[ENDGAME] Every act of time travel creates a new branch

Endgame time travel and Loki time travel are completely different from each other and operate by different rules.

That's what Tony invented. A way to navigate the timelines and return to a specific branch

Yes but the TVA only pruned branches that lead to a significant deviation, i.e. they created a Kang.

Otherwise Sylvie's branch would've been pruned long before it was

Traveling to the past creates a branch. Returning to the present does not. The TVA only pruned the branches that threatened He Who Remains. When Sylvie killed him, the Multiverse was unleashed. This directly leads into the chaos of Incursions that we will see play out in Doomsday.

none of it makes any sense and never has. you're expected to just "go with the flow" rather than try to understand it. if you find this disappointing, you're not alone.

Time travel does not create branches. Free Will does. Decisions made that would result in a creation of a Kang variant is what creates a branch.

This was explained in the first 10 minutes of Loki and reiterated in the season finale.

You go through the quantum realm to return to your original timeline.

OP u/Chuchuschee , I wanted to commend you for writing such a clear explanation of the contradictions in the MCU's time travel rules. I have had exactly the same question, and when I bring it up in these forums like these, I tend to get a lot of confident answers - many of which distinctly disagree with each other! So, if anyone tells you it's simple and obvious, rest assured that is not true, due to the number of different interpretations I have seen.

It's a bad assumption to make, given that the writers have specifically refuted it.

Ignore everything that He Who Remains says cause at the end of the day He's still Kang and all Kang are Liars.

There is no such thing as a "Sacred Timeline." as all Timelines are Sacred. If everyone is Sacred then no one is.

The first rule you list from Loki is wrong, the Sacred Timeline is not one branch, it's a collection of branches (specifically a collection of branches that does not birth a Kang variant). Multiple universes and timelines were allowed to co-exist, it's only when it strays too far does it get pruned.

As for your question, does jumping back create a new timeline? Possibly, but the differences between the two timelines after the stones are returned would be so miniscule that it becomes insignificant in the grand scheme.

Basically, if you’re right, then The Ancient One was incorrect. Steve would‘ve never been able to put the time stone back into her timeline, because he’d be unable to re-enter the same timeline twice. He’d (possibly unknowingly) be giving it to a variant, but not the same one who met with 616 Banner on the rooftop.

Agents of SHIELD tried to incorporate Endgame time travel in a consistent way in its last season. Who knows how much they communicated with the studio about it. But regardless, I find their explanations fill in some holes. A couple points made there:

* There isn't really any such thing as a "near-identical branch." Minor variations don't create new branches. It is explained on Agents of SHIELD as ripples vs waves; as long as you don't make major changes you can splash around a little. In Loki this is reinforced by the example of Sylvie hiding in apocalypses to avoid detection, and by Old Loki living a full life before being taken by the TVA since he was chilling alone in space.
* For branches created by time travel, the Quantum Realm can be used to travel between them. So after creating branches you can indeed return to your original timeline. (The act of returning wouldn't create a branch because it's just travel to the future.) I don't recall this feature being explicitly shown in any Marvel Studios project but it's really the only way to explain the events of Endgame, especially to explain how the Avengers were able to get back to their original timeline after the time heist and how Nebula/Thanos were able to follow them from a totally divergent branch.

I would also argue that the "naturally occurring" branches the TVA is always pruning operate by different rules than the branches created by time travel and they shouldn't be conflated.

I thought the Ancient One specifically tied new timelines to the removal of a Stone from that timeline.

Travelling to the *past* creates a new branch. Returning to the present doesn't, and returning to a branch after you left doesn't.

I think your explanation is pretty solid. From what we’ve seen in the MCU**,** time travel always creates a new branch when someone goes to the past. That’s why in *Endgame*, even though the Avengers return the Infinity Stones, it doesn’t “fix” the timeline they left it just prevents dangerous branches from existing without control. You can’t actually go back and change your own original branch, because every trip to the past generates a new divergence.

The Loki series adds the TVA and the concept of the Sacred Timeline, but that doesn’t change the basic rule of branching. When characters “return” to the Sacred Timeline, what’s really happening is that they arrive at a branch that the TVA has allowed to exist. The original branch you left still exists unless it’s pruned, and technically, you never go back to the exact branch you left. So “returning” is more about ending up in a branch that survives rather than restoring a previous one.

