Early Access - Arcane | Reaction & Review 1x4 "Happy Progress Day!"

Lore check here. * You've heard that other country's name, Noxus that is, from the council member (funny he is still playing with that toy that Mel gifted him years ago) * Beast-like race you saw is called Vastaya, there are numerous types (\famalies) of Vastaya that represent different animals. * Stanwick Pididly, a scientist that was flashed out this episode in the beggining, is far away from canon. By canon, he and Viktor both actually live at the same time and they have major things happening between them. He actually took credit for Viktor's invention one time. * "Shimmer" and "Gemstone" weren't exactly in the canon lore. But those two inventions (gauntlet and lazer) are present in the game you were precisely right (although creation of these things has different origin). It was suppose to be that "oooh i know that thing" moment. ps. my favorite character is Silco for sure, he is amazingly written. Mel and Viktor second best, and I love Savika's design.

Владислав Черниенко

Showing up a bit late here 😆 The relationship between Jinx and Silco is really fascinating. It's complex and full of layers. The physical contact between them was something that made me a little uncomfortable in the first scene in his office, but when I thought about her first contact with Silco it made perfect sense. She was still behaving like a child, among a lot of other issues, as you said. And Silco... amazing character development!✨️ And I love Viktor! The scene in which he and Jayce present the new equipment to the professor was so sad to me. You can see a certain despair in Viktor when Heimerdinger speaks of another 10 years. Jayce even had to restrain him, it was almost as if he was saying that he doesn't have 10 more years to live.

Nair

Writing my thoughts down in parallel with watching your discussion, hopefully this doesn't accidentally post mid-stream... That reintroduction to Jinx is spectacular, isn't it? I think the shots of her face as she fires the minigun and Ray Chen's solo violin shrieks discordantly are some of the best character animation in the entire series. I love that what we see develop in her expression isn't rage or joy or any of the emotions pop culture commonly associates with "insanity"... it's *fear.* By the time she accidentally shoots the Drax lookalike, she's staring into the middle distance, her eyes wide with terror and her mouth agape. It emphasizes immediately that this character is NOT the Joker, or Harley Quinn, or your garden variety lunatic archetype (although ironically, the video game version of Jinx is exactly that). She is incredibly traumatized, and underneath the cool villain exterior she plays up at the beginning of the scene is Powder, still terrified, still lonely and lost and broken by her abandonment. Your analysis of Silco is frighteningly good, haha. I think it helps that you had previously keyed into how he saw himself in Powder at the end of episode 3. As you guessed, a lot of folks are initially a bit WTF at Jinx and Silco's relationship as depicted in this episode - and I agree that this is intentional on the part of the writers. But as you said, the clues are there to infer that their relationship is that of a father and daughter (that "turn your blasted rock music down, kid" scene!). It's just that the daughter in this case is a full-grown woman who never had the chance to emotionally mature past her childhood.  With respect to Jayce and Viktor, IMO that moment of Jayce inviting Viktor to the stage and Viktor demurring is low-key one of the most important scenes for their relationship. It demonstrates that despite his rapid ascension in Piltover politics, and despite how it may be affecting his ego, Jayce fundamentally cares deeply about his friend and *doesn't* see Viktor as a mere assistant. It subtly reframes their burgeoning conflict as being about their differing perspectives of the world (and how their relative positions in society shape those perspectives), rather than just being a bog-standard jealousy story. But that's about all I can say about that without venturing into spoiler territory, so I'll stop there. :)

tarrsk

I'm not sure. Kevin had two select frames from the collage in slightly higher res on the tweet, but I think that might be it, sadly: https://twitter.com/AYMRC/status/1610346124241473536 (edit: now that i see them on my pc rather than the phone, even those two seem to just be cropped from the collage itself.)

Arcane does worldbuilding so well that it really isn't hard to fill in the blanks after the time skip.

Prda

This lines up with my read of their ages as well. Vi looks like she's 14-15 in Act 1, and Powder seems around 10-11. Act 1 Cait is a little harder to read since we see so little of her, although she comes off to me as someone around Vi's age (maybe a bit younger even). But it's ambiguous enough that many reactors don't even pick up on Caitlyn being substantially younger than Jayce - the number of folks who assume she's Jayce's girlfriend always kinda squicks me out lol.

tarrsk

Woah, haven't seen these images before. Thanks. Are there larger versions per each piece of art?

Sebastian Samuel

Totally agree with you on Viktor and his situation. I think also besides the looks I feel like Piltover would never let Viktor, someone from the Undercity, be part of the spotlight. Speaking of Jace, I also don't think he's purposefully letting Viktor behind but I also do see that he's unkowingly also starting to asume a role to play in it, a lot of times in this episode he makes decisions about Hextech without consulting Viktor first, and in that last scene at the council he even stops Viktor from talking, so it's a bit of a complicated mess.

Indra Villa

I will say I think Viktor is my favorite character for sure!

A

Color Script by Kevin Aymeric, shared via his Twitter. https://i.imgur.com/0yN3e5q.jpg Love all the subtle world-building in this show; what the hell is that freaking dustball following Heimerdinger, and where can I adopt one?

The song Jinx is listening to with her headphones is actually Jinx's theme made by riot years ago. Pretty cool easter egg. You may have noticed but every episode has a song specially made for it (in addition to the normal OST), most are used at the end of the episode or in the credits. The soundtrack to this show is incredible, another great aspect.

Jak

Some clarification: the undercity is a part of Piltover. That’s why you see the same enforcers there regularly. It’s basically an impoverished part of the city that’s been getting worse over time while the topside of Piltover thrives. Silco has referred to it as “the nation of Zaun” a few times before, but that is far from anything official right now. Also, I know it’s a very basic choice but Jinx is my favorite character in this show easily. I’m a big fan for broken characters that are actually well written, and the scratchy childlike animation whenever she’s having an episode is really neat and unique as well, really draws you in and makes her even more fascinating to watch. I also think the impressiveness of the animated microexpressions is best depicted with her character. Plus her VA just nails everything about her character, right down to the near-constant strain in her voice. There’s even more I love about her than that, but I’ll save that for another time lol. Looking forward to more 👍

Chelle

I REALLY hope gaming and literature I.P's take note from Arcane and make all of their adaptations this good. I didnt give a single crap about League of Legends but this show has me hooked on the universe and this is one of my favorite shows now.

jblakk

Jayce is the only one whose age is actually stated in the show (discounting Heimerdinger, who doesn’t really matter here) and a writer confirmed Powder’s age range. But the other two are mostly a guess based on their appearances in the first act, which is part of why I said approximate.

Chelly

I think the age ranges are even broader than that, because their original ages are vague too, right?

tom

It’s never actually confirmed in the show, but one of the writers have stated that the timeskip was around 6-7 years. So here are some of the approximate character ages from what I can tell: Jinx - 17/18 Vi - 21/22 Caitlyn - 21/22 Jayce - 30/31

Chelly