Season 1 review

Experiencing the show

I absolutely loved experiencing Arcane 🤩, right from the animation and visuals to characters and plot. The contrast between the 2 environments of Piltover and Undercity really shines throughout the series, both are equally important for the show and gives the show a different cool vibe which just feels brilliant 💯. Not to mention how cool the fight sequences are!

Characters

I loved how each character was developed so well, everyone had believable motives which was even better. Also how the characters interacted with one another was genuinely fun to watch. I can pretty much write a paragraph on each character, this just goes on to show how well they are fleshed out. ⭐️ I particularly dislike stories which have cartoonishly evil villains but my god Silco as an antagonist had so much depth to him, probably the most interesting character in the series for me. Also Jinx/Powder deserves a sentence or two. Really loved how well her origin story is setup, from innocent little girl to the savage young adult which, not for a single instant, felt forced.

Plot

The plot for me, seemed to have “this is just the beginning” vibe throughout hence I am so so excited for subseqeunt seasons of the show! Also that ending was so lit 🔥. I’d have loved to discuss about it here but I don’t have the review to be like 1000 words, but such a sweet bittersweet ending which felt perfect to the tone of the overall show.

Overall, I really had a lot of fun watching the show and kept wanting to know more about the world presented in Arcane

The theme it revolves around

At its core, Arcane presents the theme of “Power vs Relationships”, “Progress vs Stability” and sticks with these throughout its duration. Having experienced such a dilemma before in my life, this theme hit me really hard. I have been in such situations before and related with a few characters and the decisions they eventually take. Overall the show is deep in philosophy but presents it in a very accessible way which makes the show an excellent watch.

Negatives

It was very hard to find any minus points as such but one of them for me was convenience. A lot of the things for many felt too convenient, like Vi getting those gloves from Jayce or Vi easily freed from prison. In general, Vi’s character for me was a bit hollow for me and she felt criminally under-developed. A few more minor issues like adding in unnecessary characters like that councilor’s mother and her backstory in general was too long for me, “Skip to the interesting characters man”, is what I kept feeling.

Final Verdict: 8/10

Maybe underrating it a bit, 8.5 but not more than that