Loki TV Series to Run for 6 Episodes on Disney+, Says Tom Hiddleston

The Loki Disney+ series will run for a total of six hours, Tom Hiddleston has revealed, which most likely means that the TV series will consist of six one-hour episodes. That's in line with the lower end of what had been previously rumoured — six to eight episodes — and puts Loki in the same bracket as The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, the first Marvel Studios series for Disney+ that will also have six episodes. Hiddleston also said that the God of Mischief will face “more formidable opponents, the like of which he has never seen or known” on Loki, addressed the multiple (false) endings for his character over the years, from Thor: The Dark World to Avengers: Infinity War.

“I feel like I know [Loki], I've been playing him for 10 years now, and that's crazy to me,” Hiddleston told MTV News. “By the time it's out, I'll be 40. When I was cast, I was 29, which is a great chunk of my life. […] But the point is, there's a sense of ‘I know this character now, I feel the audience knows him.' Playing him, and playing him truthfully, but presenting him with new challenges which then have to change him in different ways is the most exciting aspect of it. You have his specific gifts, his intelligence, his treachery, his mischief, his magic, and then seeing him come up against more formidable opponents, the like of which he has never seen or known. I wish I could tell you what happens, but I can't.”

Referring to the six-hour run, the 38-year-old actor noted that he will end up playing Loki for longer on the TV series than he has on all the Marvel Cinematic Universe films in total yet. Speaking about the multiple times Loki's on-screen life has ended, Hiddleston said he “thought Thor: The Dark World was it. And then there was the sort of altered ending. But then the Marvel universe went off in quite a different direction after that, so I didn't know if I was ever gonna be back.

“Infinity War was final. The death scene in the beginning of Infinity War, that was really pitched to me two years before we filmed it. When I first went to see [Marvel Studios president] Kevin [Feige] to talk about Thor: Ragnarok, and he was kinda telling me this story and the arc and Hela and the whole thing, Sakaar and the Grandmaster, he was just sort of telling me the loose bones of the story, the Russos were in the building. And he said, ‘At the end of this meeting, I'd love for you to meet Joe and Anthony. And they don't know what's gonna happen in Avengers 3 yet, but they have their opening scene. And they're gonna tell you what it is.'”

Asked when he was first told about Loki, Hiddleston revealed he “knew about six weeks before the worldwide release of Avengers: Infinity War, which meant I had to go and do press for Avengers: Infinity War, going ‘Yup, that's it guys.' Yeah, so I did know about it then. But I didn't know what the pitch, the story was.”

Hiddleston wasn't willing to reveal the story though. Thanks to Marvel's announcement in July and a first look from June, we do know that the Disney+ series will follow The Avengers-era Loki, the one who disappeared with the Tesseract in Avengers: Endgame, as he travels through time — including the 1970s — and try to change historical events to suit his agenda. Remember, this is the Loki that hasn't had the character growth we've seen in Thor: The Dark World, and Thor: Ragnarok, so he's a lot more self-serving.

Loki will release in spring 2021 on Disney+. Michael Waldron (Rick and Morty) is the writer and showrunner.