I’m excited, and I’ve been excited ever since I saw the first four episodes of this season. This feels like home. I’ve been waiting for the chance to stop dancing around it and talk spoilers with you, so that’s what we’re doing: Loki Season 2, Episode 1, “Ouroboros.”

If you haven’t seen the episode yet, what in life are you doing here? I’m about to spoil the daylights out of this thing. If you’d rather feel it ebb and flow on your own first, my non-spoiler review of the first four episodes is on the channel. Watch that, get into the show, and come back.

Stretched Like a Rubber Band

The episode starts literally where we left off, with Loki appearing back in the TVA. What’s going on, specifically, is that he’s getting ripped apart, and it looks like it. He’s stretched like a rubber band, like spaghetti. And he’s discovered there’s a past, a present and a future for the TVA now. That used to not be the case, because the TVA existed outside of time. Clearly, since the moment Sylvie stabbed He Who Remains, that’s changed.

So when he first showed back up and they didn’t recognize him, that’s because he was in the past. Apparently, and they’re only now discovering this, they’ve all been alive for hundreds if not thousands of years, and every so often their memories get reset.

The very first order of business is that you’ve got to get Loki sorted out. He’s hopping around trying to figure things out. He keeps going to a future that looks rough, then he comes back, and he’s in different places. He finally gets to the present, and Eugene Cordero is back again. You know him as the voice of Rutherford from Star Trek: Lower Decks, but he was also the Infinity gem guy from Loki Season 1. He sees Loki, Loki reappears in the same spot but in the future, and the guy recognizes him because he’s met him now. It’s this whole thing.

Little by little they’re dropping the nuggets of information that help us as fans better understand what’s going on.

It Picks Up Like Last Week

Having watched the first four episodes, and even though I’m keeping this to the one, there are moments in this series that leave you wanting more. But I’d have been perfectly happy if we’d gone Loki Season 1, maybe one or two of the interesting things that worked, and then straight to Loki Season 2. I feel like this is coming way too late. I’m hoping it’s not too late. And if you’re watching this, it’s not. Go watch the show.

What I love is that Tom Hiddleston’s Loki is still the same Loki we’ve always known. He’s just gone through some life-changing things. It feels like the last episode happened yesterday. You could watch the last episode of Season 1 and roll right into Season 2, because Hiddleston just jumps in there and you can tell he’s in shock. He’s like, I tried to tell her to stop, I didn’t want her to do this, I couldn’t believe it. He’s freaking out, and Mobius is trying to get him to calm down.

Like I said in my non-spoiler review, if you were worried that somehow this wasn’t going to have the same vibe and energy, have no such concerns. This was amazing.

The Judges, the Mural, and He Who Remains

While Loki’s trying to figure out what’s happening to him, we shift briefly to Mobius and Hunter B-15, and you get introduced to a brand new hunter, Hunter X-5. They get called in front of the judges’ council, because apparently there are other judges. We thought Ravonna Renslayer was the only one, because she’s the only one they presented, but there’s more to the hierarchy here than we thought. That’s probably what a lot of those other pods are that we see in the windows far away.

This group is listening to a recording of what Loki told Mobius last time, and they’re having to figure out really fast what’s happening. The timelines have branched. It’s all past the red line, it’s all getting bad. So they have to make the call: until we can figure out what to do, we’re going to stop pruning timelines.

That’s when Loki reappears and tries to explain it to them. He’s just been to the future in this same court chamber, so what does he do? He takes X-5’s baton and stabs the mural behind the judges, and it reveals statuary of He Who Remains. And Loki’s like, that’s the guy, you understand, that’s who I’m trying to tell you about.

Everyone’s freaking out, and Mobius ushers him out real quick. You’ve got to tell me what’s going on, man, explain it to me. All in that weird, whispery, Owen Wilson kind of way. It’s great.

Meet O.B.

Finally Mobius sees the jumping thing for himself, and he says, okay, I’ve got to take you someplace. He takes him down to Repairs and Advancement, which is where we get introduced to Ke Huy Quan’s character, the titular Ouroboros. Or, as they affectionately call him, and don’t remember calling him, O.B.

While they’re there, Loki does his thing and time slips again, this time to the past of that same room. So he meets Ouroboros early on and they start talking, and Ouroboros tells him how to fix himself. It’s the greatest time thing, because this conversation is happening hundreds of years in the past, and O.B. is like, all right, cool, I’ll make the thing, I’ll have it ready for you when you get there.

He comes back to the present, and now they have to do a very dangerous thing. I didn’t realize this, but the TVA is built on this giant Loom that takes timelines and spins them into the Sacred Timeline. Well, there are too many now, because the branches are getting out of hand, so the machine’s breaking down. That tremor is being felt in the past, the present and the future. Everywhere.

The only way to fix it is this big, complicated rigmarole. Mobius has to go outside and plug in the thing. He has to pull Loki out of the timeline. And then Loki has to prune himself. It’s all going to be very painful, and if it goes wrong, Owen Wilson’s character is going to lose his skin. It’s very interesting, the way they do the whole thing.

Where It Leaves Us

It ends with Loki in the future, waiting for the signal to prune himself, and somebody opens the elevator. It’s Sylvie.

They barely make it out without Owen Wilson losing his skin, and the first thing Loki says is, we need to find Sylvie. So this one’s very much about getting Loki sorted out first, and then we move forward into the finding Sylvie of it all.

There is a post-credit scene, and I’m not going to spoil it for you. It takes us into the next episode, and the screener I saw didn’t have it. It cut off before I got to that point, so this was a surprise even for me. I think I’m going to start something with this episode: I’m not telling you about the post-credit scene. Just watch it, and then let’s talk about it.

The Verdict

Loki Season 2 Episode 1, “Ouroboros,” gets a 7.5 out of 10 on the Know-It-All Index.

It’s a good start. It’s a very good start, and that’s a very conservative yet enthusiastic seven and a half. That’s all because, Marvel, you’re earning my fandom back. There are no free rides here, no free meals anymore. I love everything you’ve done in the past. This is good. This whole thing feels good.

I will say there’s some presence that’s missed. You do feel Jonathan Majors in voiceover bits that all reuse existing stuff. I think some of it’s from Ant-Man and some of it’s from He Who Remains’ speech. They don’t lean much into that part.

I’m enjoying it, and I’m looking forward to seeing your reactions to the next three episodes. It’s a fun ride. There are some ups and some downs, and don’t worry, I’ll warn you when the downs start to come. But at the end of the day this is a strong beginning, and the next episode has some interesting things to look forward to.

Tell me what you thought of the episode, and once you’ve watched that post-credit scene, let’s talk about it. The conversation lives in the comments on the video above.