#viktor: lol jayce is my impulse control

[linddzz]

Important caveat for this:

Jayce can only be left by himself if Viktor is confirmed alive and well. Viktor does not need to be present with Jayce, but Jayce needs to know that his emotional support stick is out there and doing ok. In these circumstances Jayce will do generally stupid but normal things like get politically manipulated by whoever talked to him most recently.

Once Viktor is violently removed from the equation or dumps him, Jayce is going to fill in for doing unhinged shit such as:

screaming as he shoves an eldritch evil little cube of forbidden arcane power into Viktor's consumptive ribcage (possibly while also shooting his twink up with magic street drugs??? As indicated by Jayce saying he followed Viktor's notes???? Jesus Christ lads) turning Viktor into Brainfucked Cyberjesus.

Getting dumped by Brainfucked Cyberjesus Viktor leads to:

touching (WHY) the even more eldritch and evil looking magical orb floating in the liminal space his stupid gay science made, thus getting yeeted into Horrors

emerging from Horror time loop(????) with maybe two functional braincells that are screaming constantly (the braincells are also glitching) immediately proceeding to blast his ex, cybertwink jesus viktor, right in the chest jesus fucking christ

Do you think Jayce just constantly feels like this entire city is gaslighting him when they look at Viktor quietly working in the background and go "Oh I bet that studious young man helps keep you in line huh Mr. Talis? ;))"

And Jayce is nearly weeping because he can NOT make anyone believe him that Viktor is an agent of chaos. He wants to grab their shoulders and scream that the first day he met this man the guy saved his life, immediately sassed his notes afterwards, then went right to "too bad your equipment is confiscated we should do crimes about it."

Jayce tries to remind Viktor of basic lab safety protocols and Viktor calls him a pussy then builds a lazer arm.

[proximacalamity]

So we are almost a day away from Act II dropping, so before it's too late I'm putting all my thoughts about what I think is going on with Viktor and why. Because I'm obsessed with him.

First of all, I firmly believe he is not completely in control of himself. At the end of S1 he was pretty disillusioned with himself and with many things, but definitely not to this extent, that he would drop everything to wander around Zaun with no clear motive. To me, the hexcore is influencing his thoughts so he'll convert people. The hexcore is was described as hextech that learns, and after Viktor fed it his blood we see it become more and more animated because it's learning, becoming more "sentient" in a way. Now that it's fused to Viktor, not only giving it mobility but also the chance to learn more than what it's given, I do think it evolved to a point it even has motivations and wants. The fact that the hallucinations were guiding Viktor directly to the settlement where the shimmer addicts live is just not a coincidence. We know humans who have shimmer (or traces of it) in their system are the only ones who can take the transformation the hexcore gives them and we also know the transformation is an exchange, a give and take. That's why I think it pushed Viktor to transform people, because with every person it changes, it's learning something from them and also gaining control over them like it did with Viktor.

At this point, I don't think Viktor has entirely realized he is anything other than himself. He might be interpreting the hexcore's feelings as his own or just not questioning why he's feeling the way he does yet. When he says this: "I sense a charge, a potential, a recursive.. impulse. Unpleasant" I think that what he's referring to is what the hexcore feels, the impulse to learn more. It's unpleasant to him because those are not his feelings but he can't tell. It's probably related to why his voice has that effect at the start and at certain words or phrases. Like two minds speaking through the same voice.

We're also not given a concrete reason for why he leaves right away because in my opinion it's not really him who wants to leave (I don't think he left because he saw the blueprints because, well, he already knew. He saw Jayce's hammer already). I think it's more of that feeling, that impulse from the hexcore pushing him into that decision and he accepts it as his own, since he is right when he says Jayce and him were on different paths a while ago, he had realized this already. That's how I think the hexcore is influencing/manipulating him, with things he already felt or thought but channeling them into actions that benefit the hexcore. His guilt over Sky is obviously the biggest one, the hexcore wants Viktor to change more people so it pushes him through the guilt over her death to do it, making him think that doing this to other people as an act of penitence will make up for what he did to her, that's why after he converts Huck he sees "Sky" giving her approval. As if to say that this is what he has to do to earn her forgiveness. That's one of the main reason I'm so sure this isn't Viktor 100% since if the motive was to simply help the people of Zaun we would've seen him actually try to help and not just walk past many of them just watching until he got to the ones the hexcore can change. That also doesn't seem to me like it's actually Sky or her spirit, I don't think she fused with the hexcore, this is just the image of her Viktor has so it's the one the hexcore is using (if it was her spirit I doubt she would be wearing her work uniform lol).

