Warning: The following article contains spoilers for Episode 2 of “Loki” and the entire “WandaVision” series.
The second episode of “Loki” had an important moment for the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The ending showed Loki hunt down the villainous Variant Loki who had been killing members of the Time Variance Authority. This variant — revealed to be Lady Loki — set off a number of TVA reset charges to different timelines (which wipe away variant timelines and created a number of new variant timelines all at once.
That’s right, all at once, Lady Loki created a slew of timelines that diverge from the main Sacred Timeline. This is underscored by the fact that the TVA notices a number of divergent timelines spew off in different directions on their Sacred Timeline monitors.
This brief moment might explain the ending of “WandaVision.”
What happened in “Wandavision” with timelines?
Let’s travel back to “WandaVision” for a second. The show centered around Wanda Maximoff (Elizabeth Olsen) and Vision (Paul Bettany) living in a humble suburban home, but something felt off. The show — which had a sitcom-like feel to it — portrayed Vision and Wanda as a happily married couple, even though Vision had previously died in “Avengers: Infinity War.”
Long story short, we learn that Wanda has created this false reality for a chance to live with Vision and that it was Agatha Harkness (Kathryn Hahn) who had been making things seem amiss and off — including creating fake versions of Wanda’s brothers and her children, who were wiped away from existence.
Eventually, Agatha encourages Wanda to read the Darkhold — a book full of dark magic. To defeat Agatha, Wanda reads enough of the book to become the Scarlet Witch, meaning she now has magic powers. Wanda said she would then read more from the Darkhold to truly understand its power.
Fast forward to the end credits scene. After the credits roll, we see the Scarlet Witch sitting in a cabin way off in the middle of nowhere. A projection of Wanda is sitting in front of herself waiting for tea to boil. But inside a room, we see the Scarlet Witch floating in the air, surrounded by magic, reading from the Darkhold.
Per ScreenRant, the Darkhold’s “power can corrupt the reader, and even lead to tears in the fabric of reality itself. Since the book contains information on the Scarlet Witch, then it’s likely Wanda is wanting to find out exactly who and what she is, and clearly, she has already learned some new skills from it, such as the ability to separate herself into two beings.”
Then, as Scarlet Witch reads from the book, we hear the screams of her children Timmy and Billy, who had vanished from Westview. They shout for help. Cut to black.
How ‘Loki’ created ‘WandaVision’ ending
I suggested at the time of the episode that Timmy and Billy might be from an alternate reality. And that the ending might have been a setup for “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.”
But we also know that “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” and “Loki” will connect in some way, too. In fact, Marvel Studios chief creative officer Kevin Feige told Bloomberg in 2019 that “Loki” will lead into the new “Doctor Strange” film.
“I’m not sure we’ve actually acknowledged that before. But it does (connect),” he said.
And that’s not even counting the fact that the first episode had a reference to “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” when Miss Minutes — the Marvel version of Mr. DNA from “Jurassic Park” — referenced a multiuniversal war that could spin the universe into madness.
So if all of these projects weave together, what is the thread? How do they all seamlessly connect? The final scene in the second of “Loki” might have given us our answer. Lady Loki might have created a number of timelines that have spawned off in hundreds of directions. One of those timelines might be one in which Timmy and Billy — Wanda’s kids — are alive. And now, based on the ending of “WandaVision,” we’re going to see Wanda try to find them. We don’t know much about Wanda’s role in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness,” but if Doctor Strange is tasked with putting the timelines back in order and Wanda is searching for her children, we could see an epic clash between the two sides.
And then there’s Loki to consider. What role will he (or she, if Lady Loki becomes the permanent version of Loki in the MCU) play in the forthcoming film? Will he work with Doctor Strange to stop the Scarlet Witch? Or will “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” actually run simultaneously to “Loki”?
The brief scene at the end of “Loki” Episode 2 might have spelled out where we’re going in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. A number of variant timelines have now been created for the MCU. We could see that reverberate through the upcoming Marvel projects, and might even bring us to a future multiuniversal war.