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Heavy is the Crown

For the last three or four years there haven’t been more anticipated animated entries than the Ghibli legacy project The Boy and The Heron (Oscar winner), Netflix’s Castlevania, Sony and Marvel’s epic Across The Spider-Verse (Oscar nominee), and this: a top-view RPG video game spin-off of League of Legends – Emmy nominated Arcane season two. Back on the animation block to bully everything moving, does Arcane have the juice to bring us back to its gigantic world and make sense of its many plot threads? More importantly, can it back up its multimillion-dollar spectacle with substance?

Animation Byke!

I’ve seen the first six of the nine episodes that make up this season, acts one and two if you will. Without giving any spoilers, this is some damn good animated programming. I say that in a year that gave us X-Men ’97, Twilight of The Gods, and a slew of great entries. What sets Arcane apart is the amount of meticulous detail etched into every frame. The world of Arcane is just a sliver of the universe that is League of Legends, the richness of the lore feels almost lived in because everything harkens back to something else that is grounded in something else. You’ll find momentary plot holes only to find them plugged later on so intentionally it feels like a ‘gotcha’. World-building on this scale requires so much time, effort, and continuity checking you have to wonder how in the hell folks at Riot Games, Fortiche Studios, and Netflix thought it was even possible.

There is a resurgence in animated storytelling, especially with the apparent fading of Hollywood and the need for new stories. I have long upheld that video games are one of the highest art forms in human history. Collaboration across genre, medium, and international borders at levels only seen for space exploration. It’s looking like animation is back in a big way, and anyone would be remiss to leave out Arcane’s impact on a world trapped at home during Covid quarantine – in need of an escape. Seems we’ve returned to fertile ground. Because in a real-life ‘world gone mad’, we can escape into the world of Arcane.

Aesthetics On 10

Design is a giant part of video game development, and it is abundantly clear that Riot Games left nothing out of the mix for Fortiche Studios to use in the development of this show. Again. Every scene is part movie and part music video. Characters are brilliantly fleshed out and have shown even more growth from the last time jump in season one. Add to that the further passage of time and another layer of growth and change for every single character. With each of those changes comes a very visible shift in their look. From Jinx’s Akatsuki-type beat tattoos furthering the use of ‘powder blue’ to Vi’s greasy, ‘jet-black’ brawler-punk hair and jacket. The use of black to cover up her reddish-pink. Jayce sports a more rugged, weathered, and destructive tarnish in contrast to the pretty boy optimist in an ivory tower from season one. The red stitching of Ambessa’s Noxian wardrobe, Mel’s gold adornments, and on and on.

Art style and texture go above and beyond the audience’s imagination. For Arcane Fortiche layered 2D detailing on top of its 3D models and did not use motion capture (‘mocap’) performances. So that means all those cool pieces of fight choreo (like Jinx’s psycho power dash) came out of the raw creativity of the animators. Add to that all the backgrounds are digitally hand-painted! At every turn, Netflix wanted audiences to see where every penny of that two-hundred and fifty-million dollar budget went. Especially impressive in the age of Artificial Intelligence being used by greedy studios or execs to pump out “art” at a lower cost.

Which makes nothing as mind-blowing as the direction they’ve chosen for the ‘Hex-Tech’ aesthetic; a stylized interpretation of the biological, the mechanical, and the spiritual. With the rise of a messianic figure in the Arcane universe spreading the word of Hex-Tech spirituality, the imprint of this very cool, very distinct, and even a little unsettling texture still ends up being quite beautiful. Animated at 24FPS (frames per second), for a realistic, cinematic feel, everything you see matters. Every piece of embroidery, every raise of the eyebrow. All of it is a piece of the puzzle of this world, all of it moves the plot forward. You don’t really have a choice but to pay attention when the art is this good and this intentional.

Get in the Booth #¡$%&

Y’all. Everybody’s rent must’ve been due at the same time because every performer came through with their A-game. A mix of veteran on-screen and voice talent combine to bring some heat to this season of Arcane. Even though every character holds importance in this story, the main character actors popped out. There’s always a running issue with how many screen actors are occupying the voice work realm, but gotta give credit where credit is due – these folks brought it!

Vi (voiced by Oscar winner Hailey Steinfeld) and Jinx (voiced by Fallout star Ella Purnell) are just as respectively broody and unhinged as ever. Purnell’s turn as Jinx has deepened this season. There was always a complexity to the trauma-laden character but Jinx’s maturity is seeping in and it comes through to great effect.

Noxian general (and general badass) Ambessa, voiced by seasoned UK actor Ellen Thomas, went the hell OFF this season. We knew she was a force to be reckoned with from the first go-round but as a general. Now we get Ellen Thomas stepping into the warlord side of Ambessa’s character and it’s delightfully ruthless and calculated. If I’m being honest, I’d watch a whole series just about her. It’s always refreshing to see a Black character hold a high station and even more for them to be as confident, self-assured, and capable as Thomas’ turn as Ambessa.

Rounding out the main narrative arc strong is Kevin Alejandro as Jayce. Alejandro has been in everything under the sun, and I’m hella hyped that he was brought onto this project as Jayce. The character seems so simple and plain, but the complexity is dialed up so much and Alejandro is committed to making this clean-cut character gritty and get their hands dirty AF. Not to be slept on and a more impactful character this season is Katie Leung’s (Cho Chang from the Harry Potter films) aristocrat police officer, Caitlin. If you thought Caitlin maxed out as just a sharpshooter with a chip on her shoulder, you thought wrong. The depth of what she faces this season makes her one of the most dynamic, and Leung steps into it with a performance that makes it hard to know just who the main character is.

Spectacle & Substance

The budget for Arcane was gigantic. Flat out, hands down. Does it bring it each season? Yes. Is the cast and crew stacked to the gills with talent? Yes. Do they have state-of-the-art everything? Damn skippy they do. In a capitalist society, it makes perfect sense that the project with the most money will get the ad space and be promoted on the most platforms in the most places. It’s no surprise that it is as celebrated as it is. But what does it mean compared to other pieces of animation? Enter this Tweet from Castlevania series director, Samuel Deats:

Yes, Arcane is like the late 90s Yankees with how much money was invested in it. But it also is full of substance. Elements of class and race division between Piltover and Zaun. Addressing systems of power and the myth of meritocracy. Caitlin’s access to infrastructure because her family built it all. What it means for Vi to be from the oppressed citizenry and have feelings for a cop. There’s a consistent interplay between the relationships between characters and the real-life tensions they symbolically represent. So to Samuel Deats’ point, yes, Arcane has more money at its disposal than many animation projects. It also goes the distance to make sure it delivers a compelling story. The substance is basic but used to great effect. But Samuel Deats’ tweet was a response to this very real and honest critique (top):

Finally Got the Name Right

Say what you will, Arcane is an amazing piece of animation. Go check that and see what all the hype is about. Arcane is dope. The next two acts of the second season drop on November 16th and November 26th on Netflix. Come for the spectacle, stay for the substance.

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