MarvelVision: Loki, Episode 4 – “The Nexus Event”

Loki Episode 4 The Nexus Event

Loki and Sylvie take the fight to the Time Variance Authority and some big revelations come to light as we recap Loki Episode 4, “The Nexus Event.” After surviving the apocalypse event at Lamentis-1, Mobius takes them back to the TVA to try to get to the bottom of the new, strange Nexus Event that alerted them to the Lokis’ location. And in the process, not only do we discover the truth about the TVA and the Time Keepers, but we also discover that all is not what it seems when it comes to the pruning process. Spoilers on, but let’s discuss that big post credits sequence featuring Classic Loki, Kid Loki, Boastful Loki, and… Alligator Loki? Plus more Easter eggs for the Marvel Comics, and the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

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Full Episode Transcript

Alex:                 Welcome to MarvelVision, a podcast about Marvel, the MCU, and Loki. I’m Alex.

Justin:              Loki. I’m Justin.

Alex:                 It just feels very sing song. You got to say it in a sing song way, because it was such a happy, fun episode today.

Justin:              We’re having fun. People are falling in love. People are falling in friendship. People are maybe being pruned from their timelines for the rest of time. Lots happening.

Alex:                 Classic stuff. We’re going to be talking about episode four, The Nexus Event, the latest episode of Loki, and requisite spoiler warning here. If you haven’t watched it, go watch it. We already spoiled it. We already mentioned several [crosstalk 00:00:59].

Justin:              It’s over.

Alex:                 It’s too late.

Justin:              The podcast is over. That’s all I have to say.

Alex:                 Yeah, we’re good. But yeah, again, we’re going to be talking about this episode, the big broad strokes. So much went down in this episode. Sylvia and Loki are left on Lamentis-1. They are thinking that they’re going to die and, as Justin mentioned, seemingly falling in love at the same time. That gives us a new, very interesting spike that I’m sure we’re going to talk about on the sacred timeline, but it also alerts Mobius and the rest of the TVA to their location, so they are able to be rescued, except the rescue involves them being captured and interrogated, leads to a bunch of different events, including the return of Lady Sif from Asgard and, thanks to a time loop, Loki and Mobius cement their friendship, as Loki reveals that Mobius and everybody else in the TVA are actually variants. Sylvie, meanwhile, turns Hunter B-20 … Hunter B-15?

Justin:              B-15.

Alex:                 It’s Hunter B-15 and Hunter C-20. It’s hard to keep up.

Justin:              Take your B-15 in the morning, and then you can take your C-20 in the evening.

Alex:                 Got you. Energy for the day. So she manages to turn Hunter B-15, thanks to her memories. She’s been breaking down a little bit ever since the events over at Roxxcart a couple of episodes back, and Ravonna Renslayer meanwhile, Judge Renslayer, brings them in front of the Timekeepers. The Timekeepers, as we suspected, turn out to be puppets, they’re just very basic robots, they don’t seemingly exist. Over the course of this, Mobius gets pruned from the timeline, heartbreaking, and then, right at the end there as Loki is about to confess his love or something for Sylvie, he gets pruned as well, and unfortunately that is it for Loki. RIP Loki, unless you stayed through the credits and watched the credits, because there is a tag there at the end. In fact, not too much of a surprise, Loki is okay, and we meet not one, not two, but four additional Lokis. You missed one, didn’t you?

Justin:              Where’s the fourth one? Was there a tiny one?

Alex:                 There’s an alligator Loki.

Justin:              Oh, shit. Cool.

Alex:                 Yeah, kid Loki is holding an alligator Loki, so wild stuff there at the end, lots to talk about, but let’s jump back because we were talking about this very briefly before we jumped on, this episode was awesome. This show is so good.

Justin:              It is very good, and I’ll tell you, what they’re doing is they’re just giving us all this information, some of which we’ve suspected, but that’s satisfying, while, at the same time, giving us all of these extra mysteries that we still don’t really even understand what the context is for them.

