Loki season 2 is bringing Marvel Comics’ god of stories to the MCU

Start at the beginning LokiIt’s a very liberal interpretation of Marvel Comics, as the Time Variance Authority and its inner workings have not received consistent attention. Nor has the mischief-making god been directly associated with the Time Variance Authority. It made reference to specific Lokis from comics past, but wasn’t interested in playing out their stories.

The penultimate episode, however, could bring about a change in this situation. LokiSeason 2 The Marvel Cinematic Universe appears to be picking up Loki’s biggest character moment of the last decade — one that, ironically, probably wouldn’t have happened without the MCU.

[Ed. note: This piece contains spoilers for “Science/Fiction,” the fifth episode of Loki season 2.]

Gareth Gatrell/Marvel Studios

There isn’t really a specific moment that gives away the intentions of the Loki writers room in “Science/Fiction,” but lots of vague ones. Sylvie tells him: “We’re all writing our own stories now.” O.B./A.D. Sylvie encourages Loki, to seek the answer to his problem of time travel through fiction and not science. Then there’s Loki’s own end-of-episode declaration that his new ability to control his timeslipping will allow him to “rewrite the story.”

In season 2, Loki has found a place he likes in the TVA, and the TVA is in dire need of someone to teach it how to shepherd timelines instead of pruning them: Someone to watch over the “story” of the multiverse. This pivot — of likening the ability to control time to fiction — is a dead ringer for the most consequential transformation the shape-shifting Asgardian has made in modern comics: when Loki stopped being the god of lies and started being the god of stories. But it’s not exactly the same in one major way.

Old gods do new jobs

Loki’s transition from evil trickster to sympathetic trickster probably wouldn’t have happened without the sheer charm of Tom Hiddleston’s on-screen portrayal; the classic comics Loki was manipulative, sure, but far from charismatic. Everything Thor was — handsome, young, strong, charming — Loki wasn’t. It was almost the whole point.

This version of Loki passed away in 2010. He died extra-super, by the standards of comic characters and gods who are eternally revived. What followed, from the work of comics writers like Matt Fraction, Kieron Gillen, and Al Ewing, was a story of a new being born to take Loki’s name and fill his place in Asgard as Thor’s brother and Odin’s least-loved son, navigating his relationship with the previous Loki’s past crimes and what he would do with his own future.

This Loki looked handsome. This Loki had a charming personality and was likable. This Loki struggled with the perceptions of those who’d known his previous self and were convinced that this new form was just yet another trick. This Loki, in 2015 just before the entire universe restarted itself, defied both the past and future versions to find his own path.

LokiThe second season appears to try to reach the same conclusion, only in a science-fiction way. This is unfortunate, in my opinion.

You can hear the spirit of thunder

Daniel Kibblesmith/Oscar Bazaldua/Marvel Comics

Comics Loki’s turn to story as his portfolio is deeply rooted in the Marvel Comics understanding of Thor and the rest of his Asgardian cast as living mythology. The stories they tell are what gives them their power. As Jason Aaron put it in the finale of his Thor run, Thor is the god of thunder, and like a story told aloud, “the spirit of the thunder is to be heard.”

In a world that’s bound both by fiction and the literal rules of storytelling, superhero comics add an interesting metatextual element to a God of Stories. If we root Loki’s power over story in simple time travel, I think we miss something with a lot of rich metaphoric potential.

You can’t help but notice that Loki season 2 is really just playing a hand it’s already been dealt. In the early 2010s, Marvel Studios made the determination that the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Asgardians would be characterized as scientifically advanced beings who had Enjoy the following: It is better to focus on the myths themselves, than just their mystical content. So LokiThe show was forced to come to the same conclusions as Loki, the comic-book character.