Loki: Is SPOILER Really Dead?

It's Wednesday and that means that the four-episode of Loki, "The Nexus Event", arrived on Disney+, and to say it was wild would be an understatement. After last week's somewhat slower-paced "Lamentis", this week's episode was full of game-changing twists and reveals that turns the entire series on its head. Among those shocking moments are a couple of major deaths that have left fans reeling and wondering what could possibly be next. But it begs the question: are these characters really dead and what does it all mean for the remaining episodes of the series? Let's break it down.

Warning: MASSIVE spoilers for Loki Episode 4, "The Nexus Event", below. Turn back NOW if you don't want to know.

After essentially being stranded at the end of the world last week, Loki (Tom Hiddleston) and Sylvie (Sophia Di Martino) were rescued at the last minute by the TVA. Okay, well, rescue is a strong term. They were apprehended and brought back to the TVA where they were separated for interrogation. Now, viewers will recall that last week, Sylvie revealed to Loki that the TVA has been lying about the nature of its employees and they are all, in fact, variants taken from their timelines and their memories of their lives seemingly wiped. Loki tells Mobius (Owen Wilson) this and while he's initially reluctant to believe, his own suspicions about the fate of Hunter C-20 leads him to switch his TemPad with Renslayer's (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) which reveals Loki is indeed telling the truth. However, before Mobius and Loki and work together with this revelation, Renslayer confronts Mobius and has him pruned. She then takes Loki and Sylvie before the Time-Keepers which also goes awry when a fight ensues and it's revealed that the Time-Keepers are androids, but that's not the most shocking thing about that moment. The stunning moment comes when, while Loki is trying to tell Sylvie about his feelings, Renslayer prunes him, seemingly killing both Mobius and Loki.

While watching both Mobius and Loki pretty much be wiped out of existence would seem like a definitive death, that may not be the case. A post-credits scene shows Loki waking up in some unknown and seemingly devastated realm surrounded by other Loki variants. He wakes up and asks if he's in hell if he's dead and they tell him he's not but will be if he doesn't come with them.

So, Loki has been pruned but is not dead. What does it mean? There are a few things that could be going on here. The first is that Loki, being a god, may just have ended up in some sort of weird place that gods go because that would be a pretty simple and straightforward answer. However, it could also be that the TVA's pruning isn't quite what they made it out to be, yet another lie from the pretty sketchy group. If Loki has survived and is now in some other realm with other variants, it is possible that the TVA's pruning just sends variants to some pocket realm where they are held and kept away from the "sacred timeline". Think of it as deleting something off your computer where it goes to the trash or recycle bin but isn't really gone or even a sort of prison, if you will.

While we only see Loki and these other Loki variants in the scene, it also doesn't rule out that there are other variants there. Maybe this is also where Mobius was sent as well which means that neither character is really dead. The only real question is where exactly are they, why is death still a possibility, and how the heck are they going to get out. We'll have to wait another week for those answers.

Loki streams new episodes Wednesdays on Disney+

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