Loki is back with a bang. The first episode is called "Ouroboros". Named after our favorite new character. This episode was a delight. The stakes don't feel as high as the previous season, but it is so much fun all on its own.
The episode opens straight up where the previous season ended. The previous season ended with Sylvie kicking Loki through a time door and killing He Who Remains. So many branches of timeline have been opened and the multiverse has been set free. But Sylvie kicked Loki through a time door and he arrived at the TVA. But B-15 and Mobius did not recognize him. It's an interesting start, but not as interesting as the previous season.
The season officially opens with a close up on a giant statue of a Kang variant standing in the middle of the TVA space, instead of the statue of the time-keepers. Then we see Loki running away from Mobius, B-15 and countless minuteman. Loki tries to address Mobius, but he simply doesn't recognize him. So Loki does something that they don't expect and simply jumps off the balcony to take his chance. Luck is on his side and he lands into a flying car which flies straight into the statue of Kang. Maybe symbolizing his eventual demise or the demise of this variant.
Then the car flies into a room where we see Casey again. Fans loved Casey so now he is back. He is shocked to see Loki falling out of a car that just flew through a window. Loki tries for nonchalant and says that he is fine and wishing people good morning, but they don't buy it. As they should. Then a television set falls from the ceiling and cracks the floor. The symbol on the floor looks very much like Kang's face and a sword going straight though an hourglass. But now it is cracked. Let all the metaphors guessing beginning again.
Then Loki collapses with fatigue. It has been a very long day for him. He has no more power for his charade. Then Casey gets a message that there is an intruder and Loki hears it. Loki tries to appeal to Casey, but Casey also doesn't remember him at all. Casey presents to remember him, but then just calls backup. Then we see Loki gets ripped and he is transported to what feels like a different room in the TVA, but it is actually the same room. The broken window has been fixed and now a wall covers it. Casey is there but now he does recognize Loki. Loki is confused and wants Casey to help him, but as he looks back he sees the cracked floor. The same floor that he cracked when the caused the television to fall. He asks Casey about the crack and Casey explains that it has always been there. Loki wisely concludes that he was in the past. He is spontaneously travelling through time. Loki is a clever one and this is a nice twist.
Casey is very confused about Loki's behavior. He does tell him where Mobius and B-15 are, but then Loki just disappear again, leaving Casey even more confused.
Then we have the super cool opening song. I still love it.
Now we switch to Mobius and B-15 who are contemplating their next move. Should they reveal the truth to the minuteman, that they are all variant and had lives on the timeline? Casey then informs them that Loki was there and then he disappeared which makes everyone really confused understandably. Mobius hopes that Miss Minutes can find Loki, but she's a no show. X-5 shows up and makes fun of Mobius' obsession with jet skis. X-5 informs Mobius that since Renslayer is gone there is now a new council. That means that General Dox and Judge Gamble want to see both Mobius and B-15 in the war room. I do not like X-5, he is a suspicious person in my eyes and his attitude is all wrong.
Loki then returns and gives poor Casey another heart attack. He again tell Loki where to find Mobius and B-15. Loki goes and leaves Casey very confused and distraught. Just like the branching timelines. While Mobius and B-15 walk, Loki shows up and disappears again. When they reach the war room the minuteman that pruned Mobius apologizes to him. Mobius and B-15 are worried about the war council. Loki shows up in the same room, but in a different time. The same room but this one has a statue wall full of the faces of Kang. In present time in the war room the council is listening to the recording which reveals the truth about the TVA. General Dox really cares about the protocol which is odd. Both Dox and Gamble are worried about the timeline as Mobius and B-15 gave out the order to stop pruning the branching timelines. Obviously, this is causing chaos and there seems to be a problem with the electricity as well. This entire situation is suspicious in my book.
Now we return to Loki. He turns on the recording device which is in the past and hears the voice of Kang. In this recording Kang is thanking someone and tells them that they will be proud to lead with them. This is probably referring to Renslayer as she and Kang are a couple in the comics. Then Loki rewind the tape and we hear her voice, Renslayer indeed. In the present time General Dox is unhappy with B-15 and her and Mobius' decision to stop pruning. Mobius tries to calm everyone and says that the sky hasn't fallen since they stopped pruning the timeline, but X-5 contradicts him. For him, the robot head of the time keeper means that the sky has fallen. B-15 tells them that pruning the timeline is committing atrocities and she is totally right. That was Sylvie's point all along. But General Dox is not on board with this attitude. It doesn't matter what Judge Gamble says, we can see she has made up her mind. Judge Gamble takes B-15's side and gives the official order to stop pruning the timelines effecting immediately. That changes everything, except General Dox. I expect trouble from her.
