Infinity Stones give you the power to manipulate the fundamental aspects of the universe, but only the universe where the Stones came from. The stones aren’t powerless because the Timekeepers are super badass, the stones are powerless because the Timekeepers built the TVA headquarters in a place where Infinity Stones don’t work.
Sure, they cast themselves as people who came in and installed peace. That’s what most conquerors do. But we’ve seen how they prune timelines in times of peace: they send in people with weapons to destroy them. They almost certainly ended the Time Wars the same way - they sent in people with weapons to destroy them.
Which, you know… sounds a lot like war to me.
That said, I question if there was actually a “Time War” before the Timekeepers showed up, or if that’s just the excuse they give for what they do.
Because we’ve seen how they operate, and they’re clearly dicks.
that the TVA has been corrupted from it original mission. And that’s why it seems so evil. And possibly Lady Loki (or Sylvie or whoever) is working to try and get things back on track.
Just a thought. I have nothing more substantial than a hunch.
I did not know that. If so, that’s interesting, but also brings up the question of where/when/what is the TVA. Does it have its own equivalent to the infinity stones?
How would a time war work anyway? If you send your military to another timeline, wouldn’t that create a branch, one where your military is there, and another that goes on without knowing you ever attacked it?
Though, for that matter, the TVA is obviously able to influence established timelines, or else they would only be resetting the timeline in which they showed up, and would leave a branch where they didn’t.
The Time Keepers and their agents may not be the only ones who have access to some sort of “meta-time.”
I would be amused if it turns out that Loki is uniquely qualified to deal with variants. The God of Mischief seems perfect for dealing with multiverse chaos. When he uses duplication-casting, he creates another version of himself that can carry out the opposite side of a decision. He can deal with either-or situations by doing both things. He can eat the ham sandwich and eat the tuna sandwich tomorrow, without bifurcating the timeline in the process. Afterwards, he sort of collapses the superposition and the single remaining Loki remembers doing both things. Could he extrapolate from this ability and use reverse-duplication-casting to unite with a consenting variant? I would find it quite satisfying if TVA Loki and killed-by-Thanos Loki, along with any number of other Loki variants all end up being aspects of one “true” Loki, who remembers doing everything.
Could the branches of a multiverse be considered duplication-casting on a grand scale? Rather than being pruned, can a branch be collapsed back into the trunk timeline without really destroying either? No one dies, we just don’t remember events as they would have happened in the branch? (Except for Loki, who can remember events from both duplicates. Several fourth-wall-breaking characters from DC and Marvel can remember events from before major continuity resets, which somewhat sets a precedent.) When a TVA agent prunes a timeline, is that just their term for it, when collapsing would have been more accurate in the first place?
This. I’m enjoying the ride so far, but I’m not invested enough to speculate too much on where things are going. But the one thing I’m sure about is that the version of events presented by “Miss Minute” regarding the Timekeepers is absolute propaganda. There’s something fundamental about the timekeepers that been hidden from us (and Loki, and possibly everyone at the TVA, or at least Mobius) that will be the big twist. Maybe they are doing this all for their own benefits, maybe they are actually some other character in disguise, one we know already, or one we don’t, maybe they don’t even really exist. But there’s no way this benevolent dictators of the sacred timeline BS outlives the series. Loki’s going to figure it out, or at least knock it all down to let chaos and free will rule, and find out in the process.
Tonight’s episode gives us the first big revelation about the TVA - their staff are all Variants, rather than purpose-created entities as we’ve been told before. Presumably this would’ve been Loki’s fate if he’d been pruned before Mobius took an interest in him.
Sylvie is an interesting version of Loki - she knew all along that she was a Frost Giant, and she’s apparently been a Variant for most of her existence. She and Loki make quite the pair.
Lamentis-1 has a very Mass Effect-ish aesthetic about it, between the barren rocky plains, the prefab huts, and the meteors careening down from above. I was a bit put off by how blatant it was that most of this episode was filmed in front of a green screen, but it looked great nonetheless.
Don’t get me wrong. The backgrounds looked fantastic. It’s just that it was visibly evident that the shot was of two people running in front of a background that they couldn’t interact with in any way.
I spent most of the episode expecting it to be a fake out, and they’re still both in the shack where Sylvie tried to put a whammy on him and it “failed” because “his mind was too strong.”
They’ve made Loki an inconsistent fighter in this show. In the Thors, he was obviously not as good as Thor, but he was always fairly decent. The illusions were an advantage but he wasn’t just relying on illusion.
In this, there have been more than a few fights that he should have had an easier time with. It’s hard to tell if that’s intentional or if it’s that they need this for plot reasons.
I don’t think the slightest change sets off the TVA…I think the ‘Timekeepers’ are only pruning whatever doesnt work for their interests.
I believe we’ll see a flashback to a Child Lady Loki doing something misichevious like using the tesseract to send Thor into a black hole or something…then the TVA shows up and wipes out Asgard. Hence her life-long quest of vengeance.
I have a feeling this Loki - or Sylvie - came from a timeline where Odin never adopted a frost giant foundling and raised it as his own, and so that child had to grow up alone. She doesn’t like being called Loki, because she never had that name, or that life.
Loving the show so far - I think I’ve enjoyed these three episodes more than either of the other new MCU shows at this point.
Who lifted the building that was falling on them as they ran through the city? That seems like an obvious tipoff that something’s not right… I think they’re either in a fantasy generated by Sylvie, or Loki swiped a Time Stone. Looking forward to next week!