Sorry, Loki isn’t the most powerful Marvel character in the MCU

Warning spoilers ahead for the Loki season 2 finale. It seems wild that after more than a decade of scheming, plotting, and backstabbing, Loki Laufreyson has finally achieved his glorious purpose and become king of, well, everything.

That may sound like a slight exaggeration, but if you’re up to date with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, you’ll know that following the events of Loki season 2 finale, the God of Mischief has graduated to being the God of Time — replacing He Who Remains as the man responsible for maintaining the multiverse.

Unlike the Marvel villain, though, Loki doesn’t plan on limiting the multiverse to one sacred timeline; instead, he’s willing to let the different dimensions grow like a mighty tree (a reference to Yggdrasil) and his version of the TVA won’t prune branches; they’ll look after the general health of the multiverse. It’s a big job, we know, but through his trials with the TVA, Loki has earned this responsibility and the power that comes with it.

The question is, though, just how powerful is Loki now? We’ve already seen that he’s the equal of He Who Remains when it comes to manipulating time, freely traveling anywhere in the multiverse that he wishes to go while also pausing time whenever he wants. When you couple that with his inherent Asgardian (technically Ice Giant) abilities, it becomes clear Loki’s gone from an Avengers-level threat to a multiversal-level deity.

So, is he the strongest Marvel character ever? Well, we’re struggling to name many Marvel heroes or villains who could beat him right now. Even Thanos with the Infinity Gauntlet, the most powerful villain the Avengers ever fought, would likely be powerless in front of this new Loki. Still, what if we told you there are actually a few beings who could threaten Loki?

It’s likely that the Council of Kangs, who are no slouches when it comes to time travel, could pose a threat to him. We’re actually predicting that the Kangs will deliberately collapse the multiverse in Avengers 5, which will set up Secret Wars. For that to happen right now, it seems as though the Kangs will have to go through Loki and the TVA.

The idea that the Kangs still pose a threat is also backed up by the fact that the TVA is still actively monitoring Kang variants across the multiverse and stopping them when they can. The Kangs would likely need to team up to defeat Loki, though, so we’re not sure if it counts.

The second character, though, wouldn’t need any help to beat Loki in a fight. We’re talking about the almighty Living Tribunal. Never heard of him? Well, you’ve clearly not watched Doctor Strange 2 recently, where the character made a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it appearance while Stephen and American Chavez were crashing through the multiverse.

The Living Tribunal is a sort of cosmic guardian who safeguards the multiverse from harm and is the second most powerful being in all of creation. He was actually supposed to appear as Tony Stark in Endgame but got the chop for the sake of brevity, and Mordo used a magical weapon named after him as well, so we know he exists in the MCU.

As you’d expect from such a being, The Living Tribunal only interferes in the most serious of incidents, so it’s hardly surprising we’ve not had much interaction with him. The Living Tribunal chose to go toe-to-toe with Loki, it would end with the God of Time eating dirt.

The Living Tribunal also has a boss who could kick Loki’s ass, the all-powerful One Above All. Its name tells you everything about its power level. Name a character; it’s above them. Sorry, that’s just how it works. We’re not sure how canon the One Above All is to the MCU, though, so he might not count either. Still, let this serve as a reminder: when it comes to the multiverse, there’s almost always a bigger fish.

If you want to know more about the God of Mischeief’s fate we’ve written a Loki season 2 ending explained which goes into detail on what we think is next for the former villain. That’s not all though, we’ve also written about Ravonna Renslayer’s fate and looked into the possibility of Loki season 3.

If you’re more interested in the feature length MCU adventures though you should check out our guides breaking down Marvel’s Phase 5 and Phase 6, which explore all the upcoming Marvel movies. Not enough for you? Well we’ve also broken down how to watch all the Marvel movies in order and got a list of everythign new on Disney Plus.