Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Arcane’ On Netflix, An Animated Adventure That’s Part Of The ‘League Of Legends’ Universe

Netflix is going for a bit of a different rollout model with the League of Legends “event series” Arcane. The streamer will debut the show in three separate 3-episode arcs, each one premiering on subsequent Saturday nights (11/6, 11/13, 11/20). They’re also doing it in conjunction with a bunch of League of Legends events. It’s a new strategy that we’d imagine is designed to reel in gamers, but it’s also a good one to keep the show away from the onslaught of Friday premieres. Will that strategy work?

ARCANE: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: A red haze of smoke envelops an area. Enforcers use their zapping weapons, and in the background a child sings.

The Gist: That child is Powder (Mia Sinclair Jenness); her older sister Vi (Hailee Steinfeld) is leading her through this horrific battle zone and has told her to close her eyes and sing her favorite song. When they come across their guardian Vander (JB Blanc), they see that their mother was killed in the battle. He carries them back to the underground city of Zaun.

A few years later, Vi and Powder are above ground in the wealthy city of Piltover. The two of them, with their buddies Claggor (Roger Craig Smith) and Mylo (Yuri Lowenthal), are bounding across roofs, ready to rob an inventor’s apartment, a tip that they took and ran with on their own, without Vander’s help. They get into the apartment and start taking stuff, but have to make a hasty exit when someone comes to the front door.

In the process, one crystal orb gets loose and explodes, taking the building with it. Myles is annoyed that Powder slowed them down, but her big sister defends her. As they trudge back to Zaun, they’re unexpectedly attacked by a group of street thugs. They eventually lose all their loot when Powder, threatened by someone much bigger than she is, tosses her satchel into the water.

Vander is annoyed that they went out on their own, but knows that, because the tip came from the pawn shop owned by a big dude named Benzo (Fred Tatasciore), he has to go with him with something. News of the explosion has spread throughout Zaun, and as Vander and Benzo hash things out, two enforcers from “upstairs” come in. One of them wants Vander to give up a name, but Vander refuses. The enforcer says that his not cooperating will likely lead to an attack. Benzo’s fixit kid Ekko (Miles Brown) overhears that information on his homemade eavesdropping device.

Vi tries to reassure Powder that she’s not a jinx, giving her examples where she, Myles and Claggor all made embarrassing mistakes. Meanwhile, something sinister is going on above ground, courtesy of a one-eyed man named Silco (Jason Spisak).

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? League of Legends players will recognize the worlds and characters that inhabit Arcane, but for a show comparison, it looks like it could be a cousin of the recently-premiered Star Trek: Prodigy.

Our Take: Because we don’t play League of Legends, we’re in a good position to judge Arcane on its own merits, instead of as a prequel of the game. Though Riot Games produces the show, they have gotten a long list of expert writers, directors, and CGI animation experts to create a series with a story that’s not only easy to follow — quite the feat for science fiction — but has characters that are well fleshed out right from the start.

Ash Brannon and the other directors of the series have not only set up a new interpretation of the “upstairs-downstairs” dynamic, they’ve managed to create a new story accessible to everyone, while also servicing fans of the game who want to see champion characters like Vi and Jinx (Ella Purnell) — an older version of Powder, for those who don’t know. The story of the war between Zaun and Piltover is only getting started, but the players are pretty well set at this point, as are some of the inventions that are going to make the war that much more violent and deadly.

The animation on Arcane is a revelation, especially for a television series. The human characters have realistic human expressions and move so smoothly, it feels like it’s been made with motion capture technology. There is visual purpose to the fight and chase scenes, not just a jumble of action. It goes hand and hand with the well-written characters to make for a very satisfying viewing experience.

Sex and Skin: None, but there is a fair amount of violence and language that would makes Arcane more aimed to teenagers and above than anyone else.

Parting Shot: After seeing the results of the latest batch of serum, Silco is asked if he has any subjects in mind.

Sleeper Star: After black-ish is over, Miles Brown certainly has a solid career ahead of him as a voice actor, if he chooses to go that route. He gives the young version of Ekko quite a lot of personality in only a few brief lines.

Most Pilot-y Line: When Claggor parkours down to the balcony of the apartment the gang is going to rob, we see him cramming one of the cupcakes we see into his mouth. Sure, that’s quite the feat, but why does the chubby guy eat the cupcake?

Our Call: STREAM IT. Even if you’re not a gamer, or a fan of League of Legends, Arcane will be more than entertaining enough to hold your interest, with an interesting story backed by amazing animation.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.

Stream Arcane On Netflix