Arcane: The Holy Grail of Game Adaptations - Fascinating Fiction
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- čas přidán 25. 08. 2024
- #netflix #arcane #fascinatingfiction
Fascinating Fiction is a scripted video essay series in which Pokeprof goes over various forms of fictional media to give his personal thoughts, analysis and opinions on what brought these characters and stories to life.
Few series impress me as much as this series did. I'll hold true in saying that if you've not watched Arcane yet, go and enjoy the first three episodes at the very least. It's a good show and I can't wait for what's next.
If you've got a suggestion for what you'd like to see on Fascinating Fiction, leave a suggestion in the comments or message me on Twitter!
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The people behind Arcane didn't just understand the assignment, they broke the grading curve.
Agreed. Now if Riot hadn't slashed out an entire tenth of their work force recently, I'd feel a bit better about watching season two when it came out. -_- ~ Pokeprof
@@CritiquingMinds While i agree that Riot needing to cut 530 staff because of poor planning and management absolutely sucks and nothing i will ever defend. None of the people behind Arcane are the reason for that, and i have no conflict in watching season 2.
If you haven't already, i highly recommend watching the documentary "Bridging the Rift: The making of Arcane" its right here on youtube on the League channel.
Its a 5 part docuseries made by the Arcane team. Its a miracle Arcane was made at all as it was not some show dreamed up by the execs wanting to further their reach. It was dreamed up by 2 people who started working at Riot over 10 years ago (in customer service i might add) wanting to show they can do more with their characters.
@@renehoyvik That does make me feel a little better about wanting to watch Season 2. I guess I'm just tired of all the people working for all these game companies getting the boot. Hell, we just had Blizzard do the same to the tune of almost 2000 workers, including those who've been there since the start. ~ Pokeprof
@@CritiquingMinds Yeah, sadly so many game companies saw record profits at the start of the pandemic and went on a hiring spree. Nearly 10,000 game devs got the axe last year and so far it seems even more will go this year.
If nothing else despite the poor decisions made earlier by Riot, at least the severance package they offered those getting fired is pretty much unheard of. 6 months severance + any bonus they would have earned in 2024 and more importantly ex Riot employees will be kept on the Riot health and dental plans until they get new jobs, be that 2 months 6 months or 12.
Again, i'm not defending the short sightedness of Riot made earlier, but as far as game companies firing people lately, I'd rather get fired by Riot then Blizzard or EA.
Arcane became one of my favorite animated shows of all time after watching the entire first season & I can’t wait for its second season.
I'm really, really excited to see just where they're going to go from here. And maybe get to see a few other league champions that were particular favorites come into the mix! ~ Pokeprof
It's one of my favorite shows of all time. Animated or not.
Yeah, it's a fantastic show regardless of that fact. I just hit on it being animated because it 1) let's us do things we couldn't do in live action a lot easier and 2) a lot of people even to this day still discredit anything animated. ~ Pokeprof
Seriously, if anyone hasn't seen it, especially because of the animation - there's character stuff they do with their animation that I can't imagine a live actor presenting so powerfully. And tbh, there's scenes that I wouldn't _want_ to see a live actor do. It's hard enough to watch it in animation. There's one scene in particular that took me a year to get past tearing up every time I even thought about it. As in, for a year, just writing that line would have brought tears to my eyes. And it wasn't the infamous episode 3, as intense as that is. The look of pain and self-loathing, and despair, and just being _done_ and ready for the end in that scene... no, I don't want to ever see that on a real human's face.
There are some things that I feel animation is just flat out better at conveying. Like a lot of art, music, and stories, there's something special and real about how animation does things that can't be caught in any other medium. I don't know if the way we've seen things in Arcane would have hit me the same way as they did if it was done with real life actors. And lords knows they'd be so much more restrained in what they could actually do and show. ~ Pokeprof
The sad smile at the end of ep.7, or "even though I'm different"?
Watching a series like this with children is going to be great, if you are prepared to explain everything, giving societal contexts, and children are super smart nowadays
I'll be honest, I wouldn't have any kid under ten watch this. The themes and ideas in here I feel like might be a tad too mature for them, but I'm also speaking as an uncle to a seven year old whose still too scared of Emperor Belos from Owl House. that said, kids may very and it might work a bit better for other kids, but I'd still put Arcane in the 13+ crowd personally. ~ Pokeprof
@@CritiquingMinds💯 ten would be my cutoff as well. Depends on the kid, too. The third episode could be pretty traumatic for anyone who is both old enough to grasp what happened and gets emotionally invested easily. I know I would have loved the show at twelve, but at ten it might have been too much.
I love Arcane for more reasons than I can say, which is unusual because I don't like dramas, or tragedies, and i despise the League of Legends game along with it's toxic community. But oh wow, is Arcane good. I've never deep dived into a series so far before and still find myself after all this time still deep diving and exploring every nuance of it. As a writer, I can also say that I've never watched a series or movie as well written as this was. It just excels in every line of dialogue, every voice acted delivery, and every frame of every beautifully artistically rendered moment of animation.
There's just so much about the series that screams a love and care that you wouldn't have expected from the game that it came from. And yet here we are, with characters, a story, and more that makes you just want to see what happens next. ~ Pokeprof
I don't like tragedies either, but I've come to realize it's because I can usually wiggle my way out of them. I can pick apart the causal chains, I can critique the motivations, I can argue with the writing instead of being forced to accept the tragedy. I've never bought Iago's motivation in Othello, for example. But with Arcane, I don't have a way out. The chains of causation are unbreakable, there's not the slightest bit of slack in the tightly woven characters. I have no choice but to accept, and embrace the sweet misery of the tragedy.
Not a criticism. Just can't help wondering: what's with the Noxian background music?
