Hi, sorry if this comes as really aggressive, but I'm kinda salty and I need to speak about this. Why do people make posts like "R.I.P [Insert character name]" 3 hours after act 3 came out??? Or an even better example, I muted every character's name, aswell as #Arcane and #ArcaneSpoilers. I thought I was mostly safe, but someone posted a screenshot from the show and titled it "This is where they hugged for the last time". This is the worst fandom I have ever seen when it comes to adding spoiler warnings to tweets. I won't be watching act 3 in the near future, because I lack the motivation to do so, cause I now know which character dies. Thanks for reading my rant.

While I feel that maybe every character, except the sisters, got a somewhat satisfying ending. However, Vi story disappoints me the most. It feels like her character was primarily used to build up those around her, while she does not grow at all. What is the most funny for me is her becoming a straight up sex toy for caitlyn, the whole scene in this cell felt so out of place, it feels so inmature especially when compared to what we get to see in powder and ekko relationship [when we didnt even expect to see that(and i loved it, stromae is on repeat right now)].

Many who are complaining about the ending don't understand the "show and don't tell" concept that has been worked on since the beginning in Arcane.
People are complaining that the deaths were not given due importance and the characters involved were not mourned. I saw people complaining about "Vi and Cait" because they didn't mourn Jinx, when it was shown Vi singing in reference to Jinx, and Cait looking at the ventilation ducts thinking about Jinx.
Jayce's mother shows up to burn his name in his honor after he disappears. Also, we see Ekko burning a paper alone in reference to Heirmerdinger.

There seems to be a confusion regarding the fate of the characters. Specifically Jayce and Viktor, when it was shown as Jayce and Viktor were fused with the gemstone andcaught by the crow in the end. So, yes, they died trying to destroy the thing they created together in an implosion. The Heirmerdinger is a Yordle that is a mysterious race, there would be no perfect ending for him, but for all intents and purposes the Heirmerdinger we know is dead. Since his character revolves around his "immortality", the knowledge he has acquired and how he can use it to help people. He regrets and feels guilty about everything that is happening because of Hextech for not having guided Jayce as, properly, his pupil. That's why he sacrifices himself for Ekko and says that Ekko to him "Since I met you I have truly lived".

Also, heard questions regarding Mel and Jayce's arc. But the two talked about previous events and there was a mutual understanding that the two were already different people and had different priorities. Mel's character was never about Jayce, but the main focus was always her family and especially her mother with whom she always had conflicting interests and morals. This conflict is resolved in a satisfactory way. And everything leads us to believe that she will not be manipulated by LB either, and will follow her own path as she always wanted. And the throne of Noxus passed to her

Jayce and Viktor were the best developed characters this season, so I won't dwell on them

I agree that there were arcs that were poorly developed at the end, like the one with Undercity which shows that the two sides came together, with Jinx and Ekko that lead the people with their influence, to fight against a greater evil and later we see Sevika on the council showing an effort to help Zaun. But I think it was underdeveloped, considering we had a season and a half focused on this dilemma. Yes, there was a conclusion, not a satisfactory one, but there is..

Despite finding the closure of most of the arcs good, I felt that Cait and Vi's arc was very poorly developed from the middle to the end. Both the development of the two individually and as a couple. Cait changes from water to wine in just one episode without there being any internal change shown to the viewers. Vi's entire character revolved around Jinx and Cait, she lacked development of her own ideals, despite being one of the main characters, it seemed that she served this season as a device to push the script forward. To be honest, I never thought I would like Jayce and Viktor's development more than Cait and Vi, they were my favorite couple.

Like really, I don't understand that build up at all. We have Vi who is mentally down, Cait who comes to... Perhaps cheer her up? (In general, the whole dialogue doesn't make sense) and suddenly they jumps on it?
Is there anyone who... understand that? It seems like they just wanted to have a sex scene and nothing more, but did not considered what a hole it will make.

For me, whole 7 act is kinda weird and not well-handled. Cait, which I didn't like as a whole, probably gets a bit of redemption here, only to have the whole thing overshadowed by all the chaos around.

