Loki season 2 producer explains shock episode 4 ending - and what's next

With Loki (Tom Hiddleston) finally getting hold of Victor Timely (Jonathan Majors) and OB (Key Huy Quan) coming up with a plan to fix the Temporal Loom, things seemed in hand.

Alas, there are still two episodes to go, and things could never have been that simple. The final scenes of episode 4 see Timely seemingly shredded to pieces by Temporal Radiation.

With the The Temporal Loom also exploding and our heroes seemingly about to meet their demise, we're shown the fear in Loki's eyes before the episode cuts to black.

Speaking about that shocking ending exclusively with RadioTimes.com, producer Kevin Wright says it's allowed for episodes 5 and 6 to be "profound and beautiful".

He explained: "Episode 4 came out of the idea of story acceleration. If you’re setting up in ep 1, 'Hey this thing happens in ep 4,' you would probably think that’s going to happen at the back half of the episode or think that has to be dealt with by the end of the season.

"By moving it forward, it allows for a cool, shocking moment, which we like for our episodes 4. But what it does for that back half, then, is go, 'You thought the series was going to be about this,' and it lets us push into really unexpected territory.

"I think what it will do for our episodes 5 and 6 is, if eps 1 through 4 is everything going wrong, eps 5 and 6 let us go to really profound and beautiful places with our characters."

So, how did we get here? We've got you covered.

Loki season 2 episode 4 ending explained: Is Victor Timely dead?

The episode opens with Ms Minutes revealing to Renslayer (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) that He Who Remains had erased her memories, and that, once, the pair of them had planned to rule together.

Ms Minutes tells her that she once commanded his armies and effectively kept him on the throne - and Renslayer is left furious. Ms Minutes tells Renslayer that the pair of them don't need him at all.

Elsewhere, Timely arrives at the TVA and sees his Loom, with Loki urging him to help them fix it.

OB explains their plan, which involves one of them walking through a ton of Temporal Radiation down the gangway to launch the Throughput Multiplier towards the Loom, which will allow it to manage the backlog of branches created when Sylvie (Sophia Di Martino) killed He Who Remains. Still with us?

After some quick problem solving from Timely, he and OB strive to get their plan working, with Mobius, Sylvie and Loki giving them some space to work.

Sylvie's left distraught when she thinks Mobius doesn't seem to care if the branches are dying, and she storms off. She's not convinced of the plan of showing Timely what's really happening before sending him back to his life and hoping he doesn't turn into He Who Remains, rejecting the idea of playing god, while Loki insists there's no better option.

Timely is found by Bradley, AKA X-5 (Rafael Casal), after he joins Renslayer, and B-15 (Wunmi Mosaku) informs the gang that Dox (Kate Dickie) is dead - more on that later.

They also realise Ms Minutes is back and their plan has been sabotaged. Renslayer threatens Timely for information on where the device is.

Sylvie enchants Bradley, with the agent pruning an unwitting Renslayer while under her spell, and Loki and Mobius retrieve Timely.

Timely scans himself and the scan is recognised as He Who Remains. He volunteers to take Loki's place on the gangway, but as soon as he steps out of the door, he's shredded to pieces by the radiation, screaming as he goes.

The gang are left in horror as the Temporal Loom finally explodes, with Loki flinching as the episode cuts to black. So, is literally everyone dead? We'll only find out next episode.

Why did Loki prune himself?

On the hunt for Timely, Sylvie gets trapped in a very familiar looking lift. As the TVA is evacuated, Loki runs and hears a phone ringing - just as he did in episode 1.

Just as we saw before, Sylvie forces the doors to the lift open, and future Loki - the one we've been following so far - stumbles across his past self in front of the lift doors.

He sees his past self and realises that, to complete the time loop that was previously established, he has to prune himself, realising that it was his future self who pruned him in episode 1.

He then picks up the phone and tells OB that Ms Minutes is sabotaging them, with OB rebooting the safety system to take Ms Minutes offline. Before she goes, she menacingly tells Timely: "You'll never be him."

Is Renslayer dead?

Elsewhere, Judge Gamble attempts to convince Hunter B-15 to bring General Dox around to their way of thinking - that the TVA has to change. Paying a visit to an imprisoned Dox, she tries to convince her that they're on the same side.

Renslayer appears through a time door and attempts to convince Dox to join her to stop B-15. She tells them that anyone who joins her can have a life on the timeline if they want it.

Renslayer brutally kills Dox and her followers, compressing them into a box after they refuse to join her. She spares Bradley after he joins her and Ms Minutes. Bradley makes his way to Timely, pruning an agent in his path.

Sylvie enchants Bradley, with the agent pruning an unwitting Renslayer while under her spell. As for whether we'll see her again... only time will tell.

Loki season 2 continues on Disney Plus. You can sign up to Disney Plus for £7.99 a month or £79.90 a year now.

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