#and i was like. oh. canon. also i'm drawing that.

[emilywaters]

So I just finished watching arcane season 2 act 3 and I have Thoughts.

Act 3 spoilers below

(I apologise for any spelling/grammar mistakes and if it all sounds wack. It's like late and I needed to empty my brain)

So I'll start with what I absolutely loved.

Seeing that Vi is actually the 'jinx' bcs in the timeline she dies, everyone else lives. And along this line is her saying, "I always choose wrong."

Lesbian Sex.

Canon Lesbian Sex.

The JaVik space marriage.

The casual representation of a very huge amount of demographics (queer, disabled, POC, etc)

The art style, animation, soundtrack, voice acting, character designs, set designs, fight scenes, the casual representation, all of those were absolutely beautiful. It was clearly a labour of love, and I have so much respect and appreciation for every single person involved.

Next, I do have some neutral points, where there are questions I'm not sure were answered, but it could also be me missing something.

These include,

The actual motive of the black roses,

What Ambessa did to piss them off,

Why Maddie was with Ambessa,

The consequences of going beyond the 4 second limit,

And potentially more. If there are answers to these questions that I have simply missed, please do tell me and disregard any points I make surrounding them.

Okay, so if nearly everything was perfect, where do I find fault? Tragically, the plot.

I watched season 1 quite a while back, so I'm drawing on my murky memories of it when I reference it.

In season 1 our main conflict was the undercity, with Jink, Silco, Sevika, versus the rich and affluent Piltover. Rich girl realizes the people of Zaun are suffering and two scientists try to solve problems in their own way.

This theme carries over into the first act of season 2, and somewhat into the 2nd act as well. However, this storyline, which has been a very important one, seems to almost be completely discarded for the Hextech-arcane plot line.

The undercity Vs the rich feels like it was solved too easily. How does a city that has suffered immensely at the hands of the rich and successful turn around so quickly to help them. And how does a city sending polluted air into an already crumbling city, ignoring their poverty and calling them filthy animals, simply turn around and accept them. It feels like that theme was shoved into a drawer, with having Sevika and others joining the council added as a consolation prize. There was no justice for their dead. And those in power suffer no consequences.

As I so crassly put it in my fervent texts to my friend, "Season 2 looked like it was going to be rich bitches Vs poor on steroids with police brutality." That's how the first act started out. We were going to see how the effects of grief, manipulation, hatred and privilege so quickly blur out all the innocent collateral of your rampage.

Then these seemed to minimize within the second act and vanish almost entirely in the third act. Additionally, the other minor plots feel underdeveloped, with a lot of potential, but too many spread too thin.

I saw some people talking about how Arcane was rushing the plot too much at the start of season two, and I do see what they mean now.

The inherent theme of the story, which was about liberation, equality, the guilt of the rich, felt like it shifted in act 3 into, again, as crassly put by me, "true peace is hive mind oh wait no imperfections are good thing."

Of course, I could be completely wrong and missing the mark entirely, so if I am please do enlighten me, preferably without insult, as I've been known to be careless.

The Undercity's rage requires more justice and I feel like it was discarded for a flashier prize.

I feel like the first arc and some of the second could've been a season by itself. They could've tied up the undercity Vs rich plot, with some form of stalemate or some other conclusion, and shift the focus to the Hextech-arcane plot line, with Jayce's whole speech about unity.

Then the latter half of act 2 and the third act would be a season 3, giving more time and weight to that battle and the factors surrounding it, while also showing the results of the previous parts.

I do wonder if there was an ultimatum where we get one season with lesbians or no lesbians and more seasons, where the former was chosen, but that's just conspiracy and speculation.

All in all, it's a beautiful show that had a lot of potential, but rushed and botched something they could've milked for one more season, for the money's sake, if not for good plot. If my points are dissuaded by any things I missed, please do let me know.

I did enjoy the show immensely and it was a good time overall. I'm in love with the characters and their dynamics and the setting and the art and animation, the soundtrack, it may have not made sense, but by god was it beautiful.

[jichanxo]

hiding the evidence (badly)

[non-un-topo]

What if... we killed each other and fell in love....... but also we were both trans 😳

[ohbluesky]

HII here’s a lil something for @thominho-week-2023!!! 

- Day 2: Road Trip

- Day 3: “I really thought I lost you”

[fridgefeet]

the msa trio go to a halloween party! 🎃

[dkettchen]

not me learning from the wiki that yamato (2.63m/8'8") and kiku (2.87m/9'5") are like exactly 1m taller than they should reasonably be respectively if they were normal humans of their birth sex

[mayhemspreadingguy]

This is where the goth cat belongs.

[spotaus]

Okay, this was long overdue tbh 😔🙏(N Lore (?) Under the cut!)

