The Origins Of Arcane

Arcane also known as Arcane: League of Legends, is an animated series based on the League of Legends lore, retelling the origin stories of several characters from Piltover and Zaun. The series was adapted for television by Christian Linke member of Riot Games creative team and long-time contributors to the source material.

Pitched by Linke in around 2014-2015, everything from planning and starting up the project to the overall writing, production, and animation took around six years before its eventual release. With this being the company's first foray into this media format, Riot Games decided to have Arcane developed internally and independently financed, though initially through the collaboration of Linke and Yee with artists they've worked with before they began to receive more funding from Riot.

Riot's then Global Head of Entertainment Businesses and Partnerships Jarred Kennedy worked with a creative team of writers (including Linke) in Los Angeles. The series was produced with and animated by Fortiche, a French animation and creative production studio based in Paris, Montpellier and Las Palmas (Spain) that has worked with Riot on various videos for its champions in the past. The voice actors came in early in the production process, but majority of the main cast was only announced years later on September 21, 2021.

The series was announced on October 15, 2019 as part of the League of Legends 10th anniversary celebrations,with Riot Games' CEO Nicolo Laurent stating that they have plans for Arcane to have multiple seasons. Original slated for a 2020 release, the show was delayed to 2021 due to COVID-19-related difficulties. On May 3, 2021, it was announced that the show has been picked up by Netflix for international release and by Tencent Video in China with a fall release date.

Though the events of the series are heavily based on the established lore of the game, some differences have already been noted in the series. Creators Christian Linke have shared that the changes are not necessarily retcons but are "adjustments in order to give [the viewers] the best story possible". Though working to make Arcane as consistent as possible with canon, as of 2021, he doesn't "think [they] would be considered a source of truth over the game", adding that they are taking into consideration the reaction of the fans, the current setup of Riot and its games, as well as the updates and changes to the characters.

Arcane

The Tale of Two Sisters

For those who are fans of League of Legends, there’s a lot to see in this series that expands on the initial lore. Our focus in the series is on Vi and Powder, who are two sisters who lost their parents after a rebellious battle against Piltover, the world above that’s full of wealth. Zander, the leader of the rebels, puts them under his wing, and Vi and Powder grow up learning how to fight and also be rebellious.

They return to Zaun, the underworld, and the years pass by. The series continues on when science experiments happening in the underground causes Deckard, now mutated, to go off and kill quite a few people. As more of the group is killed off by the chaos happening, Vander is sacrifices himself to allow Vi to keep living, and Vi, upset, calls Powder a Jinx. That’s the catalyst for the rest of the series, as the rupture between Powder, now known as Jinx, and Vi is a major point of conflict. Jinx joins Silco and becomes one of his henchwomen, and as the years pass, she uses explosives to help terrorize those around and disturb the tentative peace people are working towards.

When more years pass, Jayce, who was working on Hextech and the technology with shimmer needed to power it, has become acknowledged for his work. We also meet other characters, such as Heimerdinger, and Caitlyn makes her appearance as someone who works as an enforcer with a strong sense of justice. Throughout the course of the series, the plot thickens around the shimmer, Silco’s plans, and how Jinx and Vi are dancing around each other. At one point Jinx even sees someone who looks like Vi and has a mental breakdown on the spot, as she’s pretty traumatized over what happened.

Audio of interaction between Jinx and Silco

Arcane Trailer

The official trailer for Arcane, the League of Legends animated series.

Piltover

Piltover, also known as the City of Progress, is a thriving, progressive city whose power and influence is on the rise. It is Valoran's cultural center, where art, craftsmanship, trade and innovation walk hand in hand. Its power comes not through military might, but the engines of commerce and forward thinking. Situated on the cliffs above the district of Zaun and overlooking the ocean, fleets of ships pass through its titanic sea-gates, bringing goods from all over the world. The wealth this generates has given rise to an unprecedented boom in the city's growth. Piltover has - and still is - reinventing itself as a city where fortunes can be made and dreams can be lived. Burgeoning merchant clans fund development in the most incredible endeavors: grand artistic follies, esoteric hextech research, and architectural monuments to their power. With ever more inventors delving into the emergent lore of hextech, Piltover has become a lodestone for the most skilled craftsmen the world over.

Roughly 200 years ago, the city-state of Piltover was founded to be a bastion of enlightenment, with its people standing united against the deadly arcane threats that existed beyond the city's borders. As Runeterra had cannibalized itself over power and pride, An icon representing Heimerdinger Cecil B. Heimerdinger, one of Piltover's founders, helped to guide the City of Progress over the next two centuries, becoming both head of the Council of Piltover and dean of Piltover Academy.

Over time, the disparity in wealth between Piltover's topside and its undercity, located across the Bridge of Progress from its capital, culminated in an uprising led by the undercity revolutionaries An icon representing Vander Vander and An icon representing Silco Silco, who dreamed to establish their own independent nation of Zaun. The uprising soon turned into a massacre as the rioters fought the Piltover Enforcers at the bridge, leaving hundreds of Zaunites dead.

Having witnessed the civilian cost of war, Vander laid down his gauntlets and eventually struck a deal with the Enforcers, who were led by An icon representing Grayson Sheriff Grayson. In exchange for allowing the undercity their autonomy under Vander's de-facto rule, Vander would prevent his people from attacking topside.

Zaun

Zaun, also referred to as the Undercity, is a city-state across the river from Piltover, a large portion of which runs beneath the latter. Whereas its upper counterpart is thriving and rich, Zaun is the opposite, becoming almost literally the catch basin of the waste from the city above it where its residents try to survive from scraps spared to them. One known part of Zaun is the Lanes. Individuals who hail from it are known as Zaunites, though such people come from various backgrounds as a population that includes humans, Chireans, Yordles and even certain individuals that come resided inside Piltover. Regardless of their background, however, the negligence of their sister-state caused numerous Zaunites to adopt contempt or even hatred for it, striding for freedom as an independent realm that some addressed as the Nation of Zaun.

Though technically under the governance of Piltover’s Council, Zaun has virtually been cast aside and isolated from whatever gains and advancements had been made in Piltover. While Piltover prospers, Zaun is perpetually riddled with crime and hardship. So heavily polluted, its air said to be denser than Piltover's,that those not native to Zaun find the need to wear gas masks when visiting, and Piltover residents deem the undercity as dangerous and look down on the denizens living there. This has caused rising tensions between the two, and some figures from the Underground, such as Silco, yearn for independence, wanting their home to become a nation of its own. Due to the lack of true supervision over Zaun, the city is silently controlled by a group of chem-barons.

Because of its roots in mining, the air in Zaun was thick and polluted. While the issue of the pollution was solved by Councilor Cassandra Kiramman, the air remains slightly thicker than that of Piltover. However, the clearing of the air was credited to the goddess Janna, who Zaunites quickly came to worship. Though the chem-barons held the level of control, the state lacked a true government and, as a result, became rife with various different factions, such as the Jinxers, a resistance movement that idolised Jinx as a symbol of independence. Compared to Piltover, Zaun is actually quite advanced in some areas. They have figured out how to create and implement prosthetics as well as other body part replacements. In the case of the Firelights, they’ve also learned to modify certain vehicles to account for the thicker air.