Disney Plus is quickly becoming an integral part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Through shows like WandaVision and Falcon and the Winter Soldier, the streaming service has been able to tell longer-form stories outside of the blockbuster superhero movies. The latest such show is Loki, which sees Tom Hiddleston reprise his role as the trickster god in a time-traveling sci-fi whodunnit. Here you’ll find the latest news about the show as well as analyses, cast interviews, and even the occasional gadget review.
Jul 30, 2021
The special effects behind Loki’s doomed planet of Lamentis
Photo: Marvel StudiosWhen special effects studio Digital Domain was approached by Marvel to work on an episode of Loki, there was one sequence in particular that was exciting: the chance to destroy an entire planet.
Read Article >The third episode of the series is set on the moon of a planet called Lamentis, which is about to collapse on itself, taking the moon with it. As Loki and Sylvie wander the desolate, purple landscape, meteors pound the ground around them. This all leads up to a crescendo when they reach a small town, which is battered by debris as the planet rips apart.
Jul 14, 2021
Loki’s first season is the best of Marvel without the baggage
Photo: Marvel StudiosLoki did something remarkable: it made me forget about the rest of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Read Article >That’s not how it’s supposed to work. The entire conceit of the MCU is that every story, whether it’s a blockbuster movie or a streaming television show, is in service to the greater narrative arc. You’re not just watching what’s happening to the characters on-screen, but also hints of what comes next. Loki doesn’t get away from that entirely, particularly with its conclusion that sets up the universe’s next big villain. But like the variants who inhabit Loki’s world outside of time, the six-episode first season carves out its own timeline — a few of them, in fact — making it perhaps the most standalone part of the MCU to date. You can enjoy it as part of the all-encompassing cinematic universe or as what it truly is: an excellent piece of science fiction.
Jul 14, 2021
TVA TemPad review: who needs TikTok when you can control time and space?
Photo: Marvel StudiosAs time goes on, mobile devices have grown ever more powerful in their function: what were once simple communication devices or multimedia players have turned into tiny pocket-sized supercomputers that are jam-packed with features. And nothing exemplifies this trend more than the TVA TemPad, which packs in temporal tracking and manipulation abilities that give the most ordinary of owners powers that surpass even the mightiest of heroes.
Read Article >Spoilers for Loki’s first season ahead
Jul 14, 2021
Loki finale confirms second season
Disney’s Loki TV show is getting a second season, according to a scene appended to the sixth and final episode of its first season. The confirmation, first spotted by Variety, comes mid-way through the episode’s credits at the 42 minute and 48 second mark, when a stamp appears on screen which simply reads “Loki will return in season 2.”
Read Article >Loki is the third Marvel show to have premiered on Disney Plus, and the first to have had a second season officially confirmed. WandaVision star Elizabeth Olsen has confirmed that the show, which premiered in January this year, isn’t due to receive a second season. Meanwhile it’s currently unclear whether The Falcon and the Winter Soldier will return for a second season, especially given the show leads neatly into the upcoming fourth Captain America movie.
Jul 13, 2021
How Loki built a different reality with retro hardware
Photo: Marvel StudiosFor me, watching Loki has meant pausing each episode to admire the devices that keep the Time Variance Authority running — all curved silhouettes and comically tiny screens and hazy orange readouts. By the time I asked Loki production designer Kasra Farahani about the show’s prop design inspirations, I’d convinced myself that the TemPad had to be based on a Nintendo DS. It’s all I can think of whenever Mobius (Owen Wilson) flips open the little oblong compact.
Read Article >“Actually, the primary piece of research that we were looking at is, there’s this crazy image that I found of a calculator watch on a wrist,” says Farahani, when I ask him about the TemPad’s aesthetic origins. “But the calculator watch is huge, it’s like the size of an iPhone, almost... it’s basically a scientific calculator strapped to [someone’s] wrist.”
Jun 30, 2021
The Simpsons is getting a Loki short because Disney owns everything
Image: DisneyDisney’s IP has once again fully synergized with the arrival of a new Marvel-themed Simpsons short titled “The Good, The Bart, and The Loki.” Disney very much appears to be putting that $71 billion investment in IP from 21st Century Fox to work.
