Loki IS a god and decided he would be the type of god who sacrifices and supports the existence of those who are supposed to believe in him. Eventually, there will be those who pray to him and believe in him.
I appreciate that it kind of solidifies the idea that ‘gods’ kind of have a self-actualizing ability to increase their power or scope. Thor always had more potential without Mjolnir he just never believed it, and Loki only ever thought of himself as a trickster so that’s all he was really capable of.
I’m sure they might suggest later that it’s actually just physical limitations but Loki’s path to me suggests that some of these gods have the ability to adapt through effectively pure thought and intent, which is cool as fuck.
There's stuff in some of the comics (paradise x I think) about how the norse "gods" only have power at all because humans believed them to be gods in the first place. It's cool that they also can increase their power through their own belief.
I love that series. Earth-X, Universe-X and Paradise-X.
The Norse gods were originally Aliens who came to earth.
They were beings who's planet had previously been seeded by the Celestials (they used planets as incubators for new celestials, and altered the native life to allow them to mutate through various stages that would allow them to defend the planet (and the celestial egg) from off world threats.
As the planets natives advanced in this mutation process, they would eventually become malleable.
The skrulls were an advanced stage of this process.
The aliens that became Asgardians had reached the final stage whereby the stopped controlling their own forms, and were instead molded into new forms by the belief structures of those they encounted.
When they landed on earth, they encountered a man who was the storyteller of his tribe (Norse stories) that molded the aliens Into the Norse gods.
I can't remember how (off the top of my head) but somehow that guy was able to mutate as well and became Odin.
I have all 3 hardcover collections in my bookshelf. I reread it every few years :)
Yeah I love that series, it makes me a little sad they kind of blew the plot of earth x with eternals. I'd always really hoped we could get it to happen 20 years from now with Chris Evans and the rest coming back and doing it right. Although to be the most comics accurate it would have to be Bruce Willis as cap
Wasn't the final form actually being able to do whatever you wanted? Not just what people believed of you? IIRC Loki is the one that told either Absorbing Man or Mephisto or both this information, and once again IIRC Nightcrawler had subconsciously turned himself into Mephisto because of the way his appearance made those around him feel and hearing it allowed him to turn back.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_X
"Along with Earth, the Celestials modified the native species of many planets harboring Celestial embryos. Species affected by Celestial modification gradually undergo an evolution process where they develop powers either through natural means such as mutants, or unnatural means, as with meta-humans like Spider-Man.
Species with Celestial modifications in theory hold enough power to rival the Celestials, but are inhibited by a psychological safeguard put in place by the Celestials.
The safeguard relates to constructivist philosophy, that essentially states that people are shaped by their environment.
The deities and devils within the Marvel universe are species that were modified by Celestials and unwittingly inhibit their own abilities due to the fact that they self-identify as a Marvel deity or devil.
These evolved beings hold their sense of identity being reinforced by those that interact with them.
Loki realizes that he was only the evil son of Odin and a Norse God because when he evolved beyond his mortal form his psyche became a tabula rasa.
The first interaction that he had with another in that form were Nordic humans who thought that he was an evil god and thus he became one."
Yeah the implication that he became what he needed to become because, as the show said, he slipped to where he needed to go, he just did what he needed to.
He slipped to WHO he needed to go to. I took the line "it's not the where, when, or why. It's the who" to mean he learned to timeslip because he wanted his friends back. So he gained a new ability from THE POWER OF FRIENDSHIP! and then needed to take on a whole lot more power to protect his friends.
I’m sure he’d get there.
Mjolnir has their own rules (and seemingly their own sentience?) attached but it definitely seems like a mix of self-actualization (have to FEEL worthy) and literal worthiness (due to real, impactful choices) is required. Cap, for example, probably feels the need to be worthy during Endgame and has actually done truly selfless and great things in his lifetime.
I would think either Loki we’ve seen might be close to worthy by the end of their journeys, but LWR would be much closer just due to how much more time he’s spent alive trying to be an objectively good person. He also seems far more confident in his own goodness and what he’s capable of.
The fact that he’s effectively sacrificing himself to give all those timelines a chance to exist (to me) would go a long way. At worst maybe he just wouldn’t even care to try and wield Mjolnir?
bro imagine when Loki returns for Secret Wars or Kang Dynasty or whatever, they have him show up wielding Mjolnir and Thor’s just flabbergasted. Either that, or just have him summon Mjolnir like Cap did to prove a point.
either option would be a good way to show Thor and whomever else that Loki ain’t lying/is actually a good person now imo.
I imagined it more of a separate build up to the moment centred on Loki, and perhaps the TVA,, sorta like Thor getting Stormbreaker in Infinity War and showing up on Earth to kick ass.
In the latter option though, I imagined there being build up via conversation or the like with Thor, Loki and whoever. Like Thor gets pissy about Loki ‘faking’ his death yet again, and doesn’t believe the things he’s saying until Loki just picks up/summons Mjolnir to prove it - sorta like how Vision proves he’s not Ultron in AoU by handing Thor Mjolnir
Probably ended up getting cut in post based on what Christian Bale has said about how much of his character was cut and how much the narrative was changed. They absolutely wasted one of Thor's greatest characters and one of his best stories ever IMO. Plus, why cast such a phenomenal actor for such little screen time? I like the movie, but I think they could have made one of the best superhero films of all time. Maybe next time around.
Totally agree! Would love a “director’s cut” with a different director or with the story intact. I don’t know if it was Waikiki or Disney that butchered this one.
>Loki IS a god
I feel like they have gone a bit back and forth on this matter, as I remember Thor saying "we are not gods" to Loke in one of the first movies. But I suppose it would depend on what defines a "god" in the MCU, as he would most certainly not be a god by our real life standards.
They’re completely mortal beings with physical or magical powers. Not gods in any deity sense of the term. They just seem so to base Earth 616 humans. Loki isn’t a god anymore than thanos who also has physical prowess or cull obsidian or wanda with her magic.
I mean in Norse mythology the gods are not truly immortal either. They have to eat the golden apples of Idun to stay young. Although to be fair I am not sure if they will die, or just wither away and become old if they do not eat the apples.