Main reason I chose that is two fold! The first is because Noxus is something that gets introduced into Arcane's setting towards the end, with there being hints that it'll be move involved in Season 2. The second reason is because i wanted music that wasn't happy go lucky or triumphant for the background, but fit League. Noxus's Runeterra music worked best for that, being a somewhat down trodden and darker theme.
Considering Arcane's main focus was a more sad story, I thought it fit better than Demacia or even Piltover. The other one I was considering was Shadow Isles. ~ Pokeprof
also. world-building is not just Arcane. Yep it`s great. But it`s just peak of the iceberg.
riot invested A LOT in word-building in last decade. pretty much every region have bunch of characters hardly connected with each other with "gray morale" story with individual point of view and "TRUTH" behind each of them.
author mentioned that casually. from my point of view that casualty devalues hard work behind the scene.
even Arcane is a 6 years long project. Six fcking years!
Keep in mind that I said, in the episode itself, that the last time I was seriously into League of Legends was when they did the nuke to their world building the last time. I've no idea what they've done or how well they've done it SINCE then because I haven't really looked much into League outside of playing a card game where it's optional to read the lore with the cards.
I wouldn't say I'm devaluing the peoples work here, more that my past experience with the company made me be surprised that something like Arcane is as tightly written as it is. Especially considering Victor and Jayce, two characters who've got a wonderful story here were kinda a cartoon villain and hero when I last played the game they're originally from. ~ Pokeprof
11:24 Oh, c'mon man, don't trash the lore just to prove your point, especially when you actively said you didn't read it
I was in League for several years. I've read several story lines of my favorite champions, like Orianna and Mordekasier, and I'll say that there are some really fantastic stories and lore within League.
I will stick to what I said, though. Especially for older champions? They weren't designed with their lore in mind. They were designed to just have funny little battle quips and be interesting for new players to go and buy. Little, if anything, in the game reflects the deeper meaning the stories have tried to give them. The only one I remember even coming REMOTELY close was Gangplank and that's because they flat out took him out of the game to do that. ~ Pokeprof
why most reviewers work on their content so hard, but still mention Netflix as something important. Yep, it`s platform that get exclusive on Arcane show-run. But... thats all folks.
how does Arcane started? Few talented people that love their work did not fear to came with initiatives to a boss in a company that actually appreciate them and give them a try. and another try. and another in the pursuit of perfection. so everybody have their goals and motivation. and worldwide appreciation achievement finally.
Netflix is important because it's largely thanks to this that short form, more bite sized series LIKE Arcane even exist in the first place. Unless something has changed in TV recently, no network is going to green light a series like Arcane to show on cable because it's not something that they can run forever or extend out for a period of time. They want thirteen to twenty three episodes of things that fit THEIR expectations above all else.
Netflix showed the world that it didn't have to happen that way and other webservices (Like Amazon and Hulu) have followed, but Netflix thus far still has the reputation of being the most free in letting the creators do what they want to do. This isn't to discredit the people who did all the work on the actual series, but I doubt this series would have gotten off the ground without Netflix as is. ~ Pokeprof
@@CritiquingMinds seriously? can`t agree. cause this trip to change a format and human preferences was actually started way early by HBO and a whole blockbusters Hollywood industry. This part way more complicated than "Netflix revolution". Even you mentioned some other platforms. Actually there is hundreds of them worldwide.
Arcane IS NOT "Netflix series" anyway.
Netflix ruined Vedmak and CowboyBebop. It`s a sad but true. It`s a good platform which is not equal to good creators.
While other formats and types of shows have existed, especially in places not called the USA, the simple fact of the matter is that they were exceedingly rare in comparison and even to this day aren't that common. A show like Arcane, an adult animated series with only eight episodes that run about 40 minutes per episode? That doesn't work in how Networks like Nickelodeon, Disney, CN and others do things. It simply wouldn't survive or even do well because it would get a dead end time slot.
HBO got the ball started to be sure when it came on slightly different formats, but it wasn't until Streaming became a thing in part thanks to the growth of Netflix and them doing their own original content that you started to see the shift where you could have smaller, bite sized series of things never allowed elsewhere. And then HBO hit on Game of Thrones and that changed the whole landscape because you now you could claim that streaming services were offering better stuff at a price than the shlock you could find on cable.
No company is ever going to do perfectly when it comes to adaptations. For every Sponge-bob you've got, there's going to be a Planet Sheen. And in the case of Bebop, did you really expect them trying to do 'animation, but with people' was going to go anywhere? ~ Pokeprof
@@CritiquingMinds 9 episodes, my man, not 8. level of expertise just broke the roof and rocket up to the sky :D
sorry for my sarcasm. but maybe I was not accurate with words. english is not my native language. but you did not get the point.
40 minutes series? Oh gosh. HBO with best series in competition did not know that for sure , a list of blockbusters started more than 20(!!!) years ago:
The Wire 60 min
The Sopranos 55 min,
The Pacific 54 min,
Deadwood 53 min,
Game of Thrones, 55 min, et cetera. You actually young or what? HBO started this trend way early with the Wire, not Game Of Thrones. Streaming did not change much from customers perspective. They still get their lovely content at home (PC or SmartTV no diff), not in cinema which is out of home and get all benefits of it - any time, on demand, with any company and so on.
Sounds like Netflix rendered a service to RP. It`s not vice versa. True in the middle. Cause if series animated by Fortiche with army of funs across the world with project by the Riot Games with most popular games it the world is a joke to named Disney, Nickelodeon and other networks... shit, who cares? I am sure if not Netflix - other platforms (Amazon, AppleTV for example) would fight for the right to publish project like Arcane.
Meme "Rito are game studio that establish game projects to promote their music videos" maybe even older than you, my boy)) cya