Alex:                 I had to check the episode number about three quarters of the way through here, when they were confronting the timekeepers, and everything that was going down, and everybody was being erased, because I really thought I had miscounted and this was the fifth out of six episodes, not the fourth out of six episodes, so clearly there’s a lot more going on. I don’t know, and I’m sure we’ll talk about this at the end, I don’t know if we’re going to get a flashback episode, Sylvie confronts Ravonna and says, “Tell me everything,” so maybe we’ll get a whole history of the TVA going on here and a big reveal the next episode, but man, crazy, crazy stuff. And like you said, also emotional, very emotional throughout, which I was very surprised about.

Justin:              Yeah, and really they’re doing this romcom thing with both Loki and a little bit Mobius, where it’s like look, we’re friends, we should really work together and get through this, but they’re really playing it straight. And then the whole do you think that Loki loves Sylvie?

Alex:                 I think maybe. It’s an interesting thing to think about in the grand context of the world, because obviously there was a big deal the last episode that Loki was made canonically queer, he is bisexual or pansexual, they didn’t necessarily specify, but certainly they were very clear about the fact that he’s been with both men and women, so not that it negates that in any way, but cementing him in a weird relationship with a woman who is also himself is an interesting way to go with that, but I think, I mean my suspicion when I saw that branching timeline and it was a gold one, you have that conversation that Mobius and Hunter B-15?

Justin:              Yep.

Alex:                 Great.

Justin:              Take your B-15 in the morning and you can hunt all day long.

Alex:                 Okay. I didn’t get it yet. When they talk about it, that seems like that’s probably the correct timeline. We’re going to get some sort of love is the thing you should follow, whether that’s friendship love or romantic love.

Justin:              You sound like you’re struggling to even say these words here, like love?

Alex:                 What is love?

Justin:              Is love what we need to be doing?

Alex:                 Oh yeah, I’m one of those timekeeper robots. I don’t know if I mentioned that.

Justin:              I knew it.

Alex:                 Should have established that.

Justin:              Keep your head on.

Alex:                 Yeah.

Justin:              Keep your head on your neck.

Alex:                 I [crosstalk 00:05:45] talk like that. I need to watch it with subtitles because it’s very echoey, blah, blah, blah.

Justin:              Good. [inaudible 00:05:54] behind the curtain, Wizard of Oz reference. Yeah, I think we’re going to get a reveal, perhaps next episode, that cuts through their romance, revealing Sylvie to not be a Loki, to be the enchantress, as we’ve suspected, and she’s enchanted Loki and that’s why he’s feeling that way.

Alex:                 This gets into another thing, and I know we’re just jumping all over the place here, but we get to see Cailey Fleming, who plays Judith Grimes on The Walking Dead, as young Sylvie towards the beginning of the episode. This was also very surprising to me just in terms of, and this is part of the plot, but how early Sylvia was taken by the TVA. She asks towards the end of the episode, when they’re going up in the elevator, she asks Ravonna, “What was my nexus event?” Ravonna says she can’t remember. She’s probably lying about that. She probably does in fact-

Justin:              I think she’s lying.

Alex:                 Probably.

Justin:              That feels like something to zing. That’s a TVA burn, where you’re like, “I don’t even remember your nexus event. Oh.”

Alex:                 But what do you think it could possibly be? What could the nexus event be from a Loki, or Amora, or whoever she is, so young that could cause her to be pruned from the timeline?

Justin:              I think my suspicion, because the way they were like, “Erase her. Get rid of these toys. These toys are dangerous,” with their little bone stem. I was like oh yeah? What is she playing at? But I think what we’re going to find out maybe is that they’re doing some sort of pre pruning, if you will. They’re just doing what they think is right. Like Ravonna, she’s decided she’s in charge of time, and she’s like, “Well, I know for a fact, based on the time I’ve seen, that Sylvia is going to become a problem for me, so I’m going to cut her off as early as I possibly can,” which is morally not good, and it’s getting into stuff like a movie like Minority Report feels very present here in a lot of the philosophy that may be underlying this.