That might explain his expression in the poster for Act II (crying, hiding his face which is getting taken over by the purple, his eyes less colorful than how they appear in the show) maybe we'll see him realize that his actions aren't entirely his own, that the hexcore is pushing him into doing this to people even though before he had already realized that it was dangerous. He realizes but the one in control here is the hexcore, so it tries erasing his identity or even after converting so many people it's been naturally eroding it, since we're getting a time skip.

To be honest, I'm a huge fan of Viktor's original lore and motivations for being the Machine Herald so it will make me a bit sad if much of his character is now about losing agency to a higher entity and being manipulated by it, especially considering that Arcane is now supposed to be canon, so this "theory" isn't exactly what I would like but what I see is possible. I wanted sooo bad to see a take on Viktor as the Machine Herald that isn't flip flopping between him being a lame villain or an interesting morally grey person. I guess I can't be that sad when I haven't even seen what the show will actually do with him but a part of me is worried. If he is being manipulated it will make more sense to me but I'll be hoping it doesn't last and if he isn't then his actions this first act will feel disjointed from the character he was before.

Only a day before we find out which one it is, at least!

[arcane-ish]

@embershroud108

This is a great breakdown and I love all these possibilities. Option 1 definitely seems the most angsty and therefore I also think it’s the most likely lol. It would also explain why they left open the question about the exact circumstances of Vander’s “betrayal” of Silco....because it would make more sense to reveal that specifically in conjunction with and parallel to the question of just how far Vi is willing to go to stop Jinx. Although if they go that route I’m 95% sure that it will end up with Vi actively choosing to not repeat the mistakes of the previous generation (which is to say letting Jinx go/continuing to try to reconcile with her etc.), like we had with Jinx at the end of season 1 with her choosing not to follow what Silco would do and letting Vi and Caitlyn go.

I think the main reason why I'm doubtful that they would do 1 is that I would totally love that option, and I don't want to get my hopes up only to see them shattered ;)

I think the main reason why this option occurred to me is because of this vibe of the season 2 teaser, where it looks like Vi and Caitlyn are off to apprehend Jinx.

I fully expect Vi to walk into this with the concept of "This is the only choice, if I don't find her first, somebody else will capture her and hurt or kill her/I have to stop her because she will just keep hurting others as well as herself". But at the same time Jinx is very likely to see that as betrayal comparable to to Vander's betrayal of Silco. (especially if there is any element of "Vi asks Jinx for a meeting, but then turns around and tries to take her in")

Telling Vander/Warwick's story in that context would give a lot of additional depth (I still say that the main purpose of Vander and Silco in season 1 is to set a baseline for the worst case, or just bad it could go if Vi and Jinx weren't better than that/their bond wasn't deeper than that).

But at the same time, looking at The Drowning, I just see no way this can possibly be construed as a "I'm saving you from yourself". This has at best a "I must put the mad dog down for the protection of us all" vibe.

Which would mean that if they go into the backstory, Silco likely did something incredibly fucked up, so Vander's choice will seem more reasonable, not just to himself, but also to Vi.

I think it's pretty much a given that Vi will not choose that path since we know in game Jinx lives. The more interesting question is how the show will frame it. Vi will choose differently, but will this be a question of not repeating the past (and in such kind of passing judgment on Vander that maybe Vander could have handled it better, that maybe Vander could have tried harder to try and reason with or control Silco?) or will the show portray is as "yeah, it's dark, but maybe Vi should have taken down Jinx, but she cannot due to her love for Jinx" (just like Silco not surrendering Jinx for the good of the Nation of Zaun being an "undoing"). (especially if they do Viktor vs. Jayce in a different season the show would probably benefit if they at least played with the idea that not stopping somebody is a bad idea)

Because Vi also has impulsive anger issues that causes her to lash out wildly in ways that hurt herself and the people around her. So if Warwick’s arc is about him learning to channel his monstrous nature from random killing into something relatively constructive like only targeting criminals, then that actually fits Vi better for me than it does Jinx,

Really good point. Love it.

Like, we’re sort of assuming here that Warwick is going to be part of a redemption story involving Vi and Jinx, but we’ve already seen how Arcane isn’t afraid to brutally subvert usually positive tropes for the sake of affective tragedy. So I could definitely see a route where both sisters get *worse* and *more* alienated from each other after their encounters with Warwick and learning who he is like you kind of suggested with option 1 (though I certainly hope not).