Then Loki shows up in the war room and shacks things up even more. Loki is surprised, happy and panicked that now Mobius recognizes him. X-5 wants to prune Loki on the spot, but B-15 stops him. General Dox screams which stops everyone, but Loki. Loki tell Mobius that they found "him". He looks at the wall where there were previously a carving with Kang's face from all angels, but now there is just a wall there with the time keepers. Loki steal the pruning stick from X-5 and touches the wall to reveal the old wall, filled with Kang. Loki informs everyone that Kang build thing place and stole their lives and that now he will be coming back. Well, I am not sure that coming back is the correct term but I do expect trouble.
Now Loki has to tell his experience. Loki explains that Sylvie was about to kill Kang and General Dox suddenly seems awfully interested in Sylvie, more interested in Sylvie than anything else. Loki explains that he doesn't know where Sylvie is and that she kicked him through a time door. Mobius takes Loki out of the war room and we stay to focus on General Dox and X-5. Just like Renslayer, she doesn’t care that the time-keeper aren't real. She thinks that their warnings were true regardless. General Dox tells X-5 that they need to know what happened at the end of time. She seems awfully close to him, intimate even. She wants X-5 to find Sylvie and B-15 doesn't look happy at their exchange. There is something fishy going on with General Dox.
Now we switch back to Mobius and Loki. Loki explains that they found the Citadel at the End of Time. Loki explains that he just wanted time to think, but Sylvie was sure of their course of action. Loki explains that He Who Remains made sense to him. Loki explains that freeing the timeline will only bring on more violence and war and a lot more Kang variants. But Sylvie was so convinced that He Who Remains was the devil. Loki explains to Mobius that He Who Remains wiped his memory, more than once, that's why he doesn't remember him ruling. Regardless, the deed is done and the multiversal war is coming.
Mobius is a one problem at a time sort of a man, so he wants to know how Loki just showed up at the war room. Loki explains that he was in the past first, but Mobius explains that there is no past or future in the TVA. Clearly there is now. Especially as Mobius sees Loki disappearing and reappearing right in front of him. Loki says that it is not so bad, but he looks terrible and Mobius looks incredulous. Mobius wants to consulate with Miss Minutes, but Loki explains that she cannot be trusted as she was also at the end of time working with He Who Remains. That will probably be important later on.
Mobius explains that for now they need to fix Loki's time traveling problem. He says he needs a Loki who remains before they deal with He Who Remains. They have a tech dude for such problems. Mobius also explains that he looks terrible when this happens so it needs urgent fixing. Mobius thinks that He Who Remains is an arrogant name, but Loki thinks it's not because that is literally who and what he is. Now Mobius needs to imagine about a million of those which he rather not, but clearly they are coming.
Then Loki and Mobius reach what seems to be the basement of the TVA, but it is actually their version of R&A. This is Ouroboros department. Ouroboros is also a snake that devours itself and is reborn from itself, it is the symbol of the endless and cycles and it might be important later on. Ouroboros remembers Mobius, but Mobius doesn't remember him. This means that Ouroboros didn't have his memory wiped clean like Mobius did. The last time they meet was 400 years ago, but Mobius doesn't remember, he pretends to remember, but it doesn't really work. Loki tries to roll with Mobius, but it doesn't really work. Ouroboros does say that Mobius nicknamed him O.B. so that's what they call him. Also, he seems very cheerful for a dude that works none stop and never sleeps. Then Loki disappears again. O.B. calls it time-slipping and says that he can't fix it. It is supposed to be impossible to time-slip in the TVA, but it is clearly happening.
Now we switch to Loki in the past. He meets past Ouroboros and nicknames him O.B. which is cute. Then O.B. in the present time remembers meeting Loki in the past which is now currently happening with Loki. So bizarre. Loki asks past O.B. how can he fix the situation and past O.B. has an idea. He needs a Temporal Aura Extractor in the time he needs to be in. Loki asks O.B. to hang on to it until Mobius shows up. Then O.B. in the future remembers that and takes it out. It is a dangerous mission. Mobius can loss his skin and Loki needs to prune himself with the possibility of being lost forever in time. There are consequences to failing.