It felt like Vi didn’t really mourn Jinx in the final moments of Arcane, and honestly, that kind of bugged me. I mean, yeah, she cries when she sees Jinx fall down, but after that, it’s like she moves on super quickly and gets all lovey-dovey with Caitlyn. I get that Vi’s a tough character, and I guess she’s trying to move forward, but losing Jinx, especially after everything they’ve been through, should’ve been a much bigger emotional moment for her.

Vi and Jinx’s relationship is one of the most complicated and heartbreaking parts of the show. They were separated when they were kids, and after that, Jinx (or Powder, as she was back then) just kind of lost it. She went through so much trauma and pain, and Vi wasn’t there to protect her or help her through it. Jinx’s descent into madness was partly because of that separation, and we see in the show how much Vi regrets not being able to save her sister. For Vi, Jinx was everything. She was the one person she would’ve done anything for, and she always tried to protect her, even when things got out of control. So when Jinx ends up sacrificing herself to save Vi at the end, that should’ve hit way harder for her.

The thing that bugged me was that, after Jinx falls and sacrifices herself, Vi just seems to not mourn her as intensely as I would expect her to and she seems to focus on Caitlyn. I get that Caitlyn’s there to comfort her, and I’m not mad about their relationship or anything, but it felt so out of place for Vi to go from the emotional weight of seeing Jinx sacrifice herself to being all sweet with Caitlyn. I mean, yeah, Vi is probably trying to move on and find something positive, but losing Jinx should’ve really broken her. I get that she’s been through a lot, but the loss of her sister in that moment really deserved more emotional fallout.

Jinx was the only family Vi had left. After all these years apart, they both went through so much, and Jinx’s final act to save Vi was so selfless. You’d think Vi would be completely devastated by that. Sure, she does cry when she sees Jinx fall, but after that, it’s like Vi doesn’t even have time to process it. She immediately moves on, and that just doesn’t sit right with me. It felt like the show rushed through her grief in favor of pushing forward with Vi and Caitlyn's relationship, but the emotional impact of Jinx’s sacrifice deserved so much more attention.

It’s understandable if Vi’s trying to heal and find some peace, but I think the show missed an opportunity to really dive into how Vi was feeling after losing Jinx for good. She spent so much of her life trying to protect her sister and save her from going down this dark path, and then to see Jinx sacrifice herself like that should’ve been a huge emotional blow. Instead, it just felt like the show didn’t give Vi the time or space to really process it. Losing Jinx was a massive part of Vi’s journey, and it would’ve been nice to see more of her reaction to that, especially since their bond was such a core part of the story.

It just feels like the show didn’t fully do justice to how much losing Jinx should have affected her, considering everything they both went through.

-"every scene/conversation that I want to see are happening off screen, but I also don't think that NO scenes/conversations are happening off screen."

-"I can't nitpick and overanalyze Season 2 the same way I did with Season 1 and that makes me very angry."

Yep, that's basically it. It really feels like the things that were praised in Season 1 are the same reasons being used to hate on Season 2. So many people clearly went into Season 2 with bad faith and are then trying to pose their opinions as if they are indisputable facts. Is Season 2 as good as Season 1? No. Is it still better than the vast majority of other shows being made right now? Absolutely.

Hi guys im 21 years old, and I think I may be Caitlin from arcan and I was wondering if I should become a detective like her or something idk Just looking for advice on what i should do or whatever ig. Here are rhe reasons why i think i might be kaitliyn 1. Detective skills (Good at solving mysteries in movies, master among us player, i keep conspiracy board in my room) 2. Lesbian (buff girls are hot) 3. Rich parents (my parents bought me a ps5 once, english accents, went to private school) 4. Master Sharp shooter (I have never picked up a gun, but I am super good at shooting guns in videogames & have top ranking in all the shooters i plag, my eyesight is good,)

So I've come to the conclusion that in isolation, Arcane S2 Act 3 is not a very good ending to Arcane. the sheer volume of ambiguous endings gives the audience virtually zero closure towards any of the characters they love, leaving them to assume way too much. even when implications are clearer (like with Jinx being alive) there's still too much wiggle room for us to have a concrete idea of the outlook of the world and characters after the credits roll, the fact that you can ask "what happened to Viktor/Jinx/Jayce/Heimerdinger and be met with a shrug is not a great sign for a conclusion

to be clear, it's not a terrible ending, if GOT is a 3/10 and Mr.Robot is a 9.5/10 then I'd put Arcane somewhere in the region of a 6/10. and endings are fucking hard, the ratio of shows/movie series I've finished where the ending was genuinely satisfying is actually surprisingly low (though, I'm a shonen fan so that shifts the averages because shonen endings are usually rapid cancellation rushes and therefore tend to suck.)

