I just finished season 2 now. Without much spoilers, it was a real mixed bag. Some parts were amazing, some parts were very mediocre, all parts felt very rushed and poorly paced. I still liked it, but I would give it a 7/10 rather than the 10/10 starting season…
That said, episode 7 was fantastic. The only episode where the writers let characters actually talk for more than 30 seconds.
It could have used an extra season, but the money they spent on this show was already a gamble. I am honored to have been able to experience a studio really give their all to make this show. They did a lot within the 9 episodes they were given. Visually it’s a master piece and I am just happy I got to see Ekko with his sword, even if it was for a little bit.
This show will definitely be something I rewatch throughout my life.
I was always interested in the League of Legends lore, but could never get into the games, and was off-put when I found out the games don’t really use the lore. I hope they are able to continue with other stories in the future. I may give a shot at some of the riot forge games, even though I know that’s closing down.
I watched both season 1, for the first time, and 2 in the last month. And thoroughly enjoyed all of it. I’m excited to see what else comes next, even if it’s not a direct sequel like rumors say. I didn’t have an issue with the many threads they were trying to discuss, and liked how they brought them all together.
The game itself is extremely hectic and lives in short glimpses into the characters lives in their battles, and I feel like these quick and brief glimpses reflects that well for me. And I also felt that each glimpse flowed together and built upon the greater story very well.
If I were to have a complaint, it’s that I want more and wish that the game itself had a single player story driven campaign with elements like WC3.
I’m 50/50 about it. Obviously spoilers ahead…
My favorite episode was the alternate universe one, where I could, in my head, just hear that song from season 1 “what could’ve been”, with tears in my eyes, seeing Powder and everyone else so happy and getting along.
But overall the season felt so much weaker. To me it felt rushed, a kinda all over the place. It felt like they originally planned to have three seasons but then decided to cramp everything from season 2 and 3 into a final one, which cut a lot of things short. I think the relationship mending between Vi and Powder felt kinda rushed, it needed more time to develop - same with Powder’s mental progression. Things just happened too fast and with too little screen time. Or Jayce surviving in that cave?! Where did he even get all the resources from to make fire or repurpose his hammer? Other characters like Sevika completely fell to the sidelines and did not even have dialog towards the end. Mel’s story also felt super rushed and just happened, which kinda felt like they did not do her justice. Powder’s ending was sad, I loved her, but that whole last moment also was kinda lacking.
The whole season felt like a pot full of tasty ingredients only warmed up, instead of letting it gently cook for a few hours and let all those aromas blend together into something amazing.
It was all over the place, I barely knew what was going on half the time. The story felt empty and meaningless. Visuals were nice though.
3/10.
Emotional stakes > all other stakes
It’s what made season 1 so good with the climax being essentially a family dinner. I felt really disappointed that a lot of the emotional stakes were sacrificed for action set-pieces. The climax of s2 felt like Age of Ultron: league of legends edition.
I disliked how significant of a role class conflict played. I understand there is a corporate agenda to downplay such things for ideological purposes but it still disappoints me.
Act 1 was easily my favorite act.
Did anyone else find irony in the clearly anti-establishment “jinxers” faction very obviously painting a thin blue like across the entire frame. Within the logic of the story it makes sense but contextually I found that visual amusing.
I was planning on binging season 2 like I did with 1 but am struggling to get past episode 4 ;_; So far it’s a 5/10.Oof that was not great, the best episode was 7 but even that wasn’t an amazing. It’s a 3/10 for me. No amount of pretty visuals will be a substitute for bad pacing and shitty writing.
Way too many music videos crammed in.
The prison sexscene after jinx basically alluded to killing herself was nonsensical.
The multiple timeline hijinx should have been left out.
What they did with vander should have ended at episode 3.
No character was ever in danger, not even heimerdinger.There is more but to end it on a positive not, heimerdinger singing aping the wheel is my favourite (and only song I liked) song, lil man can really yordle a tune.
It’s nice to find a place with opinions close to my experience. YouTube is full of praise, and it was good in some aspects, but the pacing and especially the writing was disappointing to me.
[Spoilers]. Viktor is my biggest pet peeve. He goes from trying to eradicate suffering to trying to unify consciousness (huh?) to changing his mind too fast even within his world.
[More spoilers]. He’s a genius with increased capacities, but apparently, it didn’t occur to him that that’s how the world would look and feel like. He’s almost a prophet, a philosopher in many senses, but Jayce tells him “life is good even with its imperfections” and poof!, convinced, as it wasn’t the status quo to think that way and as if he didn’t even consider it in the past. But no, let’s make the animated philosophical pessimist/negative utilitarian a radical that loses-it-just-because.
[Spoilers continue]. And the worst of all is the enormous contradiction, as he creates a state with no suffering, but somehow, he feels bored, nostalgic, longing… Those are ways of suffering! If that state wasn’t enough, then it wasn’t the objective and it wasn’t the correct state. But no, the message had to be “life can be terrible, but embrace it because the hive-mind we are posing as non-existence seems sad from here (although it wouldn’t be sad from there; we’ll ignore that); also, let’s ditch the message about fighting for at least improving its conditions because that’s communism or something”. Shitty feel-good message. They can do a wholesome, feel-good show without ruining a character and without invalidating their own characters’ experiences.
[Mini spoiler]. In short, It was frustrating to watch Viktor unjustified descent, while real problems were not addressed.
Haven’t watched it at all, just curious:
Did they talk about where Jayce’s crystals come from?
Yes, but the answer was kind of dumb.
Eh, it was okay. I just wish they’d developed & explored it more deeply. Felt a bit like they watched the AoT finale and thought they wanted to do something similar.