Loki: Disney + TV Review

Starring: Tom Hiddleston, Owen Wilson, Gugu Mbatha-Raw

Duration: 6 episodes across season 1

It's fair to say the streaming iteration of the Marvel Cinematic Universe is taking a more paced approach to its side characters.

With a plan to evolve the supporting players in the series, there's more than enough to pick from, and more than enough lore to plunder.

While WandaVision was a more quirky take on grief and acceptance, and The Falcon and Winter Soldier was more an overt takedown of racism and attitudes, it's perhaps a little harder to pigeon hole Disney +'s latest, Loki. At least based on the evidence of the 2 episodes proffered up for screening - the first season has 6 in total.

But there's enough to form an idea of where Loki may be going - and how its billing as a series about the god of mischief is perhaps a distraction more than a reality.

Tom Hiddleston reprises his role as Loki, and the series begins moments after he escaped the clutches of the Avengers, grabbed the Tesseract and simply vanished. Appearing in Mongolia, Loki sets himself up as a god to the locals just moments before he's kidnapped and captured by agents of the Time Variance Authority.

This group purports to look after the timelines and their structured patterns - but Loki's appearance outside of the expected timeline is a niggle for the group. And it's a niggle further irritated when Mobius (Wilson, with his usual laconic drawl, but this time sporting a dull beige suit and thin moustache) believes Loki can help him solve a series of crimes across the timelines.

However, the investigation soon morphs into something a little more insidious as Loki and Mobius begin hunting what the agency terms a "Variant"....

To say more about Loki is to ruin Disney+ and Marvel's carefully curated spoiler policy, but needless to say this mesh of TimeCrimes, Looper and the Adjustment Bureau is a slow burn - a sort of more Low-key affair than what you may be expecting from the marketing around it.

With most of the first episode set around exposition and probing whether Loki actually likes killing people or annoying them, there's a feel of a talkfest in among the usual mismatched buddy cop tropes being explored here. And that's totally fine, but Marvel's billing the sci-fi series (which has already been given a second one) as a more mischievous and malevolent return to form for the Norse god - when in truth, it's anything but.

There's a lot of puncturing of Loki's ego, with comments ranging from the amount of times Loki has stabbed someone in the back to comments like "For someone born to rule, you sure do lose a lot."

A lot of it is aimed at subverting Loki's attitudes, and making him realise he's gone to a small fish in a big pond ethos as he's both powerless and power-less within proceedings.

Hiddleston proves remarkably game, delivering some lines with snark and then catching others out that crackle with emotion. His prowling preening God is on the backfoot here, and much like the audience, he's playing catch up throughout.

He makes a sensible pairing with Wilson, but in truth, they're mismatched in a world of mystery, and with only a third of the puzzle unravelled, and cards played close to their chests, it makes it difficult to judge the whole relationship.

Loki appears to be more of a probe about morality, another examination of the idea that "no one bad is truly bad" and much as he protests, Hiddleston runs with the idea that he's not the number 1 god anymore.

The 70s drained palette of the Time Variance Authority, complete with its infinite levels of bureaucrats and desks makes for a dour setting of proceedings and a tonally drab and muted atmosphere. Given Loki's more playful edges, it's a nice contrast, but there are moments when it feels slightly oppressive and almost claustrophobic.

There are hints of where Loki may be going early on, but right now, as ever with Marvel, it's a wait and see policy. As with WandaVision, whether that pays off in the final pieces of the puzzle remains to be seen.

But Loki's short run and traditional cop tropes subversion is engaging enough and has more than the required potential to ensure this journey could well be worth it.