Tag: Arcane

Finished 2nd season of Arcane.
I think the whole idea of Victor deciding to convert all humanity into robot-zombies and the red wearing Blacks getting behind it is extremely unconvincing. But the visuals are still there, at least.

The results of the second season:
Angry Old Black Woman is dead, although I’m not even sure what killed her.

Jinx blows herself away, but what would Arcane be without her?

Jayce and Victor or whatever he’s transformed into are gone.

Caitlin lost an eye to the Angry Old Black Woman.

Oh, and Angry Black Woman with Mechanical Hand got a seat at the council, for some reason.

Caitlin asks Vi if she’s still in the fight. But I have absolutely no idea who are they fighting or what that fight is even about anymore.

Still, it was sure a spectacle.

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The problem for me is that they start of exactly where the first season ended. But I watched it a couple of years ago, so I don’t actually remember who’s the son some character wants revenge for. But they also aren’t afraid to finish off some characters after an episode or two.
The first two episodes are an excercise in good animation. But the into for the 3rd episode is simply amazing.
I praised the depiction of lesbian love story in the first season. But in second season, Nolan doesn’t really work, because unlike Vi, there are no shared struggles. There’s a time jump, and here she is, in Kaitlin bed.
The Hammer Guy first rescues Victor, then become evil and kills him a few episodes later. First the werewolf guy is evil, then he’s good, then he’s evil again just to be blown away. The bodyguard is first scary, then he’s killed by the werewolf guy. I usually don’t complain when characters are killed off, because that adds impact, but here, I wasn’t sure what that was all for. I’m not even sure how many sides are there 😅

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I decided to talk about how great Arcane is some more, with the example of Caitlyn and Vi.

We aren’t told that Vi is a lesbian. And it’s even suggested early that Caitlyn is attracted to at least one man.
Often it’s shown that when two lesbians meet, they just Fall in Love. Why? Because there are no other lesbians around, stupid!

That’s not how hetero stories usually work, though, right? There’s often a conflict, a tension, they even hate each other at the beginning, because they are different (one being man, and the other, being, forgive me, a woman).

So here’s a crazy idea. What if the same would be applied to a homosexual relationship?! I know, crazy, because those are two women, and all women are identical and have zero conflicts. But humor me.

And that exactly what makes Caitlyn and Vi relationship work. They have that conflict of being from different classes, and with Caitlyn being a policewoman, and Vi’s family killed by police during an uprising. But they struggle together, the complement each other. We see that evolution, and not just “well, that’s the first homosexual woman I’ve ever met, so it will have to do”.

Finished first season of Arcane.
This is not what I expected. But I think it was brilliant nevertheless.
The world feels bigger than the single city we’re shown.

 

 

There are things that are happening outside of it. Which is a great way to build a story.

 

 

Here’s just one example:

A mother, kind of a warrior-queen, exiled her daughter, Mel, for being too soft, to another city-state, Piltover.

 

 

But now her son is dead, and she needs the weapons that Piltover produces. We’re never told who she’s fighting. Because this is something outside of the story.

 

Being all “Spartan warrior”, she still enjoys the benefits of civilization:

 

And this is mostly shown, not told. Often in a single scene.

All the characters have their conflicts. Vi with being from a lower class, and her parents killed by enforcers. Jinx being torn between her sister the vigilante and her stepfather the mob boss, Silco.

Here Silco is being offered what he dreamed off, an independent state, in exchange for his step-daughter:

 

 

I mean, just look at those sequences. The offer, the contemplation, and the statue of the hero and his friend he killed in the background.

It’s so often that characters are given easy escapes. Not here. Even when Jinx eventually kills her stepfather to save her sister:

 

It only sets the scene for a larger catastrophy, the ultimate terrorist act, the attack on the Parliament, which is the cliffhanger for the first season.And I like the ineventability of this. The fact that you take a decission doesn’t mean you don’t end up hating yourself for it. Even if it was the right decission. The hate is still there.

It would again be easy for authors to make Silco point the gun at Jinx. Here, he was always using her! But he doesn’t. Adding the layer of ambiguity:

It wasn’t just an act, he does mourn her, he does try to do everything possible to save her.

And I could go on, on how Mel’s painting represents her longing for home.

 

Again, just a single shot, her standing, him almost laying down, the divide between.

And then we see in the last moments that she ruins it: telling the viewer that she rejects her mother offer. Again, “show, don’t tell” in the most brilliant form.

To me, it’s frustrating that they managed to pull this level of a story out of a universe whose entire purpose is to sell sexy costumers to teenagers. And then we have abominations such as Resident Evil movies, that do have excellent base material, but not the will 🤷‍♂️

 

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What can I say? It’s absolutely phenomenal. Everything. The storytelling. The visuals. The animation. The fact that they managed to make compelling characters out of a spinoff of a spinoff.

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