The Short Take:
Moving at a breakneck pace, LOKI episode 4 — unrelenting in its excitement — offers explosive plot reveals, character revelations, and thrilling action. I’m now ready to say that this is the best Marvel/Disney+ series to date.
[SPOILER WARNING: Every quip I come up with to reference the episode is a spoiler. Also, there was a mid-credits scene. Make sure you’ve seen that before you continue.]
The Long Take:
Oftentimes, the measure of a great episode of television is how frequently I yell at my TV (which, since my kids are asleep, usually sounds like someone having an argument in a library, whispering exclamations while gesticulating wildly). Tonight’s readings are off the charts; I think at one point I just flailed with both arms while breathily yelling, “WHAT IS HAPPENING?!?!?!” several times.
Both WandaVision and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier kicked into high gear and arguably peaked at this point, just beyond midway into the season. It remains to be seen if the latter will apply to Loki, but after last week’s relatively slower and weaker episode, we definitely get the former here. This episode of Loki packs in so even more information than its counterparts in the other two shows. I’m usually list averse, but I think making one is the only way to illustrate just how many major events and revelations this one episode contains:
* Loki realizes he cares for Sylvie in a way that, as he says, is all new to him. Their mutual feelings for each other are so radical that they create a very noticeable line on the TVA’s radar, allowing Mobius et al to find them.
* We learn that when Ravonna Renslayer was a Hunter, she captured wee Sylvie and looked like an idiot when a small child stole her tempad and escaped. So this is personal for her.
* Mobius and Hunter B-15 both receive game-changing, life-changing new information about the TVA and the very nature of their existence. By the end of the episode they’ve completely switched allegiances and teamed up with Loki and Sylvie respectively.
* Ravonna PRUNES MOBIUS right in front of Loki.
* Ravonna also PRUNES LOKI just as he is about to profess his love for her. Way to ruin the moment, Ravonna.
* But, in true comic book fashion, dead isn’t really dead (or deleted isn’t really deleted) because in a mid-credits scene, Loki rouses in what appears to be a pocket dimension used to imprison Loki variants. He looks up to find four other Lokis — one of whom is a GATOR — staring back down at him. Turns out, like on my computer, deleted items go to a trash can in case I want to take it all back later.
* Oh wait, and the Timekeepers waiting behind those golden doors are actually animatronic robots, probably in place to create a Wizard of Oz style intimidation effect.
Did I miss anything? That’s entirely possible with so much going on.
On a thematic level, the episode ardently advocates for free will, and, more specifically, defying type or expectation. When Sylvie asks Loki, “Do you think what makes a Loki a Loki is the fact that we always lose?” He reminds her that she thwarted the TVA and is generally “amazing.” Mobius, right before Ravonna callously zaps him, tells Loki that “You could be whoever, whatever you want to be. Even someone good.” Lines like these, when strung together, argue for not only the choices we can make of our own free will but for a disregard for what society assumes about us. Not a new message, by any means, but an important one nonetheless. These individualistic sentiments could also open the door to a rebellion against what we consider canon in the MCU. Loki and all the other Marvel characters shouldn’t have to predictably follow their predecessors. A Loki doesn’t always have to be a selfish villain who’s in a story just to fail. Captain America doesn’t have to be white. Thor doesn’t have to be a man (by the way, have you seen how swole Natalie Portman got for Thor: Love and Thunder?). Comic books, of course, have long embraced this idea. Every new run of a famed character offers a new interpretation. But perhaps the Loki show signals that we can look forward more variants of our favorite heroes and villains on screen.
Loki himself would not want me to forget that his name is the title of the show, which is first and foremost a character study. And amidst all the action and drama of this week, I’d still say (as I’ve said before) that this show’s main strength is its entangling of Loki’s personal growth with not just the plot of the show but the fabric of time itself. Can the TVA rebrand themselves as a therapy clinic? Because everything they do to torture Loki seems to push him towards a breakthrough. The bad memory loop that Mobius uses to “marinate” Loki prior to interrogation is exactly what he needs to confront his own issues. He says, “I’m a horrible person. I get it….I crave attention because I’m a narcissist. And I suppose it’s because I’m scared of being alone.” Amazing delivery by Tom Huddleston here; you really get the sense that he has psychoanalyzed Loki and cares about this character quite a bit.
The problem with all this leveling up in emotional intelligence, though, is that it actively goes against the Sacred Timeline, where Loki is “destined” to be alone. So any kind of genuine connection he might now be able to make would actively pose a threat. Hence, why he and Sylvie holding hands at the end of Lamentis 2 spikes a massive Nexus event. Podcast buzz speculates that whoever is behind the Timekeeper puppets is very selfishly trying to maintain the sacred timeline, and Loki always being alone and being a (failed) villain needs to be constant in order for “their” timeline to remain intact.
So, who is actually behind the TVA? Who set up those fake space lizards? If I look back at the precedent set up by the past shows alone, I don’t think we will get a major villain reveal like Kang the Conquerer, who will be played by Lovecraft Country’s Jonathan Majors in the next Antman film. They decided not to bring Benedict Cumberbatch to WandaVision, so I think there’s a “save it for the movies” strategy in play. My research tells me that Ravonna Renslayer has been romantically involved with Kang in the comics, and lots of folks think that he might be the man behind the curtain. But we never got Mephisto in WandaVision like everyone thought, so I agree with those who say that it has to be someone we’ve already seen on the show. Yes, Ravonna seems like mini-boss, but what if her fear of the Timekeepers is all an act? She was the main antagonist in this episode, and with only two more to go, I think that’s not likely to change. The other plausible candidate would be Miss Minutes, who just seems too innocuous to NOT be a creepy sleeper villain.
Who do you think is at the top of the TVA?
And what’s going to happen with all those pruned Loki’s next week?