i saw a quote on twitter saying "the more u think abt season 1 the more good things u find, the more u think abt season 2 the more bad things u find" and it rly hits spot on for me

Pitfighter Vi was infuriating. She knows where Ekko's sanctuary is, and she should go there to help out instead of giving up on her home. I can believe that Cait/Jinx devastated her, but giving up on the undercity and its people was totally out of character for Vi. What's crazy to me is that the writers completely forgot about Ekko's and Vi's connection. They don't interact even once throughout the season.

The black rose shit was so forgetable like i would sacrifice that storyline so that theres more time for the other storyline to show

The repeated clip of silco saying “the greatest thing we can do in life is find the power to forgive” is killing me💀😭

i also felt like dialogues in S2 weren't as good as they were in S1.

i read a comment on a fb group, stating that "when it comes to S2, people never praise anything apart from shipping" andddd i think it's quite true.

They fumbled some of the most important characters of the show. Namely vi, jayce and cait. Their arcs felt so incomplete and they were sacrificed for the plot.
In season 1 the plot was DRIVEN by characters

The black rose itself is largely explained in the League universe, but their lore is just too big to have been included in Arcane. You would need an entire show dedicated to specifically Noxus and specifically the Black Rose in order to tell their story or create a new story that involves thems. As it is now, you can just literally remove the Black Rose from Arcane and almost nothing changes. I assume they wanted to have the Black Rose in the show to draw up hype for a future project that will involve them, but it kinda ruins Mel's storyline, and it takes away from Arcane too much without providing anything of value.

Greatest thing we can do in life, is find the power to forget this season

Man, I loved season 1, it was peak storytelling with emotional moments, actual consequences and likeable, believeable characters, but this one felt overwhelming AND underwhelming at the same time with many plot holes. I don't like it.

thank god someone finally verbalized literally all of my thoughts and feelings i thought i was going crazy

“You just want everything to be shown to you” that is quite literally the most braindead deflection ever. we had season 1 where every action the characters did had context and meaning tf

Calling Isha the "Baby Yoda" of Arcane is so accurate, I can't-

They gave absolutely no explanation for Isha at all, they didn't show us anything about her nor did they show her bonding with Jinx at all. They just skipped to when her and Jinx were already bonded and expected you to automatically care about her from that alone.

Whenever you rightfully demand that certain conversations NEED to happen on screen, the brain dead crowd chants "um u just want things spoon fed to u" no, i literally want the set ups to be payed off, which is basic storytelling rules

Jinx killed silco and seemed to just get over it... Like the only indication of her mental state was when she almost let Vi kill her.

Nobody mentions the failed deal Jayce and Silco had. That was a council approved deal to give Zaun sovereignty if they give up Jynx. Sevika and the chem barons kinda forgot that Silco's number 1 goal was the separation of Zaun from Piltover. Both parties would definitely believe that Jynx foiled that deal by killing Silco. Giving more reason for everybody to hate her.

jayce telling viktor it was okay to be imperfect by equating his disabilty to his terminal disease just about sumps up the entire season for me

has anyone else realized that character driven stories feel much more interesting to watch/read

arcane going from character driven to plot driven was a wild change and resulted in the assassination of basically every character

A more 'detail' nitpick i have: Jayce telling Viktor "youve always wanted to cure what you thought were imperfections: your leg, your disease" made me livid. he was DYING, jayce. he had the arcane version of stage 10 lung cancer. thats not an imperfection, thats a death sentence. comparing a deadly disease to a physical disability is just... insane to me.

and remember; Jayce in s1 did everything he could to save Viktor. he banished heimerdinger, his MENTOR from the council just so they could keep trying to save Viktor. who, again, was actively dying ("i can feel my body... eroding" is more than just an imperfection, yall. fuck im so mad lmao)

season 1 Viktor was never motivated by such shallow desires as getting rid of imperfections, and the writers trying to retcon that made me so annoyed. season 1 viktor wanted to help, he wanted to save the people in need. it was only after he fused with the hexcore that this got changed into 'save them /by perfecting them/". nothing, and i mean nothing in season 1 implies viktor hates his imperfections to the point of wanting to get rid of "all imperfections". he wanted to stay alive, because he wanted to have the chance to help people ("i suppose your legacy is well secured" talk with Heimer, where Viktor laments that he didnt get to do anything Good in his life, "Scientists seek discoveries, ways to make the world a better place" showing that his motive was helping the world)

the trope of 'this disabled character is evil, cause they want to get rid of their disability. theyre good as they are' is a trope so focused on abled people it drives me up the wall. yes, a disabled person does not need to be able bodied to be worthy of life, and to be perfect; thats true! but villainising the desire disabled people have to be treated as equal, to pretend like its THEIR ableism, instead of that of the surrounding world which makes them be critical of their disability, is vile. also, lets not forget that Viktor's illness is a direct result of the oppression of Zaun by Piltover.

i get the message was intended to be 'your perfect even if you think your not. your disability doesnt make you any less perfect', but in the same breath acting as if Viktor was only ever motivated by his desire to overcome imperfections, instead of motivated by his desire to help, and desire to keep on living SO HE COULD HELP, is just horrible. i almost wanna call it mean.

Sadly, this scene of course didnt happen in a vacuum; its a result of the writers completely misunderstanding and butchering Viktor as a character. he never wanted 'no imperfections', he never wanted a hivemind, he (arcane Viktor) never wanted to get rid of emotions nor saw them as bad (he was actually such an expressive character in season 1; his character motivations are driven by 1) anger against the council and how their hextech is used, 2) anger at how piltover mistreats zaun and how it denies him the possibility of helping zaun, and 3) regret and fear of the hexcore). In season 2 he has /no/ emotional arc. none. its insulting.

That scene of Vi crying while hitting her punching bag was in the trailer, and when the trailer came out and I saw that image, I assumed that scene was her reaction to realizing Powder is fully gone. I thought that scene would be at the start of the 2nd season and it was Vi's breakdown and moment of realization that her actions have culminated into her sister becoming a monster and hurting innocent people.

But no, turns out she's just crying cause she got dumped. Boo hoo.

what i really hated about this season is how ekko went from justifibly deeming a former childhood-friend turned mad terrorist a lost cause to talking said terrorist out of self-annihilation and we didn't even get to see ekko reunite with his fellow firelights who assumed he was dead sice the events of eisode 3.