Time is a variable under which all of our life experiments are conducted. Though modern scientific thought would challenge the concept of time as a linear phenomenon, we still behave according to the certainty of our lives beginning - and ending - in a series of measurable events.
But what if our lives weren’t so easily measured, a dotted timeline of choice and experience - action and consequence? What if there existed an infinite multiverse wherein every decision that an individual could possibly make created a never-ending fractal variation of you?
The Variant and Lamentis - the second and third episodes of Loki - work well together to explore this concept. In The Variant, we’re given a closer look at Loki’s attempts to outfox Mobius and the TVA, and it’s embarrassing to see Loki stumble over the guile of his newfound partner. Acting as liaison for trickster god methodology, Loki accompanies Mobius to a Renaissance Fair in 1980’s Wisconsin - the last known whereabouts of the variant. Here Loki discovers that he’ll have to work much harder to escape the TVA because they - unlike himself - are well knowledged in his idiosyncrasies. To add further insult, Mobius is completely dispassionate in his dismissal of Loki’s attempts to deceive. His preparation for tomfoolery is well tempered, and Loki’s desperation to convince him that his own hamfisted efforts are legit - alleged “lessons” in Asgardian mischief - is next level cringe.
Having been placed in a veritable “time out” for his actions, Mobius assigns Loki the unenviable task of studying his own case files for clues, explaining that both Rennslayer and the TVA have exhausted their patience with him, and this is in fact his last last chance at being helpful. Coincidentally, Loki discovers the destruction of Asgard amidst the TVA’s records. Despite the newfound knowledge that Ragnarok has obliterated his homeworld, Loki deduces that his quarry is hiding in pending apocalypses, and theorizes that it would be impossible to create trackable deviations in a timeline wherein devastation is imminent.
You’d think that the revelation of one’s home being erased from existence would set one aback, but not our boy Loki. In a high jinks fueled sidequest to 79 E.V. Pompeii, Loki is ecstatic to one- up Mobius with his theory. After cajoling Mobius into witnessing the apocalyptic aftermath of Vesuvius with nary a fault in the Sacred Timeline, our would-be buddy cops are on a roll towards victory. With just a bit of old fashioned detective work from Mobius, the pair determine that the variant is hiding within a megastore of a not too distant future Alabama, USA, where a devastating hurricane looms imminent.
This is where Loki had my attention in full, as there’s almost nothing more tense than hunkering down during a storm of any magnitude. It’s here also that the tempest kicks the series into high gear and sets the plot surging forward. Having split up from Mobius and the TVA Minutemen, it isn’t long before Loki and Hunter B-15 encounter our alt Loki, washing away all of their best laid plans.Much to Loki’s surprise, this variant possesses the ability to enchant its opponents, directing their speech and actions - a trick with which our Loki is not equipped. As such, the ambush of Loki and Hunter B-15 is swift, with our variant taking control of Hunter B-15 to assail Loki. Elsewhere, the separated party discovers a disheveled member of their force that has been enchanted, and she admits that she has revealed the location of the Time-Keepers to the Variant. Meanwhile, the alt-Loki has also rigged all the reset charges they’ve stolen to activate simultaneously along the Sacred Timeline, sending the Time Variance Authority into complete disarray.
Now alone with Loki, the Variant is revealed to be a female incarnation of himself, much to the shock of our anti-hero. Despite his immediate efforts to have this enchantress join him in betraying Mobius, she escapes through an activated portal. With Mobius and company finally catching up, Loki hesitates for the slightest moment before tailing his counterpart, the portal snapping shut behind him.
I love the straightforward idea of Loki stepping through a literal doorway to progress the series and further his journey of self-discovery; a journey he is most certainly now on, whether he knows it or not. I love also the tonal shifts in color throughout this episode. Inside of Roxxcart we have this green tinged fluorescence which - according to the series cinematographer, Autumn Durald Arkapaw, is a direct homage to the visual style of David Fincer. This hue eventually gives way to red as Loki considers the possibility of abandoning Mobius. Not only is it visually arresting, but it serves to suggest the potential dangers of leaving Mobius behind. Is Loki escaping a captor? Or is he in fact abandoning an ally and entering further peril?