This also explains why Infinity Stone returns work the way they do. Returning a stone doesn’t undo the stoneless branch it just creates a new branch where the stone exists and allows that one to survive. So overall, MCU time travel seems to be branch creation only**,**never true restoration and the TVA just prunes branches they don’t want. Everything fits together once you think of it that way.

It doesnt create a new branch if thats the way it always happened.

The ancient one *always* gave up the time stone and from her point of view, the moment bruce disappeared with it, cap was there to hand it back.

Its back to the future 2 logic, this stuff was always happening in the background therefore there was no deviation. There were always 2 hulks in new york, antman was always there just out of sight.

Now, the loki that escaped *was* a deviation, because thats not how it happened the first time around, hence the new branch and the pruning.

I don’t know man, I think you put may more thought into it than they did

> Even if you’re allowed to travel back to the Sacred Timeline, the act of traveling itself should still create a new branch, right?

No I still think it depends on whether your actions actually change anything. We see it in Loki when he travels to a volcano eruption. He can scare the villagers and kick a goat, it doesn't matter because everything is gonna get covered in lava anyways.

> So logically you can jump to a timeline that looks like the Sacred Timeline but you can never return to the exact same branch you left.

Tony's time machine works like an anchor to which the "time gps" clocks connect to.

>So logically you can jump to a timeline that looks like the Sacred Timeline but you can never return to the exact same branch you left. Every “return” is just creating another near-identical branch, while the TVA prunes the rest.  


This is contradicted by the events of Endgame. 


With Tony's time-space GPS, they are able to chart courses through the quantum realm that have the geometry (represented by a möbius strip, a shape with one side) to return them to their subjective past, i.e. their original future not a divergent one.  


To my understanding the time travel in Endgame looks like this: 


1. Time travel creates new branches. If they travel to the past to take the infinity stones, that does not stop Thanos from taking them in the original timeline because they are only "missing" in a new divergent timeline. Hulk explains their "present day" becomes their subjective "past" and is immutable. 


2. But, they realise, they can travel back in time to get the infinity stones (creating all those divergent timelines) and bring them to the future ("present") to use them. 


3. However, if they try travelling forward from the past, they'll end up in the future *of the divergent timeline*, not the future of the original timeline they were trying to bring the stones to. 


4. That's why they need Tony to invent his "time-space gps", which will allow them to return to their original time line. 


This is represented visually as a möbius strip, a shape with only one side. I think this is meant to work as: 


* You travel into the past on a möbius stip shaped course. 
* Rather than stop and change course to the divergent future, you keep travelling on that course. 
* By going "backwards" you end up in your subjective past, the original future, like following your finger around a möbius strip and ending up where you started. 
* this lines up with what Hulk says about how in time travel the future becomes your past.


5. With the time-space gps they get the infinity stones from the past and take them to the future. Hard part over, they easily defeat Thanos and bringing almost everyone back from the dead with no serious ramifications. 


6. The Ancient One made Hulk promise to return the infinity stones, so Captain America sets off on a journey into the past and replaces the infinity stones just as the past versions of the team take them. This prevents the creation of six dark divergent timelines... Instead, a few years later Thanos destroys the stones in the remaining, original timeline, which still happens of course, and means the timeline everyone is stuck in goes dark anyway, but the Ancient One thinks that's fine apparently.


7. On his way back, Steve Rogers reroutes to visit Peggy, creates a divergent timeline by living with her until a ripe old age [has a kid, fights Dr Doom presumably], then continues onwards to return to the "present day" of the film, back to the start of the möbius, as Old Man Rogers.

Your premise is slightly flawed. It’s not that any time travel creates a new branch. It’s traveling to someplace you don’t belong creates a new timeline.

So the Avengers from 2023 created 4 new branches when they went to get the stones.
- New York City 2012 where they acquire the time and mind stones and fail to acquire the space stone.
- Camp Lehigh 1970 where they acquire the space stone.
- Asgard 2013 where the acquire the reality stone.
- Morag/Vormir 2014 where they acquire the power and soul stones.
While all of the characters who travelled were alive during those times, the 2023 version of them did not belong there so a new branch was created in each instance. When they all returned to 2023, they did belong there and so returned to the original branch.

