The third and final series in Marvel Studios‘ freshman class of Disney+ shows, LOKI, has arrived. Honestly, the bar here doesn’t need to be super high. Tom Hiddleston can put on that outfit and read the phone book and we’d all be grateful. Loki-ly for us (I’m so sorry) the Feige dream factory has done it yet again, with creator Michael Waldron and director Kate Herron setting up a killer adventure that manages to introduce us to a whole new world of powers and problems, while giving us all the endless Loki content we crave.

Hiddleston gets the great pleasure of going back to AVENGERS (2012) Loki, which is where the story begins. You may recall in AVENGERS: ENDGAME, Loki grabbed the Tesseract when the Avengers went back and time to collect it. He promptly disappeared, and after a short reappearance, Loki is apprehended by the Time Variance Authority (TVA) for deviating from the timeline. It’s there he meets his unlikely new sidekick, Agent Mobius. Owen Wilson is a perfect foil here, clearly having a great time and slowly completing his transformation into John Slattery with a cooler nose. Rounding out the supporting cast are the delightful Gugu Mbatha-Raw (Beauty and the Beast), the fabulous Wunmi Mosaku (Lovecraft Country) and the mysterious Sophie Di Martino (Yesterday).

MouseInfo had the chance to check out the first two episodes (six total are planned), and while I wish I could say I knew where all this is going, I really don’t. The first episode (streaming June 9) is 51 minutes long and really gets things started without much ado, but it’s in episode two (June 16), which runs for 54 minutes, where we really get somewhere and the first big reveal that will make fan minds melt everywhere occurs. Seems to me that that means things are only going to get crazier in the remaining four episodes, and there are strong rumors that unlike WANDAVISION, LOKI is meant to return for multiple seasons.

Much of the show so far takes place within the kind of limbo realm of the TVA, a 70s mashup themed bureaucracy where muted browns, dark oranges, and stacks of paperwork fill every space alongside the requisite fantasy technology like time spinners (you’ll see) and holographic projectors. Production Designer Kasra Farahani has created an environment perfect for a theme park attraction. My Little Pony friends will recognize Tara Strong‘s voice right away as the impossibly perky Miss Minutes, and long time Disney fans will enjoy the style in which she brings us (and Loki) up to speed with how the TVA works.

Much like Loki himself, it always seems like the MCU is already approaching a tipping point of chaos. How can the studio juggle so many stories and keep them all at the quality the studio is known for while also weaving them together? I guess if someone could answer that question other studios would be doing what they do. It’s an incredible feat that I think most Marvel fans take for granted after 13 years.

With DOCTOR STRANGE IN THE MULTIVERSE OF MANDESS coming up fast (2022), it seems a lot of the events in this short 6-episode season truly are burdened with glorious purpose of further setting up the stakes hinted at in WANDAVISION and to an extent in THE FALCON AND THE WINTER SOLDIER.

Look at us now. We’re getting ready to enjoy a kind of buddy cop mystery action comedy starring Tom Hiddleston and Owen Wilson, and we couldn’t be happier.

See it for Yourself

LOKI debuts exclusively on Disney+ on June 9, 2021.