Loki Episodes 3 & 4 Review
Credit to: Disney and Marvel StudiosStarting to ramp up, or starting to dumb down?
Welcome back! We’ve got some more of that good Loki content y’all have been waiting for! This time around, we’re gonna be taking a look at episodes 3 and 4, doing a deep and thorough recap without spoiling too much, and then giving an honest review afterwards. From now on, I’ll be giving a few less details, as to give you all a chance to watch the shows I review for yourselves. Trust me, it’s best for you to watch things on your own to better relate to my reviews. That’s basically all I’ve got to say, so without any further ado, let’s get straight into this.
Episode 3: Lamentis
This was such a weird episode. I think even now I’m still trying to figure out if that’s good or not. Anyways, we start off with Lady Loki and her kidnapped hunter, named Hunter C-20, sitting across one another in a bar/restaurant setting. They’re wearing completely casual human clothing, and Hunter C-20 even has a nice hairstyle going on for her. They’re both laughing and talking like they’ve known each other for a while, which was super weird without any context. During this illusive scene, C-20 experienced a brain freeze from her drink, and the Variant Loki randomly decides to explain what a brain freeze actually does. To prove to her “friend” C-20, that her definition is correct, she asks her to catch another brain freeze. C-20 sips her drink, and Lady Loki asks, “How many guards are guarding the Time-Keepers?” C-20 goes silent as she stares at her “friend” in confusion. The background is suddenly changed to a night-time bar environment, and Lady Loki pretends they’ve been friends enjoying their night out the whole time. In reality though, C-20 is unconscious, and Lady Loki is using her magic to invade her memories and coerce her into giving her information on the Time-Keepers. C-20 eventually coughs up that a golden elevator is the way to the Time-Keepers. This is actually the perspective of Lady Loki during the events of episode 2. Pretty dope. Now we jump to present time, where we see Lady Loki using her stolen portal device (called a TemPad) to infiltrate the TVA. The moment she gets there, she just rips through hunter after hunter, until she finally reaches the golden elevator. Before she can do anything, Loki himself appears behind her, daggers in hand, wanting to know what she’s planning. Of course, she doesn’t want to talk, and would rather fight. She pulls her sword out, and they engage. A bit later during the scuffle, Ravonna (also known as Renslayer) and some Minutemen have their batons in hand, and they try to immediately strike the two Lokis down. Loki though, reaches into Lady Loki’s jacket, pulls out her TemPad, and transports them into an unknown area.
Upon landing, Loki and Lady Loki fight, again. They realize the TemPad isn’t working due to a low battery charge, and that basically kicks off their journey as forced together allies. Oh, and in case you didn’t realize how much they really don’t trust each other, they almost fight yet again. This episode really had a problem with that. Anyways, they’re on a moon called Lamentis-1, and it’s about to face certain doom in 12 hours when a nearby planet will eventually crash into it and destroy it and everyone on it. Needing battery life to escape this certain doom, they make their way through a town that they think might have something to charge the device, but they quickly realize how that’s hopeless. During this journey, Lady Loki reveals that she’s named herself Sylvie, since she hates the Loki name. They eventually find a lone woman armed with a pretty cool weapon that shoots a super strong shockwave at you, sending you flying backwards. The woman (after shooting them both of course) tells them that there’s a train that takes them to an escort ship called “The Ark”. The Lokis head for the train station, so they can get to the ship to use its power to charge the TemPad. Since they have no tickets, they use their good old Loki magic skills to get through the guards preventing anyone without a ticket onboard, and their long train ride begins. It’s on this train ride that the two actually begin to form a bit of a bond. Sylvie asks Loki about his history on Asgard and about his mother, and Loki tells her as much as he can. He even shows her some magic fireworks, telling her his mother taught him how to do it. It was really sweet. It’s here that Loki also confirms that he’s bisexual, so that’s pretty cool. Due to it being a long ride, Sylvie eventually takes a nap, but wakes up to Loki’s drunken singing and dancing with the other passengers. Sylvie notices a not so pleased passenger staring at Loki, and then notices them walk into the next train car, bringing the guards back to the Lokis. Of course, this starts a fight, but because of this, Loki literally gets thrown out of the train window. and Sylvie jumps out to get to him.
