The end of What If…?'s second season briefly acknowledges the current state of Marvel’s multiverse

Marvel Studios has picked up a somewhat annoying habit lately of ignoring things established in its larger universe, rendering the larger universe irrelevant and spoiling what was once the big selling point of these movies and TV shows. But, despite its supposed dependence on standalone stories, season two of Disney+’s What If…? ends with an encouraging sign that things are going to change a little bit.

But, then again, it seemed like season one did as well. That season spun out from the events of Loki’s first season, which ended with the death of a being called He Who Remains who had been secretly using a group called the Time Variance Authority to destroy all potential alternate timelines that deviated from the core events of the MCU (because, in those alternate timelines, other versions of himself might come to power and threaten his rule). When he died, that all started to fall apart and the alternate timelines began to run free—creating the MCU’s version of the multiverse and making it possible, say, for three Spider-Mans to meet in No Way Home.

What If…?, under the watchful eye of The Watcher (Jeffrey Wright, serving as narrator), showcased stories from that multiverse, with different things happening to different characters and creating new twists on the established canon of the MCU (like T’Challa getting kidnapped by the Ravagers and becoming Star-Lord instead of Peter Quill). The two most noteworthy things to come out of the show’s first season were a twisted, evil-ish version of Doctor Strange known as Strange Supreme who destroyed his entire reality in an attempt to resurrect his dead girlfriend, and the instantly iconic Captain Carter (a version of Hayley Atwell’s Peggy Carter who got the super-soldier serum instead of Steve Rogers).

One of the reasons Strange Supreme and Captain Carter seemed Important coming out of the first season of What If…? is that it really seemed like both of them would show up in Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness, which saw the eponymous, definitely American wizard traveling through different realities in pursuit of a grief-stricken Scarlet Witch. The trailers teased Captain Carter, making her live-action debut, but also a weird, messed-up version of Strange.

But, it turns out, neither of those characters was really in the movie. The version of Captain Carter is apparently not the same one from What If…?, and the weird version of Strange was just some other weird wizard and not Strange Supreme himself. That seemed like the MCU’s one big opportunity to acknowledge that What If…? was canon, despite the fact that it’s exclusively about other universes, but since it didn’t, What If…? was apparently relegated to some easily ignorable junk drawer like Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. and anything else that doesn’t really matter to the MCU.

Then Loki season two happened and the rules of the MCU’s multiverse were apparently rewritten, sidelining He Who Remains entirely and putting Loki himself—literally—at the center of everything. In the season finale’s tragically triumphant climax, Loki marched into the fringes of existence itself and collected all of the strands of alternate realities, clutching them together to keep them safe and restructuring the multiverse into something reminiscent of Yggdrasil, the World Tree from Norse mythology that represents the different realms of the universe.

It was a striking image, but in terms of anything tangible, all it really seemed to mean was that the potential was now there for Marvel to reshape its plans for the future of the multiverse. Perhaps by abandoning this plan altogether?

And much like with season one, the second season of What If…? was happy to follow Loki’s lead. In the final moments of the season finale, after Captain Carter has saved all of existence from being destroyed (again), the Watcher returns to take her back to her own universe—where she may or may not be in a more-than-friends relationship with that world’s Black Widow. Rather than heading straight home, though, the Watcher agrees to show Captain Carter the scenic route… at which point he presents her with Loki’s Yggdrasil multiverse, a departure from the “floating cosmic windows” that the show had previously used to depict the endless array of alternate realities.

Does it mean anything? Maybe not, but it is a clear indication that Loki changed something and that What If…? is aware of it, which—if absolutely nothing else—shows some commitment to this whole thing still being a proper interconnected universe. Loki’s World Tree may never be seen again, and the characters introduced in What If…? may never get a real live-action spotlight, but things are arguably better this way. No complicated homework to keep up with, just a nice bit of consistency for the people who care.