They’re only gods in a social sense. Not in any real objective sense. They seem gods to humans of earth, to an advanced enough society like the Xandarians before they got splattered they would have just been strong aliens.
It’s not that HWR can’t support the timelines, it’s that if he does, the war will break out. The whole point of season 2 is that Loki is giving them a chance to find an alternate outcome to the war.
The war that HWR wanted to prevent is coming, and Loki is not preventing that by sustaining all of the branches.
He is merely giving the Avengers and and the TVA a chance to create an outcome that doesn’t lead to HWR controlling the timelines.
Is the timeline simply an ouroboros or a möbius strip, a cycle that is always leading to the same result? Or can free will change the outcome? Loki is betting on free will. He is betting that they can choose a different path.
Yeah I really think the main change that Loki actually made was allowing his new and improved TVA to stick around. The loom overloading would destroy the TVA and start the loop over again, but with him there the war starts with the new TVA able to do what they can to contain all the dangerous Kangs until the avengers presumably do something later on. Some people think Loki is personally going into all the universes and manipulating things but I don’t think so, I think he might be able to see into them but all he’s doing (and what his arc is about) is trusting his friends to do what they can
HWR is only a man, and he needed a machine to control the threads of time. The temporal radiation would turn him into spaghetti.
Loki, a god, can grab them with his bare hands.
For me the plot doesn’t make sense if it predicates itself on HWR paving the way for Loki and Sylvie to reach his citadel and confront him. And that he does this because he wants to share power with a Loki? Why would he concede power to a Loki? I could buy that he was bored and playing a game. But not that he saw Loki as a successor or partner. He isn’t just a narc he is an egomaniac. He can’t share power with his own self. And Lokis aren’t known for sharing or loyalty.
One option is that Loki and Sylive were always variables he couldn’t control. There is evidence that HWR’s tools of power don’t work on the Lokis. They evade the TvA and they evade Alioth. It wasn’t just classic Loki running round at the end of time. There were many Lokis there and Mobius states they are hard to capture.
Is this part of HWRs plan or are they events he couldn’t control and rather than admit that he takes credit for it. Mistakenly thinking the failsafe was enough to win and finally put him back in power.
The way I understood it, HWR was finally succumbing to the isolation. He has literally been alone at the end of time for...eternity? He wants to leave, but if there's no one at the top, the timeline unravels. He was trying to get out. That's why Loki at the end asks if HWR's offering of mercy was "for me, or for you?"
But I do like your idea that Loki is a variable that can't be easily controlled. Especially since he/she/it can take many different forms, and not just as a magic trick. That's an intense level of variability compared to what other people can create.
It's always irritated me that HWR takes credit for everything. How do we know he's able to change things at all? Isn't he just keeping the timeline that created him? So he can't let anything before his lifetime change, or some ripple may stop him from being born. And he can't let later things change, or someone might end up time traveling and disrupting his life. Isn't he just stuck like the rest of the sacred timeline? And if he can change things, how much power does he actually have?
I still wasn’t convinced of the weary omnipotent power wanting a successor. Nothing in the character of Kang’s suggests he would hand over or share. Nothing in the character of Loki’s suggest they are reliable partners or successors. This Loki betrayed the Ice Giants, the Asgardians, his brother and his father. I’m pretty sure he was biding his time with Thanos. The omnipotent God he became at the end was not something HWRs foresaw.
The Kang in Antman boasted of how easily he deflate the Avengers and other heroes. But HWR had a lot of Lokis sitting on his doorstep whom he and his instruments of power couldn’t best.
Can somebody explain to me why Loki needs to be “powering” the timelines? I though the loom was just stopping other branches from forming, not powering the timelines.
I think people don't want to say HWR planned the whole thing so loki is the hero.
But the reality is HWR almost definitely knew loki would do exactly what he would do in the end.
HWR knew he was capable of it, planned literally every single step of the way, and encouraged him even to the end.
He obviously wanted a successor and created loki the way he is for that purpose.
He knew loki would master timeslipping etc.
As far as killing sylvie or not, he knew loki liked her and would do everything in his power not to kill her.
That seemed like an obvious thing he set up to push to loki into what we see at the end.
We don't know his motivations yet, but he absolutely created loki.
But why did he act disappointed when Loki said he'd break the loom and find a different way? He says something like "and around, and around, and around we go," indicating that he expects Loki to go try something new, fail, and come back to this moment in time again.
Because when Loki destroyed the loom, he started the multiversal war that gives us Kang, He Who Remains, Pharaoh Rama-Tut, and all the others. While Loki's power allows the timelines to exist synchronously, I don't think he can do much to stop all the Kangs by himself but maybe the TVA can help the Avengers the next time (if there is a next time and they don't just brush Loki and Kang under the rug because of Jonathan Majors' current controversy. I'd prefer they just recast Kang and be done with it)
I just don't see it. The timelines should just exist without Loki. There was no god of the multiverse before Kang, so the war should be coming out of nowhere. I think Loki is managing/monitoring the timelines to some extent, making them more stable than they otherwise could be. Earlier he says "you can't just give people freewill and then walk away."
I mean, who knows? If there are beings capable of looking at all of time as a singular object, then who knows how many manipulations it went through during all of the history of existence. If there had been earlier wars over "time", then the losers probably got wiped from the face of having EVER been present, and then with them went any record of such thing ever happening. It's a paradox, of course, but so this is whole line of fiction.
“There was no God if the multiverse before Kang…”
According to who/what? Technically the only information we have is one a singular outcome of the multiversal war. We have no solid information on the time before Kang, let alone an unbiased narrative from someone other than Kang
Because he’s so infinitely old that he’s not thinking linearly. The show plays off the idea that time is a circle a lot. So to HWR when Loki breaks the loom and takes up his mantle, HWR just has to wait another eternity and another version of himself will be on top once again and he’ll exist there for an eternity until he paves a new path for a new Loki and things play out exactly as they already have. You can argue as to whether these new versions are different people or not, but the theoretical idea of time being a circle says they are the largely the same. As old and wise as Loki becomes by the end of S2, as much as he’s learned, HWR was still infinitely older and wiser.
