Tony Stark's invention of a time machine in Avengers: Endgame was the reason that the team are able to collect the Infinity Stones and change the outcome of Thanos' snap. However, one fan is suggesting that Tony didn't make a time machine - he made a multiverse machine.
The grounding of Reddit user Hickspy's theory is related to Loki, so if you're not up to speed with the trickster god's spinoff show, here be spoilers. Proceed below the What If...? trailer at your own risk.
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So, in Avengers: Endgame, Bruce Banner explained that whatever the heroes do in the past will not affect their present. What will happen instead is the creation of alternate realities. Doesn't that sound a lot like the Nexus events that the Time Variance Authority sets out to prune before damage is done to the sacred timeline? Moreover, the concept of a multiverse means that Tony and the team might have identified universes that are extremely alike to their own and travelled to them, removing the Infinity Stones from that plane of reality and bringing them back into their universe.
We also see that Infinity Stones are a dime a dozen in the offices of the TVA. The employees were using them as paperweights - that's how blasé the organisation is to these powerful relics.
And, Hickspy pointed out that the universe is literally enormous and endless. Is it likely that Tony Stark is the very first individual to have "invented" time travel, when there are Celestials and sorcerers who have a greater understanding of possible alternate realities and dedicate their lives to discovering more? In spite of its name, the TVA doesn't use time travel. Their role is to protect the sacred timeline by pruning the results of the split caused by a Nexus event.
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Here's something else to think about, too. A post from Reddit user Twigryph shows that there's a funky feature of Mobius M. Mobius' wardrobe in Loki. The collar of his suit jacket is inverted. The fabric overlaps from the outside rather than the collar overlaying the rest of the jacket. In Endgame, Tony Stark inverts the Mobius strip model that he uses to create his "time machine," and that's when the plan for travelling into different "timelines" and finding the Stones becomes viable.
Weird, isn't it? Well, this is all conjecture until Marvel finally shows its hand in Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness. Scarlet Witch and Loki are set to appear alongside the sorcerer, so it's anyone's bet what this magical trio will uncover in the darkest recesses of reality.
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