The recent Super Bowl has given lovers of film and series around the world plenty of new content from some of the most eagerly awaited projects in the coming years. In particular, Disney+, Disney's streaming platform, launched a short teaser trailer about its upcoming series with Marvel: 'The Falcon and the Winter Soldier', 'WandaVision' and a brief but important glimpse of 'Loki'.
In the first shot of the slippery Asgardian, we see him sat in the shadows wearing what appears to be a prisoner's uniform emblazoned with a red insignia that reads TVA. "I'm going to burn this place to the ground", says Loki in the scene, portrayed with smooth-talking menace by Tom Hiddleston.
Amidst all the excitement, this short trailer left fans with a lot of questions: namely, what does TVA stand for? According to Comicbook, in the Marvel comics, the TVA (Time Variance Authority) is a bureaucratic group dedicated to overseeing the various earths and alternate realities that exist within the multiverse, stepping in to wield their authority when someone - or something - tampers with the timeline. As we saw in 'Avengers: Endgame', Loki escaped with the Tesseract, creating an alternate timeline to that of his capture in 'The Avengers'. Following the knowledge we have about the TVA from the comic books, it is likely that the TVA has captured the god of mischief for wreaking havoc with the parallel universes.
During the San Diego ComicCon, the producer of 'Loki', Stephen Broussard, confirmed that Loki's travels through time would play an important role in the series: "There's a huge time travel component. There will be a man on the run quality to it and we get the chance to explore more human sides of Loki". The official synopsis of the series reads: "In Marvel Studios' "Loki," the mercurial villain Loki (Tom Hiddleston) resumes his role as the God of Mischief in a new series that takes place after the events of "Avengers: Endgame." Kate Herron directs and Michael Waldron is head writer. Debuts on Disney+ next year - 2021".
Other series set to expand the Marvel Cinematic Universe include 'The Falcon and the Winter Soldier', which is set for an August 2020 release, and 'WandaVision', which is currently set to hit our screens in the spring of 2021. Disney+ will launch in the UK on the 24th March 2020.
Hiddleston's take on the trickster god
In an interview with MTV news, Tom Hiddleston spoke about his return to the role of Loki and the challenges of keeping the fact that he was working on the series under wraps. "I knew about six weeks before the worldwide release of 'Avengers: Infinity War', which meant I had to go and do press for 'Avengers: Infinity War' going, "Yep, that's it guys"". This implies that Hiddleston had to keep all he knew about Loki's future hidden from around March 2018 until the series was officially announced in November 2019.
Hiddleston also spoke about Loki's monumental arc. The actor admits that, by now, he knows Loki's personality inside out. "I know this character now. I feel that the audience knows him. And playing him, but playing him truthfully and presenting him with new challenges which then mean I have to change him in different ways is the most exciting aspect of it. You've got his very specific gifts. His intelligence, his treachery, his mischief, his magic. And then you see him come up against more formidable opponents, the like of which he has never seen or known. I mean, I wish I could tell you what happens, but I can't".
The aura of secrecy that always surrounds every new Marvel project is still in place, as the actor says, but what we do know for now is that joining the British actor in the cast of 'Loki' will be Sophia Di Martino ('Yesterday') and Owen Wilson ('Midnight in Paris').