The now super angry Sylvie is sitting on a mound of dirt, and Loki joins her, trying to calm her. Loki brings up the ark, to which Sylvie says it’s destroyed before it leaves the moon, but Loki quickly realizes that it would be different if they manage to board it. So crazy it might work. They start their journey yet again as they walk to the city that has the ark, and they engage in a conversation about their respective magical skills. Loki asks Sylvie how she invades people’s minds, and she explains. She brings up Hunter C-20, explaining how she had a life before the TVA. Loki is baffled, because he was told that everyone at the TVA were created by the Time-Keepers, to which Sylvie clarifies that no, everyone at the TVA are Variants. After hearing the 10 minute launch announcement in the background, they rush into the city. They of course have to fight through guards, evade falling meteorites, and push through citizens. Just when they’re about to make it, a huge meteor crashes through the ship, and everyone in the city stares at the destruction. Sylvie drops her head, and walks away, while Loki just stares in silence. End of episode.
Okay, two issues. Number one: The fight scenes? Absolutely boring to watch. The choreography was just so bad this time around, I’m not sure what’s going on here. They’re just so lifeless and bland, it’s always just a bad time. There was only one good fight, and that was definitely when Sylvie first came to the TVA looking for the elevator. Seeing her wreck those hunters was actually really cool. Number two: The amount of times Sylvie and Loki fought or almost fought. We’ve seen them fight in Roxxcart, we’ve seen them fight in the TVA, we’ve seen them fight the moment they arrived on Lamentis-1, and they almost fought one more time just a few minutes later. Thankfully they seem to be cool now, but jeez. That’s honestly waaay too much. They should’ve only fought twice honestly, because even the dialogue between the two as they were fighting or were about to start fighting was awful. Other than these two things, the rest of the episode was pretty fun to watch, or got me a bit emotional.
2.5 Out of 5.
Episode 4: The Nexus Event
For this episode, we start on Asgard where we see a young Sylvie playing with her toys, before a portal appears behind her and a team of Minutemen apprehend her. The commanding hunter is actually Ravonna, so that was a pretty cool connection between the two characters. She takes Sylvie to a judge after she’s all ready, but Sylvie attacks Ravonna and snatches her TemPad, creating a portal to escape through. We jump to present day Ravonna, who’s taking the elevator to the Time-Keepers while looking super nervous. The doors open and we get a glimpse at 3 ominous shadows with glowing eyes, sitting in a room full of mist. Spooky. After their meeting, Ravonna is met downstairs by Mobius, who asks about the Time-Keepers and the status of Hunter C-20. Of course she explains how serious the situation is now that the Lokis are on the loose, and she informs him the C-20 is dead. He realizes how weird that is, because C-20 was perfectly fine when rescued, but Ravonna basically just tells him to find the Lokis. Over on Lamentis-1, we see the Lokis sitting with one another as the planet above them inches closer and closer, with small meteorites landing on the moon. The two have a genuine heart to heart about what it means to be a Loki, and how no matter what, they survive. Back at the TVA, Mobius and the hunter that arrested Loki, Hunter B-15, are looking at a monitor of the Sacred Timeline to see if they can catch any branches the Lokis may create. B-15 emphasizes how they need to find the Lokis, but a look on her face shows how shaken up she looks, something even Mobius notices. On Lamentis-1, the planet inches closer, until suddenly, a massive meteor hits the moon, and the two Lokis hold hands. They stare at each other in an interesting way, as it’s almost lovingly. Even back at the TVA, the connection is so strong, it creates a HUGE branch. This branch lets them track the two Variants before they’re doomed, and they’re arrested and taken back to the TVA wearing the power disabling collars, safe and sound.
