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Arcane Season 2 - The Base Violence Necessary for Change

I think this shot is the most interesting part of the trailer. We see a shot of Jinx as a painting on a wall. A symbol. A leader. Her actions stand for revolution in Zaun and I think this could be an interesting expansion of Arcane’s exploration of violence and the idea that there is a base violence necessary for change.

Silco is framed as an antagonist in season 1 because of his actions against the undercity people specifically.

In act 3 he’s not the revolutionary he positioned himself as and is instead hurting the people of Zaun through his leadership. He’s doing as much to hurt topside as Vander was in act 1 (meaning nothing at all). He’s even got the sheriff working with him just like Vander, but, unlike Vander, Silco is hurting his own people to facilitate power and he’s not even fighting for that freedom he claimed to want so much.

We see the damage his actions have wrought. We see the shimmer addicts, forgotten and exploited. We see that he's created a hierarchy rather than a community.

And it’s contrasted with the firelights. People considered terrorists to Piltover, who do use violence to fight back against Silco and topside, and yet offer the biggest glimmer of hope. They aren’t villainized. The act of fighting back isn’t villainized and it shouldn’t be.

Because it’s not the violence in and of itself that’s the issue. It’s what that violence is used for.

The series hammers this idea home through Vander. 

Vander’s staunch stance against violence is flawed as well. It comes from a good place. A desire to protect what he loves rather than destroy what he hates and it did create a time free of the death revolution brings, but it’s made it so no ground could be made to free Zaun and create a better world for the people in it. It created stagnation. 

The people of the undercity are still stuck in a cycle of crushing poverty, growing up without parents, dying young due to pollution or violence wrought by desperate people or oppressive enforcers.

It didn’t move the needle because Piltover and the system in place wasn’t going to change just because the people of the undercity were playing nice.

The unrest and anger felt towards Vander for his ideal was understandable. His views on the cyclical nature of violence and the fact that if you fight you will lose people (“What are you willing to lose”) is correct, but that doesn’t make this option the ideal one.

Which brings me back to that shot in the trailer of that painting of Jinx.

Season 2 looks like it’s going to be a season of opposites and rediscovery where it flips what we expect of Jinx and Vi on its head and further explores these ideas of violence, oppression, and revolution.

And I think this season is going to do that by reversing how Vi and Jinx reflect Vander and Silco.

In the first season the siblings were direct reflections of their respective father figures, but now they’re inversions. Jinx the good to be found in Silco’s ideals and Vi the pitfalls of Vander’s.

Jinx’s actions in season 1 weren’t those of a revolutionary. Her actions weren’t meant to free the people of the undercity or improve their lives. She didn’t steal the hexcrystal to bring hextech to the undercity and improve their lives and she didn’t kill the enforcers on the bridge to get rid of dirty cops. She didn’t kidnap Caitlyn for a greater cause.

But we know that Jinx isn’t only the violence she enacted. That she is “the monster they (the system and people around her) created”. Her actions weren’t heroic in the first season, but they were driven by the life that was forced upon her. Her hurt and anger are justified.

Now that she’s away from Silco, no longer a part of his machine and actively participating in his actions that were hurting the undercity, her actions and anger can take on a new light. She can rediscover herself away from his manipulations (this isn’t to say he didn’t love her but what he did and said isolated her and allowed her issues to fester) and become that symbol we see on the wall.

Jinx could be in a way what Silco could have been if he didn’t let his own self interest get in the way of his ideals. Not quite as forward thinking as Ekko or as idealistic, but still a symbol for resistance that fights for Zaun.

Whereas Vi is sort of on a path to becoming a darker reflection of Vander’s ideals.

Vi becomes a part of the system she used to rage against.

 Based on the season 2 teaser that was released in 2021– 

“Nobody else needs to get hurt.”

–I think it’s likely that Vi believes she can prevent more death or can stop Piltover’s violence against the undercity if she takes Jinx in.

Vi sees herself as a protector who has failed at every turn to protect those she cares about. She lost her parents, Powder, Vander, Mylo, Claggor, etc. and she is constantly desperate to try and save what she loves and that will likely drive her decision to become an enforcer.

Vi, like Vander, wants to save what she loves and as a result isn’t going to fight back against topside. This is a much more extreme version of Vander’s ideals. Where she “compromises” in an attempt to prevent bloodshed but as a result enables (or in her case helps) the system in place.

This decision will have negative consequences (and deservedly so!) because no matter what thoughts or feelings are the driving factor in it she is still siding with her oppressors and ultimately helping the system that is the root cause of that loss and pain in the first place. 

Based on the clip released at Annecy and what people have said the writers explained about Vi’s arc in season 2 it seems like Vi will be ostracized for this decision and deservedly so. She won’t belong anywhere. To the undercity she’s a traitor and to Piltover she’s nothing more than an undercity rat.

She will have lost everything. She will have no one to protect. And who is Vi if she’s not a protector?

Vi will be forced to re-evaluate who she is and what she wants. Just like Jinx, Vi will have to redefine herself when she loses everything.

I can’t wait for season 2 and what the team at Fortiche has in store for us. The way the show tackles complex themes and ideas is incredible and Vi and Jinx are some of the most compelling and complicated characters I’ve seen on tv. I’m looking forward to November.