All Marvel had to do was wait a week. The fourth episode of Loki season 2 concluded with a mind-melter of a cliffhanger, one which saw Loki and the TVA lose, with all of time and space seemingly wiped out in the process. As MCU mic drops go, it’s up there with the best – and inarguably the greatest water-cooler moment Marvel Studios has had since Avengers: Infinity War.
It led to all sorts of questions: Wait, there are two episodes left?! What happens next? Has the MCU been rebooted? Like most watching, I had no clue what could come down the line thanks to this reality-ripping cut to black.
Unfortunately, Marvel has undone a fair chunk of goodwill in my eyes by dropping marketing – a whole trailer, in fact – for the final two episodes well in advance.
Remember when Marvel went radio silent after Thanos snapped away half the universe? Avengers: Endgame had no promo for around six months and, even then, it was gloriously vague in how Earth’s Mightiest Heroes could undo the effects of the Blip – or even if they could at all.
Heck, we didn’t even get a title for months, which led to the sort of fervent speculation that had many across Reddit and social media donning their tinfoil hats and trying to figure out if an unfolded ladder meant we were getting Avengers: Annihilation (yes, that really happened).
Loki has been on a similar trajectory, inviting the sort of weekly fan theories and conspiracies that propelled the likes of WandaVision to greatness. The problem is that now, we can put some of the pieces together. If you don’t want any of Loki spoiled, I suggest you look away now – and avoid social media for the next few days.
Time for a re-think
The new Loki season 2 trailer focuses on Loki seemingly rounding up many of his old colleagues, each of whom has apparently forgotten both the God of Mischief and everything that happened inside the corridors of the TVA. From that, and the abundance of locations that Loki revisits from episodes 1-3, it’s not too much of a leap to work out that he’s now caught in a time loop that keeps ending with reality being destroyed at the Temporal Loom.
Now, it’s up to Tom Hiddleston’s trickster to work out what went wrong and aim to fix it. In essence, it’s less a cataclysmic event and more Groundhog Day with an Asgardian at the middle of it all. A cool concept, to be sure, but one that I wish wasn’t ruined by a single trailer. We even see the effects of Loki’s actions, with someone – not Victor Timely – heading out to fix the Temporal Loom this time. Surely there are more sleights of hands and tricksy feints to come but this all now seems too… straightforward.
A theory posited by one Redditor – that Victor Timely would have to become He Who Remains to save/doom (depending on how you look at it) the universe – is now in danger of becoming something far more concrete – days and weeks before we were meant to get the answers.
The lessons here are clear. When Marvel is holding a hot hand – try as it might, it’s been hard to come by in Marvel Phase 5 – then it should have more faith in the product. Sometimes doing nothing is better than showing what’s behind the curtain. Keep the mystery, keep the suspense, and keep people watching.
After all, are there now more questions than answers? Not really. That’s the strength of an all-timer of a cliffhanger and it’s one we had up until a few days ago. Sadly, it’s all been undone by a trailer and someone in marketing with an itchy trigger finger. If only Loki had been a little more low-key. Maybe next time…
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