Episode 5 of Loki was a treasure trove packed full of winks, nods, references and Easter Eggs to the back catalogue of both Marvel Comics and the shared cinematic universe, but it also substantially furthered the narrative by setting the stage for Tom Hiddleston’s title hero and Sophia Di Martino’s Sylvie to take the final step towards the Citadel at the End of Time.
It additionally introduced a ton of brand new variants into the mix, and while many of them didn’t have speaking roles and President Loki’s brief appearance left some viewers disappointed, watching an entire room of tricksters repeatedly double cross each other and end up brawling was a highlight regardless.
However, creator Michael Waldron revealed in a new interview that things could have turned out very differently, after admitting that one of the earliest ideas for the fifth installment was for our intrepid Asgardian to find himself in a reality where the Sacred Timeline is overseen by the Loki Variance Authority.
“Tom Kauffman wrote Episode 5 of the show. Tom’s a Rick and Morty writer, he was there from the first season Rick and Morty. He’s one of my great friends, and one of the funniest people alive. And his first draft of that script had so much amazing stuff. I think there was, at one point, a Loki Variance Authority, like an LVA with all the different Lokis who were down there.”
That still would have provided plenty of scope for cameos and all sorts of weird and wonderful variants, but it might not have fit the main storyline, so it could have been abandoned in favor of tightening the focus to Loki and Sylvie’s quest to eventually discover the brains behind the TVA, although the LVA would have been a hilarious sight to see.
Of course, with the finale cracking the multiverse wide open and Season 2 confirmed to be in the works, there’s every chance the idea could be revisited whenever Loki returns to Disney Plus for its next batch of adventures, especially when the bar is obligated to be raised in terms of scope, scale and all-out weirdness.
