Since the end of Arcane’s first season, Caitlyn has gone on quite a personal journey. She begins hellbent on revenge against Jinx for the murder of her mother. Soon, she’s taking Vi down into Zaun with a strike team. Not long after that, she’s propped up as Piltover’s military dictator, though she’s really just a puppet of Ambessa’s. There’s a big dramatic moment where she takes power at the end of Season 2, Part 1.
Then we get a time jump. Caitlyn and Vi have split, and now Caitlyn is sleeping with the Enforcer we met in Part 1, Maddie. She’s training with Ambessa and out for blood—until she’s not. Quite suddenly, Caitlyn goes back over to Vi’s side, betraying Ambessa and even fighting alongside Jinx in the final confrontation in Episode 6. It’s narrative whiplash. I don’t know any other way to describe it.
This is the fundamental flaw in Season 2, and it applies to more characters than just Caitlyn. We get very little time with Vi in the fighting pits. The introduction of Warwick and big Vander reveal were built up but still feel out of left field. Jinx goes from crazed maniac to kind of just bored with the whole thing when she adopts Isha. And while Isha’s big sacrifice at the end of Part 2 was intense and gut-wrenching, I can’t help but feel like it wasn’t quite earned.
Same goes for the Viktor arc. I really find his powers and the commune he creates quite fascinating, but Jayce showing up and killing him felt abrupt and confusing. I suspect we’ll get some backstory in Part 3 explaining what Jayce and Ekko and Heimerdinger have all been up to, and why Bearded Jayce (a more handsome version of the character) is so hellbent on stopping Viktor, despite Viktor being obviously motivated by a desire to do good and help people. But this whole segment felt jarring, even though it was a great catalyst for the wolf monster going off the rails again.
I can’t shake the feeling that a lot more story needed to happen around all these characters than what we’re getting, leaping from big plot beat to big plot beat without much time to stop and smell the shimmer. We learn that Singed is actually Dr. Corin Reveck—a name non-League players won’t be familiar with—and that his motivation all along has been bringing his daughter, Orianna, back to life. How you do that with a giant, mad werewolf is a little harder to parse. But there are some great scenes with him, and with him and Viktor. All the stuff with Vi and Jinx reuniting with poor Vander was also great. And the backstory we got of their mother drinking with Vander and a young Silco was great also.
There’s so much really top-notch stuff in Season 2, but I get a little out of breath watching it, like we’re just rushing from one thing to the next so quickly. At least in Part 2 there was some “downtime” where we got to push on the brakes a bit, but so much of this ends up just being emotional setup for Isha’s heroic sacrifice. Meanwhile, we barely get any of Jayce and no Heimerdinger or Ekko to speak of. We do get a pretty fascinating scene with Mel, trapped by the Black Rose with a fake version of her missing brother, but I have to admit that adding in another major storyline, when all the main ones feel so rushed, isn’t my favorite.
Another thing I have not been enjoying is the music video segments. I’m not loving the song choices or the fact that these take up so much screen time. It all feels so different from Season 1. Even the fight scenes feel different, more heavily stylized with so much slow-motion it would make Zack Snyder proud. They’re still good and the animation remains gorgeous and unique, but by the end of Part 2 I just felt like something was missing, and I think that thing is time. We just don’t have enough of it to properly flesh out these stories and characters. I think it’s obvious at this point that a third season would have given this one more room to breathe.
Some fans have said “Well of course it’s more intense and fast-paced, there’s a war on, things have ramped up etc.” but they basically skipped the war and went right to the occupation of Zaun. The pacing issue isn’t because of the nature of the conflict, it’s because they’re moving through so much story so quickly. It has nothing to do with the nature of the conflict. All the meticulous character development of Season 1 has gone out the window, and we’re left with rather jarring leaps instead.
I still like it. I know people are going to yell at me for being so critical, so rest assured that I’m still very much enjoying the season and I’m not just “hating” but I was expecting something more. Season 1 was so close to perfection, maybe this is just the sophomore slump. If only there was a third season. Maybe Part 3 of Season 2 will lead to redemption. We’ll know next week!
Read my review of Season 2, Part 1 here.
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