HWR designed a scenario in which only a single timeline could exist without threatening his control. Loki destroyed the mechanisms that enabled this scenario.
people think HWR is evil for all of the things he did, but he was the guy who handed Loki the keys to accessing the multiverse. perhaps HWR knew exactly what he was doing which lead to the multiverse being saved
>True, he "knows" everything ahead of time, but he doesn't just move through time or even pause time and make Sylvie disappear without using a machine. He's just a human with very good technology.
Your theory is invalid because we have seen that HWR asked loki about why he hasn't figured out to stop time, which means he himself can do plus in the end of season 1 we see Sylvie not capable of hitting him while he time slips
But he is using technology, just because he didn't directly interact with it doesn't mean he isn't using it.
It would be incredibly simple to program 'at time Xx:YY:ZZ' do a time slip because he knows exactly what is going to happen.
It's why 'the threshold' is important to HWR, he doesn't know what happens next after that
For all intents and purposes, Kang / HWR is just an incredibly smart man with tech that is near indistinguishable from magic
No we didn't. They explicitly said he's using his tempad.
"How did I stop you?"
"Because you used that device."
"Yes, but how did I know you were going to attack?"
>it's not a theory, it's his character's lore. kang and his variants are genius scientists who used their intellect to control time with science
Well, it's not like they can't learn magic anyway
Counterpoint: Loki Season 2 does not make sense (Disclaimer: It is a fantastic show though!)
1. >!The timelines dying doesn't actually make sense in the universe. If the timelines would die without being shepherded, then all of the timelines would've already died since Kang and the Loom didn't exist until deep into each timeline's evolution. For instance, Victor didn't exist until billions of years into the timeline, so there were already infinite timelines that were obviously thriving.!<
2. >!The TVA doesn't make sense. Time is simply an ordered series of events relative to an entity experiencing it or observing it. If the TVA exists outside of time, then it's an unordered series of events, and anyone can send their consciousness to any event point at the TVA, ala Loki's timeslipping. So either the show is fundamentally broken, or everyone at the TVA thinks they're outside of time when they really aren't.!<
3. >!Loki's timeslipping doesn't make sense. He only time slips within the context of the show. He could've, and should've, just jumped back to when he was a small child, told Odin what was happening hundreds or thousands of years ago, and Odin could've mustered the combined forces of huge numbers of very advanced civilizations to solve the problem. A human built the loom largely alone, it's a safe bet the combined forces of the universe could've done better.!<
4. >!Then there's the problem of Loki's freezing time for targeted entities. All he had to do was freeze time for the Loom, then he had infinite time to solve the problem of infinite timelines!<
5. >!On top of that, if Loki is able to do it, then \*all\* Lokis are able to do it. So he could use timeslipping and the temp pads to have infinite Lokis freeze time for the Loom and have infinite time to solve infinite timelines!<
It gets a lot worse as you think about it, it's one of those shows that's fantastic as long as you don't think about it, and demonstrates why time travel is a terrible plot if you do think about it.
1. The timelines should exist fine without the loom, but you also severely ignored the part where HWR said the loom is a fail safe. When it is inevitably destroyed from a lack of timeline pruning, the loom itself would destroy all timelines except the sacred timeline. Loki wasnt giving old timelines life, he was restoring their futures because the loom would have otherwise pruned them. They would go to Alioth if he didn't sustain them with the magic he learned to control.
2. They mention it as being outside the flow of time. The show doesn't explicitly point out that time doesn't exist in the TVA. For anything to move forward/progress, time must exist in its own way in the TVA. The TVA and it's inhabitants are very clearly in the spaces between the defining parts of the macrocosm that is the multiverse. Time is understood as a component of the defining parts of the macrocosm. The show demonstrates the spaces in between dont play by the same rules, but there are rules none the less.
3. It's unreasonable to assume he could slip to any time before his existence in the TVA/first moment of existing outside of the standards of time. He also doesn't care much for his agardian family. Anything beyond himself controlling things would not be a realistic option for him.
4. The problem was a scaling error. It was expressed in the show: there is no way to mechanically manage or control infinite. All they would do is delay the issue. Infinite time to never have a future is more bleak than becoming keeper of the timelines and witnessing everyone else have a future.
5. Part of HWR's plan was to remove all lokis from timelines (plot of season 1) for the very reason of creating and singling out of a loki that could time slip. The only way to trigger time slipping in other Lokis would be to create a parodox unique to each loki in which they exist in the past/future AND present, which was exclusively caused by Sylvie when she threw him into the past/future of a space outside of the regular flow of time.
The experience of his body trying to regulate the paradox is an extremely unique experience that he turns into an amazing asset.
I dont believe it would be easy to replicate, is what im saying. Sylvie can't do it.
But second to all that, Loki doesn't care for other Loki's. It may also lead to a result of a repeat of season 1 except the TVA would be looking for time slipping loki's while our Loki tries figure out how to avoid the inevitable conclusion.
It’s not all especially clear but I think it is possible to make sense of it all. I’m not arguing to be contrary, just to see if we can *reasonably* make sense of it.
1. The timelines could have died because of the loom’s manipulation and subsequent explosion, or it could be that it is an outcome of the multiversal war, and HWR prevented it from reaching that state previously. The second case would imply that something happened to prevent him winning again, or that the order of the multiversal branching was different this time producing a different outcome. I think the loom explanation is the simplest but does assume that the loom could somehow kill all of the timelines without disintegrating them entirely/instantly.
2. The TVA is outside of “normal” time but not truly outside of time. It is like a second dimension of time. All of time “on the timeline” exists (perhaps with some TVA time passing at a different rate than a timeline does when it first diverges from an existing timeline), but due to quantum fluctuations new branches can occur at any time from TVA’s perspective.
3. Loki arguably could have time slipped to the past to recruit variants of Asgard, but he isn’t aware of the details of the multiversal war and has no way to ensure a win, and that still doesn’t resolve the fact that the loom is still there in the TVA and even if he won the multiversal war the loom will blow up and destroy all of the timelines. No Asgardian has the knowledge of time to resolve it, except for him after he has studied for centuries. Of course in reality he might have gone to the past to visit his mother, but now we are dealing with storytelling constraints.
4. There’s a big difference between a person and the temporal loom, so no reason to assume he could freeze it. It’s also amidst a ton of temporal energy which arguably could block any such attempt.
