Loki Season 1's Alligator Loki Was Almost 'Too Cute' - Here's Why They Changed It

There are lots of "Loki" Season 1 scenes that could act as the exact moment a viewer realizes that this is not your average Marvel Cinematic Universe show. Some could point to the series premiere, which reveals that this incarnation of the titular protagonist (Tom Hiddleston) is the variant we see escaping custody in "Avengers: Endgame." For others, the big "Loki" moment could be the scene in which Loki variant Sylvie (Sophia Di Martino) arrives on the scene, or perhaps the one where the main Loki realizes what monumental forces he's dealing with when he finds several defunct Infinity Stones in a random Time Variance Authority drawer. However, even the viewers who manage to make it through these scenes (and many others like them) unaffected will quite possibly do a double take by the time they get to the end of Episode 4 and the show's one true scaly king, Alligator Loki, arrives. 

As you might expect, a lot of work went into the character. At one point, the people behind the show considered making him far cuter than he ended up being ... that is until they realized how hilarious the sheer absurdity of a small, realistic alligator in a Loki helmet was. "We had some early versions when we were doing visual effects that probably were a bit too cute, in the sense of it was a bit more like a cartoony kind of alligator," "Loki" director Kate Herron told Marvel.com. "But it just became funnier and funnier the more it looked like a real alligator that just happened to be wearing the horns. That was the sweet spot. Once we landed in that spot where it felt like a real alligator, but with a kind of slightly jaunty horns on, that's where we were like, 'Oh, there he is.'"

Alligator Loki isn't the only thing to gawk at in the Void. He's part of a crack team that includes Classic Loki (Richard E. Grant), Boastful Loki (DeObia Oparei), and Kid Loki (Jack Veal), all forces to be reckoned with in their own right. What's more, the Void is essentially a garbage chute for the remains of dead timelines, and all that survives is constantly hunted by an all-consuming entity called Alioth. Only crafty Loki variants can survive there, which leads to the logical end result: a brawl-for-all between the various versions of the trickster god. 

This mystical "Mad Max" scenario that consists entirely of Loki variants is a jaw-dropper in its own right, but Alligator Loki still manages to steal the scenes it's in like only a toothsome reptile wearing a horned Loki helmet can. Behind the scenes, however, the character's look was somewhat different. Because the actors needed something to interact with, the makers of the show used a stuffed alligator toy as a placeholder Alligator Loki. Perhaps inevitably, it even acquired a pair of googly eyes during filming.  

"It was like a Muppet character on set," Herron recalled. "You put [the stuffed alligator] in there, and the actors can interact with it and get a sense of how heavy or how large the alligator would be. [It was filmed] in the world of imagination with our cast because sometimes they were acting to a blade of grass."