Riot Games and Netflix’s popular animated series Arcane dropped its final act of the first season earlier today. The series is set in Piltover and Zaun and shows the past of some of the champions in League of Legends. The show also showcases the dichotomy between the two cities and their inhabitants. Arcane has already made a strong impression by topping global charts on Netflix with its first two acts.
The first act of the series mainly provides background context for the champions in the show, with Vi, Jinx (then called Powder), Jayce, and others taking the spotlight. The first part alternates its focus between Vi and Powder’s childhood and Jayce’s Hextech research. Vander—the Hound of the undercity and one of the people maintaining the peace between the two cities—died at the end of the act’s last episode, with Jinx’s newly formed Hextech bomb killing her friends by accident. The tragedy pushed her into the arms of Silco, the show’s main antagonist, who appears during the first act.
The second act marked a time skip and helped showcase some of the character development that happened between the first two parts of the show. Caitlyn took Vi out of Stillwater Prison and hunted down Silco to collect evidence against his crimes against the Upper City. An unknown faction, the Firelights, seized control of the Shimmer from Silco as well, though the identity of their leader is unknown at the end of act two.
In Piltover, Jayce and Viktor had significant arcs of their own. Jayce became one of the councilors of the Academy and voted Heimerdinger, his mentor, out of the Council. He explained his reason by stating Heimerdinger’s old-fashioned way of thinking and that humans have a limited life span, unlike yordles. He also pushed towards closing the bridge between the two cities as a drastic measure.
On the other hand, Viktor’s health significantly deteriorated, pushing him to research the mysteries of the Hexcore to save his life from the illness afflicting him after growing up in Zaun. This also nudged Jayce towards drastic directions.
Vi and Jinx reunited at the end of episode six, but the Firelights cut the reunion short and spoiled the moment. They took away Jinx’s Hextech Crystal and kidnapped Vi and Caitlyn. The second part of the show ended with a cliffhanger, leaving the mystery of where the characters will end up in the final act of the show—and plenty of development left until the characters become the League champions fans have known for years.
Arcane’s act three is out now exclusively on Netflix.
