Loki Episode 2 review – Loki Vs The Apocalypse
*** WARNING: This review contains spoilers for all episodes of Loki and parts of The MCU ***
Last week’s opening episode of Loki saw our favourite God of Mischief (Tom Hiddleston) apprehended by the Time Variance Authority, and saved from extermination by a TVA agent named Mobius (Owen Wilson) who believes he is key to helping catch a time variant who is another version of Loki. Considering their task of introducing a whole dimension in around fifty minutes, we think they did quite well.
This week’s episode opens at a renaissance fair in the 1980s, a kind of playful take on the time travel aspect (a period setting with people dressed from an even earlier period). TVA agents are called in to deal with a discrepancy in The Sacred Timeline, but are trapped by the hooded figure from last week who we assume to be Bad Loki (well, Worse Loki). The figure briefly possesses an agent (Sasha Lane), using them to take out their comrades, before dragging them into a portal.
Back at TVA headquarters, we briefly see Loki feuding with Miss Minutes, before being briefed on this latest incident by Mobius. It’s explained that different versions of Loki may have variations, be it subtle or major. Some plot holes are sealed (you can’t travel back before the incidents happened because reasons), Bad Loki is stealing reset charges, and Mobius teases an audience with The Time Keepers if Our Loki helps him in his mission.
There’s a lot of “wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey stuff”, to quote Doctor Who, but what’s important here is the tone the series is setting. It’s another buddy cop scenario, but slightly more reluctant in this case. If Falcon and Winter Soldier was Lethal Weapon, think of Loki as 48 Hours – a criminal temporarily paired with a weary detective to catch a killer.
Loki enters the renaissance fair with Mobius and Hunter B-15 (Wunmi Mosaku), a senior agent who mistrusts Loki. Loki tells the agents it’s a trap and demands assurances if he is to help them, stalling for time. Mobius sees through it, and the mission is ruined through Loki’s stalling.
Again, it’s not so much what is happening, but how it happens. This particular scene isn’t important narratively, but gives Hiddleston a chance to shine and be the most Loki he can be. “I see a scheme, and in that scheme, I see myself” he hisses, matching Elissa Karasik’s impressive dialogue with his own gravitas. We’ve achieved little in terms of plot advancement, but we learn a lot about our lead’s knack for survival.
Back at the headquarters, Judge Renslayer (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) berates Mobius for trusting Loki too much, and reveals The Time Keepers (whom even Mobius hasn’t met) are closely watching their case. Frustrated with Loki, Mobius drowns him in paperwork, which Loki obviously ignores in favour of looking up files about the future, including Ragnarok. While upset by the news, he deduces that Bad Loki can do anything inside of an apocalyptic event, because those actions will be wiped out and the future will not be affected. We then see a sequence where he proves his theory at the eruption in Pompeii.
We’re not sure why the Pompeii scene is so glorious, there’s just something enjoyable about seeing Loki causing chaos, then gleefully celebrating when he finds out he’s right, with an ash cloud just ahead in the distance. An earlier conversation saw Mobius call Loki a lost little boy, desperate for validation. It’s hard not to smile when we see him get it.
After some discussion about the end of time and free will back at the TVA, the pair deduce that the bubble gum Mobius found the first time we saw him is the key to finding The Variant/Bad Loki. The bubble gum is from a certain time period, and so they cross reference with apocalyptic events to find The Variant at a Roxxcart grocery store in 2050, just before the area is destroyed by a natural disaster. Indeed, The Variant is there, and takes over Hunter B-15 in order to eliminate agents and fight Loki. The Variant switches bodies as the fight goes on, while Mobius looks for the stolen reset charges that they are planning to use to blow a hole in The Sacred Timeline.
Mobius finds the kidnapped agent from the renaissance fair, who reveals she told The Variant “everything”, while repeating “it’s real, it’s real”. Loki asks The Variant to team up, an offer which is declined before they unmask to reveal… Lady Loki (Sophia Di Martino)! She steps through a time portal just as the reset charges detonate, going through doors of their own and causing multiple offshoots in The Sacred Timeline. Mobius catches up with Loki and tells him not to follow her through the portal, but our anti-hero just can’t resist and disappears with her.
As with the timeline itself, there are a lot of loose threads for next week. Is this the start of The Multiverse teased in the title of the new Doctor Strange film? What did the agent mean when she said “it’s real”? What is Lady Loki’s plan, and are the reset charges the plan or a distraction? “Lady Loki” isn’t lazy naming on our part, by the way. The character appeared in the Dark Reign comics in the 2000s, but given both the comics and the series have confirmed Loki is Genderfluid, it makes sense that this is the same Loki in another form.
Internet theories also suggest this may be a version of Enchantress, a powerful sorceress and part of the Thor universe, though how she would trick the TVA into thinking she’s Loki would be anyone’s guess. There’s a whole lot of questions and misdirection, but at the moment Loki is shaping up to be a fun detective story that, as the finale to this episode proves, isn’t afraid to cause a bit of mischief.
New episodes of Loki are available every Wednesday on Disney+