Loki Director Officially Rules Out X-Men Theory

Loki got some Marvel fans excited when they thought they spotted a reference to the X-Men in the Disney+ series. Season 2 of the Tom Hiddleston-starring show expanded the depths of the TVA, taking characters and viewers to the group’s temporal loom on several occasions. The doors to this important room vaguely resemble those of Cerebro, a key setting in X-Men comics and movies. With a similar “X” pattern meeting at the center of the doors and a circular centerpiece which is attached to one side, some thought Loki had intentionally made a reference to the still-to-debut-in-the-MCU mutant characters. As it turns out, this is not the case. 

Loki production designer and director of Episode 3, Kasra Farahani spoke to ComicBook.com, where he was asked if the X-Men reference many fans have been discussing is intentional. Unfortunately for those hoping to see the origins of Cerebro as being rooted in the TVA, quickly shut down the speculation. “No, I don’t even know the doors people are talking about, honestly,” Farahani said. “It’s not. We were looking of subterranean missile bunkers, missile silos from the Cold War era. There’s some insanely, heavy fortified doors in those bunkers and that’s where that’s coming from.” The full interview with Farahani is available on the Phase Zero channel.

Mutants have made their way to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, with characters such as Ms. Marvel and Namor having been revealed to possess the iconic gene. However, the X-Men are yet to play a role in the Marvel Cinematic Universe on its Sacred Timeline. Of course, Deadpool 3 is about to bring some worlds together as Ryan Reynolds reprises his role as the titular character, going on some sort of journey with Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine (or variants of the character) who was introduced in the original X-Men films made by Fox, a separate canon from the Marvel Cinematic Universe where the Avengers reside.

Given Farahani’s persepctive on the central theme of Loki and how character-focused he is, having worked on the show’s story in additon to his other roles, it should come as no surprise he wasn’t thinking about the X-Men when developing the impressive TVA sets. “[Loki Season 2 is] about the growth of the character and the maturing of Loki. Tom has embodied this character for a really long time, now. As it happens, I worked on Thor 1 myself,” Farahani said. “So, I’ve been there from the start with that but Tom has evolved and refined and created this super-rich and textured and now layered version of Loki which is an amalgamation of all the Loki’s that came before. Loki has this phase, ‘I’m burdened with glorious purpose.’ I’ve always thought of the Loki from the pre-Loki series, the Loki from the movies, as preoccupied with the ‘glorious’ part of that phrase and in the first season, he’s preoccupied with finding purpose, I think. In this season, he’s taking on a lot of burden.”

Following new episodes of Loki, Phase Zero hosts a live aftershow to recap, discuss, and theorize based on the events of new episodes. Loki releases new episodes from Season 2 at 9pm ET on Disney+.