Loki: What is a variant?
IF you have been watching Loki on Disney+, you may be wondering why the Time-Keepers call Loki a "variant" in the MCU.
The answer is all to do with the MCU timelines. We've got the explanation...
What is a variant?
A variant is a person who branches away from the main timeline of the Marvel Cinematic Universe by creating an alternate version of events.
The term is generally used by the Time Variance Authority, a group of officers responsible for maintaining the cohesion of the MCU timeline.
When someone creates an alternate timeline, their officers work to arrest the individual.
They must then undo the change that created the new timeline, thus restoring the main MCU timeline to its correct form.
This stops the MCU splintering into an infinite number of other universes, which would make everything very chaotic.
Is Loki a variant?
Yes, the Loki we see in the new Disney+ series is a variant.
This is because in Avengers: Infinity War, Tom Hiddleston’s Loki is actually killed a battle with Thanos.
But, as Marvel fans will be well-aware, when the Avengers travelled back to 2012 in Endgame, Loki managed to avoid capture.
The Disney series takes place with the version of Loki that is created following the Battle of New York in 2012, after he picked up the Tesseract and jumped through a timehole.
However, he has thus created a brand new timeline and is picked up by the Time Variance Authority (TVA).
In the first episode of the new series, the TVA threatened to eradicate this Loki variant.
But before they do, Agent Mobius decides to enlists Loki's help to track down another rogue variant who has been killing TVA officers.
It transpires that the variant is an alternate version of Loki, who also broke free from the Sacred timeline of events and has been causing havoc.
The evil variant was concealed by an emerald cloak and hood.
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In J. Michael Straczynski, Marko Djurdjevic, and Olivier Coipel’s 2008 Thor series, Loki shapeshifts into villain known as Lady Loki.
And some fans have suspected that this evil variant may take the form of Lady Loki.
Fans have suspected she may be played by former Casualty and Flowers star Sophia Di Martino.