With only two episodes left, Loki is ramping up for a fairly epic and exciting conclusion. And while there is still a lot of mystery surrounding the TVA and the Time Keepers, episode 4 gave some big revelations. With the show's cosmic feel and dealing with alternate timelines, it has at times felt closer to MCU projects like Thor and Doctor Strange. However, with this latest episode Loki has surprisingly come to share a lot in common with Captain America: The Winter Soldier.
At first glance, these two movies could not appear to be more different. Loki is a show that explores time travel and all-powerful beings that keep the universe in check. It also has a protagonist who is an anti-hero attempting to scheme his way into a position of power where he can rule over innocent lives. On the very different hand is the story about Steve Rogers, the most purely heroic being in the MCU who is in the midst of a relatively small-scale spy story that feels like one of the more grounded MCU projects to date. However, underneath the tone and settings of these projects, there emerges a shared theme of surveillance, blind loyalty, and governing out of fear and lies.
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Despite the fact that Loki and Steve seem like very different protagonists, they are both men out of time. Loki managed to cheat death and change his future by escaping his timeline. Steve was a man who was created and lived in another time who must now get used to living in a world much more complicated than his own. He is especially disturbed by Nick Fury's plan to use Helicarriers to police the entire world with a system that can identify and neutralize a threat before it has a chance to do any damage.
While Fury sees this as a necessity in a world that he becoming more dangerous, Steve says "This isn't freedom, this is fear." He sees it as a way of keeping tabs on everyone in the world, ensuring they are doing only what S.H.I.E.LD. permits them to do and says it is all for their own protection. This is a similar complaint Loki has about the TVA and its mission. While it initially seems like Loki is complaining about things not going his way, he is proven right when the TVA's secrets come out. They are also an organization that keeps a close eye on everyone and punishes those who step off their predestined path. Again, they insist this is all done to protect the "Sacred Timeline."
The idea of fear keeping people in line is explored in some interesting ways. S.H.I.E.L.D. is seen as this heroic institution that helps protect the world from the likes of Hydra. The people within the organization like Fury and even Natasha Romanoff are willing to compromise at times because they feel like they are working for the good guys. This is very much the same as the TVA is run in Loki as Mobius is a blind follower of their mission thinking it is what keeps order in the universe. In both cases, it takes an outsider, Steve and Loki, to come in and begin questioning things about these institutions, revealing that there is more than meets the eye.
One of the great twists in the MCU was the revelation that Hydra was not only still in operation, but was being regrown from within S.H.I.E.L.D. The organization that was said to be working for the good of the people and protecting the world was actually corrupt to its core. A similar revelation came in the most recent episode of Loki when Mobius and the other TVA agents learned they were actually variants with lives before being taken. Even further, when Loki and Sylvie confront the Time Keepers, they learn that these supposed all-powerful beings are robotic puppets whose strings are being pulled by someone behind the scenes. This moment feels reminiscent of Steve and Natasha learning the truth about Hydra from Arnim Zola. They are both moments that cement the idea that those in power have built their legacy through lies.
With all the ways these two projects have mirrored each other, it will be interesting to see if Loki follows Captain America: The Winter Soldier in its conclusion to this story. In Winter Soldier, Hydra is not just purely evil. They do believe their domination will result in a better world and are willing to do terrible things to ensure that happens. It can be expected that whoever is in charge of the TVA has a similar outlook. Under all the deception and questionable acts, they likely think the timeline does need to be protected at all costs, and perhaps the story about the multiverse war was a real possibility.
That leads to the question of how this all will end. In Winter Soldier, Steve exposed Hydra and brought it all down. But in order to do this, it meant that S.H.I.E.L.D. would also have to go, plunging the world into uncertainty. There could be a similar outcome in Loki that is both triumphant and sets up possible problems for the future. Similar to Steve Rogers, Loki could expose the truth about the TVA to its followers and they could bring down the organization and whoever is in charge. However, destroying the TVA could be what causes a rift in the multiverse which will be explored in Spider-Man: No Way Home and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.
Loki airs on Wednesdays on Disney+.
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