Unraveling the Mysteries of Loki Season 2's Time Travel: Everything You Need to Know

Summary

Loki season 2 introduces new concepts to the MCU's time travel, including time-slipping, rewriting the past, and erasing oneself from history.

Loki's ability to time-slip affects the TVA's history instantly, introducing a stronger sense of cause and effect to the organization.

Unlike the Avengers' time travel regulations, which solely pertain to events in the Sacred Timeline, the TVA possesses its own distinct set of time travel rules due to their operations outside the constraints of time.

WARNING! This article contains spoilers for the first episode of Loki season 2. The second season delves deeper into the complexities of time travel within the MCU. Loki discovers the truth about the Time Variance Authority and witnesses Sylvie killing He Who Remains, leading to new challenges in his journey. The concepts of time-slipping, altering the past, and separating oneself from time prove to be confusing even for Loki. The TVA operates independently from the main time-space continuum of the MCU, making time a highly adaptable concept within its premises. Time travel was initially introduced in the MCU in Avengers: Endgame, where the Avengers' technology allowed them to interact with the past without altering the present. Instead, any changes created new realities branching off from the original timeline, unless they were undone. This is why the Avengers could retrieve the Infinity Stones from the past and return them once they were no longer needed. However, Loki season 2 reveals that the time travel rules established in Avengers: Endgame only apply to the events within the Sacred Timeline. As the TVA exists outside of time, their time travel operates differently.

How Loki Time Travels In Loki Season 2

After returning to the TVA from his visit to the Citadel at the End of Time, Loki experiences a phenomenon known as "time-slipping" according to Ouroboros. This rare anomaly occurs when individuals have unconventional interactions with time, causing Loki to shift between the past, present, and future. As a result, Loki's presence at the TVA headquarters becomes detached from the regular flow of time, causing him to flicker in and out of existence like a malfunctioning light or a glitching computer file. Adding to the confusion, Ouroboros suggests that while Loki's time-slipping has previous occurrences, none of them have taken place within the TVA.

Unlike the Avengers' time travel, Loki's time-slipping has an impact on other points in time. For example, the information Loki shares with Ouroboros during the first episode of Loki season 2 starts to become recorded in O.B.'s memory in the present, even though the conversation happened in the past. Rather than creating a diverging timeline or triggering a complete reset, Loki's time-slipping rewrites the history of the TVA in what an external observer would perceive as "real time". Prior to Loki season 2, time held less significance at the TVA, but now his time-slipping introduces a heightened sense of causality to the organization.

How The TVA Time Travel In Loki

Loki season 1 implies that in the past of the TVA, He Who Remains took several variants captive and transformed them into TVA agents, equipping them with advanced technology. The TVA harnessed the ability to travel through time using TemPads- portable devices that enable TVA agents to access any moment within the Sacred Timeline. Similar to the Avengers' Time-Space GPS, the TemPads pinpoint specific instances in time as designated arrival points. However, the TemPads create their own portals known as "Timedoors," whereas the Avengers require a Quantum Tunnel to transport themselves to their chosen destination.

How Time Works In The TVA & The Void

The TVA possesses the ability to access realms beyond the confines of time and space. By utilizing their pruning sticks, they banish variants into the Void, where they are forsaken indefinitely. However, by circumventing Alioth, both Loki and Sylvie manage to reach the Citadel at the End of Time, a place that oversees the Sacred Timeline itself. It's worth noting that the TVA, the Void, and the Citadel at the End of Time exist outside the constraints of time and space, rendering them absent from the chronological timeline of the MCU. Nevertheless, despite being detached from a specific timeline, these locations appear to possess their own history, present, and future. This explains Loki's ability to navigate through time within the confines of the TVA's headquarters.

The TVA has the ability to manipulate the Sacred Timeline by utilizing the Temporal Loom, a machine that streamlines time to create a seamless continuity. For countless years, TVA agents have diligently safeguarded the Sacred Timeline, eliminating any irregularities that pose a threat. However, the MCU's Sacred Timeline has spiraled out of control, resulting in multiple branches and the emergence of a chaotic multiverse. Regrettably, the TVA is now limited in their ability to rectify this situation. The events of Loki season 2 further demonstrate that even the TVA's headquarters are susceptible to the fluctuations in the flow of time. Don't forget to catch new episodes of Loki on Disney+ every Thursday at 6pm PT / 9pm ET.