Bad news for Arcane fans. Whileseason two of the award-winning animated series is on its way, we now know that it won’t be here until next year.
This all comes courtesy of Riot CEO Nicolo Laurent. In aninterview with League of Legends Pro League caster Guan Ze Yuan, Laurent was asked point-blank by a Chinese fan, “Where is Arcane part two?” Laurent said that it won’t be here until 2024 and offered a few reasons for the long production schedule.
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“I just watched the third episode of season two before my flight, so we’re making progress on it,” he said. “It is not ready yet and there’s two reasons for that. One, you want the quality. We just don’t want to rush. That takes time. So that’s the good reason. The bad reason is, honestly, we didn’t know if season one was gonna be a success, so we didn’t start season two until after.
“If I had known we could have started season two way earlier, but we didn’t know, so we kind of waited a bit, and so now we’re paying the price. So, unfortunately, not gonna be this year.”
We can forgive Riot for being a little nervous about their big-budget animated adaptation of the League of Legends universe, but it turns out they really didn’t need to be so cautious. Arcane not onlywon the award for Best Adaptations at The Game Awards(beating out theincredible Edgerunners anime), but iteven won an Emmy for Oustanding Animated Program. It’s easily seen as one of the best video game adaptations ever made, not just for its faithfulness to the source material, but because you may enjoy Arcane without having any prior knowledge of League of Legends.
Of course, it also didn’t hurt that Riot went on an absolutely enormous marketing blitz prior to Arcane’s release. Naturally, Riot made sure to cross over Arcanewith the many League of Legends spinoffs, but it also crossed over with titles likePUBG,Fortnite, andAmong Us. The show even had a marketingtie-in with Fenty, Rihanna’s beauty brand.
You can still catch season one of Arcane on Netflix. For those who missed it, it’s a story of two sisters separated as children who find themselves on opposite sides of a growing conflict in the city of Piltover over Hextech–magic-infused technology that has the potential for massive societal progress or its utter destruction.
Our review of Arcane season one’s third actcalled it a “triumphant debut with only a smattering of shortcomings. It’s smart, gorgeous, sexy, and acts as a perfect entry point for those who’ve never heard of the franchise before.” You’ve got plenty of time to get caught up before season two arrives sometime next year.