Alex:                 Well, in Minority Report, there’s three people in a milk bath and here we got three timekeepers, so it’s basically the same thing.

Justin:              Exactly. And we couldn’t see the milk, but I guarantee you 100% that it was milk that was fueling those robots.

Alex:                 Yeah.

Justin:              Those robots drink milk.

Alex:                 100%. I’ve seen Westworld and they’re full of milk.

Justin:              100%. Exactly.

Alex:                 Yeah. And this is again jumping all over the place, but just talking about robot stuff, we got a classic tears in the rain speech from Hunter B-15 when they went to Roxxcart. I mean not the tears of the rain speech, but certainly I called back to that, she’s very robotic as a hunter, she’s following orders, Sylvie breaks her out of that, giving her memories back. I love the choice of not actually going into her memories and seeing it, and just see it through, I think it’s Wunmi Mosaku. I’ll look up her name, but Wunmi’s face and facial expressions, and having her live through that, but it definitely seemed like that Blade Runner thing a little bit, which gives us the second out of three Marvel series that have had references to Blade Runner. The first one being WandaVision, which had the whole Tannhäuser Gate​ and crying Vision thing. So we’re leading up to some sort of blade runner event in the MCU, right?

Justin:              I mean I feel like Blade Runner, just everybody loves Blade Runner. Everybody wants to reference Blade Runner, Blade Runner is this nexus event when it comes to filmmaking, so people are like I’m just going to reference Blade Runner a little bit.

Alex:                 Do you think people are going to do that from now on? They’re going to refer to really seminal movies as nexus events?

Justin:              I think that’s where we’re getting to, yeah. We’re all variants. Fast 9 is definitely a variant that needs to be pruned.

Alex:                 Little side note on this, I did not even realize that Wunmi was Ruby from Lovecraft Country. I don’t know if you watch that show, but I didn’t put it together because her performance was so different and her look was so different here, but she’s great.

Justin:              She’s great.

Alex:                 She’s really good.

Justin:              In a role that she’s just a soldier, she’s a foot soldier, and then she really distinguishes herself in this episode, I think. If all of Loki’s emotions and the friendship, love paradigm we’re talking about with Loki is going to be pruned or not real, I think her emotional journey here really then becomes the true emotional journey of these characters.

Alex:                 I also wanted to give you a shout out. I was thinking about your stuff that you’ve been talking about on the podcast here, because so much of this episode was about lying, and who’s lying, and who’s lying to who, whether it is about things about the TVA, whether it is about friendship, whether it’s about love or anything like that, obviously that’s core to Loki, which is something that we even talk about here in the episode, but that seemed to be a very central theme that they were playing with specifically in this hour.

Justin:              Yeah, everybody’s playing everyone all the time, and I think everyone thinks they’re right, everyone’s trying to do the right thing. The Owen Wilson arc in this episode was really fun, seeing Mobius just very chilly betray the TVA, side with Loki, and then go out really craving jet-skis, which I think is the one true thing in the Loki television show, that jet-skis [crosstalk 00:11:15].

Alex:                 Do you think maybe the idea here is to have a well-rounded life, you have to lie? Is that part of it? Because Mobius isn’t really a full person until he starts betraying his friends and organization.

Justin:              I think what the Loki core idea is, if you think Loki’s a hero, when he’s played for a hero, and I think we’re going to get a lot of variants of Loki, as we saw at the end of the episode, so this may be a conversation, I think you can lie if you’re getting after a greater truth. That’s a morally slippery slope to start saying that’s a good to do, but I do think everyone does that, and that’s the slippery slope that I think Ravonna did. She maybe started, and that’s the flashback episode that maybe we’re going to see next episode, she probably started trying to do the right thing, like oh, this multi-verse is actually bad, all these broken timelines, let me just prune some of those up, and then you start to do this slippery slope thing, and pretty soon you’re going back to Asgard and pruning this child because you think she’s going to be a problem later, and that’s where we’re at. So I think it’s all about people trying to do the right thing and ending up in a very bad place.