Apparently things are more problematic then they knew. O.B. complains that his lamp has been twitching all day and Mobius explains that all day there are power problems in the TVA. O.B. thinks that this is a big problem, more serious than Mobius thought it to be. B-15 shows up and tell them everything is a mess upstairs, but they explain that this is important. Since they are no longer pruning the timelines there is too much stress on the Temporal Loom. The Temporal Loom is the heart of the TVA. It creates the physical timeline that they see on their screens. They didn't think about opening the guidebook to see where it came from. It looks and it is a disaster, the overload of endless timelines. Miss Minutes used to take care of everything, but of course now she doesn't. It looks like the branching timelines will become a very big problem.
A problem for the future. Now they have to extract Loki immediately, because in order to save the TVA without pruning the timeline, they need to close the blast doors. The doors that will shut out the Temporal Loom from the TVA. They have about five minute to make their new plan work because the Temporal Loom is causing havoc. A minute man shows up to tell them that General Dox is raiding the armory. B-15 says she will handle Dox while they have to save Loki and the TVA. I don't think she has what it takes to handle Dox.
Things become more complicated when Loki time-slips again and the pruning stick gets accidently left behind. Loki seems the scribble that Mobius left and realizes that he is in the future and that there is an emergency in the TVA. I am not sure what sort of an emergency it is. He has to find a new time stick though. Mobius is nervous about his part as he has to go out into Temporal Loom which is vacuum space it seems, with a cracked suit hoping his skin doesn't peel off. In the future there is some emergency in the TVA and everyone are evacuating because everything is collapsing. There is no one there and no time stick to find. Mobius does hit part without a problem and Loki gets the single to prune himself, but he is lost. He hears a phone ringing in the distance. O.B. tells Mobius that Loki failed and they have to close the Temporal Loom now. They have 30 seconds and Loki walks slowly towards the phone realizing that he lost. He is doomed and he is crying. Near the phone the elevator doors start to open. O.B. tries to delay the 30 seconds. He keeps saying three hoping that Loki will miraculously show up. Mobius eventually accepts that Loki is lost and heads back because the blast doors start to close. In the future the elevator opens and we see Sylvie. She tells Loki "there you are" and prunes him. Which in this case basically saves him. Loki is blasted through the extractor and he lands on Mobius pushing them both through the blast doors at the last second. They are both saved. Saved to deal with the bigger threat.
We switch to B-15. General Dox has gathered an army at her disposal. They are armed and they are many. It cannot be all for Sylvie. They all go through a time door so it is too late to stop them and General Dox is with them. This is how the episode ends.
But there is a post credit scene here. Sylvie shows up on a branched timeline in 1982 on Earth. She walks into a McDonalds of all places. She looks at the clean tables and the happy people and she is actually touched by it. She asks how to do this and the person at the cash register asks her what she would like. Her list of demands is pretty terrible, basically something dead without a face. The dude doesn't seemed troubled by her strange request and basically reads her the entire menu. She looks at the happy people and she has tears in her eyes. She says she wants to try everything. I hope not all at once because that is a lot of food.
The performances in this episode were most fantastic. Tom Hiddleston was born to be Loki. He just nails every single line, perfect delivery and so much charisma. He nails it all. Ke Huy Quan, as Ouroboros, is the newest addition to the show after he won an Oscar for best supporting actor for his role in Everything Everywhere all at Once. He crushes it here. His comedic timing is perfect, he is both serious and hilarious all at once and I hope we will see a lot more of him this season. Owen Wilson is great as ever, his Mobius is great both with serious part and the comedic parts. I mean he is very much a slight more serious version of Owen Wilson in this role, but it works. Kate Dickie sure leaves a terrifying impression as General Dox. Sophia Di Martino seems to be playing two Sylvies in this episode and she did it perfectly. Wunmi Mosaku's B-15 didn't have all that much to do in this episode. I was wondering if she and the other minuteman would want to go back to the timeline to live their lives, but it looks like that is not on her agenda or anyone else's for that matter.
It was a good first episode. We have the bigger problems, Kang variants, the TVA physically falling apart and General Dox's plan and the small problem of the episode that also resolved in this episode, the time-slipping. It was very well paced. I don't think we will get to see the multiverse war in this show, but maybe the start of it. It still feels a bit underwhelming considering the ending of the previous season. It is going to be hard to live up to that big reveal. But it was still a fun episode. High stakes, but also high humor. So yeah, I really liked this episode. I hope that there is another mind-blowing finale waiting for us. It will be so hard to top the previous season, but I have high expectations.
What do you think? Did you watch the first episode and did you like it?
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