Spoilers for Episode 3 of Loki Follow!
Last week’s episode of Loki ended on a huge cliffhanger with our titular God of Mischief finally meeting the other variant who is being hunted by the TVA, which actually turned out to be the MCU’s first iteration of a female Loki. This Lady Loki variant who chooses to go by Sylvie (Sophia Di Martino) does the impossible by sending ‘time charges’ across various points in the past and present, causing the time stream to branch off into complete chaos.
Episode 3 picks up with Loki chasing Sylvie back into the TVA, as she attempts to finish her grand scheme by killing the Time-keepers themselves. The two Lokis clash and their own mischievous devices backfire, resulting with them being stranded on Lamentis-1 – a planet on the eve of apocalypse in the year 2077 as its moon slowly crumbles down to the surface. Loki and Sylvie must put their literal and internal differences aside so they can escape this Armageddon.
Episode 3 of Loki is the shortest in the series so far, coming in at roughly 35 minutes (not counting 7 minutes of credits). The majority of the runtime sees the two tricksters trying to escape Lamentis-1 before its ultimate doom, here is where we get the best parts of the episode in Loki and Sylvie’s interactions. Specifically during an intimate scene where both of them talk about their mothers and past relationships, we’re given more of what is seen as best part of Loki: the small moments where characters can just talk to one another.
This entry mostly serves to just introduce Sylvie and show the distinctions between her and the Loki we have known for 10 years now. However, outside of a few tidbits, we still don’t know much about Sylvie except her being a version of Loki who no longer claims the name and is on a righteous mission to kill the Time-keepers. Now, she is a variant of the God of Mischief, so we can only take anything she says with caution. Having said that, Sylvie shows plenty of potential to become a new fan-favorite for the long run, especially in part due to Sophia Di Martino’s performance. They seamlessly match Tom Hiddleston’s screen presence and the duo’s combined energy makes their shared scenes such a joy to watch.
Visually, the show has looked fantastic and Episode 3 continues this trend with Lamentis-1 being eye-popping with its purple rock-like landscapes, very similar to Vormir from the last two Avengers films. Meanwhile, its cities and architecture are reminiscent of places we’ve seen before in Thor: Ragnarok and Guardians of The Galaxy. Only being 3 episodes in, Loki already boasts more spectacle than the previous Marvel Disney+ shows. Speaking of being only 3 episodes in though, we are now officially at the halfway point for the show, which raises some great concerns.
The fact of the matter is, for now being at the middle of the series, we still don’t have any grasp of answers to any of the questions we had beforehand – we’re just left to ask more questions on top of the previous ones. We obviously can’t say how the show is going to exactly end, but after today’s episode, we can start to form an idea of how the next few weeks might play out. It’s unfortunate that Loki seems to be falling into the same trap as the previous MCU shows in terms of the audience already knowing where the series is going take its characters from the beginning. To elaborate, “Wandavision is here to show how Wanda Maximoff becomes the Scarlet Witch and how she connects to the world of Doctor Strange while The Falcon and the Winter Soldier exists to show Sam accept the mantle of Captain America.” Loki started with endless possibility, but the current structure slightly takes away from that. We may not be able to see the future like the Time-keepers, but some interesting revelations this week can definitely set us on the correct path in predicting Loki, for better and worse.
This week’s episode gave us two interesting revelations with the first being that all of the TVA’s workers, including Mobius, Hunter-B-15, and possibly even Renslayer, are variants themselves. This leads to more questions about the Time-keepers and the real role they’re playing in the Multiverse, as well as the true origin of Mobius and if this shocking reveal will lead him to join Loki and Sylvie in overthrowing the timeline. The other revelation is a pretty big one as this episode confirms that Loki himself is Bisexual. On one hand, it’s not shocking that this is confirmed in one line as Disney is notorious for doing the bare minimum in terms of LGBTQ+ representation. On the other, this is long overdue development for a character that we’ve seen on screen for a decade. Admittedly, this is just the first step and while it’s unlikely that we’ll see a love interest for Loki in the second half of the show, the door is now open for Marvel to do so in a future season or movie.
Still, Episode 3 of Loki is a fun ride that picks up from the crazy ending of last week and delivers more of the small, quieter moments that this series has really excelled at. A good time filled with beautiful visuals and heartfelt interactions between Loki and Sylvie, albeit a bit frustrating with it not giving us much for a mid-season outing, the interesting reveals that are shown make up and leave us with more anticipation for what is next.