Yes, it's an interesting thought. Especially since based on the voice lines it's not clear to me where Warwick exactly stands vis a vis Jinx and Vi. For example, one of his voice lines make it sound like he is kind of pissed at Vi while his voice lines against Jinx are more neutral. Which is in part what prompted the whole "Jinx and Warwick bond as monsters" concept of point 2. Of course, Arcane isn't obliged to follow every voice line to a T. But I still get the vibe that Warwick might have been written specifically with Arcane in mind. Arcane came out in 2021. Amanda said that she started writing for it "3 years ago" and that when she started certain storyline cornerstones were already firmly in place and fixed (ie Powder killing her first family).

In Warwick's old lore, he was an evil experimenter himself (or even he was the mentor of singed) who got himself wolfy-fied by his own dumbassery/by pissing off a celestial being. They specifically rewrote it into him being Singed's tortured victim and a former gangster in 2017.

Granted, a character rework takes some time to prepare, so I wouldn't rule out that the timeline does not match. But I could at least imagine a proto version of Arcane/the needs of Arcane as a story influencing the lore of Warwick rather than his lore influencing Arcane.

So how aware Warwick really is of his memories by the end of the season or whether maybe he regains memories but then loses them again is an interesting question. I feel like if they wanted to follow voice lines then maybe him not remembering but Vi and/or Jinx know but never comment on it would fit better. But of course this would severely limit to what extent they could explore his backstory (unless he is better at remembering things that were long past compared to his more recent history with Jinx and Vi, or they maybe find some of his old stuff or it is told through the point of view of other characters like Singed, Sevika or Camille who were around back then).

As for the top tragedy option. I think a big question is how long they really want to stay in Piltover. I saw some creator interview with Alex Ye and Christian Linke where they said they would love to explore stories in the other Runeterra countries (Christian specifically noted Ionia). So how many Piltover and Zaun seasons are we talking? Aka if they end season 2 in big tragedy again, how much more time do they have to resolve this and leave the characters at a point where the audience is at least semi-okay with moving on to other characters? I could picture maybe season 2 being the Warwick season and Viktor and Jayce is still more brewing in the background and then they get another season specifically about them. Or Machine Herald takes place in parallel to Warwick.

I could picture Viktor and Jayce being a cool cliffhanger moment. Like have a season dedicated mostly to Warwick vs Jinx vs ViCait and then end on Machine Herald Viktor. (I think that's why the idea of a "Do you let your sibling go/what will you do to stop your sibling" is so compelling to me. Like you could have a season dedicated "okay, we just saw how Vi and Vander handle a crisis like that, so how will Jayce handle it?" or if it is going on at the same time it would provide again interesting parallels (and maybe even work better as running in parallel, because if Vi reaches some sort of decision or epiphany on that topic one would think that she would voice that to Jayce if Jayce finds himself in a similar situation)

Regarding Camille, those voice lines you mentioned linking her to Vi actually kind of ties in with an idea I’ve been brewing over that Camille will actually be initially introduced as a seemingly friendly mentor figure to Caitlyn and/or Vi as she tries to mould them into tools for her own corrupt purposes. Think Training Day with Camille as Alonzo and Vi/Caitlyn as Jake lmao. If they go that route though it could make sense to parallel that with a Warwick + Jinx “mentorship” where one or both of them become more randomly violent OR more directed/controlled in their violence.

I don't know how likely it is to happen, but it would certainly be cool. I'd love it and I feel like it would still feel pretty unexpected to both lore fans and non lore fans to see Vi have a more in depth storyline with Camille. Either way, I really hope that we'll see Camille in season 2 and very interested if we will get to see pre-augmented and augmented forms (again her choosing to become more augmented would work nicely as a parallel to Viktor going through the same thing.

(maybe season 2 is still mostly human Camille and she starts to augment more seriously as the show goes into Machine Herald for season 3?)

[absolmon]

Yeah! I’m glad people agree with my late night rambling. It’s been pretty well stated by the Arcane writers that Arcane is not a prequel leading into LoL lore, fractured as it is. The timeline of Hextech alone shows that to be true, it was something well established before Giapora started messing with it and the Herald didn’t build Blitzcrank so much as salvage him from an already there automaton.

Like this might just be my own personal head canons, but I honestly don’t think the MH was ever as physically disabled or as sick as A!Viktor was. There’s nothing in his lore that he had any problems physically and while I think his exposure to chemical waste while he was working on the solution to that spill caused some instability, I don’t think he was dying. He did have an interest in machines before, but his success with Blitzcrank and subsequent betrayal by academia causes him to go all in. And I don’t think he would have gone as far as he did had he not attempted to perform a brain surgery on himself. There’s a famous neurological case study where a man got himself shot through the head with a rail road spike and survived. The biggest consequence of this is that it destroyed the area of his brain that dealt with impulse control and he was unable to control himself from just doing or saying anything that came into his head. He eventually died from it after pushing everyone away. I think something similar happened to the MH, he never got rid of his emotions he simply lost his ability to regulate them healthily.

