Arcane’s Most Memorable Moments

Of the many outstanding qualities that make up the hit Netflix show, Arcane, is the way how everything that comes together often creates a crescendo, allowing the show to highlight specific, profound moments. Allowing these moments enough room to breathe elevates Arcane from good to great, and the addition of so many stand-out moments evenly distributed among prominent characters elevates the show from great to legendary. Here are some of the most memorable moments from season one that made everyone’s jaws drop.

Table of Contents

Powder’s Monkey Bomb

During the first three episodes, Arcane builds up the close relationship between sisters Vi (Hailee Steinfeld) and Powder (Mia Sinclair Jenness), as well as the found family that they live with in The Lanes: Vander (JB Blanc), their father figure, and Mylo (Yuri Lowenthal) and Claggar (Roger Craig Smith). Vi is the leader of the kids group, but Powder, as the youngest, is always struggling to keep up. She wants to be taken seriously like Vi and wants to finally prove Mylo wrong when he calls her a jinx. Unfortunately, none of her homemade bombs work, leading Vi to leave her behind when she, Mylo, and Claggar go on a rescue mission to save Vander. Powder follows with a stolen arcane gem and sets it off just as her family is about to escape Silco’s (Jason Spisak) clutches.

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Powder is blown from the building in beautifully animated slow-motion, as glowing blue sparks rain down around her. Based alone on her facial expression, Powder is clearly ecstatic that her monkey bomb worked. The scene replays the explosion from multiple perspectives: Powder falls; Silco is thrown out of the way by Sevika (Arimah Vann), who loses her arm in the blast; Marcus (Remy Hill) sees the blue flame from far away; and Mylo and Claggar are both killed in the explosion. The use of alternating slow-motion and regular speed elongates shots that leave a greater emotional impact, while still keeping the shock value and feeling that everything is happening too quickly to stop.

The unfortunate success of Powder’s monkey bomb is a shocking and explosive end to Act I and serves as the catalyst for Vi and Powder’s falling out, and the visuals paired with the tragedy that Powder gets what she wants only to lose so much more, highlight just how much this one moment changes everything.

Vander’s Last Stand

From Vander’s first introduction as the main character duo’s father figure, death flags were waving all around him, especially considering how powerful a player he is in the Undercity, keeping peace between his people and Piltover. Naturally, his death isn’t unexpected, but the execution is what makes his last stand remarkable.

Until Powder’s explosion incapacitates all three of his kids, viewers have never seen Vander truly fight before. He’d given up his life of violence with the hopes of welcoming peace. So, when Vander stands his ground against a Shimmer-strengthened Deckard (Josh Keaton) to save his daughter, it’s exciting to see that he isn’t in the least bit rusty. It looks like Vander has the upper hand when he is back-stabbed by Silco. Even getting stabbed doesn’t slow him down, but he refuses to kill Silco on principle and is tossed unceremoniously off a bridge and into an entire pile of Shimmer vials. Not only do viewers get an epic fistfight between Vander and Deckard, but they also get to witness the damage that a Shimmer-strengthened Vander can do.

Even when given the opportunity to take revenge against Silco, Vander lets him go, instead choosing to save Vi and attempt to protect Powder with his final breath. Though Vander’s death may have been an obvious plot point, his principles and beast-like fighting skills are a tremendous display of his will. As far as death-bound mentor figures go, Vander made sure to leave a mark, and he protected his daughters in the process, choosing to reject violence in favor of peace until the bitter end.

Jinx’s Flare

Powder, having gone mad with guilt and resentment toward Vi, has been renamed Jinx (Ella Purnell) and has become a terror, accepting a new life as Silco’s daughter. But when Vi resurfaces after several years, Jinx decides that she wants to see her sister again after all. She lights the flare she’s been carrying for years in an effort to signal Vi, standing atop a high building to ensure the best view and holding the flare up until it fizzles out. Even though the reunion between Jinx and Vi following the flare scene is less than ideal, the scene itself is a beautiful cry for help from a young woman who knows she’s lost her way and just wants her sister back.

No words are spoken in this scene, as Jinx spends the entire sequence with her eyes closed, daring to hope but too scared to look. The scene is accompanied by the song “Guns for Hire” by Woodkid and the ghosts of the past. Jinx stands back-to-back with gray visions of Mylo and Claggar, clearly showing just how the weight of their deaths burdens her. Nevertheless, Jinx takes a huge step toward becoming a healthier person by facing Vi again.

Ekko v. Jinx

By the time Ekko (Reed Shannon) is reintroduced to the series, he has become an extremely competent leader and fighter, having held up the fight against Jinx and Silco all these years to keep the Undercity safe. As the leader of the Firelights, he takes action instead of just spying on people like he used to do when he was too young to fight. Despite his rivalry with Jinx, he used to consider her a friend. He and Powder used to mock fight as kids, and Powder would usually win. But Ekko learns from his mistakes, making him and Jinx evenly matched. Their battle sequence on the bridge is mostly flashback material, with a stylistic change of animation that intersperses younger Powder and younger Ekko with their older counterparts.

