Arcane Season 2 suffers from a Game of Thrones Season 8 problem

Heavy is the crown indeed. It is tough being on top in the TV world. For so many series, it seems that the only place you can go is down. Arcane Season 2 has come to an end, and while I alongside a lot of fans think that the show's final episodes were very good, you're not alone if you felt this irritating, gnawing feeling that something wasn't quite right.

Before we begin proper, I'm going to go ahead with a SPOILER WARNING for all of Arcane Season 2. If you've not yet seen it, go and watch it. While the headline might have baited you into thinking I believe otherwise, this show is great from start to finish, and is often excellent, but there is a problem that emerged in Season 2.

Arcane's second season has seen more of a mixed reaction in places. While we loved it, as you can tell in our network review, others have pointed at different things to try and figure out why there might be a lacking feeling in these nine episodes. The animation is still incredible so it must be to do with the storytelling, but it's not the dialogue that's changed, nor the characters themselves, and instead - as was the case for Game of Thrones' final season - I believe everything can be traced back to a simple issue with pacing.

Pacing might be the most underappreciated part of telling a story. People will look at dialogue, plotting, and more, but completely skip over the pacing of the story. Arcane Season 2 has a lot to accomplish. It starts in the Jinx and Vi rivalry that ended Season 1, but then has to leap towards the plot with the Arcane, Viktor's fall, Vander's return, and Jinx's friendship with the little girl Isha. Because of all that, the pacing moves at a mile a minute. It's breathless, and leaves little space for things to stew as Season 1 did.

Letting the audience have a moment, letting them breathe in and understand what has transpired often makes the emotional peaks feel that much more impactful. No sooner do we have Vander back in Arcane Season 2 than we have him ripped away from Vi and Jinx once more, and while that is effective at tearing away a bit of joy just as the sisters thought they had it, we're then thrown into the Viktor robot apocalypse so quickly that it becomes difficult to process what's going on. It seems even Vi and Jinx are given little time to care, which means that as an audience we can't do the emotional heavy lifting for them.

Outside of the first three episodes, it seems like Vi and Jinx do take much more of a back seat. The relationship that is the focal point of Season 1 is treated more as just another arc in Season 2, as there's simply too much stuff to get done. The most glaring example of this is in the finale, which has to juggle so much that just as we reach the climax of Viktor and Jayce's arc, where they both disappear seemingly forever, we're then slammed with the sacrifice of Jinx too. Without a moment to breathe, it becomes hard to care and understand what's going on as real. The battle towards the end is chaotic, yes, but it also feels incredibly rushed, throwing you into the midst of the conflict in episode 9 with little build-up.

We suffered the same things in Game of Thrones Season 8, although that show also had weak character work, dialogue, and more to make fans rightfully hate it. But, when I knew the show was really going downhill was when they dealt with the White Walkers by episode 3. With Arcane, a similar problem exists and it feels like this show could have gone on for another season at least. Arcane is still at its best when it takes things at a slightly slower pace, as shown in episode 7 this season. Just having Jayce, Ekko, and Heimerdinger be the focus led to some of the best character development and moments in the show. But then, we look at the remaining two episodes, and things feel very awkwardly paced. As mentioned, this isn't just a finale problem either, as Vi and Caitlyn's reunion felt almost unnaturally quick when they met back up. Vi dyed her hair, fell into minor alcoholism, and got the shite beaten out of her for three months, then she sees her situationship again and is willing to let bygones be bygones. Also, Caitlyn on the other side feels as if she's being set up to be evil woman #2 to Ambessa, only to then immediately return to the good side despite not really appearing to get over her hatred of the Zaunites.

The switch suddenly flipping in Viktor to turn the world into an automated mess seems rather quick, too, and even though it was likely caused by Jayce blasting him to pieces, because you're not given a moment to breathe, the show feels like it is moving these pieces on a board because they need to be in a certain position soon, rather than allowing the characters to more naturally move into place. Another season really could have allowed us that time to see characters develop into who they should be by the time the finale rolls around. Spend Season 2 on Jinx and Vi coming back together to save the returned Vander, only to end with the tragedy of that situation before setting up Season 3 as the time when the world is at stake.

Once again, this isn't to say that Season 2 of Arcane is bad. Not at all, it will still go down as the best video game adaptation (so far) and one of the greatest animated series we've seen. But, as with every show, movie, game, etc. there are always things you can look at and see how they could improve. As we know, more League of Legends series are on their way, and hopefully in the future we can see slight changes in the pacing to ensure people don't have a weird feeling watching these shows. It's easy to see with how much time and money a third season would take why the writers kept it to two, but on some rare occasions it's worth making something last a little longer, so that the ending feels a little sweeter.