Timely Thorsday #23: The Nexus Event

 Or perhaps I should call it TimeDrop Thorsday, seeing as how it's the 23rd issue? For those who don't know, TimeDrop and the number twenty-three are kind of my personal brand when it comes to the creative arts. It's my DJ name, as well as my self-publication company; a nexus value in my existence, if you will.

Anyway, Ticketholders, it's that time again! So use your Temp Pads to click those social media buttons and make your comments converge on the comments section down below. Also, check your chronometers because a SPOILER Event is imminent.

Did you know that if you Google Nexus, you get everything from loan companies and border patrol initiatives to smartphones and community improvement projects? Seriously, the word is connected to so many things that I didn't find the definition until near the bottom of my first page of search results. And that definition is as follows: "a means of connection; tie; link. A connected series or group. The core or center, as of a matter or situation." So it makes sense in reference to beings in the MCU (and Marvel properties at large) who are uniform across realities and possess multiversal knowledge.

But as it is repurposed in Loki (to identify beings or events that catalyze divergence into multiple timelines), it seems like a misnomer or retroactive designation (perhaps born of TVA propaganda?). And--this is where the SPOILER Warning ⚠️ first applies--the titular "Nexus Event" doesn't even happen! Those time bombs Sylvie set off two episodes ago? Their effects apparently got reset offscreen because budget and episode limitations (and saving it for the movies?), so that isn't a thing, either.

We open on Asgard, where a young Sylvie Laufeydottir (not Lushton--this is not Enchantress II we're dealing with) is playing with Ragnarok toys when the TVA show up and drag her away because reasons, led by not-yet-a-Judge Renslayer. Sylvie is put through the Soul-aroid machine, the same way Loki was at the beginning of the season, dashing several of my theories to pieces in a matter of minutes. Sylvie is not a robot, or a Vision Variant, or a Scarlet Witch Variant, or a TVA creation. She could still be an amalgated reincarnation of Billy and Tommy (who aren't supposed to exist even though we know they do, and so fit the Variant criteria in their own right), which adheres to the Loki mythos, Sylvie's comic book origins, her adoption, her inability to remember her mother (Wanda? Or maybe Dottie/Arcanna Jones?), and her claims of being a self-taught mage. But speculation will lead where it must. The other guy they detained at the same time as Sylvie caught my attention, but I don't know if he means anything yet. Using tactics typical of a child character, young Sylvie steals Ravonna's Temp Pad and escapes, with Renslayer staring after her for a "could have done dozens of things to stop her" length of time. Now the real question becomes: how does someone get promoted to a Judgeship after a screw-up that colossal? We get to see the Timekeepers here for the first...time, heavily shadowed, and back-lit in red despite being in a blue room with three-to-five too many fog machines. This screaming, VILLAIN!! symbolism title-transitions into a strained conversation between Renslayer and Agent 3M, where she denies him access to C-20, the enchanted Minute from the beginning of the last episode, claiming  that C-20 became "scrambled" and committed suicide (guess what? Nope!).

Meanwhile, in 2077, I have learned to pay more attention to thematic color choices. Sylvie (back-lit by green and gold because foreshadowing) and Loki (back-lit by purple and gold because same foreshadowing) await the Lamentis-1 Apocalypse and discuss the relationship they obviously have, but are too Loki to admit to one another. With the cloud of purple, Independence Day destruction mere feet away, two time doors open, and they are recaptured by the TVA. Loki gets imprisoned in a time loop of Sif (Jamie Alexander is back!) beating him up and fun-shaming him for cutting off her hair, which is supposed to be a way of punishing him with thoughts of a lonely destiny and forcing more rapid character development. Disappointingly, Groundhog Minute works. But it was great to see Sif again, so...plus!? As for Sylvie, she just gets put in the TVA's Plot Armory because the foreshadowed shadow is about to shadow. But we don't know this right away because Renslayer is up to her old, clock-blocking tricks with Mobius, who switches Temp Pads with her on the sly and gains access to the truth about C-20, whom Renslayer pruned for remembering her past as a Variant.

Meanwhile, B-15 (Wunmi Mosaku is wonderful in this episode) takes Sylvie back to the 2050 RoxxPocalypse because she is also having memory flashes of the truth, and wants the full unlock. We don't see these flashes, or her full memories, but Mosaku is so good at emoting that our feelings and imaginations are more powerful than any flashback visual that could have been shown instead. Mobius, B-15, Loki, and Sylvie attempt a divided revolution, but Renslayer and her guards quickly prune Mobius and take Loki and Sylvie to the Timekeepers' chamber. On the elevator ride down, Sylvie asks Renslayer if she remembers her, and what Sylvie's personal Nexus Event was, only to be met with more villainous clock-blocking. If she turns out to be the main villain of Loki, Renslayer's bag is woefully under-tricked, as in, she only has the one trick. Please be Kang! Or Mephisto! Or Nightmare! Even Casey "What Are Fish?" Deskman would be a more compelling villain at this point. He could be like the Oscar Z. PINHEAD of the MCU!

So, after all of that scheme-shaming I just did, Renslayer apparently wants to sacrifice Loki and Sylvie to the Timekeepers because love based on gender-fluid, doppelganger narcissism can either save or doom all of existence, or something. B-15 gets to be a badass before she is also pruned, and Loki takes on the goon squad while Sylvie settles her grudge with the Judge. Our anti-heroic pair come out on top and Loki takes a "could have expressed himself or gotten killed dozens of times by now" length of time to not say the four letter word that starts with L-O and isn't his name, before that foreshadowing pays off and Renslayer prunes him in a very "Loki killing Coulson" kind of way, but with some "snappy" particle effects (hence the Thanos-y color scheme when he and Sylvie were talking on Lamentis-1). This gives Sylvie the fridge motivation to overpower Renslayer once again and Sailor Moon one of the Timekeepers' heads off...revealing that the Timekeepers are robots. Sylvie demands answers, and the credits roll.

In a post-credits scene that (SPOILER Warning! if you haven't seen RWBY Volume 8 yet) has a similar reveal concept to the post-credits scene from RWBY's Volume 8 finale, it turns out that pruning does not equal death or erasure. Loki wakes up in a destroyed version of New York City (most likely from "What If Loki Beat the Avengers?"), and is greeted by four pruned Loki Variants: "Classic"/Old Man Loki (from the Agent Of Asgard comic series), Kid Loki (from the Fear Itself comic event, and there goes another theory), "Boastful" Loki (a worthy Variant, possibly based on the AXIS comic event or 2020's Thor #4), and...Alligator Loki (an instant meme inspired by Throg, "The Frog of Thunder" from Pet Avengers and the Spider-Ham Universe)? Many thanks to IGN for the post-credits info.

Official, new best episode of Loki so far.

Speaking of What Ifs and diverging from the topic at hand, I was in a darkly comedic frame of mind on Tuesday night, and I decided to kill off the phoenix in Dragon Ball BE. I also wrote my review of the first season of Rising Of the Shield Hero for Isekai "Quartet," so don't expect another free look at BE on Blogger. I plan to publish my re-writes of the first three chapters on WattPad, and crank out a fourth chapter before the week ends.

Once again, go click those social media buttons and comment down below, and I will see you next week (and next month) with more content.

Ticketkeeper,

Out of time.