Loki season 2 director reveals Tom Hiddleston’s improvised moments

Deleeuw revealed that built into the show's development process was a workshopping stage, through which the actors would add in their own thoughts and improvisations to the current scripts.

Deleeuw spoke specifically about the scenes in which Loki tries to get information out of Hunter X-5, with Mobius locked outside the door as he reverts to some of his old, torturous ways.

He explained: "A lot of the process in the show is, as the scripts were completed or got to a certain point, we would all get in a room together with the actors and workshop the scenes.

"Rafael [Casal] came in, we had Tom there, we had Owen there, we would just run the dialogue and make sure it felt like it was an honest line, something that the characters would say or do.

"So in that room, there was complete freedom to improvise, improve, so we were able to find - especially with Tom and his understanding of Loki over all the films - what buttons to actually push that would put Loki in a place where he might do something, go back to his former self a bit there."

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The new season, of course, comes with plenty of history - not only does it follow on from the show's first season, but also from Loki's many other appearances in past MCU films.

Deleeuw explained the benefit of having Hiddleston, who has lived with the character for almost 15 years, on set to determine how Loki would react in any given situation.

He said: "Tom’s like a Loki encyclopaedia, it’s like Loki 101. You would go to Tom and talk about all his powers and talk about what happened in each of the movies and you would just immediately say the dialogue from the movie and then he would start saying the other characters’ dialogue that was said to Loki.

"His deep understanding and deep love for the character and his story is brilliant in terms of what Loki would do and different situations. Then you’re sitting there with Owen, who’s a writer himself, and then Rafael’s a writer too, so you’re pulling in and using all that talent to work on the script.

"Once they got to the set, there was still some improvisation, but we pretty much had it. A lot of the emotional rhythm with Owen - the takes, as he got more into it and got spun up a little bit, you get a bit more of the energy with him and you start getting the ad-libs and the jokes, like the knock-knock joke came from Owen."

Read more:

• Loki is at his 'most emotionally raw' in season 2, producer says
• Loki producer says there were no talks about recasting Jonathan Majors

This season of Loki will be made up of six episodes in total, but it won't necessarily bring the show to a close.

Producer Kevin Wright said that while seasons 1 and 2 are "two chapters of the same book" which is closing, "now there’s other books on the shelf we can tell stories from".

Loki season 2 continues on Disney Plus on 20th October 2023. You can sign up to Disney Plus for £7.99 a month or £79.90 a year now.

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