Alex:                 I think that’s a smart take on it, but I do want to touch on one thing that you just mentioned, do you think that Ravonna is the man behind the curtain here?

Justin:              I do, yeah. Do you think there’s a deeper person? A next person?

Alex:                 Yeah, I still do, and part this-

Justin:              Oh, Al Pacino as Mephisto.

Alex:                 He’s coming. Mephisto coming. Yeah, I think whoever it is, it’s going to be some big Marvel character that they’ve mentioned in no way throughout the previous episodes of the show. Now, I’m thinking it’s … I still stand by it, I think a Loki is behind this. I really thought we were going to get a Loki reveal as soon as the robot head fell, but part of the reason I think Ravonna is not the person behind this is she still went into the Timekeepers’ room at the beginning by herself. We just saw the scene where she’s taking Sylvie and Loki into the Timekeepers’ room and escorting them there. I’d have an easier time believing she’s the person behind it, particularly because she’s one of the only ones left, we do get that earlier scene where she’s going in there.

Alex:                 I do think she knows they’re robots, I do think she knows that they’re not real, but there’s a moment when she steps into the room towards the beginning of the episode, and she takes a very halting and very nervous breath, so I still think there’s something that she fears. And the immediate speculation, I know we’ve talked about this a bit, because Ravonna Renslayer I believe is the daughter of Kang in the comics, meaning the speculation is Kang is behind it, but like I just said, I don’t think we’re going to suddenly get episode six, “I am Kang. I’ve been behind this the entire time,” when nobody has mentioned anything about Kang before. I think it’s going to be a Loki.

Justin:              What do you think about Ravonna being a Loki? She’s a Loki variant, a lady Loki, which we haven’t seen but we’ve definitely referenced that idea in the show, and a Loki who did the worst thing possible, went super straight and doesn’t even believe in mischief anymore.

Alex:                 Oh man, what if they’re all Lokis. What if it’s Lokis all the way down.

Justin:              Look at that title sequence. It’s a bunch of different fonts of the word Loki, so I think this is going to end with as many Lokis as we can cram in here. One of us is a Loki.

Alex:                 I do think at least part of what’s going on with Ravonna is we do get that scene in the judge’s chambers, the flashback with Cailey Fleming, with young Sylvie, where, either accidentally, or because she hesitates, or whatever happens, she lets Sylvie go. So I do think at least part of this is Ravonna cleaning up her mess, not owning up to it, not revealing that particular fact that this is all kind of her fault, and covering it up in a certain way. So I do think at least that’s part of her motivation, or a large part of her motivation, versus her being the mastermind behind all of this.

Justin:              Yeah, and I will say that scene, clearly Ravonna, if she is the big bad, didn’t invent the TVA, based on that scene, the TVA was a thing, but I think that’s where I had the idea that maybe it’s going to be … it used to be this regular bureaucratic organization that’s like, “Let’s prune up these broken timelines off the multiverse and just keep all the good ones going,” and then she’s like, “No, let’s have one timeline. Let’s just keep everything. Why have all this variation? It’s a problem.” And so my guess is she went from this regular organization, took it over, and turned it into this controlling, using variants as their foot soldiers, bad organization that it is now.

Alex:                 Interesting. This is a very broad statement and doesn’t necessarily have to do with the Ravonna thing, but I just wanted to-

Justin:              That’s what podcasts are for, broad statements.

