Netflix’s Arcane season 2 kicks off with shifting alliances and bad blood
“There is a monster in all of us. It’s time to let the monster out,” says crime lord Silko in the Arcane season 2 trailer – and from the trio of episodes I saw, it’s clear that everyone is breaking the thin threads of the story. love, hate and loyalty that once bound them together.
At Netflix’s Egyptian Theater in Los Angeles, the streaming service gave the media a look at the first few episodes of the second and final season of Arcane, the show set in the League of Legends universe. I saw Act I ahead of its release on November 9 to a packed crowd of fans cheering on the next chapters of the story for Jinx, Vi, Caitlyn, Jayce and others as they fight for the future of the town of Piltover.
The first three episodes set the stakes for season 2, and while it spends a lot of time laying the groundwork, it also has a lot of character moments and intriguing developments that keep me excited for the final six episodes. I will be sad to leave Piltover and all the vibrant characters that make Arcane such a joyful, heartbreaking melodrama.
If you haven’t seen Arcane season 1 yet, it’s worth watching to prepare for season 2, but here’s a quick recap to catch you up. Warning: There are spoilers ahead for the first season.
Arcane is inspired by League of Legends lore, but has its own history. It’s set in the wonder city of Piltover, roughly divided between a posh overworld of nobility and scientific progress ruled by a council of privileged upper crust – along with Heimerdinger, the feisty, long-lived Yordle scientist and de facto elder. of the city. His prodigy, Jayce, develops magic-infused Hextech that furthers the city’s progress but puts it at odds with the undercity of poorer residents clamoring for independence to form their own nation of Zaun.
Over the course of Arcane’s first season, crime lord Silco dominates the undercity, at the expense of sisters Vi, a fighter, and the unstable Powder, who, after being abandoned, becomes the mad bomber Jinx at Silco’s right hand. Pressure builds between the self-proclaimed Zaun and Piltover’s council and army, with the noble city soldier Caitlyn attempting to bring Jinx to justice (falling for Vi in the process). In the season 1 finale, this culminates in a brutal battle that leaves Silco dead and Jinx bombards the town, creating a firestorm as Piltover’s higher and lower factions charge towards war.
Act I of Arcane season 2 picks up where the first season left off – and if you thought the first season’s unlikely team-ups between higher and lower Piltover characters were surprising, you haven’t seen anything yet.
When will Arcane season 2 be on Netflix?
The first three episodes of Arcane season 2, called Act I, arrive on November 9. The second trio of episodes, Act II, will be released on November 16, while the show’s final three episodes, Act III, will arrive on November 16. 23. There are currently no plans to make an Arcane season 3.
Caitlyn (left) recruits Vi (right) to track down her sister Jinx.
What happens in the first three episodes of Arcane season 2?
Overall, Act I is about dealing with the impact of Jinx’s attack on the council and the subsequent power vacuums that reshuffle the board. Spoilers for season 2 below – but only the first three episodes, which drop on Netflix today.
Act I begins immediately after Jinx’s attack, with three council members lying dead, including Caitlyn’s mother. The elite of Piltover would like to control the undercity and invade with troops. Vi, herself from the Undercity, wears a Piltover soldier badge in her plea with Caitlyn to bring Jinx to justice rather than punish innocent civilians. A small squad descends to face whoever Vi’s younger sister has become, and her relationship with the noble soldier deepens. But after a brutal brawl that pits Caitlyn and Vi against Jinx and undercity enforcer Sevika, the former lovers part ways.
Caitlyn, nobleman and soldier, pauses for a fateful shot.
This is the main theme of the first three episodes: character alliances are broken and others are formed, reflecting the changing conscience of the cast as the war heats up. As surviving councilor Mel tries to unravel the conspiracies between the drug-ridden undercity and Piltover’s elite, her mother Ambessa – a noble from Noxus who arrived in the first season with mercenaries in tow – continues her political chess moves, quietly plays the games of the city. powerfully against each other to increase its own influence.
After Jinx unknowingly shoots crime lord Silco at the end of season 1, the undercity crime lords dive into the power vacuum. Some launch an attack on Piltover’s nobles during a ceremony lionizing fallen council members, but mostly they clash among themselves and make life worse for residents of the undercity – including a young girl who saves Jinx from crime family thugs and becomes a little sidekick. It’s a nice parallel and a chance for Jinx to reflect, but it doesn’t bear fruit in the early episodes.
Even more secrets are revealed about Hextech – and the mysterious magic itself.
What does change, in another heartbreaking sequence, is inventor Jayce’s friendship with his assistant Victor, who was injured in the municipal bombing and placed in bio-stasis thanks to the Hextech core. Emerging from his chrysalis in a newly transformed body, Victor shares bitter words with Jayce and poisons their friendship, choosing to descend into the depths of the Undercity among the wretched victims of Shimmer, the drug Silco that flowed through the Undercity . In a dim alley, Victor lays hands on an addict and reveals surprising new powers to cure him of his condition (although he also changes it) – and create his own holy following.
Jayce, adrift and neglecting his council duties to focus on Hextech, finds his laboratory invaded by the most unlikely of burglars: his old mentor, Heimerdinger, and Ekko, a young leader of the Fireflies, an undercity vigilante faction fighting against the crime lords and Jinx. . Returning to the Firefly headquarters built around a massive underground tree, the trio develop a surprising new theory: new, wild magic is a response from the forces of magic itself, counterbalancing the increase in its use of magic by Hextech. This seems to be the basis for the rest of the series, so we’ll wait for it to pay off.
Ambessa, a noble from the city of Noxus, is playing her own political game in Piltover.
As the final episode ends, a new order emerges. As indicated in the first season, Ambessa had fled her homeland of Noxus due to a faction feud that claimed her son’s life and will affect the rest of her family. A magical force kidnaps Mel and takes her off the board. In her absence, Ambessa uses another councilor to push Piltover’s nobility into military action once and for all. She then replaces her pawn by appointing an embittered Caitlyn to take control of the city’s armed forces.
As the curtain closes on Act I of Arcane’s second season, hearts are broken and new alliances are forged, but Piltover stands ready to invade the Undercity en masse, regardless of the human cost: a powder keg (pun intended) waiting to to explode between factions and champions. And in the background someone is slowly coming back from the dead as something completely different.
The first three episodes of Arcane season 2, as Act I, drop today on Netflix.
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