When Steve travelled back to return the stones, he returned to the branches that had already been created when they went to get the stones.

The Sacred Timeline isn’t one single timeline but multiple branches of time woven together by the loom.

>Even if you’re allowed to travel back to the Sacred Timeline, the act of traveling itself should still create a new branch, right?
>So logically you can jump to a timeline that looks like the Sacred Timeline but you can never return to the exact same branch you left. Every “return” is just creating another near-identical branch, while the TVA prunes the rest.


Wrong. Ripples don't cause splits. Waves do. While Ripples can lead to Waves, the act of traveling itself is just a ripple.  


> or you CAN return back to Sacred timeline after created any branch


With rigth tech, Yes? They literally return to the sacred timeline after completing the heist.


>Returning the Infinity Stones doesn’t actually “fix” the stoneless branch


>It just creates a new branch where the stone exists


No. 




>The original stoneless branch would still be doomed unless pruned by the TVA


There isn't one to begin with. 


>Ruling out Back To The Future theory seems like a contradiction, without affecting the future paradox thing.


Huh? What? Contradiction to what? Branches don't affect the original future. 

Endgame's time travel is a mess and has been since the movie, it was made for the nostalgia trip, that's it

Traveling to the past only creates a new branch only if that travel didn’t already happen. The Sacred Timeline could have already had people from the future time travel in it, in which case they would need to travel back in time to ensure a new branch isn’t created.

There are many branches but only the ones that lead to Kang are the sacred timeline.

You can travel to a time and place and not create a branch if you going there in no way changes anything, like if you go to a natural disaster where everything is destroyed, like Pompei.

You’re right about returning the stones, so long as you return it to the exact time and place they were taken and leave no evidence you were there. I can’t imagine Cap succeeding at this task considering he never comes back until very old. He clearly created branches.

An important aspect is that the Loki TV Show technically takes place outside of time and space.

The timeline without Thanos' army might have been pruned by HWR TVA or allowed to exist by Loki TVA. This is also why Steve is allowed to have his Peggy ending and isn't pruned: new TVA management.

My understanding of the temporal GPS Tony built is that it does allow you to return to specific timelines. Initially, it was the only way for the Avengers to return to their own present-timeline, and later allowed Steve to return the Infinity Stones to their own past-branch timelines.

*Returning* to a timeline wouldn’t create a branch ***IFF*** you return *after* you (and anyone else from the future) left. If you return *before* you (and anyone else) left, you are actually entering *your own* past, which creates branches.

you're trying to make sense of fictional writing. which you're basing the facts on the writers of many stories. hate to say it but the writers were not perfect in creating the story. you're thinking waaaay too much into it.

[watch this video](https://youtu.be/X7rPMwSgfv4?si=aRz3qfesY_-MM6_L) it’ll help make some sense of things

Edit: downvoted because???

I thought the simplest explanation was that Tony created a "GPS" for time travel and using it you can travel to any place you need to be. Also I thought branches were only created when something changes and not just from time travel

Don’t think about it so hard. Just enjoy the ride.

You’re confused because your first principle is incorrect: the act of traveling in time doesn’t create a branch.

Simply traveling to the past does not create a branch. Full stop. That would make returning the stones and giving Sam the shield impossible.


You travel to your own past and if you do something contrary to what is supposed to happen or you take an infinity stone, a branch forms. 


Time loops can happen if the person was always meant to be in one.


There.

I want to address this line:

>*There are many branches, but only one is designated the **Sacred Timeline**

This is a **MASSIVE**, and I mean probably the biggest misconception in the entire MCU, that just isn’t true at all. This is such a big misconception that even Marvel and seemingly Feige himself don’t understand what “The Sacred Timeline” actually means.

(And yes I’m confident enough to say both Marvel and Feige are wrong on this)

Here’s what The Sacred Timeline actually is:

**Any timeline that doesn’t create a Kang.**

That’s it. So any timeline without a Kang is still one of many sacred timelines.

So for example, Tobey, Andrew and Tom exist on separate timelines right? Well they can all exist on separate unique universes, that are also sacred timelines because they don’t create a Kang.