Lamentis is easily my favorite of the series. I adore everything about this episode, particularly in terms of the score from Natalie Holt. It is at once lonesome and menacing, and brings with it a sense of sublime despair that can only belong to a doomed world named Lamentis-1. The futuristic cityscape once again calls us back to films like Bladerunner and its sequel, Villenueve’s Bladerunner 2049. As in the latter, its opulent use of a fluorescent palette is crowded and surreal, and appeals to aesthetics while also raising alarm.
Little occurs in episode 3, plot-wise, but the development of Loki and Sylvie - as she’s purposefully elected to identify herself - is nothing short of poetry. Left in a lurch on a doomed satellite, the two must shelve their mutual distrust and work together to escape the moon before it collides with its neighboring planet. As the pair trek towards what they hope will be a way out, they reveal to one another details of their individual lives which - while remarkably similar - differ in subtle but no less dramatic ways. Both admit to the other that they were adopted, but it’s our Loki who had the truth held back from him. Sylvie was not only aware of her adoption, but had embraced that knowledge. These interactions between characters indicate that Sylvie, while a stranger, is still a reflection of himself, and vice versa. She represents an aspect of a Loki that has taken ownership of her life. She’s not only embraced her upbringing, but has gone so far as to rename herself, declaring her agency as wholly her own.
Our Loki, a veritable demigod, is mired in a desperate loop of wanting. A master of illusion and cunning, it’s ironic that he should be so easily fooled by himself, and it is Sylvie who serves to illustrate this. During their flight, she declares to Loki, “You don’t know what you want!”
While it’s hard to refute Sylvies claim, it’s clear that Loki is at least peripherally aware of his own desires - especially since he can only begin to articulate himself while in his cups. During a scene in which the pair have stowed away aboard a train headed towards believed escape, the two agree to relax “in their own ways,” leading Sylvie to sit quietly alone while Loki mingles towards inebriation. After some time, Sylvie awakens to a merrily intoxicated Loki leading the train’s passengers in song. After a penultimate refrain, Loki implores the crowd to silence, and then renders a lonesome verse in Asgardian. With lyrics based on Norwegian, they are translated by the songs writer, Erland Nødtvedt, thusly:
In storm-blackened mountains I wander alone
Across glaciers I travel forth
In the apple orchard the fair maiden stands
And sings, "When will you come home?"
One could easily assume - and rightly - that Loki is singing of Sylvie, or at the very least a woman similar to her, however; it’s more appropriate to assume that Loki is singing of himself. I’ll try not to go too hard off the rails into Loki’s projections, but it’s fair to say that Loki is the epitome of narcissism, and what could be more narcissistic than literally falling in love with yourself? In the end, it’s more than that, though, and to love himself - to truly know and love himself - is what Loki desires.
It’s a big swing for Lamentis writer Bisha K. Ali (Black Mirror, Ms. Marvel), and she without a doubt connects. While we know Loki is conceited, the notion of wanting to come home to himself is what’s important, and falling in love with Sylvie is not only a wonderful metaphor, it’s also the most cinematically dynamic way to convey this idea. Here, Loki is capable of integrating this knowledge of the Self, moving towards something that more resembles wholeness.
This is the crux of Loki thus far - that there is indeed something to the idea of self-knowledge. So many of us are wrapped up in the day to day, the grind, the rat race - that not nearly enough time is spent - much less granted - to the task of knowing oneself. To some, the Greek maxim of Know Thyself may seem a simple enough task. You know your name, your birthdate. You know your job. You know what foods you like and dislike, what movies and television shows you enjoy. Perhaps you enjoy gardening, video games, leatherwork, or cosplay. Hell, maybe you’ve even cast your own natal chart. But do you know why you enjoy the things that you do? Do you know why you make the choices that you make, the subtle influences behind any one of your implicit biases? The things that make your heart sing, as well as the things that make you cry - do you know why? And of all of these myriad things, how many of them are based upon stories that we affirm to ourselves by rote repetition? What about the stories that others tell us about ourselves?
Are we defined by the limits of what the world allows us to be? What if suddenly we were stripped of those things?
The third episode of Loki ends with our viridian variants stranded with no way off of Lamentis-1, hand in hand, staring into a lonely, lavender end. I too felt trapped right along with them, pondering the ways in which I’ve been estranged from myself.
These are the questions that Loki is urging us to explore, and I for one am absolutely here for it.