by Jeffery J. Rahming, Contributing Writer
Of all the bad guys that Marvel has had over the past decade-plus, Loki is the one that stood out the most, so it’s no surprise that he would be the first villain to get his own tv show.
In the new Disney+ show, Loki, we follow Loki himself after he takes the Tesseract in Avengers: Endgame and ends up in the hands of the Time Variance Authority (or, the TVA), a group dedicated to protecting the flow of the timeline run by the mysterious timekeepers. Under the watch of TVA agent Mobius (Owen Wilson), Loki works with the organization to confront an alternate timeline version of himself that seems bent on destroying the timekeepers. As it turns out, the title doesn’t just refer to the Loki we know, but all Lokis from every timeline.
I would say out of the three Marvel TV shows we’ve had so far, Loki is the one that reminds me the most of a traditional Marvel movie. It has the most impact on the broader Marvel universe, which ends up being both a blessing and a burden for the show.
If there’s one thing this show nails, it’s the characters. Loki’s character arc throughout this series, while arguably quite rushed, is entertaining and engaging to watch. His inflated ego is destroyed when his encounters with his variants forces him to see himself as others see him: a scared, self-centered, and lonely being. The show takes the idea of taking a good, hard look at yourself to the next level. Of course, we’ve already seen MCU Loki go through a bad to good character arc, but this time we get to experience it with Loki as the main character, as opposed to the movies where it was a subplot to Thor’s story.
Tom Hiddleston kills it in the titular role as always, but Sophia Di Martino as the Female Loki variant, Sylvie steals the show. I don’t know how Marvel finds so much strong, relatively unknown talent, but they’re the best at it. I can’t wait to see what the future holds for her character in the MCU. The cast is rounded out by the TVA agents whose ranks include prolific actors like Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Wunmi Mosaku, and the previously mentioned Wilson in a rare non-comedic role. Wilson and Hiddleston’s chemistry together was one of the best aspects of the season.
While the cast and characters are far and away the best part of this show, the story itself felt a little lackluster. While the agents in the TVA were fun, the mystery plot of who the timekeepers were wasn’t as interesting or suspenseful as the writers thought it was. For anybody that’s a Marvel Comics fan, where it ended up was pretty predictable, but for people that weren’t as versed in the comics, it felt a little underwhelming. It sets up some amazing possibilities for the future of the universe, but in the context of just the series, the final reveal would’ve been better served if it happened earlier in the season instead of making it a big mystery saved until the very end.
This season also didn’t fully utilize the “anywhere in space and time” aspect of the show. You gave Loki the ability to be in any era and any place in the universe, and the most the series offers us is a brief scene in Pompeii, a dark supermarket, a rather generic alien planet with a purple filter on it, a grassy field, and when we finally get to the climactic moment of the season we end up in… a room. Outside of those scenes, the majority of the show is spent in the TVA office which, while it has an impressive design, is still just an office. Hopefully, the second season can capitalize more on the idea and give us some more exciting settings.
All that being said, when Loki was over, I felt it was an entertaining enough journey to overcome its shortcomings. Loki’s character and his chemistry with Sylvie and Mobius are enough to carry a somewhat meandering plot. It also sets up some fascinating possibilities for the MCU (though the very fact that it is a setup is what contributes to it being somewhat sloppy). If you’re one of the few people who hasn’t given it a chance yet, it’s a TV show that’s worth your time.
Grade: A-