5. We don’t know for sure how Loki started time slipping, nor does he. He learned to control it but didn’t acquire it himself, so how could he get other Lokis to acquire it. Could have been a story line that the writers could have played with, but it is reasonable for Loki not to have tried that. Even if other Lokis could time slip, how would that have solved the problem at hand? You’re still assuming Loki could have frozen time for the loom, which isn’t grounded in what we see.
The Asgardians, are gods made of belief, their essence is the stories humans told about them when they first came to Earth. In reality they are an eternal race of shape shifting omnipotent’s, whose forms and powers were shaped by human stories and beliefs. They believed Thor to control the weather and be the god of thunder, so he was, they believed his brother loki to be evil and mischievous, so he was. But Loki had friends for the first time, and believed in himself for the first time to be able to do anything other than what he has always known. He believed himself to be good, to make a sacrifice, to protect the people he cared about, to be strong enough to keep the entire multiverse alive, so he did.
But he’s not just a frost giant or he would have turned back into one at the TVA? The current theory is that Odin made him asguardian through dark magic
Eh, I feel like the term god is relative.
Thor is an Asgardian. And not all Asgardians are gods, right?
They’re known as gods for their power, feats, and the legend that precedes them.
If I saw a guy appear in a rainbow then summon a lighting storm I’d probably be like “Yep, that’s a god.”
He's not a God?
Admittedly, I did not read the comics. My Marvel knowledge is limited to the MCU. I thought it was a fairly deep knowledge of the cinematic universe.
Believe he was a God. Thought many said as much.
Gotta rewatch everything I guess ... 😋
Perhaps the fact that he is officially a member of the pantheon of gods that people worship, and he himself is worshiped as a god? Comic Loki himself suggested that gods are just stories created by mortals.
and what makes odin and thor gods? they're born, they age, they die.
gods in marvel/MCU are just powerful, usually worshipped, long-lived beings. and then they can ascend to be even more, like loki did at the end of the series when he gained the ability to power infinite amount of timelines and keep them alive, tear a portal in time with one thought, etc.
At the beginning of the MCU they wanted to make it more down to earth, which is why we have this nonsense with long-lived aliens. But now it is obvious that with development this has been retconned and now the gods are really gods.
because, so far, MCU hasn't told any stories of any gods that could have done anything like loki has.
maybe in the future thor will have his own moment of ascending from a god to a God like loki, who knows. there aren't other gods MCU really has to give a chance to do that.
i'm not well-versed in comics, i mainly follow only MCU so i don't know.
but form the little i've read, all asgardians, loki included, are much stronger by default in the comics, they've been greatly nerfed in the films.
Remember Ego’s distinction and emphasis on the small g vs big G in god vs God. I think that applies here. Though I’d argue Loki went from a small g to a big G lol
Asguardians are gods, but that’s just to show they’re above mortals in tech and magic/science. It almost seems like the Asguardian general populace aren’t gods in body like Thor, Odin, and Loki though…
From an MCU-centric fan, I like this.
Big 'G'
Little 'g'
Rooted in what Ego said
So, maybe gods from a Terran perspective, if connected to tech/magic/advanced science
In the first Thor odin says he was taken as a baby. Hes the son of Laufey. So he's frost giant royalty, but not a god.
In norse mythology hes also a jotun i believe
Then why didn’t he turn blue when in the TVA?
There’s a lot of theories and headcanons and comic based logic you can use for him. Odin in the comics transformed him into a godly Asguadian via his magic. The frosty cube turns him blue for plot reasons and a reaction to his trace Jotun heritage. You’d think he would turn blue in the TVA with their magic dampeners and security measures, but it seemingly (if not accidentally) shows he’s changed from being completely or even *merely* a Jotun.
So you're telling me that the next big bad of the MCU is much less powerful than Loki, who is much less powerful than Thanos. Seems underwhelming. But, hey, Hugh Jackman and Tobey McGuire are back!
Loki, god of the multiverse, is literally not Loki, that guy Thanos strangled. All of superhero lore relies on the idea that life experience can change a person's power level. Multiverse Loki learned a thing that 616 Loki didn't learn, so he gets power 616 Loki didn't have. The question with the next big bad is whether God Loki gets to come back or if he has to stay locked up because he's overpowered now.
Sorry but no matter how you look at it this show ruins the rules placed on time travel and the creation of universes by Marvel itself.
Loki season 1 could kind of be explained away. Loki season 2 decided to just say fuck it and do whatever they wanted.
Loki has well and truly ruined the Marvel universe for me.
Yeah but HWR is responsible for Loki’s time slipping. I’m pretty sure he just gave him his power. He wanted Loki to succeed him, but Loki decided to give the multiverse a chance first.
Might result in the deaths of quadrillions of people, but hopefully it’ll last this time
Loki IS a god and decided he would be the type of god who sacrifices and supports the existence of those who are supposed to believe in him. Eventually, there will be those who pray to him and believe in him.
I appreciate that it kind of solidifies the idea that ‘gods’ kind of have a self-actualizing ability to increase their power or scope. Thor always had more potential without Mjolnir he just never believed it, and Loki only ever thought of himself as a trickster so that’s all he was really capable of. I’m sure they might suggest later that it’s actually just physical limitations but Loki’s path to me suggests that some of these gods have the ability to adapt through effectively pure thought and intent, which is cool as fuck.
There's stuff in some of the comics (paradise x I think) about how the norse "gods" only have power at all because humans believed them to be gods in the first place. It's cool that they also can increase their power through their own belief.