A few scenes pass, and Mobius takes Loki to an interrogation room while Sylvie is taken to another room to be watched by B-15. Loki tries to honestly explain that the TVA is lying to him, but of course Mobius laughs it off. He throws Loki into a “Time Cell”, where it repeats an unpleasant memory over and over again. Mobius hits up Ravonna’s office wanting to get permission to interrogate Sylvie, but Ravonna oddly declines, giving him lackluster reasons. He continues to try, but it’s no use. Mobius is sent right back to Loki. Mobius eventually lets Loki out of the cell, and asks Loki how long he’s planned to betray them and if he’s Sylvie’s pawn. Loki actually tries to defend Sylvie by saying she’s just a puppet and he’s the mastermind of the whole scheme. Mobius tests this by explaining that Sylvie’s already been pruned (been killed, to be clear), much to Loki’s dismay. Loki tries to pretend he doesn’t care, but Mobius laughs knowing he clearly does. He explains that the branch was obviously because they must like each other in a weird, narcissistic way, but does confirm that Sylvie is fine. He’s right, that is super weird. Loki’s thrown back into the cell, and we cut to B-15, who is suuuper shaken up. She demands that she’s let into Sylvie’s room, and lets the doors close behind her. Sylvie makes fun of her name since it’s just a number, but B-15 just opens a portal so the pair can walk through. Once again, Mobius and Ravonna are in her office sharing a drink, and Ravonna is congratulating Mobius for finding the Lokis. Mobius is thankful, but keeps asking about C-20 and Sylvie. He notices that Ravonna ignores and deflects the questions, so he switches his TemPad for hers when she’s not looking, and says goodbye after his drink. Back over to B-15 and Sylvie, we see them back in front of Roxxcart. B-15 explains that she saw something when Sylvie mind controlled her in episode 2, but thinks it’s all deceptions by Sylvie. She lets Sylvie truly show her the memories she has that were erased by the TVA, and begins to cry, saying how happy she was. Back with Mobius, he heads to the library area to go through Ravonna’s TemPad. He finds an interrogation recording of Hunter C-20, who explains that she has memories of a life before the TVA, she had friends and remembers the bar being real. The interrogation is cut off and the recording is stopped by none other than Ravonna herself. Yikes.
Mobius heads into Loki’s Time Cell memory loop thing, and explains how he’s been right about it all. He explains that the only way to save Sylvie is if he trusts Mobius, and Mobius trusts Loki back. When they exit the cell, Ravonna and multiple hunters are waiting. A hunter takes back the TemPad, and Mobius absolutely breaks my heart here. While I won’t spoil the line, I will emphasize just how sad it is. Mobius is suddenly pruned by a hunter, and we see Loki gasp and almost cry. Both he and eventually Sylvie are escorted into the golden elevator, where they are taken to the Time-Keepers by Ravonna. We actually see the faces of the Time-Keepers, and they’re… underwhelming. Anyways, Sylvie tries to approach them, and Ravonna tries to reset Sylvie in time, but notices she can’t. B-15 actually saves the day by unlocking the collars the Lokis are wearing, and of course a big fight breaks out. During the fight, one of the Time-Keepers is beheaded but it’s revealed that the Time-Keepers are… androids. Yeah, androids. Gosh that is so underwhelming. After the fighting is done, we see Loki try to comfort Sylvie, and it seems that he almost confesses his feelings, but is suddenly pruned by Ramonna. Sylvie disarms her, and demands answers to everything. End of episode… not? We cut to Loki in an end credits scene waking up and wondering if he’s dead, to which he' is responded to by none other than classic comics Loki, who is standing alongside a black, hammer wielding Loki, a teenage Loki, and an… alligator Loki? End of episode.
Well that was crazy. I gotta say, while the fights were horrible yet again, and the Time-Keepers absolutely sucked, the rest of this episode was so good. The inclusion of multiple Lokis was just such a cool thing to me, and I hope this means that Mobius is safe and sound. Overall, not bad.
4 Out of 5.
Final Thoughts
Thankfully, things are starting to get good. Episode 3 was definitely a pretty boring episode, but episode 4 made up for it for sure. This series overall so far seems to have trouble finding itself. It started off AMAZINGLY with episode, got a liiittle lackluster with episode 2, went downhill in episode 3, and went right back up in episode 4. I genuinely cannot wait to see Classic Loki and Alligator Loki in action, I never thought I’d see something like that in my life. But yeah, that’s gonna wrap it up on my end! What did you all think? Make sure you’re following my Instagram and Twitter to not only let me know, but to receive updates on the website’s planned articles and more! That’s gonna do it from me, y’all, this has been The Wolf Den!