Alex:                 Broad statements. I just wanted to mention, I really like the writing in this episode. I thought there was a lot of very solid turns of phrase, particularly in the conversations about friendship, both between Ravonna and Mobius, and also Mobius and Loki. I love the fact, this is coming off of, I think there was a big discussion about the last episode, the Sylvie, Loki episode, where some fans, which I think is crazy, no insult to anybody who listens to this podcast, but that it was a little too talky, and I go entirely the opposite direction. My favorite scene, I think, of the episode was just Mobius and Loki sitting down and talking. And Owen Wilson and Tom Hiddleston’s rapport there, the way they go back and forth, the way they’re parrying, the way they’re talking about everything was so thrilling to watch, and that’s not easy to do. It’s not easy to make a back and forth talking scene so interesting.

Justin:              This is a talky show. I mean we get a little fight at the end here, but otherwise this is just a lot of walking in and out of rooms having serious chats with a couple of fun moments in between. And I agree with you, I love that. These actors are great, the way that they’re … the things they’re talking about are exciting. It’s really working. My favorite line was, “Another folksy dopey insult from this folksy dope.” So funny.

Alex:                 Yeah. Let’s talk about Lady Sif, the big MCU return this episode. So great to see her back. I know she was very underserved in the Thor movies, I don’t even think she showed up in Thor Ragnarok at all, but we finally got to see Jaimie Alexander again. She got a big, really full emotional arc in this episode, so that was great to see and I hope fans were pleased.

Justin:              Yeah, this is the appearance that the Sif fans have been waiting for, where she just methodically says the same two to three lines over and over again.

Alex:                 I felt a little bad, to be honest.

Justin:              Yeah, I mean, Sif just doesn’t get the star turn, in anything. And it’s just hard in the whole Thor verse, there’s so much going on. And in this, clearly this wasn’t about her, this is just about doing the Groundhog’s day thing for Loki. And I liked the sequence of it, it was cool. And you do just feel a little bit bad for Sif.

Alex:                 Yeah. I think the fullest arc that she ever got was the one episode of Agents of Shield that tied her to Thor: The Dark World, where, if I remember correctly, they start in London and they’re like, “Huh, this is some weird wreckage that happened during Thor: The Dark World. Well, time to head somewhere else and talk to Sif, and see what’s going on with her.” But maybe she’ll come back at some point. I think she’s in Thor: Love and Thunder, so hopefully they’ll do a more solid, better job with her there, but still nice to see her, and a fun sequence for our Loki. Can we call him our Loki? Is that okay?

Justin:              I think that’s the only way to distinguish. There’s going to be so many Lokis in this show very soon, what are we going to do? Loki Prime? Our Loki?

Alex:                 My Loki, your Loki.

Justin:              We should each claim a Loki.

Alex:                 We should each claim a Loki. Yeah.

Justin:              Exactly.

Alex:                 Wait, which one is yours?

Justin:              If my theory is correct, I’m going to take Ravonna.

Alex:                 I like it.

Justin:              A dark horse Loki.

Alex:                 I’m going to take Mobius, who is also a Loki.

Justin:              Nice. I’m going to take the jet-ski, which is a Loki jet-ski.

Alex:                 It has a little hat on it. Those are the handlebars.

Justin:              That’s the handlebars.

Alex:                 Yeah, there you go. A couple of other little notes I wanted to mention, there was a ton of speculation off of the trailer when it first dropped that Black Widow was going to show up, but it turns out it’s actually just Sylvia with some red lighting on her hair, which was kind of funny.

Justin:              Can you imagine Black Widow showing up in this series? That’d be so odd.

Alex:                 Yeah, well it makes no sense now, but I think back then, the speculation was that Loki was going to have to confront all the things that he had done wrong in his life, and it also looked like … Oh my God, I always blank on this. What’s the name of the terrible planet where Black Widow died with the soul stone?

Justin:              Vormir?

Alex:                 Vormir. Yeah, I think that’s right. Anyway, the planet kind of looked like Vormir, so I see how people potentially could have put that together, but obviously that’s not what it was at all. There was also a little tease here, I’m a little bummed that Pete isn’t on this episode because I feel like this is the one detail he would have picked out of the entire episode, but Mobius mentioned that they’ve had to pull in Kree, Titans, and vampires, clear set up for the Blade movie.