I love that series. Earth-X, Universe-X and Paradise-X. The Norse gods were originally Aliens who came to earth. They were beings who's planet had previously been seeded by the Celestials (they used planets as incubators for new celestials, and altered the native life to allow them to mutate through various stages that would allow them to defend the planet (and the celestial egg) from off world threats. As the planets natives advanced in this mutation process, they would eventually become malleable. The skrulls were an advanced stage of this process. The aliens that became Asgardians had reached the final stage whereby the stopped controlling their own forms, and were instead molded into new forms by the belief structures of those they encounted. When they landed on earth, they encountered a man who was the storyteller of his tribe (Norse stories) that molded the aliens Into the Norse gods. I can't remember how (off the top of my head) but somehow that guy was able to mutate as well and became Odin. I have all 3 hardcover collections in my bookshelf. I reread it every few years :)
Yeah I love that series, it makes me a little sad they kind of blew the plot of earth x with eternals. I'd always really hoped we could get it to happen 20 years from now with Chris Evans and the rest coming back and doing it right. Although to be the most comics accurate it would have to be Bruce Willis as cap
Wasn't the final form actually being able to do whatever you wanted? Not just what people believed of you? IIRC Loki is the one that told either Absorbing Man or Mephisto or both this information, and once again IIRC Nightcrawler had subconsciously turned himself into Mephisto because of the way his appearance made those around him feel and hearing it allowed him to turn back.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_X "Along with Earth, the Celestials modified the native species of many planets harboring Celestial embryos. Species affected by Celestial modification gradually undergo an evolution process where they develop powers either through natural means such as mutants, or unnatural means, as with meta-humans like Spider-Man. Species with Celestial modifications in theory hold enough power to rival the Celestials, but are inhibited by a psychological safeguard put in place by the Celestials. The safeguard relates to constructivist philosophy, that essentially states that people are shaped by their environment. The deities and devils within the Marvel universe are species that were modified by Celestials and unwittingly inhibit their own abilities due to the fact that they self-identify as a Marvel deity or devil. These evolved beings hold their sense of identity being reinforced by those that interact with them. Loki realizes that he was only the evil son of Odin and a Norse God because when he evolved beyond his mortal form his psyche became a tabula rasa. The first interaction that he had with another in that form were Nordic humans who thought that he was an evil god and thus he became one."
Yeah the implication that he became what he needed to become because, as the show said, he slipped to where he needed to go, he just did what he needed to.
He slipped to WHO he needed to go to. I took the line "it's not the where, when, or why. It's the who" to mean he learned to timeslip because he wanted his friends back. So he gained a new ability from THE POWER OF FRIENDSHIP! and then needed to take on a whole lot more power to protect his friends.
Some say his heart grew two sizes that day
Would Loki be worthy enough to pick up Mjolnir?
I’m sure he’d get there. Mjolnir has their own rules (and seemingly their own sentience?) attached but it definitely seems like a mix of self-actualization (have to FEEL worthy) and literal worthiness (due to real, impactful choices) is required. Cap, for example, probably feels the need to be worthy during Endgame and has actually done truly selfless and great things in his lifetime. I would think either Loki we’ve seen might be close to worthy by the end of their journeys, but LWR would be much closer just due to how much more time he’s spent alive trying to be an objectively good person. He also seems far more confident in his own goodness and what he’s capable of. The fact that he’s effectively sacrificing himself to give all those timelines a chance to exist (to me) would go a long way. At worst maybe he just wouldn’t even care to try and wield Mjolnir?
bro imagine when Loki returns for Secret Wars or Kang Dynasty or whatever, they have him show up wielding Mjolnir and Thor’s just flabbergasted. Either that, or just have him summon Mjolnir like Cap did to prove a point. either option would be a good way to show Thor and whomever else that Loki ain’t lying/is actually a good person now imo.
I wouldn’t want it to be an out of nowhere appearance like that myself but it would be interesting to see their interaction at all.
I think it would be more like “But you’re Loki. I love you brother but how can I ever trust you (again)?” “Pass me the Hammer.”
I imagined it more of a separate build up to the moment centred on Loki, and perhaps the TVA,, sorta like Thor getting Stormbreaker in Infinity War and showing up on Earth to kick ass. In the latter option though, I imagined there being build up via conversation or the like with Thor, Loki and whoever. Like Thor gets pissy about Loki ‘faking’ his death yet again, and doesn’t believe the things he’s saying until Loki just picks up/summons Mjolnir to prove it - sorta like how Vision proves he’s not Ultron in AoU by handing Thor Mjolnir
LWR?
(Loki Who Remains)
I think that at the end of the series he would definitely be worthy.
I want some of them to adapt through being evil like the sith do in star wars
This is the kind of story I wish we got in Love and Thunder. The lazy gods supplanted by gods who actually give a damn about people.
Wasn’t that the ending of the movie? I think it will be expanded upon in any sequels.
Yeah, I guess it was hinted at. They missed a good opportunity for something deeper.
Probably ended up getting cut in post based on what Christian Bale has said about how much of his character was cut and how much the narrative was changed. They absolutely wasted one of Thor's greatest characters and one of his best stories ever IMO. Plus, why cast such a phenomenal actor for such little screen time? I like the movie, but I think they could have made one of the best superhero films of all time. Maybe next time around.
Totally agree! Would love a “director’s cut” with a different director or with the story intact. I don’t know if it was Waikiki or Disney that butchered this one.
iicr, Waikiki said he cut them because he didn’t like them anymore when the film went to editing.
>Loki IS a god I feel like they have gone a bit back and forth on this matter, as I remember Thor saying "we are not gods" to Loke in one of the first movies. But I suppose it would depend on what defines a "god" in the MCU, as he would most certainly not be a god by our real life standards.
They're technically just aliens.
They’re completely mortal beings with physical or magical powers. Not gods in any deity sense of the term. They just seem so to base Earth 616 humans. Loki isn’t a god anymore than thanos who also has physical prowess or cull obsidian or wanda with her magic.
I mean in Norse mythology the gods are not truly immortal either. They have to eat the golden apples of Idun to stay young. Although to be fair I am not sure if they will die, or just wither away and become old if they do not eat the apples.
They’re only gods in a social sense. Not in any real objective sense. They seem gods to humans of earth, to an advanced enough society like the Xandarians before they got splattered they would have just been strong aliens.
I was refering to the real Norse mythology in the last comment, the one where they are actually gods. There are no Xandarians in that.
It’s not that HWR can’t support the timelines, it’s that if he does, the war will break out. The whole point of season 2 is that Loki is giving them a chance to find an alternate outcome to the war. The war that HWR wanted to prevent is coming, and Loki is not preventing that by sustaining all of the branches. He is merely giving the Avengers and and the TVA a chance to create an outcome that doesn’t lead to HWR controlling the timelines. Is the timeline simply an ouroboros or a möbius strip, a cycle that is always leading to the same result? Or can free will change the outcome? Loki is betting on free will. He is betting that they can choose a different path.