Read Article >The company announced Wednesday that the special will debut July 7th exclusively on its streaming service Disney Plus. Tom Hiddleston, who plays Loki in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, will also voice Loki in the Simpsons adaptation.
Jun 10, 2021
Loki director Kate Herron says the show is a ‘big love letter to sci-fi’
Photo: Marvel StudiosBefore she got her start working on TV shows like Sex Education, Kate Herron’s career involved temping at a lot of offices. So when she was given the chance to direct Loki, a new Disney Plus series that follows a bureaucratic organization called the TVA that controls time, she knew exactly the vibe she was going for. She describes the style as Mad Men meets brutalist architecture — with plenty of sci-fi influences. And it was her previous career that helped inspire some of those aesthetics.
Read Article >“I took a lot of experience as well from my own life as an office temp, I worked in a lot of offices before I got my first film job,” she tells The Verge. “It actually inspired the style of tech. I remember the computers I used to work on were really archaic and really old. But I was working for these big institutions, and they were like, ‘Well, we’re not going to update them because they’re not broken.’ I like the idea that this organization that’s controlling time, they maybe wouldn’t have the most futuristic technology. But it works, so why are they going to change it?”
Jun 9, 2021
We spoke to Tom Hiddleston about Loki, PowerPoint presentations, and the nature of free will
Photo: Marvel StudiosDespite a decade of playing Loki in various Marvel films, and now a TV show, Tom Hiddleston isn’t tired of the role. “There’s always something new to find,” he tells The Verge.
Read Article >This week sees the premiere of Loki on Disney Plus, a six-episode series that marks the character’s first leading role. It’s a story of time travel and branching timelines, as Loki is captured by an organization called the Time Variance Authority (TVA). It mixes action, humor, and some good old-fashioned detective work, while touching on serious subjects like the nature of free will. There are also some fresh faces on board, as Hiddleston is joined by Marvel newcomers Owen Wilson, who plays a TVA agent named Mobius, and director Kate Herron, best-known for her work on the first season of Sex Education.
Jun 8, 2021
Loki’s first two episodes are a blast
Photo: Marvel StudiosWhen Loki is first captured by an organization devoted to maintaining the purity of the timestream, it’s a bit like a trip to the DMV.
Read Article >His time at the TVA — otherwise known as the Time Variance Authority — includes taking a number to wait in line, walking through a metal detector-like security device, and verifying some paperwork. But there are some differences compared to getting your license renewed. Failing to queue up properly at the TVA can result in death. And that paperwork? It’s a massive stack consisting of literally everything Loki has ever said (including the two confused words he utters while standing in the office). It’s extremely funny to watch an all-powerful deity be forced through a confusing bureaucracy — and it’s the perfect way to start off the new Loki series on Disney Plus.
Jun 7, 2021
Loki is a chance for Disney Plus to escape the shadow of Marvel blockbusters
Courtesy of Marvel StudiosLoki, the one-time Marvel villain played for over a decade now by Tom Hiddleston, is on the verge of starring in his own series. Instead of playing the scene-stealing antagonist — or, later, grudging sidekick — to Chris Hemsworth’s square-jawed Thor, the God of Mischief is finally going to get to be fully in the spotlight. It’s something that fans have been asking for since the character first made his scenery-chewing debut in 2011’s Thor — but the new show looks far more detached from the MCU than any of his previous adventures.
Read Article >Loki is a new kind of series for Disney Plus. It’s the first that intentionally feels like a capital-S Spinoff. The first two Marvel shows, WandaVision and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, occupied very different roles in the overarching storyline that Kevin Feige has been overseeing for the last 23 odd films.
May 5, 2021
Loki’s show is coming out two days earlier, in the spirit of the trickster god
Loki, the upcoming Disney Plus show about the trickster god and brother of Thor, will be coming out slightly earlier than originally planned: the premiere date has moved to June 9th, from the 11th. The show will also air on a new day of the week, with new episodes airing on Wednesdays instead of Fridays.
Read Article >The announcement was made in a video uploaded to Marvel’s YouTube channel. The video starts with a typical Marvel montage, but then is interrupted by Tom Hiddleston talking about how Loki is always left out of superhero montages. (It’s understandable that he’d feel left out — even in articles about a show dedicated to the character, he’s typically described in relation to his brother.) “Wednesdays are the new Fridays,” he says, before the new date is revealed.