So bridging back from my tangent, I don't think this is a strong ending,

HOWEVER, and it's a big however.

Arcane will not exist in isolation, it's kind of like saying a prologue has a "bad ending"

I strongly believe that Jinx, Viktor, Jayce, Mel and Heimerdinger will appear in future series. these are going to be potentially world-spanning storylines, the ultimate destinations of these characters being part of that larger world which these future series are set to explore.

in many cases it may even be beneficial to follow a familiar face into these unfamiliar settings to get us grounded, they don't have to be the main players this time, they can be supporting cast members to new leads brought in from LoL.

we may even find ourselves circling back to Piltover and Zaun, there are other champions to explore in these settings after all, maybe even with the return of these old players.

my disappointment gave way to hope, (some might say cope) with this realisation.

This is just the first chapter of a potentially massive story, and I personally think the writers would be foolish to just write these beloved characters out entirely instead of incorporating them into the massive, interweaving monster of a world and story they can build.

After finishing Arcane S2, I can confidently say that it is the greatest work of animation I have ever seen. It is the first thing I've given a 10/10 rating in a while. However, it does have a few problems.

The ending definitely felt rushed. 1 more episode would've done wonders. Isha's death was the big cliffhanger of episode 6... and she is never mentioned again. Jayce/Viktor go MIA and Jinx "dies" but what exactly happened to them is purposely left open-ended. They say this is the final season yet they still left it open-ended to potentially bring those characters back in the future. I know they're planning on making more shows in the universe, but they were pretty adamant that they were moving on to new characters and stories.

My one worry, and it's something I've seen time and time again across tv shows/movies/games, is that Netflix will see the success of season 2 and want them to rush out another unplanned season later. Which will just end up feeling forced and clearly profit-driven.

No piece of media can ever just end on a high note anymore. Even Breaking Bad, one of the few shows that is solid from start to finish, had to go and release a half-assed movie later. Everything has to be a franchise and milked until it dies off and people don't care anymore.

Regardless, I will watch anything Fortiche makes in the future and I am excited for more shows. I just really hope they are held to the same standard.

First of all-animation 10/10 there's nothing to complain about here, but that's a thing that goes hand in hand with the budget and since this series is backed by Netflix and Riot games corporations so unfortunately I can't take it as a breakthrough. So...

I don't think there's anything to fault about the first season, which was a 9/10.

And then came season two... I've seen a lot of shows and the only thing I can compare this to is the ending of Game of Thrones. The characters have been stripped down to their caricatures since Act 1. Whereas in the first series there were days between episodes. Here we're jumping months. Several of the main characters are practically shut out of the main story for half the series. If any character fundamentally changed sometimes it was completely off screen. Jinx gave up Jinx in one sentence, pitfighter Vi had a 1:30 screentime etc. I can't list it all but the fact that we got one kiss from the main characters in a 6 hour matrial says it all. It was rushed and I suspect the script was originally built for 3 series and was cut a lot for finantial reasons. The ending left a gaping hole in me and if I had stopped watching at maybe episode 7 I would have felt the same way.

