Loki impresses with one of its best episodes yet in “Science/Fiction”

Watching Loki has been a pleasant experience, which is a comfort given that the MCU has been so unpredictable of late. The MCU has been lacking in “oomph” factor for quite some time. Apart from shows like WandaVision, it just hasn’t been the same since Avengers: Endgame.

However, with Loki’s second season, it’s finally feeling like old times, as Loki tries to keep the multiverse from completely unraveling. Last week’s episode left us in shock and awe as the Temporal Loom collapsed and essentially destroyed life as we know it.

It was exciting to go into this week’s episode with no idea what would happen next. Of course, while last week gave us the impression that everyone is now “dead,” we knew with two more episodes to go, couldn’t be the case.

There is a lot to dissect and break down, so let’s jump right into it. And remember that there are MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD!

Loki’s trip through space and time

As expected, nobody really “died” when the Temporal Loom collapsed. We start with Loki (Tom Hiddleston) discovering that he is slipping through time and space again, and that he just might be the key to saving the entire world.

Given that he can zip in and out of different points in time, it becomes clear that Loki is the only one who can make sense of this chaos. As he begins to time-slip, he has no control over when and where he will end up. But he keeps slipping to points on the timeline where he sees his old friends back in their original lives. They have no memory of him. Clearly something is going on.

His first stop was is a branched timeline in 1962 in San Francisco, at Alcatraz. He finds Casey (Eugene Cordero) as a prisoner trying to escape. Fun fact: the two prisoners Casey is escaping with are the directors of the episode: Aaron Moorhead and Justin Benson. They also directed episodes 1 and 4!

Next, Loki shows up in 2012 New York, in a doctor’s office. He meets B-15 (Wunmi Mosaku), who is a physician in this branched timeline. Just like Casey, she does not know who Loki is.

Things get especially interesting when Loki lands in 2022 and meets this timeline’s version of Mobius (Owen Wilson), who is selling jet skis in Cleveland. We’ve heard Mobius wax rhapsodic about jet skies time and again, so it’s hilarious that this is his life.

And of course, last but not least, the God of Mischief then finds himself in 1994 Pasadena, where he runs into this timeline’s O.B. (Ke Huy Quan). This is where the episode takes a turn, because it doesn’t matter what timeline this guy is on; every version of O.B. is open-minded about time-travel.

Avengers team…assemble!

Of course, O.B. has to now create all the timey-wimey TVA tools from scratch, which he can do because Loki gives him the TVA guidebook that O.B. himself wrote in another life. But as O.B. is trying to figure out how to make a tempad, Loki ends up time-slipping back to 2022 Cleveland, where he has to convince Mobius that he’s needed to help save the multiverse. It’s a hard sell considering Mobius has two sons in this branched timeline. Mobius is finally convinced when O.B. walks through a time portal door, having taken 19 months in his own timeline to throw together a DIY tempad.

With O.B.’s tempad, Loki is able to whiz in and out of different points in time and space to assemble the former TVA team. It takes some convincing and cajoling, but he manages to gather them all in…except Sylvie (Sophia Di Martino).

Unlike everyone else, Sylvie didn’t forget what happened; she just went back to her life working at McDonald’s, which she now considers “home.” She’s more or less happy making Big Macs and visiting record stores, and doesn’t see why she should give that up. She points out to Loki that he was trying to get the team back together not because he really cares about saving the TVA, but because he’s lonely.

This moment is quite heartbreaking because, to a degree, the God of Mischief has always been on the outskirts. He was never part of a community in a way that made him feel loved or accepted, and with this unconventional group of people, he found that.

Ending of Loki Season 2, Episode 5 explained

Sylvie’s belief that she’ll be fine staying in her own timeline is proven wrong when she visits a record store only to find that her universe is being shredded into strands, which leaves her with only one choice: join the mission to save the multiverse.

Things aren’t doing great back in O.B.’s timeline either, where the gang has gathered to discuss their next moves. This timeline starts to unravel just like Sylvie’s did, and one by one, each member of the team is spaghettified out of existence.

Earlier in the episode, O.B. was very eager to have Loki learn how to control his time-slipping. In this desperate moment, the God of Mischief finally realizes that it is not when and where that helps him control his slips; it’s who.

We watch him slip in and out of different points right before everyone except him and Sylvie are shredded into time strands. And finally, in the final moment of the episode, Loki finds himself at the moment right before all this chaos ensues, back at the Temporal Loom right before it’s destroyed!

Wow, just typing all that out reminded me how amazing this episode was and how much fun it was to see all these storylines come together. It’s been a confusing but wild ride so far, and I cannot wait to see what the Season 2 finale has in store next week. I can’t even imagine where all this is headed, but I do know one thing: it is going to determine the fate of the MCU. What happens next week is going to be very telling of what direction the rest of the movies and shows will take, so buckle in, Marvel fans, we are in for a wild ride!

Episode Grade: A-

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