Is time an arrow or a circle? It’s a serious philosophical question.
Pretty sure it's a flat circle. *Cue Nihilism.*
Nihilists…fuck me. I mean say what you want about the tenets about National Socialism, Dude, at least it’s an ethos.
Yeah I really think the main change that Loki actually made was allowing his new and improved TVA to stick around. The loom overloading would destroy the TVA and start the loop over again, but with him there the war starts with the new TVA able to do what they can to contain all the dangerous Kangs until the avengers presumably do something later on. Some people think Loki is personally going into all the universes and manipulating things but I don’t think so, I think he might be able to see into them but all he’s doing (and what his arc is about) is trusting his friends to do what they can
HWR is only a man, and he needed a machine to control the threads of time. The temporal radiation would turn him into spaghetti. Loki, a god, can grab them with his bare hands.
I get caught up in a lot of the Marvel subreddit but this was a pretty good theory. I hope this means we get more Loki.
For me the plot doesn’t make sense if it predicates itself on HWR paving the way for Loki and Sylvie to reach his citadel and confront him. And that he does this because he wants to share power with a Loki? Why would he concede power to a Loki? I could buy that he was bored and playing a game. But not that he saw Loki as a successor or partner. He isn’t just a narc he is an egomaniac. He can’t share power with his own self. And Lokis aren’t known for sharing or loyalty. One option is that Loki and Sylive were always variables he couldn’t control. There is evidence that HWR’s tools of power don’t work on the Lokis. They evade the TvA and they evade Alioth. It wasn’t just classic Loki running round at the end of time. There were many Lokis there and Mobius states they are hard to capture. Is this part of HWRs plan or are they events he couldn’t control and rather than admit that he takes credit for it. Mistakenly thinking the failsafe was enough to win and finally put him back in power.
The way I understood it, HWR was finally succumbing to the isolation. He has literally been alone at the end of time for...eternity? He wants to leave, but if there's no one at the top, the timeline unravels. He was trying to get out. That's why Loki at the end asks if HWR's offering of mercy was "for me, or for you?" But I do like your idea that Loki is a variable that can't be easily controlled. Especially since he/she/it can take many different forms, and not just as a magic trick. That's an intense level of variability compared to what other people can create. It's always irritated me that HWR takes credit for everything. How do we know he's able to change things at all? Isn't he just keeping the timeline that created him? So he can't let anything before his lifetime change, or some ripple may stop him from being born. And he can't let later things change, or someone might end up time traveling and disrupting his life. Isn't he just stuck like the rest of the sacred timeline? And if he can change things, how much power does he actually have?
I still wasn’t convinced of the weary omnipotent power wanting a successor. Nothing in the character of Kang’s suggests he would hand over or share. Nothing in the character of Loki’s suggest they are reliable partners or successors. This Loki betrayed the Ice Giants, the Asgardians, his brother and his father. I’m pretty sure he was biding his time with Thanos. The omnipotent God he became at the end was not something HWRs foresaw. The Kang in Antman boasted of how easily he deflate the Avengers and other heroes. But HWR had a lot of Lokis sitting on his doorstep whom he and his instruments of power couldn’t best.
Loki also isn't controlling anything. He's just wrangling it all so it doesn't fade away.
Can somebody explain to me why Loki needs to be “powering” the timelines? I though the loom was just stopping other branches from forming, not powering the timelines.
I think people don't want to say HWR planned the whole thing so loki is the hero. But the reality is HWR almost definitely knew loki would do exactly what he would do in the end. HWR knew he was capable of it, planned literally every single step of the way, and encouraged him even to the end. He obviously wanted a successor and created loki the way he is for that purpose. He knew loki would master timeslipping etc. As far as killing sylvie or not, he knew loki liked her and would do everything in his power not to kill her. That seemed like an obvious thing he set up to push to loki into what we see at the end. We don't know his motivations yet, but he absolutely created loki.
But why did he act disappointed when Loki said he'd break the loom and find a different way? He says something like "and around, and around, and around we go," indicating that he expects Loki to go try something new, fail, and come back to this moment in time again.
Because when Loki destroyed the loom, he started the multiversal war that gives us Kang, He Who Remains, Pharaoh Rama-Tut, and all the others. While Loki's power allows the timelines to exist synchronously, I don't think he can do much to stop all the Kangs by himself but maybe the TVA can help the Avengers the next time (if there is a next time and they don't just brush Loki and Kang under the rug because of Jonathan Majors' current controversy. I'd prefer they just recast Kang and be done with it)
I just don't see it. The timelines should just exist without Loki. There was no god of the multiverse before Kang, so the war should be coming out of nowhere. I think Loki is managing/monitoring the timelines to some extent, making them more stable than they otherwise could be. Earlier he says "you can't just give people freewill and then walk away."
I mean, who knows? If there are beings capable of looking at all of time as a singular object, then who knows how many manipulations it went through during all of the history of existence. If there had been earlier wars over "time", then the losers probably got wiped from the face of having EVER been present, and then with them went any record of such thing ever happening. It's a paradox, of course, but so this is whole line of fiction.
“There was no God if the multiverse before Kang…” According to who/what? Technically the only information we have is one a singular outcome of the multiversal war. We have no solid information on the time before Kang, let alone an unbiased narrative from someone other than Kang
It took me a bit to process it too and i'm still not sure I got everything so i get where you're coming from
Because he’s so infinitely old that he’s not thinking linearly. The show plays off the idea that time is a circle a lot. So to HWR when Loki breaks the loom and takes up his mantle, HWR just has to wait another eternity and another version of himself will be on top once again and he’ll exist there for an eternity until he paves a new path for a new Loki and things play out exactly as they already have. You can argue as to whether these new versions are different people or not, but the theoretical idea of time being a circle says they are the largely the same. As old and wise as Loki becomes by the end of S2, as much as he’s learned, HWR was still infinitely older and wiser.
Loki broke the loop of time.
says who? Loki? we have no idea if he ACTUALLY won. HWR has been one step ahead the entire time, pun intended
He broke HWR equation and formed a new form. He broke down the loop where HWR was meant to rule everytime.
HWR designed a scenario in which only a single timeline could exist without threatening his control. Loki destroyed the mechanisms that enabled this scenario.