Justin:              Huge. Definitely a nod to the Blade heads out there. And he turned to camera and winked at that time too.

Alex:                 Yeah, and he said, “Hey Mahershala, you ready? Wow, you ready?”

Justin:              Good way to warm up there. Yeah, and it’s weird when he said the Blade movies are definitely … the original Blade movies are part of the MCU, which was gratifying for Pete.

Alex:                 Pete loved it. I heard him cheer somewhere. Should we talk about the end of the episode?

Justin:              Yes.

Alex:                 The very end of the episode, the teaser after the credits. So there’s a couple of things here, we definitely should talk about all of these Lokis that show up for our Loki, our shared Loki, if you will.

Justin:              Our shared. We share. We. He’s our child or boy. Our best boy.

Alex:                 Yeah. By the way, just a reminder, but it’s my weekend. So I’ll be picking him up at 5:00 on Friday.

Justin:              Yeah, the reason he’s so mischievous is because we’re divorced and we haven’t been able to really be the fathers that this Loki has needed.

Alex:                 So we get to see these Lokis, which is great, and I do want to talk about them, but I almost feel like the bigger reveal here is it seems like people who are being pruned are not actually being deleted, they’re being sent somewhere else. Was that your impression as well?

Justin:              Yeah, and I think since we lost both Mobius and Loki to pruning, I feel like they’re not dead. We’re going to get … We’re going to get them back. We have two more episodes. Obviously, we already get Loki back, but we have to get Mobius back as well, unless he’s just out there jet-skiing like a mother fucker, like he’s always wanted to be, I think we have to see him again. Yes, and I don’t know how this works in the overall logic of the show. Where do you go when you’re pruned? Also, the term pruned, I don’t know. I’m sick of using it.

Alex:                 Oh, you don’t like it? Does it make you think of prunes? [crosstalk 00:22:30].

Justin:              I think of the large … I think of the large raisin as opposed to the shearing of bush, but never before has pruned been used to say things that are supposed to sound cool.

Alex:                 Well, I will say the old classic Loki is pretty pruney, so maybe that’s what they mean.

Justin:              100%. He got pruned. [crosstalk 00:22:48].

Alex:                 Yeah. Aging is the original pruning.

Justin:              It’s true in many ways, actually. I’m getting pruned from the timeline at about 80, I imagine.

Alex:                 Ish. 85, 90 if I’m real lucky.

Justin:              [crosstalk 00:23:02] who am I saying, 52 max over here.

Alex:                 Let’s talk about these Lokis because, as mentioned, four of them showed up. I don’t know, I couldn’t find out who was playing Alligator Loki. Sorry about that. I assume it’s Tom Cruise or something. Maybe Al Pacino.

Justin:              You think Al Pacino is sitting in the red makeup and like, “Yeah, I’ll do the alligator. If you’re not using me in this red Mephisto shit, let me just voice the alligator.”

Alex:                 If anybody disappears into a role in Hollywood, it’s Al Pacino. I never notice him in a movie. I’m just like oh, that was Al Pacino in there?

Justin:              He’s a chameleon, and, in this case, an alligator.

Alex:                 But the three others, we got Richard E. Grant, who you probably from a million things. Of course, we all know him from Spice World and Gosford Park. Those are the two big roles. Nothing else.

Justin:              Yeah, definitely.

Alex:                 But he is, and I love this, not just old Loki but classic Marvel comics original appearance uniform down to the dinky look. I wonder if we’re going to get a sense of him making his own costume because it almost looked like the Halloween costumes that Vision and Wanda were over in WandaVision.

Justin:              Yes. It’s very bright, very bright whites. I don’t know who’s doing the laundry for old Loki but it is pristine.

Alex:                 He’s in a post-apocalyptic wasteland. The only thing that works is a washer and dryer. That’s it.

Justin:              Yeah, great detergent. He’s shouting it out, for sure.