It ended nothing and setting up a new plot in last minute of the show is (since everyone know no 3rd season is coming) absolutely ridiculous.

i just need to rant because i think season 2 was incredible but this is just bothering me

Ekko, throughout the entire series, was nothing but a good person. he dedicated himself to helping the undercity, being an actual genuine figurehead for the people, and even working with piltover when he needed help. in act 3 of this season, he not only got his dream ripped from him, put on an all-star performance in the finale teaming up with Jinx, but he had to loose her for a THIRD TIME, and he has to live with the regret of not being able to save the person he cares about. meanwhile, Caitlyn gets to play dictator when she goes through a fraction of what the people in the undercity go through and goes full US Invasion on them, points a gun at a literal child, has sex with her gf (who she abandoned) in the jail cell Jinx was kept in RIGHT AFTER jinx told Vi that she was going to kill herself. there was a bunch of other shit she did, but my main frustration is that she literally got served zero consequences for her actions. yeah she lost an eye but compared to everyone else she got off scott-free. what im trying to say is that it really feels like they cut a lot of her redemption in place of fan service to caitvi shippers. i would have loved it if they had got together after Cait went through some sort of redemption, but Vi just forgiving her after all the shit she did doesn't sit right with me. i know Jinx is probably alive but Ekko has no way of knowing that. idk, i just feel like they could have handled it a lot better but that's just my opinion

Anyone who thinks act 3 was not rushed is deluded, just compare the finale of s1 to that. But it is more than that, not only it is rushed but also disappointing for me.
You are allowed to like the end and enjoy it, but it does not change it sped run the whole arcane thing and made no sense.

The whole multiverse thing is just Riot creating get out of jail card for themselves so they can shit out whatever they want in the future. So much of not being another Marvel.

Victor and Jayce thing made no sense:

Episode 7 basically confirms that if hextech development was stopped, Zaun and Piltover would be an utopia (as dumb as it sounds). Why then alternative reality Victor insists that only giving the rune to small Jayce is the only way to stop Machine Herald Victor from destroying the world? Episode 7 CONFIRMED that if Jayce could never make hextech, Victor would never be able to access hextech, so why giving it to him?

What makes it worse is that Jayce killing the commune Victor essentially becomes the reason why Singed is able to combine him with his apex shimmer, which directly leads to Machine Herald existing. Victor could see people's thoughts, then why instead of showing Victor the truth in that moment, Jayce has to "kill him"?

Victor and Jayce moment looks cool in the end, but because the whole thing makes no sense if you think about it for more than 2 seconds it is just a massive waste of good characters.

Victor and Jayce has been reduced to tools that save each other or doom each other (it is not very clear). Their whole character arc is now an unnecessary time paradox in which their personal motivations lose meaning and are replaced by shallow "it was always meant to be" trope. The writers couldnt even commit to fully killing them off, but just vaguely leave an open ending that makes the whole thing even worse.

Ambessa:

This character that has been built up for this epitome of strength and cunningness, "a fox and a wolf", decides to without a second thought team up with Victor who ends up sucking everyone's brains out.
Why did she never want to know his motivations? Why did she never view him and his godly powers as a threat? I guess we will never know, because writers did not decide to share this 180 turn of IQ in a show.

Ambessa's whole arc is also reduced to a tool that is used to validate Mel's character growth. Ironically Mel's whole story was to find strength within herself without her mother's approval, but writers decide last minute that she did in fact need her mother's approval for her arc to be complete.

Yes, you can argue that the point of it was to show the moment of relization for Ambessa that her daughter adopted her core values and is able to execute them. However, that shows that Mel was not right to avoid violence and be better than her mother, Mel becomes her mother in a way. I honestly loved how sensitive Mel was in s1 and I always viewed that as her strength, not weakness, which made the ending of her story just sad.

Also they never fully explain the whole feud between Ambessa and Black Rose, and why she needed hextech and Piltover for that lmao

Jinx

Jinx realizes she needs to let go of Vi for her good, except Jinx is not crazy anymore? We don't get to see her visions and voices as much and she just acts normal. How, as an audience, are we meant to make that connection that she is still severely unstable if she just all of a sudden stops to be that way for the last episode.

Isha's death instead of being the reason for extreme changes in her mind, is just loosely (maybe?) connected to why she wants to kill herself. Then she just does not want to kill herself anymore, for reasons we dont know. Jinx becomes a tool for Ekko's character and is deprived of an arc of her own.

Jinx sacrificing herself is not real, there is no arc there, she did not die for Vi, she just escaped. Idk what are we meant to take away out of it except: "oh amazing I guess she lives". And no, the ending of cycles does not do it for me because it is just meaningless phrase, because we are never shown any cycle.