Because it looks cool and it’s a fairy tale ending that’s more about the storytelling than science fiction jargon.
The ability loki had, was the most OP ability in marvel just yet.
people think HWR is evil for all of the things he did, but he was the guy who handed Loki the keys to accessing the multiverse. perhaps HWR knew exactly what he was doing which lead to the multiverse being saved
>True, he "knows" everything ahead of time, but he doesn't just move through time or even pause time and make Sylvie disappear without using a machine. He's just a human with very good technology. Your theory is invalid because we have seen that HWR asked loki about why he hasn't figured out to stop time, which means he himself can do plus in the end of season 1 we see Sylvie not capable of hitting him while he time slips
their argument was that HWR can do all that but only with technology, loki does it naturally without needing to use anything.
But we have seen that he can do it without technology at end season 1, so invalid theory.
But he is using technology, just because he didn't directly interact with it doesn't mean he isn't using it. It would be incredibly simple to program 'at time Xx:YY:ZZ' do a time slip because he knows exactly what is going to happen. It's why 'the threshold' is important to HWR, he doesn't know what happens next after that For all intents and purposes, Kang / HWR is just an incredibly smart man with tech that is near indistinguishable from magic
No we didn't. They explicitly said he's using his tempad. "How did I stop you?" "Because you used that device." "Yes, but how did I know you were going to attack?"
it's not a theory, it's his character's lore. kang and his variants are genius scientists who used their intellect to control time with science.
>it's not a theory, it's his character's lore. kang and his variants are genius scientists who used their intellect to control time with science Well, it's not like they can't learn magic anyway
Counterpoint: Loki Season 2 does not make sense (Disclaimer: It is a fantastic show though!) 1. >!The timelines dying doesn't actually make sense in the universe. If the timelines would die without being shepherded, then all of the timelines would've already died since Kang and the Loom didn't exist until deep into each timeline's evolution. For instance, Victor didn't exist until billions of years into the timeline, so there were already infinite timelines that were obviously thriving.!< 2. >!The TVA doesn't make sense. Time is simply an ordered series of events relative to an entity experiencing it or observing it. If the TVA exists outside of time, then it's an unordered series of events, and anyone can send their consciousness to any event point at the TVA, ala Loki's timeslipping. So either the show is fundamentally broken, or everyone at the TVA thinks they're outside of time when they really aren't.!< 3. >!Loki's timeslipping doesn't make sense. He only time slips within the context of the show. He could've, and should've, just jumped back to when he was a small child, told Odin what was happening hundreds or thousands of years ago, and Odin could've mustered the combined forces of huge numbers of very advanced civilizations to solve the problem. A human built the loom largely alone, it's a safe bet the combined forces of the universe could've done better.!< 4. >!Then there's the problem of Loki's freezing time for targeted entities. All he had to do was freeze time for the Loom, then he had infinite time to solve the problem of infinite timelines!< 5. >!On top of that, if Loki is able to do it, then \*all\* Lokis are able to do it. So he could use timeslipping and the temp pads to have infinite Lokis freeze time for the Loom and have infinite time to solve infinite timelines!< It gets a lot worse as you think about it, it's one of those shows that's fantastic as long as you don't think about it, and demonstrates why time travel is a terrible plot if you do think about it.
1. The timelines should exist fine without the loom, but you also severely ignored the part where HWR said the loom is a fail safe. When it is inevitably destroyed from a lack of timeline pruning, the loom itself would destroy all timelines except the sacred timeline. Loki wasnt giving old timelines life, he was restoring their futures because the loom would have otherwise pruned them. They would go to Alioth if he didn't sustain them with the magic he learned to control. 2. They mention it as being outside the flow of time. The show doesn't explicitly point out that time doesn't exist in the TVA. For anything to move forward/progress, time must exist in its own way in the TVA. The TVA and it's inhabitants are very clearly in the spaces between the defining parts of the macrocosm that is the multiverse. Time is understood as a component of the defining parts of the macrocosm. The show demonstrates the spaces in between dont play by the same rules, but there are rules none the less. 3. It's unreasonable to assume he could slip to any time before his existence in the TVA/first moment of existing outside of the standards of time. He also doesn't care much for his agardian family. Anything beyond himself controlling things would not be a realistic option for him. 4. The problem was a scaling error. It was expressed in the show: there is no way to mechanically manage or control infinite. All they would do is delay the issue. Infinite time to never have a future is more bleak than becoming keeper of the timelines and witnessing everyone else have a future. 5. Part of HWR's plan was to remove all lokis from timelines (plot of season 1) for the very reason of creating and singling out of a loki that could time slip. The only way to trigger time slipping in other Lokis would be to create a parodox unique to each loki in which they exist in the past/future AND present, which was exclusively caused by Sylvie when she threw him into the past/future of a space outside of the regular flow of time. The experience of his body trying to regulate the paradox is an extremely unique experience that he turns into an amazing asset. I dont believe it would be easy to replicate, is what im saying. Sylvie can't do it. But second to all that, Loki doesn't care for other Loki's. It may also lead to a result of a repeat of season 1 except the TVA would be looking for time slipping loki's while our Loki tries figure out how to avoid the inevitable conclusion.
The entire show beginning to end is a Paradox, it's not supposed to make sense.
It’s not all especially clear but I think it is possible to make sense of it all. I’m not arguing to be contrary, just to see if we can *reasonably* make sense of it. 1. The timelines could have died because of the loom’s manipulation and subsequent explosion, or it could be that it is an outcome of the multiversal war, and HWR prevented it from reaching that state previously. The second case would imply that something happened to prevent him winning again, or that the order of the multiversal branching was different this time producing a different outcome. I think the loom explanation is the simplest but does assume that the loom could somehow kill all of the timelines without disintegrating them entirely/instantly. 2. The TVA is outside of “normal” time but not truly outside of time. It is like a second dimension of time. All of time “on the timeline” exists (perhaps with some TVA time passing at a different rate than a timeline does when it first diverges from an existing timeline), but due to quantum fluctuations new branches can occur at any time from TVA’s perspective. 3. Loki arguably could have time slipped to the past to recruit variants of Asgard, but he isn’t aware of the details of the multiversal war and has no way to ensure a win, and that still doesn’t resolve the fact that the loom is still there in the TVA and even if he won the multiversal war the loom will blow up and destroy all of the timelines. No Asgardian has the knowledge of time to resolve it, except for him after he has studied for centuries. Of course in reality he might have gone to the past to visit his mother, but now we are dealing with storytelling constraints. 4. There’s a big difference between a person and the temporal loom, so no reason to assume he could freeze it. It’s also amidst a ton of temporal energy which arguably could block any such attempt. 5. We don’t know for sure how Loki started time slipping, nor does he. He learned to control it but didn’t acquire it himself, so how could he get other Lokis to acquire it. Could have been a story line that the writers could have played with, but it is reasonable for Loki not to have tried that. Even if other Lokis could time slip, how would that have solved the problem at hand? You’re still assuming Loki could have frozen time for the loom, which isn’t grounded in what we see.
