Marvel's measured progression into weirdness has us ready for 'Loki'

*** WARNING: SPOILERS FOR THE ENTIRE MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE ***

You like Loki. I like Loki. Everyone likes Loki.

One of the many tricks Marvel’s Cinematic Universe has pulled over its first several phases is making the smarmy villain into an endearing scamp whose death in “Avengers: Infinity War” was the first of a great many sad moments in that film.

But thanks to the recent introduction of the Marvel multiverse — by way of “WandaVision” and the forthcoming Dr. Strange sequel — he’s coming back. Kind of.

Some version of Loki is returning in his namesake series, which premieres June 9 on the Disney+ streaming platform. But it’s not the Loki from “Infinity War.” That Loki was killed before Thanos snapped half the universe out of existence, so he didn’t return when the Hulk reversed things in “Avengers: Endgame.”

And that’s kind of the rub about the multiverse: Now that there are officially multiple universes, is anyone really ever dead?

However, the fact that we can ask that question illustrates just how interesting it’s been to watch Kevin Feige and the MCU’s guiding forces gradually lead casual fans along as things got progressively weirder and weirder. They are now edging into territory that will allow for some of the big, cosmic, expansive storylines that longtime comic fans have wanted to see onscreen.

It’s kind of wild when you stop to think about it.

The MCU started with a humble beginning, taking a second-tier Avenger in Iron Man and using Robert Downey Jr. to make him as cool as he could possibly be. It was a superhero movie, but aside from the notion that you could just strap on a giant metal propulsion suit and fly around without immediately smashing into something and dying, it was pretty firmly grounded in reality.

It progressed to the Shakespearean overtones of the first two “Thor” movies — a shaky course that I thought was corrected in the best way possible with Taika Waititi’s hilarious “Thor: Ragnarok” — and then things started to get weird (two main characters are a raccoon and a his bodyguard, a tree) and weirder (the world-bending, acid-trip madness of “Dr. Strange”).

All of that prepared even the most casual MCU viewer for the universe-hopping “Infinity War/Endgame” finale of its first three phases.

The “WandaVision” series kicked off the fourth phase with perhaps the weirdest entry yet, a loopy romp through sitcom history before that slowly got creepy and ultimately became a moving meditation on the power of grief. It also culminated in Wanda Maximoff officially becoming the Scarlet Witch, one of Marvel’s most cosmically-powerful beings.

She’s “OP,” as my 8-year-old son would say. She’s also a being who can affect the multiverse, which brings us back to “Loki.”

The various trailers have shown Loki as a guest/employee/prisoner of the Time Variance Authority, who correct problems with the flow of time in the multiverse. When Loki grabbed an Infinity Stone to escape capture in “Endgame,” he screwed with time, and now Mobius M. Mobius (Owen Wilson in what looks to be a very funny role as a jaded bureaucrat who just happens to fix the time-space continuum) wants him to fix it.

And this is what I’m talking about. If someone had pitched this as a storyline a decade ago, they would have gotten laughed out of the meeting.

But now, the second “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier” ended, MCU fans began clamoring for “Loki” to get under way.

“Loki” premieres June 9 on the Disney+ streaming service, with new episodes each Wednesday.