Well, Loki Here — It's the Trailer of the Week

The fall usually offers a robust broadcast lineup, but the AMPTP’s recalcitrance about the ongoing joint strike — which has at least seen some “promising” movement on the Writers Guild front — means this year’s schedule will be a little light. So, we looked once again to cable and streaming options for the best previews of the week, and found everything from an extravagant new YA adaptation to Ke Huy Quan’s latest multiverse adventure.

Best trailer for the week for September 18: Loki Season 2, premieres October 5 on Disney+

While not technically a trailer, this featurette for Loki Season 2 still has some of the most exciting preview footage we’ve watched all week. Loki (Tom Hiddleston) and Mobius (Owen Wilson), everyone’s favorite Time Variance Authority odd couple, will reunite in a new season that sets the erstwhile god of mischief on a journey of self-discovery. Executive producer Kevin R. Wright teases, “Loki has always been a villain. What we want to explore is also Loki finding what heroism really looks like.” It looks like Sylvie (Sophia Di Martino) will be right there to help her counterpart along the way, while Ke Huy Quan finds his way into this corner of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Honorable Mention: Squid Game: The Challenge, premieres November 22 on Netflix

This Squid Game offshoot has gathered 456 people from around the world to compete for the largest cash prize in reality TV history: $4.56 million. The trailer doesn’t reveal any of the grueling challenges, but it does have a rather ominous voiceover: “People do a whole lot worse for a whole lot less.” It remains to be seen if The Challenge will just play into the very capitalistic excesses that the Korean drama skewered in its first season.

Honorable Mention: Percy Jackson and the Olympians, premieres December 20 on Disney+

Forget Harry Potter: You can get a sweeping YA fantasy adaptation without the transphobic creator in Percy Jackson and the Olympians, the latest take on Rick Riordan’s book series. Walker Scobell follows in Logan Lerman’s footsteps as Percy, one of the sons of Poseidon and a demigod in his own right. The Disney+ adaptation looks like it will hew closely to the Lightning Thief, the source material for Season 1 and the 2010 film, with a 12-year-old Percy instead of the teenager Lerman played. Leah Sava Jeffries also stars as Annabeth Chase, the daughter of Athena. The rest of the supporting cast is bonkers: Glynn Turman as Chiron, Timothy Omundson as Hephaestus, Jason Mantzoukas as Dionysus (the role he was born to play!), Megan Mullally as Ms. Dodds, and because this is a Disney production, Lin-Manuel Miranda as Hermes.

Honorable Mention: Love in Fairhope, premieres September 27 on Hulu

The bartender’s strange “delivery” of “single and… ready to… MIN-gle?” in the opening seconds of this trailer is a good indicator of the bizarre mix of artifice and earnestness to be found in Love in Fairhope. Produced by MGM and Reese Witherspoon’s Hello Sunshine, this “uniquely unscripted series” gives its cast the “chance to bring your fantasy love story to life on TV.” Judging by the preview, at least one contestant wants to recreate My Best Friend’s Wedding.