I am weirdly sad that the excellent discussions of class and power get somewhat sidelined for the ending of Arcane. Still a great show overall, but definitely disappointing compared to its heights.
Comments
Log in with your Bluesky account to leave a comment
Yeah, still one of my favorite series of all time, probably the best series ever in visuals and craft, but that’s the ONE thing for me that was the sad miss. It could have been perfect!
I actually think it makes perfect sense;they united to face an existential threat to humanity. We’re kind of in the same boat, with AI making humans irrelevant as a workforce, combined with the climate crisis (note how exploitation of arcane, as an energy source, is what nearly destroyed the world).
It is always very funny to me how 90% of people just go after shiny things. Just because it is one of the best visually stunning works ever made, nobody seems to notice this season is just like every other netflix soap opera in terms of writing
it built up in season 1 as something they wanted to highlight and then from there it was hard to follow in the same vein for a whole other season. the noxxus stuff was awesome, the victor stuff was peak, singed was cool it all came together really well.
Idk like, Isha's entire character arc (outside of being an obvious parallel to Powder) was highlighting how the "City of Progress" still never extended to Zaun or her.
We also see authoritarian checkpoints, upped police brutality, a prison break, lesbians, all continuing that societal struggle.
I can see the argument that the ending simplified things a bit too much given the history. But like, joining together to deal with the actual authoritarian threat feels like the ideal situation? Where people put their differences aside, realize they're stronger together, and work together to win.
Ambessa's "wrath must be met with wrath" line feels good to hear. It feels cathartic and right. She's convincing because she appeals to our desire for quick decisive victory over our enemies.
But we see how that plays out and how it affects all of the people of Zaun.
S2 didn't have a moment like in S1 where Viktor looks to Jayce/the camera and says "I'm from Zaun" but like it absolutely seemed to consistently bring up the furthering societal divide and uptick in violence and authoritarian regime would invoke. And I think the season addressed that really well.
the writing in season 2 was terrible and the reason is because the writers room was shrunk down to just 3 people who wrote the majority of the season. a complete mess imo
Fictional progressivism got shafted by real-world capitalism. Apparently the writer’s room for s2 shrunk down to 3 people (with only 1 or 2 being professional writers) during Covid.
Typical ending of a project like this: the ep count got slashed for budgetary reasons, the writers got shoved out the room & whoever was left slap-dashed together some MCUified drivel to make sure it at least had a solid & conclusive finale.
It's become a trend at this point, it happens so much.
I completely agree. I’m more of a casual viewer, but I had much higher expectations with the storylines from season 1. Like how the academy was directly linked to politics and systems of oppression. You don’t see that often in media. I’d love to see some intersectional analyses of this show.
Viktor is part of the oppressed with disabilities caused by poverty & oppression & tried to solve it with innovation/nonviolence in S1 (but lost his way). In S2, with new power, he sought to end oppression by erasing the wounds of oppression. After violence against him, (1/4)
he sought to end it by just erasing that the oppression happened at all & removing everyone’s agency to hurt & be hurt. Jayce’s speech is about how boundaries between ppl need to drop but erasing the wounds of oppression & human nature doesn’t solve the problem. (2/4)
It just ignores what has shaped ppl & takes away their potential to be better & work toward the better lives they want. Ending oppression by removing individuality, agency, and recognition of the oppression people have faced (like “colorblind” approaches) is not a real solution. (3/4)
It just dehumanizes humanity & oppresses in a new way. The imperfections of humans & human nature give us the best of humanity (Viktor as a healer) and the worst of humanity (Viktor as the leader of an oppressive hive mind). Oppression wounds & shapes us but hasn’t broken us & our beauty. (4/4)
I just woke up, so I hope I explained what I mean well enough 😅 I just feel like there is still a lot of discussion of class, power, & oppression in S2. The Gray is literally only controlled bc an aristocrat allowed the poor to breathe. Ambessa uses the oppression to manipulate & gain power. + more.
Yeah, it's a bit of a shame. It felt like we had two seasons worth of story smooshed down into one, and because of that a lot of chunky potential got dropped.
The show blew me away in so many ways, but yeah not resolving the class divide, which was the catalyst that was driving so much of the story, felt like a weak point to me
I feel like a lot of the political discussions got sidelined at around season 2 episode 5 onwards which was a huge disappointment on my end as someone who's interested in LoL lore and loves Arcane season 1. Definitely a shame.
Especially since it has what could be a strong set up in act 1. Only for act 2 to pay lip service to the idea early on then moving on to do other things.
show is still good. but it needed more time to cook.
I disagree that the class discussion was discarded. Viktor's socialist non-violent paradise was destroyed because it had something the war machine wanted. This radicalized him, and he transitioned to facist-socialism. Then his final defeat is through recognition of the value in the individual.
Though the transition to facist-socialism is exaggerated for effect. Viktor's motivation is to do good for everyone, so that they can all become shining lights in his mind prison. He is the ultimate authority, subsuming the will of his people, though he thinks himself to be acting in their interest
Hopefully their next series has more solid themes. My best guess is that Netflix or something else held them back. Now that they’re more established they can let their creativity go wild
They were more than established after S1 blew everyone away. It just may have been that they had a lot of threads to tie up and had to choose which path to focus on instead of taking on so much.
I'm honestly surprised they went so far into that in the show to begin with, given how h0rny the game is for the Sexy Lesbian Cop couple. Vi even had abilities making light of police brutality until the names were changed.
The series added a lot more depth to previously shallow characters and retconned quite a bit. Early LoL champs basically used to be "guy with cool sword" or "big tree"
Agreed. The way they "solved" the Piltover/Zaun conflict mostly off-screen was very disappointing for me. I think that should have still been the main conflict. They could still have all the metaphysical stuff, it was good, but it kinda took over and sidelined the main conflict of season one
In contrast, I think it really speaks to how silly money and power seem when compared to universal threats (for us AI taking over the workforce and climate change). I think it’s a good critique you have but I also see the idea behind removing those issues from the forefront.
Yeah, it felt like it swapped out the source of threat very quickly from the interesting social dynamics of the society to *crazy magic bad* in too much of a hurry. Like 2 seasons smashed into one or something.
I'm hopeful we get another series in this world with new characters. theres so much more i want to learn about. and i say this as someone who gives zero fucks for League of Legends as a game
I haven't finished but I'm feeling the same. Almost done, but this whole season Vi has been annoying me. She was an amazing class hero in season one, but her character is reckless in a way that ignores growth. As far as I can tell at least.
Literally, while they were suiting up and preparing for war, and combining forces, I was all, "Hold up, what happens to the uniforms when this is over? No way this solves the societal issues that have been going on for decades now."
Comments
We also see authoritarian checkpoints, upped police brutality, a prison break, lesbians, all continuing that societal struggle.
But we see how that plays out and how it affects all of the people of Zaun.
didn't looked it for myself for now though
It's become a trend at this point, it happens so much.
show is still good. but it needed more time to cook.
There are too many they wanted to show with so limited time *sighs*
Then again it is a teevee show