At the end of the ‘Loki’ Season 2 finale, Loki finds himself at the start of this story, with a new title and, more importantly, a new creation myth for the MCU.
It’s taken a long time, but the God of Mischief has finally died. At the end of Loki’s second season, the Asgardian discovers his glorious purpose as a deity worthy of a new title: the God of Stories.
No character in the Marvel Cinematic Universe has evolved more dramatically than Tom Hiddleston’s Loki over the course of six films and one live-action TV series since 2011’s Thor. He began as a villain, progressed to an antihero, and then to a full-fledged superhero. However, by the end of the Season 2 finale, aptly titled “Glorious Purpose,” Loki has evolved beyond such simple narrative archetypes. He has effectively become the multiverse itself, guardian of all hero’s journeys past, present, and future.
Loki’s 12th and possibly final episode in the MCU is the culmination of the Asgardian’s appearances in the MCU for more than a decade. It’s both a satisfying conclusion for Marvel’s flagship TV show and a heartbreaking end for one of the show’s most tragic and beloved characters. The Prince of Lies once desired a royal throne above all else, even if it meant harming his brother, parents, or millions of earthlings in the process. Loki finally gets his throne in “Glorious Purpose,” but it’s not the one he had hoped for.
Last week’s installment concluded with Loki learning how to control his time slipping, transforming what was once a problem into a potential solution to save all of his friends. He used his new superpower to return to the TVA just before the Temporal Loom was destroyed, trying to figure out what they could have done differently to avoid the disaster. When O.B. suggested that they were taking too long to even attempt to fix the Loom, Loki entered his own time loop, trying again and again to speed up their progress.
Just enough to ensure their mission’s success. Loki had been experimenting with time loops for much of the second season, but the finale takes this narrative device a step further as he creates his own Groundhog Day.
To begin “Glorious Purpose,” Loki retraces his steps over the course of the second season to see how every action can be executed faster, spending literally centuries doing so to achieve optimal sequencing, much to the consternation of his allies. (At one point, Mobius approaches him and asks him, “What the shit are you doing?!”) But when they finally succeed in expanding the Loom’s capacity to account for the growing number of branches, they realize their efforts—and Loki’s lifetime of work—were for naught.
“The Loom will never be able to accommodate for an infinitely growing multiverse,” Victor Timely says. As Loki realizes that the only way to prevent the destruction of the Loom and the TVA is to return to the moment when Sylvie unlocked the true potential of the multiverse and stop her from killing He Who Remains, he embarks on a tour through the greatest hits of Season 2.
Loki finds himself in another futile cycle at the Citadel at the End of Time, each time attempting and failing to save He Who Remains from being stabbed by Sylvie. The full extent of Loki’s impossible predicament begins to take shape only when the TVA’s mastermind pulls Loki out of it, using his advanced time-twisting TemPad to freeze Sylvie in place.At the end of the first season, He Who Remains paved the way for Loki and Sylvie to find him at the End of Time, and here, the villain reveals to Loki that everything that has happened since then—from his death to Loki’s time slipping—has all happened exactly as he predicted.
Beginning with this conversation with He Who Remains, Loki travels back and forth in time to determine what he must do, seeking advice as he comes up with the words to rewrite the story of the entire multiverse. It’s a clever way of revisiting some of the series’ most pivotal moments to show how far Loki has progressed while also allowing him to have one last conversation with the show’s most important characters. Loki has mastered the ability to transport his body through time and space, and he has grown powerful enough to dictate time for those around him, similar to HWR’s Time Twister. Though Loki appears to be able to travel to any point in time,He chooses one of their very first conversations with Mobius, when he was just learning about the TVA in the series premiere.
Loki chooses a time when he was still restrained and Mobius was just a TVA analyst trying to figure out what made Loki tick. In some ways, this version of Mobius is more objective because he has yet to learn about all of the lies and deceptions upon which the TVA was built, and he is still a devoted servant to an organization that prunes every variant and branching timeline without exception.
They decide to skip the rewatch of Loki’s life as they sit across from each other in the TVA’s time theater. Mobius instead tells him a story about an incident involving a pair of Hunters, which is a thinly veiled personal anecdote. Mobius describes how this Hunter once “lost sight of the big picture” when he failed to prune a variant because he was a young boy. A couple of Hunters died as a result of his hesitation, and things would have been even worse if his partner, Ravonna, hadn’t intervened. “Most purpose is more burden than glory,” explains Mobius.
Loki’s only option now appears to be to murder Sylvie. Loki must choose the burden, as Mobius’ story helps to frame it. So Loki makes one last stop, visiting Sylvie at A.D. Doug’s Pasadena workshop from last week’s “Science/Fiction” to inform her of the unfortunate reality. For one last time, they debate the need for the TVA, the choice between dying free or living under oppressive rule, and their unparalleled power over everyone’s lives in every universe. Sylvie assists him in realizing that protecting the Sacred Timeline isn’t enough; for all that she has preached about the importance of free will, her position finally sinks in with Loki. “Who are you to judge?” “How can we die fighting?” Sylvie inquires.
Loki returns to the Temporal Core rather than the End of Time, to those familiar final moments before the Loom is destroyed and the multiverse begins to decay. Loki, on the other hand, chooses his own path rather than following HWR’s rules. He takes one last look at his friends before leaving to be alone for the rest of his life, accepting the fate he was most afraid of. “I know exactly what I want,” he tells Sylvie and Mobius. “I know what kind of god I must be… for you.” For everyone.”
Loki’s final climactic scene is a stunning visual sequence accompanied by an epic score by composer Natalie Holt, whose best work in the series appears near the end of this finale. As Loki takes Victor’s place on the gangway to the Loom, his TVA attire disintegrates due to the temporal radiation in the room, and his magic creates an iconic green costume in its place to match his new unofficial title as the God of Stories. A horned helmet appears on his head, with a black-and-gold aesthetic similar to He Who Remains’ Citadel and technology. Loki destroys the Loom, scattering the branches into the void ahead of him as they decompose.He then grabs these vine-like threads, entire universes crumbling in his palms, and pulls them together through a portal to the End of Time. And while Loki wraps himself in the multiverse’s branches, imbuing them with his magic, he sits alone on a throne at his Citadel, creating a new type of Loom better suited for an Asgardian god: Yggdrasil, the World’s Tree.
