Most critics like Loki, and nearly all of them like it for the same reason: the pairing of Tom Hiddleston and Owen Wilson. The sparring between the god of mischief and his patient handler at the Time Variance Authority is the one thing every review, warm or cold, points to as the source of the fun. Beyond that the praise settles on the world-building, with the TVA’s bureaucratic absurdity called fresh and lived-in, and several reviews rank it above Marvel’s earlier television series.
The reservations are about pace and talk. Even admirers concede the opening episodes carry a heavy load of exposition, and the sceptics find them static, with too much rule-setting and too little of the character’s mischief. The spread is wide. The Telegraph argues the time-cop premise strips Loki of what made him enjoyable; The i Paper finds the premiere limp and short on ambition; The Guardian calls the setup flat while still enjoying the double act.