Arcane Season 1 defies convention and provides a strong blueprint for how to adapt a video game to television, condensing the best parts of the lore in a digestible format.
Directors: Pascal Charrue & Arnaud Delord
Genre: Action, Animation, Fantasy, Steampunk, Adaptation
Number of Episodes: 10
US Release: November 6, 2021
UK Release: November 7, 2021
Where to watch Season 1 of Arcane: Netflix
For much of their history, video games have had an uphill battle when it comes to adaptation. Hours of story in a game will try people’s patience if put in cinematic form, and the limited runtime for films means they cannot progress a story at the same leisurely pace as a game. The one to start a golden age of video game adaptations was Arcane Season 1, adapted from “League of Legends”, the most popular video game in the world. This show understands the game, but also what goes into making the story more digestible, allowing for the best of both worlds.
Television seems to be the most successful medium for adapting video games, with major hits like The Last of Us and Cyberpunk Edgerunners coming about in this format. More segmented storytelling combined with more time to tell the tale make this a logical progression. When Season 1 came out in 2021, it was a landmark for both video game adaptations and animation. With a second season due soon, it is time to look back on what made Arcane Season 1 succeed where so many adaptations failed in the past.
“League of Legends” does have a story, but little of it is presented in the game. It is told through the expanded universe on the Riot Games website through character bios and comics. Arcane Season 1 takes these little tidbits and expands upon and modifies them as necessary for the continuation of its own story, with its own conflict and ideas while keeping the setting and characters intact. This “broad strokes” retelling is perhaps the best way to engage new fans while keeping the old, providing hints at greater ideas and things to come, while also making things comprehensible.
The main action is set within the city of Piltover and the nearby city of Zaun. Two sisters named Vi (Hailee Steinfeld, of Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse) and Jinx (Ella Purnell) find themselves on opposite sides of a brewing civil war. Vi becomes a law enforcer, bent on doing what is right at all costs, while Jinx is taken in by the wicked Silco (Jason Spisak), and her intelligence combined with her hair-trigger emotions make her a valuable asset for the city’s crime syndicate. Meanwhile, the brilliant scientist Jayce Talis (Kevin Alejandro) founds a special administration called Hextech, which seeks to harness magic for energy to power Piltover, though they may not be fully aware of the consequences. All of these plots come together in detailed, intricate ways that encourage the viewer to pay attention to the subtle foreshadowing in each episode. The smallest detail can come back in full force at the end of an episode, catching viewers by surprise.
The story of Arcane Season 1 is detailed and convoluted on the level of “War and Peace”. Several characters, geopolitical stakes spanning an entire world, and a complex and detailed magic system may go over one’s head with so much exposition, but you can get involved in the plot if given enough attention. You may require repeat viewings to fully appreciate it. A time skip is given after episode 3 to show the sisters as adults and the progress within Piltover, which can make the narrative feel a bit disjointed. Perhaps it is best to view Arcane as three movies within a show, where each set of three episodes tells one full story. It is a unique experiment, but only enhances the atmosphere and feel for the storytelling. The best way to view the series is by setting an appropriate pace.
In its adaptation, season 1 of Arcane also modifies the existing lore of the games. Jinx and Vi are established as sisters for the first time in this show. This dynamic makes their characters more relatable and their relationship has greater stakes. Having them be related means sympathy is felt for them whenever they meet and there is no clear villain between them because both have been manipulated by external forces. The greatest changes to the lore come from Jayce’s subplot. The game never specifies he founded Hextech, with this organization and its system being a key element in the game mechanics. Here, Jayce finding the crystals and harnessing them is his whole character arc. The story needs this change to build conflict and add tension to the grander narrative design. Without Hextech explained, Jayce has little reason to be there, just another scientist among many. Placing him as a major character expands his role and makes him both more compelling and more three-dimensional.
This series also has one of the most distinctive and breathtaking animation styles put to television. Every episode is carefully storyboarded, with five months of production time dedicated to the animation. It takes the comic book style perfected by Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse and amplifies it, adding style and texture to the world with saturated colors and stylized movements. In particular, scenes showing internal monologue or scenes with use of magic (such as with Jinx or in the use of Hextech magic) show the characters in a more expressive manner in ways that cannot be illustrated in live action. Arcane Season 1 is a case study on why more video game adaptations benefit from being animated: with limitless potential in the medium of animation, the aesthetic can fit the game first and foremost.
All of this comes together to make Arcane a landmark in television. In 2022, the show became the first streaming exclusive program to win an Emmy for Best Animated Program and won the inaugural Video Game Award for Best Adaptation. The detailed storytelling and unique visual style were instant hooks and made for an engaging watch, with drama on the level of serious adult dramas of the time. While animation targeted for adults is nothing new, Arcane took it out of the realm of sitcoms and into the world of high fantasy and epic storytelling, more Game of Thrones than Modern Family. It was clear showrunners Christian Linke and Alex Yee had respect for the source material, and were able to take the most important parts of the game while also reworking the story to make something original.
Arcane Season 1 has a little something for everyone. Whether you are a “League of Legends” pro or someone who has never even touched the game, the show should appeal to you with its strong writing and detailed setting. The immense cliffhanger of Season 1 is the perfect segue to generate hype for Season 2, and with three years to sit on it, the time is right to resume the story. With such a high bar set by the first season, the second is looking to be even better, with higher stakes, grander narratives, and more stories to grab the attention of viewers, this is a seminal work in the Netflix canon.
Arcane Season 1 is now available to watch on Netflix.