There’s not just one single “The Sacred Timeline”. But rather Sacred Timeline is like the Milky Way, it’s a grouping of timelines that don’t create a Kang. There can be billions of completely separate Sacred Timelines.

Why do I think this:

1. Well the creator of the whole idea said so.

Apologies this sub banned the link but absolutely feel free to Fact Check me. The ScreenCrush article titled “Creator Michael Waldron Answers All Our Questions About ‘Loki’ And ‘Heels’” said:

> There’s always like different permutations and instances happening. The TVA has their own barometer, their own gauge of what constitutes a deviation from the baseline, the way it’s supposed to go. The way it went that produced He Who Remains.

(See any branches are anything that creates a Kang variant, if they don’t, the TVA doesn’t care)

>That is their baseline. And so they are constantly calculating, “Okay, we see how time has always...” If you zoomed in on the timeline, **it wouldn’t necessarily look like a straight line**. It might look like almost the **intertwined strands of a rope** fluctuating and spiking here and there.

Explicitly there isn’t a single sacred timeline, its many wound together. He says very clearly there isn’t one straight line, but many strands of timeline.

>When it becomes a problem for the TVA is when, according to their own rules, when could something branch off in a way that it could actually produce a new timeline that could produce a new version of He Who Remains? That is the practical thing that they’re guarding against.

Again the TVA only cares if it creates a Kang variant.

2. And it’s not just an out of universe interview thing. My apologies if this comes off as rude, but I genuinely don’t understand how people didn’t understand this from the Loki series as well. This is like the biggest plot point of Loki Season 2, that’s smack dab right in your face.

[this](https://marvelcinematicuniverse.fandom.com/wiki/Temporal_Loom?file=Temporal_Loom.png) is what the Loom looked like in Loki S2.

The loom always had a ton of timelines making up the Sacred Timeline that was shown to us on screen since the beginning of the idea of The Sacred Timeline. (Note this is shown to look the exact same on both sides having many intertwined timelines before and after the loom stops working)

Even look at [this](https://marvelcinematicuniverse.fandom.com/wiki/Sacred_Timeline?file=Loki_Stills_132.jpg) it’s not one line (even though it’s much more uniform) it’s many lines.

So yes no matter what Feige or Marvel says or shows it can’t magically undo what’s very clearly shown on screen in the Loki series.

Now for the rest of your comment unfortunately the answer is “who the hell knows because this isn’t defined at all” basically.

The MCU has this arbitrary term called a Nexus Point/Nexus Event that basically means this is where the MCU diverges from a timeline and creates a branched reality. What constitutes a Nexus Point/Event? We don’t really know.

The best guess we had was based on Kang. Essentially it was anything that doesn’t go along with how things are supposed to go according to the TVA (which was really run by He Who Remains). That creates a branch. Now since he’s gone what is a Nexus Point/Event? No idea. We don’t actually know what creates a branch and what doesn’t. According to the TVA, the Avengers actions in Endgame didn’t because they were “supposed to happen”. But besides that or how true that is objectively speaking, no clue. We just don’t know if they made branches or not.

I don’t want to come off as rude or offensive but rather I really just want to educate and teach people correcting them to be accurate. But man it’s so frustrating seeing even Marvel over and over again get this term wrong and every fan out there acting like there’s only 1 singular MCU.

> Baseline assumption (from Endgame), any time travel to the past creates a new branch, You cannot change or re-enter your original past and Branches do not merge.

This seems right. Any timeline you go to is a new separate reality. Anything you do there doesn’t directly affect yours and you can’t go to your own past and make changes there to affect your future.

> Even if you’re allowed to travel back to the Sacred Timeline, the act of traveling itself should still create a new branch, right?

As far as going back to your own timeline/the Sacred Timeline, I don’t think that creates a new timeline. You’re going back to one that actually exists, the one you’re actually from. So that should be fine. And the time travel GPSes mean that any travelers can specifically target a timeline, meaning they can get back with no issue rather than just going to another similar timeline.

> • Returning the Infinity Stones doesn’t actually “fix” the stoneless branch
• It just creates a new branch where the stone exists
• The original stoneless branch would still be doomed unless pruned by the TVA

This part is unclear to me too. What Endgame and Loki seemed to imply is that the Avengers creating a new timeline was allowed by the TVA/Kang and thus allowed to exist. So it was never pruned. And could potentially be considered part of the actual Sacred Timeline.

