Loki's New Trailer Confirms The MCU's Return To Asgard
A trailer for Marvel's upcoming Loki series reveals the MCU's return to Asgard. While the realm of the gods was destroyed in a fiery rampage by the demon lord Surtur at the end of Thor: Ragnarok, it looks as though the time travel adventures of Loki will see the God of Mischief's return to Asgard at some point in an alternate timeline. However, this won't be the same Loki as the one who sought redemption at the end of the third Thor film and sacrificed himself in Avengers: Infinity War. The series will instead follow the variant Loki seen in Avengers: Endgame, and this Loki was still trying to rule Asgard as its king.
Marvel's Loki will follow the variant Loki who teleported away after the Avengers' Battle of New York, using the Tesseract that became available due to the future Avengers meddling with time to retrieve the Infinity Stones in their past. Apparently, Loki's escape with the Tesseract had led to several branch timelines and realities being created, and the Time Variance Authority will need his help to restore the proper flow of time he broke. This should no doubt prove to be incredibly interesting, as this variant Loki is one who had yet to go through his journey of redemption in the subsequent MCU films after his invasion in the first Avengers movie, meaning that the new Loki has an entirely new path ahead of him that will also feature coming home to Asgard.
In the Loki trailer, a brief shot sees Loki in Odin's throne room on Asgard, which seemingly confirms either a flashback to Loki's past, Loki traveling back to the past, or most likely Loki visiting an alternate branch reality that he inadvertently created. Interestingly enough, Loki is seen standing with the throne behind him, perhaps indicating that this is indeed a branch timeline where Asgard has bowed to Loki's rule. Likewise, the throne itself is different from that of Odin's seen in past MCU films, featuring a certain Loki flair not unlike his iconic helmet.
Furthermore, subsequent shots see Loki venturing through dark hallways that might also be Asgard as well. However, glowing cracks are featured all over the doors and walls surrounding the God of Mischief, and it's possible that this could be Loki visiting Asgard just before its demise thanks to Surtur at the end of Ragnarok. If that's the case, it could potentially provide the opportunity for the variant Loki to interact with the original Loki, seeing the version of himself that was working on redemption and had reunited with his brother Thor. This would certainly be an exciting dynamic, possibly inspiring the variant to walk a similar path of redemption (though that's purely speculation at the moment).
While the exact details of the return to Asgard are still unclear, seeing Loki and Thor's home again will be incredibly interesting given the realm's destruction in the present-day MCU all the same. Furthermore, no matter how Loki's homecoming goes down, it's more than likely that the God of Mischief will experience a major turning point given Asgard's significance in his life when Marvel's Loki releases on Disney+.