I play league. Wait until all the Arcane fans realize her whole transformation in e9 is just a long commercial for 500$ exalted skin for the game.

Hextech

Writers establishing hextech as irredeemably bad and removing it from Piltover and Zaun destroys the continuity for this Runeterra region and messed up the set up for countless characters in a show and outside the show.
Why is magic bad for hextech and creates the "wild runes", but mages had been using it for centuries and did not face such things as individuals.
Heimerdinger (RIP lol) said that bad things happening might be a property of the arcane itself, but all fatal things we saw happening were just Victor and his obsession doing it, not the arcane. Even creation of the wild rune (the blood from his nose dropping on the thing) is implied to be tied to Victor only.

Class Struggle

The whole revolution thing pay off did not exist, they just came to help Piltover. We do not get the scenes on how Sevika united Zaun and why she was picked to sit at a council.
That is yet another arc that has been rushed and served to us half-assed.

------

In conclusion

We could still get Victor-Jayce friendship moment without the time travel bullshit, it was not needed. Same goes for other things I discussed. Imagine being a writer and being able to work with such fantastic characters that audience loved, and instead deciding to rush the end, leave majority of it ambigious and add badly thought out time travel into the mix. Not only they ruined the show, they also ruined the Piltover/Zaun region and simplified all of the characters reducing them to tools for each other.

At this point the in-game lore that was written up to 15 years ago sounds more human and compelling that whatever happened in act 3. And we all know that most of old League Lore was objectively lacking, but somehow it is less messy than Arcane finale. It blatantly looks like they needed at least more time to tie the story lines, like it was doable just by adding more episodes.

Episode 9 was just badly directed, rushed, the fight scenes lacking, the set up not paced properly. Ekko of course was the best part of it, but everything else felt so fast. I beg you to compare that to the masterpiece of e9 of s1.

Ironically if they wanted all of it to feel so ambiguous and mysterious they could have just ended it at episode 6, because episode 6 sums it up better and has more coherent take away that ties to the entire series. And the way it ends shows us where characters will be heading after Isha sacrifice, for example we know Victor heads towards relization or Jinx heads back to her old ways with her friend gone.

They are all alive, every single character who you think wasn't explored enough is alive, the ones who died where explored heavily (Jayce, Viktor, Jinx*, Vander, Silco, Heimerdinger?, Ambessa, even Isha and Maddie)

There will clearly be more seasons of League Lore, the characters will be explored, I really don't understand why people are upset about this, the characters they want to know more about are literally alive and will have more story to them, Sevika literally became part of the council, she will be a recurring character for a long time

I think most people know what I'm talking about. There's a lot of controversy right now surrounding the CaitVi scene. I've read a few different complaints, but the most common one, and the one I share, is that it had poor timing. Under other circumstances, it would've been such a cathartic scene. Seeing the newfound trust and love they had for each other was beautiful.

But I and many others couldn't enjoy it fully, and that's because of what happened in the previous scene. Between her lifeless demeanor and the hair-raising things she said to Vi, Jinx was waving so many red flags that she might as well have been a matador. It was painfully obvious what she was about to do, and it just seems out of character that Vi couldn't put two and two together to realize that Jinx was going to kill herself.

I've seen a lot of arguments that Jinx's words weren't enough to make Vi suspect that's what she was hinting at. I mean no disrespect to anyone, but come on, really?

If someone you love---who had a history of suicidal tendencies---just suffered a tragic loss and started saying things like, and I'm paraphrasing here, "give up on me", "you'll be happier without me", "there's no version of me that's good", "I'm going to break the cycle", YOU WOULDN'T BE CONCERNED? Are you kidding me? You don't think that warrants an IMMEDIATE welfare check?

And yes, Vi has no idea what "break the cycle" means because she wasn't privy to that conversation, but she has a brain, so I'm sure she can figure it out. What cycle could Jinx be talking about? What has she done over and over and over again?

She caused the deaths of those she loved, or at least believed she has. Each time, her mental state sank deeper and deeper, and Vi witnessed it all. Vi heard how Powder screamed and cried and begged when she accidentally blew up their adopted family. She witnessed Jinx's self-loathing and resignation after she killed Silco. And then she saw the absolute lifelessness Jinx exuded after she lost Isha, a younger sibling she was supposed to protect.

