“Science/Fiction”
What They Say:
Loki traverses dying timelines in attempt to find his friends, but Reality is not what it seems.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
That bit in the summary just kind of makes me chuckle when you consider the character of Loki across the MCU since his introduction. Attempting to find his friends. Loki has never had friends until we got to this series and it’s such an interesting growth change for the character. That it came in forced form in the first season when he saw the Sacred Timeline showing what happened after the Battle of New York, it definitely changed him. Especially the loss of his mother. This variant Loki has become quite interesting and I definitely get the conversations about him being a villain and the way that he’s not quite a hero her, but I think sometimes folks forget just what that kind of deluge of information can do both in the initial shock and the processing of it over time. Especially amid everything else that has been going on.
Such as the end of everything as we saw at the end of the fourth episode.
Where does a show go from there? It’s not the first time a property has played with that trick but it’s effective here as we see how Loki is able to survive because of his time slipping. What becomes intriguing about this is that he ends up on a journey to various parts of branched timelines where he’s ending up where the other members of the TVA are in their respective lives. It doesn’t do this right away, however, as first we get the eeriness of him being dropped into an empty TVA just before the end and trying to process how he’s still alive. There’s some fun playing with the time slippage but it’s also something that can be frustrating for some viewers who want everything to mean something. Similar to the phone call finally being answered in the previous episode only for it to be a kind of light joke piece. I actually appreciated that moment of levity and it serving as a reminder that not everything has to be this huge clue that will reshape everything.
What we get with Loki being pulled to different places and branches is interesting as it serves as a way to showcase some of the possibilities of these characters. I believe they were all branches so it’s not Sacred Timeline material for most so it’s not 100% certain this is where their lives were. But it is great to see what is likely true, such as B-15 being a doctor or seeing Mobius being a single dad selling jetskis and ATVs among other things. Those glimpses of who they are have shown through in their time in the TVA in different ways and getting a fuller feel for some of it is great. That OB is a science fiction author who doesn’t want to be a scientist anymore is delightfully silly, especially with how he tries to get his books sold. And the sequence with Casey in discovering that his story is connected to a real-life event is a sly and delightful bit that may frustrate some for its intrusion in reality but hits an interesting note to me.
What works well with the episode is that as it progresses, it gets down to why things are happening and circles to it being about Loki. It’s a little muddled in some ways but Loki figuring out that the central thing seems to be him, and how he’s found his friends, allows him to make the bold move toward the end as everything is falling apart again to embrace his ability to move through the time stream by controlling the slipping. Having him watch as his friends are rendered into nothing – in a way that feels far more brutal than the Snap from Infinity War – is that final impetus to actually take control of the slippage. But just the fact that he has friends and is doing this is a fascinating piece for the character. You could see him doing this for his brother to be sure, and certainly his mother, but Loki and friends are things that don’t happen. People have always just been a means to an end. Having him invested in their being alive and to know them and to take action to save them is a wonderfully interesting arc for the character that we’ve known for almost fifteen years in film form.
In Summary:
As I’ve said in the past, I totally get why folks may struggle with this show and what they’re doing. And I do know that there’s a good chunk of MCU fans that will just soak up anything from the property and enjoy it. But Loki, to me, continues to be one of the best if not the best of the Disney+ projects on so many levels. I was concerned with the change in some of the team in going from the first season to the second, especially as it seemed like there was no formal plan for a second season, but the team here hit the ground running and have utilized the cast and their talents incredibly well while bringing it together with fantastic sets and an aesthetic that is as distinctive as Loki is a character. This episode does some great stuff with both Loki and the supporting cast and I’m excited to see if the teases are going to unfold in the finale like it seems they might. And where it all goes from there.
Grade: B+