Alex:                 The next one, people are probably pretty excited about this one, not only do we get kid Loki in terms of young Silvia but we also got kid Loki actually played by Jack Veal, who was little James from The End of the Fucking World on Netflix, so that’s fun. And the last one, very interesting one, and I’m curious to get your input here, we got Deobia Oparei as a Thor Loki, it looked like. He definitely has a hammer there.

Justin:              Holding some sort of hammer, so yeah, I don’t know. That’s the one where I was like I don’t have a lot of basis for who this Loki is. Yeah. It may be like a switched world, switched timeline where Thor and Loki are swapped in some way, and Thor’s the villain and this Loki has the Mjölnir, and he’s more the hero. Heroic Thor, I think would make sense here. If it’s old, evil, Loki, and then heroic Loki, and kid Loki, who is undecided about what he wants to become. And of course, Alligator Loki.

Alex:                 Yes, Al Pacino, as we’ve established. Real quick on the-

Justin:              Yeah. It’s in the name. Al Pacinagator.

Alex:                 I don’t know what that was. That was kind of like an alligator thing, but it just didn’t work. Real quick on the actor, if you recognize him, the guy who’s playing the Thor Loki, he was Mr. Effiong on Sex Education. He also played a character named Loki on Santa Clarita Diet, so that’s pretty interesting.

Justin:              That’s weird.

Alex:                 But most people probably know him as Areo Hotah from Game of Thrones, in case you recognized him there.

Justin:              You think that’s how they cast it. They were like, “Hey, you played a Loki in another TV show. You’re in. Get in here.”

Alex:                 Yep, that’s how it works. They did a search on IMDB and they’re like, “Bring in anybody who’s played a character named Loki. Let’s do it.”

Justin:              That’s how Hollywood works. It’s fast. It’s fast and it doesn’t make any sense.

Alex:                 It’s nonsense. Before we move on here though, so many big moments in the episode that I’m sure we skimmed right by. Anything in particular you want to call out, Justin?

Justin:              I love the wizard of Oziness of the Timekeepers, how they’re just straight up bad robots. They were like Hall of Presidents style clunky, animatronic robots, rejected Chuck E. Cheese robots that were barely speaking, it was hard to hear them. It’s like, “Hey, I’m here for a pizza party. Can you turn on these robots a little bit louder so we can all hear them?”

Alex:                 Somebody should have come out in a Timekeeper costume, very ill fitting, and been like, “Hey guys, it’s time to party, like Chuck E. Cheese.”

Justin:              [crosstalk 00:27:09] clap your hands, yeah. We’ve all been there.

Alex:                 Have you ever been to a Chuck E. Cheese birthday party?

Justin:              Definitely. I grew up in Syracuse, New York area. There was a Chuck E. Cheese that we went to. Stay out of the cheese holes underneath the stage, because there are fights down there.

Alex:                 Oh, nice. Was the costume mouse also very tired and sad for you as well? Is that across the whole franchise or was it just the one in Brooklyn?

Justin:              That’s a mandate. Chuck E. Cheese is canonically struggling with a lot of issues at home. The whole E. Cheese family is just not [crosstalk 00:27:42].

Alex:                 The E stands for empathy, which he feels everything very deeply and it hurts him.

Justin:              I’m sorry, Alex. That was your father in the Chuck E. Cheese costume.

Alex:                 Oh my God.

Justin:              He was really disappointed in you.

Alex:                 My father, by the way, also a Loki.

Justin:              Yeah, it’s true. It’s true. It shows [crosstalk 00:27:59].

Alex:                 Any other moments you wanted to call out?

Justin:              Yes, great. We talked about Hunter B-15, how great that stuff was. Oh, I love the PalmPilot. We get to see the close-up of their-

Alex:                 The TemPad?

Justin:              Yeah, the time pads. And seeing that closeup and how old-timey tech it was I thought was really fun to get that closeup.

