Review: Loki – ‘Lamentis’ s01e03

After a fairly low-key (no apologies for the pun) start to this series, episode 3 of Loki, ‘Lamentis’ sees a slight change of pace, and some key reveals.  *Warning! Spoilers Ahead!*

Much of the previous two episodes have essentially been very drawn out and at times tedious explanations for the show’s setup.  While some of this has been interesting, it got bogged down in slightly slow pacing and relying on some very old tropes.  Pick any plot point from a ‘criminal broken out of jail to help’ film or tv show for instance, and that is what we had here.

In those previous episodes one of the saving graces was the rapport between Tom Hiddleston (Loki) and Owen Wilson (Agent Mobius), which gave it a bit of a kick, but in ‘Lamentis’ that is no longer present.  Luckily, what we get instead is the ‘big bad’ Loki variant front and centre, although now going by the name Sylvie (Sophia Di Martino).  The pairing of both Loki’s for the whole episode works very well, and the verbal sparring bounces between them effectively most of the time.

The setup for this continues from last week, with Sylvie jumping from the supermarket back to the TVA, with Loki in pursuit, aiming to get to the Timekeepers.  During a fight in front of what is obviously a key elevator, Loki manages to get hold of Sylvie’s ‘TemPad’ and opens a time door, sending the pair of them to another location.  This turns out to be the doomed planet of Lamentis-1 in 2077.  Without sufficient power remaining in the TemPad, they must come to some kind of truce in order to find a way to charge it back up.

In theory, this should all work fairly well, but for some reason it just doesn’t come across as a Marvel show, and is lacking something.  What we actually get is a sort of ‘sub-Doctor Who-esque’ episode that feels very uncinematic, and very small.  Even at its most tv-centric Wandavision still seemed to have a grander scope and viewpoint, with the MCU very much attached.  Here, things seem very removed from the MCU and it seems to be in a much less exciting universe.

‘Lamentis’ is generally just a bit disappointing and despite all the large-scale action sequences, didn’t feel fully engaging or thrilling.  Part of that will be the lack of any real peril, and part of it is probably in the interactions between Loki and Sylvie.  None of the latter is the actors fault, as they make the dialogue sing, and the chemistry is fantastic.  In my opinion the character of Sylvie just isn’t dark enough, and doesn’t come across how you would expect.  While they may be playing a longer game with her, here it seems that she becomes very innocuous, very quickly.

It’s very difficult to see what exactly the plan is for this series, and how it is going to fit into the MCU, beyond laying down some details about the multiverse.  There’s no great substance so far and the best elements have been in the character interactions.  There is a big mystery here, and an exciting story to tell about the TVA, but it seems like they’re reluctant to actually get to it.  Once that element kicks off, we could find that the last three episodes are suddenly jammed packed with interesting stuff.  We can but hope.