The whole point of these rules around timelines and the Sacred Timeline seems to be making sure that no other Kangs come into existence to threaten the multiverse. So as long as that timeline won’t do that, it could be allowed to exist before Loki became the god of Stories and allowed all timelines to exist with the TVA now repurposed to stop Kangs without having to prune entire timelines.

I think any changes to the logic for Doomsday will be introduced in it. We already see from the trailers that we will be visiting Rogers in the past timeline. So my guess is we’ll be told that even though branch timelines and returning to their own didn’t initially cause problems, now it is. Maybe because Steve wasn’t just a ghost there, he made changes like having a kid. Maybe making too drastic of changes in a branch timelines increases the likelyhood of incursions. And something like the world’s first super soldier and the hero of the 616 (possibly anchor being/Nexus being if that is actually a thing still) having a child and likely making other major changes was too much for balance. The TVA being focused on Kang variants explicitly without cleaning up the mess by pruning the timelines could also be a contributing factor.

Cant remember specifically but I think they may have made reference to the idea of changing the timeline and affecting it. As in you cant change it (without causing a branch) but you can affect it.

Not the strongest argument but it already exists in philosophy.

okay, my interpretation

the watch brings you back to the coordinate you left. ie, the same timeline.

so Avengers happens in 2012 and Thor takes Loki to Asgard and everything proceeds until 2023 when they go back in time to get the stone - then return to where they left and then Cap takes the stone and heads out, returning much older.

so when they go back to NY in 2012, let's call this timeline B because it's branching. the 2023 team couldn't have been here in 2012, bc Loki went back to Asgard with Thor - but now we're seeing Loki escapes. (a lot of the other stuff COULD have still happened in 2012 Avengers - just between the shots we saw. like maybe we didn't see it but Cap did meet a version of himself he thought was Loki... it just wasn't included in the 2012 cut we saw.

so in Timeline B Bruce talks to the Ancient One. and she shows him the timeline - if you take the stone away, it creates a branch (C) where without the stone, they're unable to defend against Dormammu and earth falls into ruin.

Bruce says, "so we'll return the stone to the moment we left. and you'll never have been without it." when he puts the stone back in the diagram of the B timeline the C thread Disappears - bc it was never created.

Ancient One trusts Strange and Bruce and let's him leave with the stone -- a second later Steve arrives to drop off the stone.

the reason this is not timeline C or D - the reason it's STILL timeline B is bc the watch's coordinates are still locked on that point.

if you're going to say "but that creates a branch" you have to consider then that life is nothing more than us CONSTANTLY branching - and there is no sacred timeline. but then the entirety of this story falls apart.

so there is. there's timeline A and timeline B and no further branches.

now, technically... timeline B gets pruned. that's on the writers of Loki. take it up with them.
it's very possible the ancient one recognized this was about to happen, and that's why when Bruce tells her of Strange's "1 solution" she laments her own doom -- "strange was meant to be the best of us." so she trusts him implicitly - knowing that "our world may have to be sacrificed to save countless others." (unsaid. i'm projecting)

but endgame is essentially saying, timeline A is the one where there were only the main 6 avengers at the battle of new york, and nothing in the past was changed. they then kill thanos post snap, and 5 yearsa later they encounter briefly leave and then "why does cap return old?"

well he stayed in the 1920s, so again, "timeline B" until Cap stays - and THAT is timeline C

unpruned - because there's no risk of Kang coming.

Don’t think too much and enjoy Cap’s return as it’s happening in the endgame timeline unless they specifically mention otherwise.

I think some branches are able to loop back onto themselves and continue on (As long as they don’t create a variant Kang).

For example, Kamala Khan in Ms. Marvel had to go back in time to save her own grandmother. Kind of ensuring she is born to then go back in time to save her grandmother in a seemingly endless cycle.

I think the Time Heist in Endgame may be an example of this (except for the branch that makes Story Teller Loki in the Loki Series). I think that’s what the TVA means when tell Loki that the Avengers going back in time was supposed to happen. This would also mean Steve possibly didn’t create a branched timeline when he stayed behind. Possibly.

There could be more to this theory or there’s straight up holes but that’s what I’ve been piecing together lately.