Just A Theory: Is LOKI’s Miss Minutes more powerful than Thanos?

One of the defining moments of the premiere episode of LOKI was when Loki escaped and made it all the way to Casey’s evidence cart in the TVA where he demanded the Tesseract (aka the space stone). After a funny-awkward conversation where Loki threatened Casey saying he would gut Casey “like a fish” and Casey asked what a fish was, having spent his entire existence in the TVA – Casey handed the Tesseract over to Loki who promptly discovered that the damn thing had no power. And no value.

In fact, Casey’s drawer was filled with leftover infinity stones (although noticeably and curiously no soul stone) and he admitted that many of his co-workers use them “as paperweights”. Loki quickly asked: “Is this the greatest power in the universe?”

Is the TVA in our timeline or any universe?

Upon discovering the “powerless” infinity stones and also discovering that he was also powerless, I think it’s safe to surmise that the TVA is not on any map – spatial or temporal – and exists outside of any timeline and outside of any universe in the multiverse, since the power of the infinity stones must be in their specific timeline to work (as was stated in that Jonathan Hickman issue of the “Fantastic Four” [#570] where there were like 100 Reed Richards and they had multiple infinity gauntlets).

Therefore inside the TVA office each infinity stone would have no power and could easily be used as a paperweight. I think what is also interesting is that Casey qualifies his paperweight comment a bit by adding “well some people do” as in some people use them as a paperweight. Which leads me to wonder – well who? It seems like the kind of comment someone might say about someone who was breaking the rules at work and also a realization that the infinity stones, while be powerless, are not completely valueless and if restored to their proper universe would regain their power, and by association, danger, again.

So who are these cocky people…

and is the animated mascot of the TVA Miss Minutes one of them? 

Miss Minutes is certainly the member of the TVA with the most spice. She’s what the MCU press release terms as an animated mascot that for the purposes of the narrative explains a lot in a little time for both Loki AND the audience. It’s a warm, funny and easily digestible story about certain rather tragic and incomprehensible topics including a multiverse war, the idea that you are not the only you but one of a possible infinite number, oh and also that a trio of three timekeepers are now are in charge of keeping the order of our “sacred timeline”. And leading this narrative parade down the street is Miss Minutes – the animated mascot of the TVA specifically created to help people understand all of these topics and more – so that if you find yourself a variant in the TVA you can comprehend where you are and how you got here. She’s cute and lets face it, Shop Disney has already merched the heck out of the mascot. And I admit I really want a Miss Minutes pin, coffee cup, apron – but I can’t help but wonder… is she secretly the most powerful and potentially evil character in the MCU?

Some might want to stop me here and say “hey you are talking about an animated mascot” that is oh so cute and really seems like she’d make an awesome character on my hydroflask. But let’s remember that the place for which Miss Minutes is the mascot is a place that is not on any map and exists outside of any timeline or any universe – so (1.) I don’t think it’s out of the realm of possibilities that an animated mascot could be sentient – especially when she’s infused with so much sass and personality – certainly more personality than some of Loki’s previous adversaries including that dark elf guy from Thor 2.

And (2.) I must ask if Miss Minutes is sentient, she would be one of those that surely knows the most about the TVA, its history, the history of all timelines, and being the keeper of this knowledge would surely infuse her with a certain confidence and almost a cockiness. Heck – anyone with that kind of knowledge would have a similar self-assurance – you’re omniscient! Also if you had that knowledge then (3.) you would be a really powerful being – in control of so much more than we could even imagine. But let’s say she is just a mascot created by someone else. Well, that could be even worse because that brings up this question:

If Miss Minutes is an animated creation…

who is her creator, and how is it a reflection for that person and the people who work at the TVA?

If Miss Minutes was created by someone then that person had one point and one person – to tell the viewer of Minutes as much as they needed to know but not more, in the most visually pleasing and calming way. This style of storytelling mimics other animated tutorial characters, like “Schoolhouse Rock” of the 1970s and 1980s were created for American Youth back in THAT day to engender a sense of comfort and trust in them when they were learning about ideas that otherwise might cause frustration, mistrust, confusion or even fear. 

Sure it’s a good thing to know about the preamble to the US Constitution – but is it a good thing to trick you into learning about it (probably still is – ok I guet it). But my point remains, even good indoctrination is still indoctrination, right? And it is a very slippery slope. You see this ideas that you could manipulate kids by presenting them with a warm and trusting narrator paved the way for using colorful animated characters and puppets and songs to sell all kinds of things from pizza to toys to fabric softener to cereal.

Ironically the charlatanic use of animated characters to create a false sense of trust was ultimately one of the many things that alienated and sidelined Generation X to this day. Now Gen X is just a powerless and mostly irrelevant generation that held power as neither youth (like Millenials thanks to social media) nor adults (like boomers who controlled the media and the power elite). But that is another story. Lets just say that while Miss Minutes is clearly meant to be one of the nicer parts of the TVA, she actually may be one of the most insidiously evil. She is indoctrinating and pulling the springs – just like “School House Rock”. And if we keep going with this line of reasoning, pretty soon you have teddy bears selling fabric softener

It’s worth noting that Miss Minutes is also (and obviously) reminiscent of the Mr. DNA character from “Jurassic Park” (and yuck – “Jurassic World”) which in turn was ANOTHER animated character created to explain a dangerous and unnatural procedure to people in a digestible fashion that would ultimately trick them into believing that they would be safe at a THEME PARK WITH DINOSAURS.

Anyway, to recap if Miss Minutes is sentient, she’s evil. If she is just a creation, and she isn’t sentient, then the sentient people behind her are surely more powerful than we can even know – and they are likely up to no good. Forget Thanos as a threat. Forget Captain Marvel. Forget Doctor Strange. Forget US Agent. They are kitty cats in comparison to the kind of power and knowledge that the people behind Miss Minutes hold. And what they are trying to do for or with our timeline (while maintaining that it is all planning and protection) could possibly be something very unnatural and very dangerous. Much like creating dinosaurs or teaching kids what a bill does, it is surely something that is being presented as positive and coated with the sweet sugar that is Miss Minutes because there is bad, bad medicine underneath.

So think about that next time you smile at the cuteness of Miss Minutes, realize that whatever knowledge and power she wields will be far more destructive than anything Thanos could have thrown at us – heck to them, Infinity Stones are no more powerful than what I put in my junk drawer at home.