Arcane Viktor on the other hand was actively crippled and slowly dying from his long term exposure to toxic runoff. Honestly the biggest plot hole in the show is that A!Viktor would focus on making mining tools then anything to clean the constant poisoning of the Undercity. Yeah, yeah he needs the Hexclaw so when he eventually turns into the MH he can have a third arm but he knows what the biggest problem is, constant toxic waste, and focuses on making things that will make even more faster? Eh, I’m honestly not sure how in tune A!Viktor is with the undercity I don’t think he has any knowledge of the current political situation there as of Act two and beyond.

Both Viktor’s are very similar in some aspects but they are fundamentally not the same man. Honestly I think a lot of the hate Jayce gets, besides the inherent jealousy I think a lot of haters feel, comes from conflating him with the biased version of JG that the Machine Herald talks about in his lore. JG is no angel, he can be pretty insufferable, but a lot of people are taking everything in the MH’s lore as 100% factual and unbiased. And A!Jayce didn’t even do most of what JG did so it’s extra unfair. As much as people love both Viktor’s I feel like an unavoidable part of fandom is the inherent flattening of characters via memes and comparison to other popular characters. This isn’t wrong per say but some people forget the actual work when making fan content.

It’s always fun to talk with people about this stuff, thanks for the insight.

I know a lot of Arcane/LoL JayVik meeting fics have the Viktor’s getting along pretty well to really well while the Jayce’s are on sight but I don’t think that’s the right dynamic. Don’t get me wrong, the Jayce’s would be total assholes to each other, but I don’t think the Viktor’s would get along at all.

Machine Heralds whole deal is that he hated himself so much that he tore his body and mind apart to remake himself into something completely new. That he would rather tear out his emotions then have to deal with the pain of existing as he was. And that this change altered his thinking so much that he can’t imagine anyone else wanting to exist as a human rather then a machine. He’ll do anything to achieve this goal including kill people and work with the Chembaron’s to keep moving forward. To him A!Viktor represents all the past parts of himself that he’s worked hard to destroy, everything that he hates about being human, weak and emotional.

On A!Viktor’s end, he’s a man who is intrinsically opposed to causing harm. The mere idea of people taking his work and making weapons causes him to lash out and fight against it. And while I think he’s sad that he’s dying, I don’t get the feeling he hates his body for being disabled. He doesn’t want to die but he’s not out to change himself for the sake of change. He’s empathetic and emotionally in tune with himself. A!Viktor would see the Machine Herald and see what he could become if he allowed himself to be only consumed by science. He hated himself for letting his experiment kill Sky, the idea of becoming someone who uses his creations to hurt people would be repulsive to him. He ran when Singed first revealed what he was willing to do to keep something alive, and what is the Machine Herald but a walking monument to the length’s of Singed’s ideals.

That’s not even getting into their differing views on Jayce. Before the incident on the bridge A!Viktor has almost complete faith in A!Jayce. He’s not shy about the fact that Jayce is probably the person he’s closest to, even from a non-shipping context. Jayce is the person who’s opinion matter most to him, no one else came to mind when Singed warned of the potential repercussions of his experiment.

The Machine Herald on the other hand is trying to actively erase JG’s importance in his own narrative. He protests far to hard that he never cared about him and that he doesn’t give a damn about him now. The idea that JG could be someone to trust and an equal doesn’t fit with in the story he tells about himself. JG can’t be important to him because that would mean acknowledging that JG hurt him enough to make him into the man he is now.

They would see each other as the worst aspects of themselves, the parts of themselves they’d rather cut off and hide then acknowledge. They’d be disappointed in each other on a deep level; one for how they’ve cut themselves from humanity, the other for wallowing in useless attachments.

Honestly I think A!Jayce would be far more empathetic and willing to listen to the Machine Herald then A!Viktor would be. It’s shown several times in the show that he’s always seeking outside opinions on what to do, mix with the forceful personality of MH and Jayce’s desire to save Viktor and you’ve got an interesting dynamic.

I don’t know this is just my opinion but I just find it interesting that people are more willing to overlook the contradictions in the Machine Herald and Arcane Viktor’s characters then the more obvious ones in the two Jayce’s. In the end it’s all for fun, and I’m not saying others are wrong but I wonder if anyone else thinks similarly. Let me know what you guys think.