Alex:                 It’s those sort of details, and I don’t think we’re heading in this direction, but those sort of details, because everything is so much fun about the TVA, makes me not want Loki and Sylvia to succeed. I don’t want them to bring down the TVA. I like the TVA. It’s a fun place to play in. And I do think, we’ve talked about this before, but given that this is the one Marvel show that we know there’s probably going to be a season two, I don’t think they’re going to destroy it or anything, they’re just going to change it, so we still will get those details, but I definitely had a little feeling in this episode where they’re like, “We’re going to bring this place to its knees,” I’m like but it’s fun. I don’t know. I’m having a nice time.

Justin:              But if you know Marvel, they’re not going to erase anything, like you said, they’re just going to change it back to the more bureaucratic organization run by a jet-ski loving Mobius. That’s my prediction.

Alex:                 All right, why don’t we move on to our vision board, where we talk about what we want to come up in the next episode. Justin, what do you want to see in episode five.

Justin:              Well, I mean we’ve talked a little bit about it. I think we’re going to get a lot of Lokis, I think we’re going to get a flashback to Ravonna’s journey, and the revelation at the end of the episode that she is behind it all, and she is perhaps a Loki. That’s my vision board.

Alex:                 Like you’re saying, I think episode five is the one where we’re going to get the villain reveal. That’s pretty much happened in each of the previous Marvel series, just in terms of pacing. We’re here at the end, so just an understanding of what they’re dealing with as they’re going into episode six, I feel like that’s a no-brainer, but I still want to see the thing that I called a couple of episodes back about just tumbling through a bunch of different timelines. We got that a little bit in previous episodes, very interested in these new Lokis that we get to see towards the end, but I want to see an army of Lokis coming together to take down the TVA or transform it into something new, and I think that’s what we’re going to get.

Justin:              A Loki Vultron, that’s all holding onto each other.

Alex:                 Love it. The other thing that we know we’re going to get though is that scene from the trailer of Vote Loki from Daniel Kibblesmith, friend of the show’s book. We are definitely going to see that. It’ll be interesting to see if that’s our Loki or another variation of Loki. Maybe we’ll get an Expendable style going around and getting the team together, just a bunch of Lokis.

Justin:              And I think Loki’s is going to have an existential crisis where he has to choose what kind of person he is. Is he a good guy? Is he a bad guy? I think that’s going to be something running through this next episode as well, and it’s going to end on I’m Loki. It’s I’m in the middle somewhere. I’m a mischievous do-gooder. I’m selfish but also want to do the right thing.

Alex:                 It’ll also be interesting to see, and I do feel like this is a last episode thing at this point, because we’ll probably have Loki and Sylvie separated at least for the next episode, some clarity in terms of their relationship and what that means for that golden timeline or whatever’s going to happen next. I don’t know, I’m still not totally feeling like we’re necessarily going to get romance from them so much as even him just saying I like you as a person, which is a big admission for Loki to make, that he cares for somebody and that he trusts them, because I don’t even think he’s necessarily told Thor that at any point. Maybe he has in one of the movies, but he clearly loves Thor, he’s his brother, but he never tells him that. So saying that-

Justin:              Go talk to your bro. Go talk to your bro.

Alex:                 Give him a call. Call him on the alligator phone.

Justin:              I think you’re slipping into an accidental Owen Wilson impression.

Alex:                 Wow. It just happens regularly.

Justin:              You’re becoming him.

Alex:                 Oh my God. Maybe I’m a variant. Oh no, is this a nexus event. Oh wow. All right, folks. If you’d like to support our podcast, patreon.com/comicbookclub. Also, we do a live show every Tuesday night at 7:00 PM to Crowdcast and YouTube. Come hang out, we would love to chat with you about Loki. ITunes, Android, Spotify, Stitcher, or the app of your choice to subscribe, listen, and follow the show, @marvelvisionpod on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, comicbookclublive.com for this podcast and many more. Until next time, stay marvelous.

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