Marvel's Loki Has New Powers

When Loki season 2 started on Disney+, the title character already had a major problem, he was time-slipping. Having become unstuck from his present timeline in the first episode, and partially as a result of so many timeline branches being woven into the Sacred Timeline, Loki was slipping between past and present in a violent fashion that looked like it was painful. After the jaw-dropping events of Loki season 2 episode 4 though, the Marvel series brought back the time-slipping concept and even built on it in a big way, expanding Loki's powerset and potentially making him one of the MCU's most powerful characters. 

Loki season 2 episode 5 ending explained:

Loki season 2's latest episode on Disney+ begins from the events of last week's episode, but this time Loki is once again time-slipping. To make things a little wilder he's not just showing up at the TVA, though he does begin his journey there. Loki's time-slipping in the new episode sends him across branched timelines where he encounters many of his cohorts and collaborators in the TVA, revealing what their lives were like before they joined the TVA, including: Casey is a prisoner escaping from Alcatraz in 1961, Hunter B-15 is a doctor living in New York in 2012, OB is a failed science-fiction author in California in the 1990s, and Mobius is a jet-ski salesman in Cleveland in the present day.

After encountering OB and explaining everything to him, including how random time-slipping has been for him, Ke Huy Quan's science-obsessed brain offers a revelation about it: Loki's time-slipping isn't random, it's been pushing him around to all the people that he's looking for. Loki just needs to learn to control his time-slipping, especially since it's getting better at moving not only through time, but also space, essentially making Loki a walking TemPad. Knowing the threat that lingers though is what is driving Loki, and that is what will drive him to control his time-slipping

Guess what? At the end of this episode of Loki, that's exactly what happens. As the timeline that Loki and all of his TVA pals are sitting in begins to spaghettify, he screams out in anguish and manages to take control of the time-slipping for the first time. 

"It's not about where, when, or why, it's about who," Loki says to his friends. 

He adds, "I can rewrite the story," taking control of his power and slipping back in time exactly to the moment in season 2 episode 4 right before Victor Timely walks out of the TVA and perishes.

With this newfound ability, Loki is clearly one of the Marvel Cinematic Universe's most powerful characters. Not only can he go back in time and change things, he seemingly has no limit to how far back he can go and what he can do. This will no doubt play a big part in the Loki season 2 finale which premieres next week, but what's unclear is how this will position Loki in the larger MCU. Marvel Studios has often shied away from characters that they've made a little TOO powerful, so the potential for Loki to get sidelined until a much later appearance seems likely.

Marvel Studios fan-favorite Tom Hiddleston stars in Loki Season 2, returning as the titular God of Mischief for another round of time-traveling hijinx on Disney+. Loki is once again joined by Mobius (Owen Wilson) as the two attempt to keep the timelines intact. After the events of Season 1 saw his variant Sylvie (Sophia Di Martino) kill He Who Remains and unleash the wrath of Kang the Conqueror upon the Multiverse, Loki must once again embark on an adventure to keep reality from collapsing. Loki was last seen in the post-credits scene of Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, where he and Mobius were keeping tabs on one of Kang's mysterious variants. Loki Season 2 will continue the story of the Multiverse Saga in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.