Loki season 2 episode 5 spoilers follow.
Bodies bursting into tendril-like ribbons, the temporal loom erupting and the devastating heartbreak in Loki's eyes – it's safe to say that Marvel made it feel as though there was no way back after episode four's dire end. And yet there had to be.
What else were they going to fill the two remaining episodes of the season with? More timeline tendrils floating around just to further creep us out? No thanks.
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Episode five kicked off with Loki (Tom Hiddleston) wandering the empty halls of the TVA just hoping to find a single other living soul. He was not in luck.
So where was everyone else? Or was Loki the sole survivor of the temporal loom meltdown and the destruction of the TVA?
Did everyone die at the end of Loki season 2 episode 4?
Don't be so morbid. Of course everyone didn't die.
While Hiddleston could certainly carry the series in a one-man-show sort of way, Marvel's plans are a little more fleshed out than that (we think).
It wasn't long before Loki caught up with the gang, but how they were reunited is a little less straightforward.
Loki season 2, episode 5: How did everyone survive?
Loki began time-slipping again and as torturous as that has always looked, it was actually a good thing.
The God of Mischief's time-hopping ability allowed him to reconnect with his friends who survived the blast by returning to their place on the original timeline.
The sweet and earnest Casey (Eugene Cordero) turned out to be the infamous Alcatraz escapee Frank Morris, while Hunter B-15's persona was more on par with the caring TVA hunter we're familiar with. In her real life she was a paediatric doctor.
OB (Ke Huy Quan) doubled up as an ambitious but unpublished science fiction author/ scientist, whereas Mobius (Owen Wilson) was the family man Don, a single father to two boys who sold jet skis, wouldn't you know.
Sylvie (Sophia Di Martino) remained Sylvie, and continued to live out her life on her adopted branch of the timeline.
Loki season 2 episode 5 explained
Unfortunately for Loki, getting to his friends proved difficult given that his time-slipping was wholly unpredictable. Even more irksome, when he was able to locate each of them separately on their given timeline, they couldn't remember who he was.
Talk about a conundrum, because of course the TVA still needed saving and all the lives in existence were still in danger.
"Why?" you may ask. If everyone was able to happily live out their lives in bliss didn't that prove the TVA wasn't needed in the first place?
It's a question Sylvie posed to Loki when he eventually caught up with her and one he began to wrestle with after strong-arming the gang back together and figuring out a way to get them all back to the barren TVA.
Lucky for Loki, OB was a scientific genius even in his timeline. With the aid of the TVA handbook that Loki happened to snag from the TVA before being forced onto another timeline, OB was able to recreate the TemPad. It was that TemPad that allowed Loki to retrieve his friends and escort them back to the TVA. It only took a mere 18, (sorry, 19) months, which was effectively minutes because, well, time travel, but we digress.
After deciding that the TVA didn't need saving and deducing what he really wanted was to stay where he felt he most belonged – with his friends – Loki began encouraging them to give up on saving the TVA and told them to return to their own lives.
That was until Sylvie burst through a time-travel door after witnessing her timeline fall to ribbon-like shreds.
"Everything's falling apart," she tells them. "The branches are dying."
However, before they can figure out what that all means, the destruction of the timeline catches up to them at the TVA and everyone begins to fall away into those terrifying ribbons that seem to turn into colourful dust when touched.
Sylvie and Loki were the last people standing until even she was whisked away in tendrils.
In devastation, Loki cried out and managed to timeslip, this time with a little more control, travelling back mere moments to when Sylvie was alive.
He realised then that he could control his time jumping and forced himself back to just before the main group disappeared into the time-ribbon-like streams.
He explained to them that he had figured out how to control his time travel, not by focusing on a place or time but on a person: on himself, to be more specific.
"I can rewrite the story," he told them.
This allows him to time travel back to the moment before the temporal loom imploded, meaning he has a chance to save what was lost.
It's not a stretch to assume that his controlled time jumping is the key to saving the TVA in the finale, but with this much control how far back in time will Loki travel and how much will he seek to change?
Loki is available to stream now on Disney+ with the finale airing next week Friday.
TV writer, Digital Spy Janet completed her Masters degree in Magazine Journalism in 2013 and has continued to grow professionally within the industry ever since. For six years she honed her analytical reviewing skills at the Good Housekeeping institute eventually becoming Acting Head of Food testing. She also freelanced in the field of film and TV journalism from 2013-2020, when she interviewed A-List stars such as Samuel L Jackson, Colin Firth and Scarlett Johansson. In 2021 she joined Digital Spy as TV writer where she gets to delve into more of what she loves, watching copious amounts of telly all in the name of work. Since taking on the role she has conducted red carpet interviews with the cast of Bridgerton, covered the BAFTAs and been interviewed by BBC Radio and London Live. In her spare time she also moonlights as a published author, the book Gothic Angel.