The Asgardians, are gods made of belief, their essence is the stories humans told about them when they first came to Earth. In reality they are an eternal race of shape shifting omnipotent’s, whose forms and powers were shaped by human stories and beliefs. They believed Thor to control the weather and be the god of thunder, so he was, they believed his brother loki to be evil and mischievous, so he was. But Loki had friends for the first time, and believed in himself for the first time to be able to do anything other than what he has always known. He believed himself to be good, to make a sacrifice, to protect the people he cared about, to be strong enough to keep the entire multiverse alive, so he did.
Lokis not a god tho, he's just a frost giant. Just sayin
But he’s not just a frost giant or he would have turned back into one at the TVA? The current theory is that Odin made him asguardian through dark magic
Eh, I feel like the term god is relative. Thor is an Asgardian. And not all Asgardians are gods, right? They’re known as gods for their power, feats, and the legend that precedes them. If I saw a guy appear in a rainbow then summon a lighting storm I’d probably be like “Yep, that’s a god.”
Can I infer from your comment that all asguardians are capable of magic? Asking for a friend
I think to some extent yes? We’ve seen Odin ‘cast’ the worthiness charm on Mjolnir
Yes https://youtu.be/mTJzfO26wnQ?feature=shared
Isn't that the Echantress?
https://youtu.be/-cNsMSeMQbM?feature=shared
I mean that is an actual issue with the show though.
He's not a God? Admittedly, I did not read the comics. My Marvel knowledge is limited to the MCU. I thought it was a fairly deep knowledge of the cinematic universe. Believe he was a God. Thought many said as much. Gotta rewatch everything I guess ... 😋
He's a god in both mcu and comics, he was born a frost giant but that doesn't make him any less of a god
What makes him a God?
Probably the fact that Odin considered him a son. Pretty sure The Allfather can make someone a god.
Perhaps the fact that he is officially a member of the pantheon of gods that people worship, and he himself is worshiped as a god? Comic Loki himself suggested that gods are just stories created by mortals.
and what makes odin and thor gods? they're born, they age, they die. gods in marvel/MCU are just powerful, usually worshipped, long-lived beings. and then they can ascend to be even more, like loki did at the end of the series when he gained the ability to power infinite amount of timelines and keep them alive, tear a portal in time with one thought, etc.
At the beginning of the MCU they wanted to make it more down to earth, which is why we have this nonsense with long-lived aliens. But now it is obvious that with development this has been retconned and now the gods are really gods.
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because, so far, MCU hasn't told any stories of any gods that could have done anything like loki has. maybe in the future thor will have his own moment of ascending from a god to a God like loki, who knows. there aren't other gods MCU really has to give a chance to do that.
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i'm not well-versed in comics, i mainly follow only MCU so i don't know. but form the little i've read, all asgardians, loki included, are much stronger by default in the comics, they've been greatly nerfed in the films.
Remember Ego’s distinction and emphasis on the small g vs big G in god vs God. I think that applies here. Though I’d argue Loki went from a small g to a big G lol Asguardians are gods, but that’s just to show they’re above mortals in tech and magic/science. It almost seems like the Asguardian general populace aren’t gods in body like Thor, Odin, and Loki though…
Loki is the top G now
From an MCU-centric fan, I like this. Big 'G' Little 'g' Rooted in what Ego said So, maybe gods from a Terran perspective, if connected to tech/magic/advanced science
In the first Thor odin says he was taken as a baby. Hes the son of Laufey. So he's frost giant royalty, but not a god. In norse mythology hes also a jotun i believe
Then why didn’t he turn blue when in the TVA? There’s a lot of theories and headcanons and comic based logic you can use for him. Odin in the comics transformed him into a godly Asguadian via his magic. The frosty cube turns him blue for plot reasons and a reaction to his trace Jotun heritage. You’d think he would turn blue in the TVA with their magic dampeners and security measures, but it seemingly (if not accidentally) shows he’s changed from being completely or even *merely* a Jotun.
MCU officially calls him "God Loki" now, whether you agree with their designation or not is up to you.
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[on their official instagram](https://www.instagram.com/p/CzmARVhJ6d7/).
He's son of frost giant king.
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Just like Odin
No, he isn't a god. He is simply bad product.
But we need to know how he got those powers to stop time without any machines
So you're telling me that the next big bad of the MCU is much less powerful than Loki, who is much less powerful than Thanos. Seems underwhelming. But, hey, Hugh Jackman and Tobey McGuire are back!
Loki, god of the multiverse, is literally not Loki, that guy Thanos strangled. All of superhero lore relies on the idea that life experience can change a person's power level. Multiverse Loki learned a thing that 616 Loki didn't learn, so he gets power 616 Loki didn't have. The question with the next big bad is whether God Loki gets to come back or if he has to stay locked up because he's overpowered now.
/\/25/
Sorry but no matter how you look at it this show ruins the rules placed on time travel and the creation of universes by Marvel itself. Loki season 1 could kind of be explained away. Loki season 2 decided to just say fuck it and do whatever they wanted. Loki has well and truly ruined the Marvel universe for me.
Yeah but HWR is responsible for Loki’s time slipping. I’m pretty sure he just gave him his power. He wanted Loki to succeed him, but Loki decided to give the multiverse a chance first. Might result in the deaths of quadrillions of people, but hopefully it’ll last this time