Has ‘Loki’ just given MCU a way to resurrect Black Widow?

The first episode of the Loki series has not only been getting a lot of cheer from the fans and audience but has also become an epicentre of fan theories. The one particular scene in Loki episode 1, which has inspired the most number of fan theories till now, is the scene with the Infinity Stones being deemed useless in the TVA (Time Variance Authority). Recently, another fan theory that surfaced online from the same scene, is that of the Marvel Cinematic Universe opening up a possibility of bringing Black Widow back to life.

The Infinity Stones scene in Loki episode 1

The first episode of Loki begins with the Time Variance Authority, or the TVA, apprehending Loki for creating an alternate timeline. This comes after Loki escapes with the Tesseract (Space Stone), from the 2012 timeline of Avengers: Endgame. After being held as a prisoner, Loki tries to escape from the TVA and looks for the Tesseract that they had seized from him. While looking, he opens a drawer, to find that multiple Infinity Stones are simply lying in there, with other random objects.

Upon asking a TVA employee, he finds out that the Stones are being used as paperweights in TVA. He realises that since the TVA exists out of the time and space boundaries of the universe, these Stones do not work there. The TVA agents also possess a device that can reset messed up timelines, like Loki’s timeline of 2012. From this scene, the entertainment news site, The Wrap, unfurled a theory about how Natasha Romanoff could come back to life.

Theory of how Black Widow could return

In Avengers: Endgame, Natasha Romanoff sacrificed her life so that Clint Barton, Hawkeye, could obtain the Soul Stone for their mission. And after Thanos was defeated in the movie, Captain America returned the Stones to their original timelines, to avoid any kind of alternate timeline mess. While all other Stones could have been returned normally, no one knows how Steve could return the Soul Stone, since the sacrifice made for it could not be reversed. Here is where the new theory comes in.

According to the theory, the TVA could have helped Steve restore the timeline of the Soul Stone by their timeline-restoring device, and taken the Stone for themselves (as we saw in the episode, they had multiple Stones just lying around). If this was possible, then maybe Natasha Romanoff exists in the Soul Stone that they might have seized. This speculation comes because like we saw in the Avengers: Infinity War climax, after Thanos snapped his fingers, he saw Gamora in the Soul World because she was sacrificed for the Soul Stone (and that particular Soul Stone was later destroyed by Thanos). Similarly, if Natasha exists in the Soul Stone (or its Soul World), and the TVA has seized that stone, there is a possibility she can come back to life.

Starring Tom Hiddleston as Loki, Owen Wilson as Agent Mobius, Gugu Mbatha-Raw as Ravonna Renslayer, and Wunmi Mosaku as Hunter B-15, the Loki series premiered on Disney + Hotstar, on June 9. The second episode of Loki will come out on June 16. Also, the Black Widow movie, starring Scarlett Johansson, Rachel Weisz, Florence Pugh, and David Harbour, releases on July 9.

Image: Marvel Studios Instagram