to himself) and to understand what Ms. Minutes really is – apparently, AI is truly the future – but also, every time they add a layer on this story it gets more intriguing.
It is so fascinating the way that they are dealing with time travel, to finally see its effects in the rest of the MCU, and how Kang, even if technically dead, is intelligent enough to arrange a plan for thousands of years in the past.
Jonathan Majors has been doing an outstanding job with this character. Victor Timley, the variant from the past, is nothing like we have seen from Kang up until now, and it leaves us wanting to know more about this Victor-Ramona-Ms. Minutes relationship.
We’re already through half of a great season, the third episode left us on the edge of the couch with a promising cliffhanger, and we can’t wait to see what’s happening next.
———————-
The article above was edited by Clara Rocha.
Liked this type of content? Check Her Campus at Casper Libero‘s home page for more!