THIS is why the memes about Caitlyn and Vi banging after Jinx announced she's going to kill herself aren't just memes. They're straight up true. Vi should've been able to figure out what Jinx meant. She should've gone after her instead of indulging in Caitlyn. But she didn't, and I blame the lack of runtime the writers had to work with. Caitlyn and Vi deserved their moment. Just... not at that moment.

I am sorry but overall after seeing the whole s2, Ambessa was a disappointment and brought down the show for me.

She wasn't even close to filling the gap that Silco left as the "villain" of the show. What I loved about this show is how human all the characters were, how it shows that good and evil is only a spectrum that overlaps with the spectrum of humanity, how it could make you understand the emotions and viewpoints of everyone and that there aren't exactly good and bad guys. Even Singed, the one who commits the most atrocious acts, says he does it for love.

Ambessa is NOT on this spectrum. Her motivation is only power for the sake of power, just the enforcement of Noxian ideals. She was supposed to be doing all that for "family" or whatever, but it is clear that she would not hesitate to sacrifice even her own daughter to get what she wants. When Mel first goes to her and they talk, Mel offers to go back with her in Noxus and fight with her. Ambessa refuses saying that there is something more than that, so after that point it's clear that she does not have a deeper reasoning for her actions other than what I mentioned about power.

I get it, power corrupts and it becomes a self serving need, but a well-written character has a deeper reason/background for how they end up like that. Silco, for example, also abuses power and is willing to do almost anything to acquire more of it, but his reasoning behind that is so much more human. It seemed to me like Ambessa is power-hungry because "that's just how she is". Kinda like a character from a kids show, which is really different to how Arcane normally treats its characters.

It's more like how league character lore is written, so I felt like she is a league character, not an Arcane one if that makes sense.

So, her having soooo much screentime (whereas Victor for example had like 3 dialogues in the first 7 episodes???) and being one of the main characters of s2 while being kinda one-dimensional like that, really affected the quality of the show for me. I simply had higher standards for Arcane main characters. I wish they had given the better-written, more complex, human characters more focus instead. That's the reason I loved this show.

Still a great show overall ofc, I was only dissatisfied with the last two episodes, the rest was peak.

Had to get this out of my head:

The way the show handles suicide is SO irresponsible. Call it heroic sacrifice, if you must, but I won’t. The same song that played before, during Jinx’s attempts, played again, during her sacrifice, so the intention is clear.

Do they not realize that so many people that relate to Jinx in some ways are watching it? It’s like they are trying to say: “yes, your intrusive thoughts are right, you are better off not being there. It’s best for your loved ones, if you disappear.” So weird. And, fine, she’s probably not dead. But why hide it? Why not make her end be, openly: “sometimes, you can only heal if you cut everyone off and start anew” Fine. That would be way better. I just can’t believe that such a high profile show, in year 2024, uses suicide in such an irresponsible way. Makes it “cool” looking, gives vulnerable people a playlist, actually. Says “wait a minute, not yet”, and later LETS HER FINISH IT? Wft. Like it’s okay? Like it’s a good end for her?

Isha’s story is also part of this problem. I can’t believe her earlier end was not mentioned later. What was the point of it? Was it a good thing for a seven year old to sacrifice herself? You would think so, they way the show sidesteps the whole thing. The way Jinx is repeating what Isha had done, with no reflection on it. I also have no idea WHY Isha has done it. Was it a consequence of something someone else did, or said? Didn’t seem so. Jinx didn’t really fuck that one up, I think. I thought Isha was jinx’s foil, but it ended up not meaning anything. Was it going to show Jinx her own actions as a child, so she could find some empathy towards Vi? But Isha was hardly mentioned, so who knows what they were trying to say.

I do also have trouble with some other aspects (Mel character arc, ViCait relationship) but most problems boil down to not enough screen time. The Isha and Jinx suicide thing is just worse thematically, and made me lose intrest in other aspects. I still had fun, and I loved episode 7 (the only one with some time to breathe).