Loki season one concluded last night with an episode written by showrunner Michael Waldron and Eric Martin. The writing's not perfect but it's a cut well above the four episodes between the first (also written by Waldron) and this. In fact, most of the problems with the finale are attributable to baggage from those middle episodes. But not so much that I couldn't enjoy the terrific looking locations and what turned out to be a pretty good finale villain.
Everyone who predicted it would be Kang the Conqueror gets a gold star. Thank goodness the writers aren't of the new petulant breed who can't abide being predicted. Kang is played by Jonathan Majors from Lovecraft Country, a show I have no interest in because I love Lovecraft and find fiction and commentary that focus on his racism to be boorish and imaginatively dead. But Majors does a good job basically playing a version of Star Trek: TNG's Q, one of those wacky, theatrical, over-the-top, all powerful types, which seems a pretty credible take on omnipotence.
Even better than Kang, though, is his far out purple space mansion.
Fucking fabulous, man.
There's a little subplot business as Owen Wilson confronts Ravonna (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), which felt superfluous and I'd still be arguing Mobius' survival was pointless except I liked the moment where he doesn't recognise Loki (Tom Hiddleston) at the end of the episode.
For most of the episode, Loki is pretty passive and Sylvie seems to be in charge. Which is odd for a guy who'd just been trying to take over the universe. It's been odd for the whole series, though. The relationship between him and Sylvie is meant to be point at which the big dramatic moment pivots as Loki is torn between his desire to avert disaster and his love for Sylvie. That love was never really credibly established, though.
The basic argument of the episode, and the series as a whole, seems to be about order versus chaos. Some have said Marvel has been influenced by Jordan Peterson, much as Benioff and Weiss clearly were with the final season of Game of Thrones, but order and chaos have been a recurring theme in the MCU since the first Avengers movie when Joss Whedon imported his long preoccupation with the topic--it was the centrepiece of the penultimate season of Angel. The Loki season finale seems to come down on the side of order as it looks like Sylvie's decision to tear down the status quo, damn the consequences, has indeed led to a worse situation. But to know for sure, I guess we'll need to shell out cash for the new Ant-Man and Doctor Strange movies. Good old capitalism.
Loki is available on Disney+.
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