I've been meaning to make N a new ref for a bit, so here we are! Since she's my skele-sona I kinda want to do a quick rundown on her design elements for fun, then her in-universe lore!

(Note: I refer to her a lot with she/her, she is technically a she/they/he/it genderfluid kinda girly, but I made her before gender tomfoolery registered in my brain so I default to 'she/her' out of habit-)

Design:

Her Halo/Crescent/Horns were initially inspired by wanting her to have metaphorical horns instead of slapping points onto her skull. She's also a shape-shifter, so her human form uses the crescent like a hair clip! Also based on the moon a bit.

The wings/tail are things I ended up w/ in the long run. The wings used to be optional + usually based on specific birds, and the tail was thicker w/ an end piece that looked like a fountain pen tip, but the long windy one abd the black wings were more fun to draw/animate!

Virgin Killer sweater used to be a Grey sleeveless turtleneck, but I just like the aesthetics here better.

Arm Gloves/Leg Socks are half because I hate drawing arm bones, abd half because I thought it brought more dynamic shapes into the design! Also... kibty... (inspired by gloves/socks I own)

Pants: She's always worn snow-pants in her design, and they used to have hanging suspenders, but I removed them. Why they're amarica colored I couldn't tell you... I just like the color combo 😔

Cracks on her face: The forehead crack is inspired by when I tripped and smacked my forehead onto a stair corner as a kid (blacked out, don't remember the hospital trip that followed?). Chin crack inspo is a random scar I have on my chin!

Color on Bones: I actually just added this, but my skin gets blotchy when I'm nervous or embarrassed, and I like the visual that N's magic does that to her Often lol. So! It's like blush! (It's also on her collarbone but you can't normally see it, haha-)

Blue + Purple: I actually don't have symbolism here. Just that I had another oc (B) who was my *other* skelesona insert oc, and *her* colors were blue and purple. N used to have white eyelights I think? Silver? But N and B traded off some traits in a point where I tried to combine them, and the result was this current version of N! Actually...

Old Art jumpscare...

So, I stole the pattern from her jacket and put it kn her pants, stole the crack in B's forehead and gave it to N, her Halo kept tilting further left, and I revoked shoe privileges?? Idk man, it's been a wild ride.

Oh! Her hands *do* still have holes in them too.

Lore:

N is less like Me and more like a bossy little minion I custom-made to go harass my ocs. She exists anywhere, anytime, and is only restricted my universal laws if it makes a situation more interesting. Very much a mary-sue. Meant to play almost a 'narrator' role!

She has beef specifically with Ichor (because I put hin thru so so much in the early days-) and is very chill with Phishbone and Pretender. She loves to chill in different aus with different people, but she adores just being obnoxious to my ocs specifically. Objectively, *not* a good person 🙏

And yeah. She looks different in has new clothes everytimr I draw her, but this is a good basic design base!

[sadrockandwaltzes]

Just some crappy Mikage drawings based on images from the show cause I need practice... I feel like I'm really getting the devianart experience tryna draw him😅😭

He looks much better in the show I assure you...

[writing on top left says 'Mikage Death Pose' since it looks very simpson death esque; writing for glasses (he looks so cool in his prof outfit) says 'stylish professor turned stylish librarian after pick-up attempt' (cause I accidentally gave him lipstick😅); middle left writing says 'shading fail' and 'dude being shady- not blushy; and bottom writing says 'Gah... She kept me waiting again!']

Favorite's definitely the bottom one

[can-of-slorgs]

Final surprise boop attack for @yowassupitsred!!

Faeran would 100% be really obnoxious about Calamari, and would intentionally make others appreciate her boopings haha.

(Secret second boop attack to @starbiology in revenge to the april fools war because even though i didn't know if you had any characters, I think of her as your character by this point and I found this scenario hilarious in my mind)

[oh-meow-swirls]

i think this was funnier in my head.

[sysig]

maybe you should doodle however many or few starcon/helix/damned characters as you like (in human or alien form) in cute halloween costumes! imagine... ZEX dressed up as Ariel thelittlemermaid...

Day 26 - "I hadn't realized humans also had aquatic subcultures!" "Oh, well, uhm..."

[figs-oliomedley]

The biggest thing keeping me rooting for Skailor in canon is the way she makes Kai crumple like a leaf

he literally burns himself with his own fire when talking to her oh my god

[nillisaie]

Selfshiptober Day 2: Blanket / Flame

The family just chilling in front of the fireplace

[butterflieswhisper]

tori sitting on the stairs is so. the lighting in heartstopper is awesome big fan of the blue/orange. is tori also depressed in the show i still think it would be so fucking funny to offhandedly mention her school burning down

[journey-to-the-attic]

happy devil day from your two favourite humans <3