Tom Hiddleston's God of Mischief has had a fascinating journey through the MCU over the years, but the "Loki" series takes him to even weirder heights.
The show plucks the version of Loki who escapes with the Tesseract in "Avengers: Endgame" out of the timeline. He's recruited into the Time Variance Authority to hunt down a rogue, alternate version of himself called Sylvie (Sophia Di Martino).
While the show does an excellent job of teeing up a brand new big bad in the MCU (Jonathan Majors as Kang the Conqueror) this is also an excuse to analyze Loki in a much deeper way.
It digs into why Loki wants to rule Earth, Asgard, and the universe, as he's forced to realize that he's trying to fill a void in his life. It's also fascinating to see Loki in a romantic relationship with Sylvie, even if he does technically fall in love with himself (he is a narcissist, after all).
Season two dives further into the potential collapse of the multiverse, with Loki and the TVA scrambling to keep the timeline stable with the help of a Kang variant, Victor Timely (Majors).
But season two's biggest accomplishment is that it still manages to deepen Loki's journey of self-discovery. The Asgardian is forced to drop his "glorious purpose" act and look at what he truly wants in life, while also trying to save the multiverse.
As a whole, "Loki" masterfully balances huge stakes and genuine character development — which is no easy feat. It's undeniably one of the best Marvel shows of the last few years.