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As Loki kicks off on Disney Plus, there's a lot to get our heads around – the whole concept of time in the MCU has pretty much been turned on its head, for example. Turns out there's a Sacred Timeline that no one is allowed to deviate from and, if they do, they'll have the Time Variance Authority on their backs. The TVA is an organization tasked with monitoring the timeline of the universe and making sure nothing goes awry – except, of course, "things going awry" is sort of Loki's specialty.
Teaming up with the TVA's Mobius M. Mobius (played by Owen Wilson), can Loki help clean up the Sacred Timeline, or will his involvement just make things go from bad to worse? GamesRadar+ spoke to Michael Waldron, head writer and executive producer on the new Marvel show, about what we can expect from the God of Mischief (and his associated variants) over the rest of season 1.
The show features moments of Thor: The Dark World, Thor: Ragnarok, and Avengers: Endgame in episode 1. Which of these MCU projects did you find the most influential on Loki?
Michael Waldron: Actually, I think that Thor: The Dark World was probably the most influential for me for Loki's development in the show. I think you could say that Thor: The Dark World is almost a Loki movie. There's great stuff with him in that movie with his mother, the scene over music where he's told, you know, that his mother was killed and he has that telekinetic explosion of anger. I just loved everything with Loki in there and so, yeah, I was very inspired by The Dark World.
This rogue Loki variant is being positioned as the series big bad. How explosive can we expect the battle between Loki and Loki to get?
MW: I mean, look, Loki is the ultimate narcissist, you know. I think there's probably no one he's more threatened by than the idea that 'Maybe there's a better me out there getting the jump on the TVA, these guys that I couldn't get the jump on,' so it's safe to say he's gonna really have a bone to pick with whoever this other Loki is.
Can we expect to see more Loki variants? And is Richard E. Grant one of them?
MW: Nobody wants to hear me say who Richard E. Grant's playing. We're lucky to have him in the show – if he's in the show, I heard he might be. So I think everybody should just watch and find out. Like Loki himself, we really wanted the experience of watching the show to feel kind of unexpected and constantly shape-shifting.
So just how sort of weird can we expect things to get? How many timelines and multiverses are they going to be?
MW: I can just say that there was no governor on this thing, we were able to take this story to its absolute limits and go as crazy and big as we wanted to. So, everybody can just tune in and we'll see where it goes.
Check out our Loki release schedule to make sure you never miss an episode.