This first portion presents their fight as a fun game before rewinding back and showing the fight again, this time between the older Ekko and Jinx. Instead of slow-motion action shots and cool poses, this fight lasts only a few seconds, as Jinx shoots rapidly and Ekko rushes to get in close. Ultimately, Ekko hesitates too long before he can finish her off, and Jinx sets off a bomb that’s too close to both of them. Despite the fight ending in a draw, it’s one of the most satisfying fights in the series. It shows off Ekko’s hard-won skills and an impressive and perfectly-timed change in animation style.

Vi and Jayce’s Team-Up

Meanwhile, in Piltover, Hextech-inventor-turned-councilman Jayce (Kevin Alejandro), is buckling beneath the pressure of keeping his people safe from terrorists in the Undercity. When faced with the evidence of Silco and Jinx’s advanced weaponry, Jayce is swayed by Mel to consider using Hextech, originally invented to help people and save lives, to make weapons for the protection of Piltover. And though Mel eventually changes her viewpoint when the arrival of her mother reminds her what war looks like, the same event makes Jayce even more impatient to take action against the rising threat. When Vi tells the council that Silco is behind everything, both Vi and Jayce are frustrated when the council talks about making a deal with Silco instead of bringing him to justice. In the privacy of Jayce’s blacksmith workshop, Vi approaches with an offer: team up and destroy Silco’s Shimmer production.

For those who are familiar with the champions from League of Legends, which Arcane is based on, this development is an exciting display of Jayce’s signature weapon from the game: his war hammer. When Jayce and Vi launch their attack, their teamwork is fluid and their oversized weapons (gauntlets and hammer) slam their opponents mercilessly. The attack seems to be a victory until Jayce shatters the fighting suit of one of his opponents and realizes that he’s just fatally wounded a child soldier. The exciting music cuts off abruptly, and the child falls to his death.

For Jayce, this is a powerful moment of realization for what war would mean, not just for Piltover but for the Undercity, and the event pushes him toward the side of diplomacy and peace. But for viewers, an amazingly choreographed action scene followed immediately by emotional heartbreak is the best of both worlds.

Viktor’s Run

One of the most interesting side characters on the Piltover side of the story goes through his own expansive character arc. Viktor (Harry Lloyd), Jayce’s partner and fellow scientist, has been disabled ever seen he was a child and growing up in the Undercity put him at another disadvantage in life. Despite all this, his ambition and relentless desire to help people pushed him to rise in station, becoming a respected scientist in Piltover. But at the height of Hextech’s popularity, he is diagnosed with a fatal illness. With a body that was already weak and frail, Viktor doesn’t have much longer to contribute to the world.

However, he finds a potential way to heal himself through a more developed version of the arcane, the Hextech core. Even though the transmutation is dangerous and requires the Undercity drug, Shimmer, in order to work, Viktor risks everything to try it out. The first experiment is a resounding success. As Viktor stands at the docks at night, he drops his crutch and tests out his new foot, made completely out of Hextech. When he realizes that he can stand and walk on it, he immediately starts to jog and then run as fast as he can, screaming with the rush of being able to defy his physical limits.

This scene is a parallel to a flashback during which Viktor chases his homemade toy boat down a river and falls when he’s unable to keep up with it, signifying his inability to keep up with the flow of progress and even his own inventions. Now, with the help of Hextech, his body is stronger and allows him to accomplish things he’s always desperately wanted to do. The viewer follows Viktor down the dock in a wide shot as he outruns the boats. Though the scene is immediately followed by the tragic downside to risky Hextech experiments, Viktor’s run remains as one of Arcane’s most satisfying scenes.

Silco’s Last Words

A good storyline can benefit from a good villain, and Silco blows it out of the water with his polite but cruel drawl, intimidating presence, and hellish actions. But despite terrorizing the Undercity that he claims to care so much about, using child soldiers, manipulating his adopted daughter, and murdering those who get in his way, Silco is a multidimensional character who isn’t entirely evil. From his first encounter with Powder, he sees himself in her and over the years grows to truly love her as his daughter. Many times throughout the series his actions prove that he cares deeply for Jinx, the most telling of which is his inability to make a deal with Jayce that would have given him his coveted nation of Zaun but would also have forced him to betray Jinx.

When Jinx becomes overwhelmed in the series finale and shoots him in the chest on instinct, Silco doesn’t blame her at all and with his dying breath assures her that he would never have given her up. As gently as Silco has ever spoken, he says the words of affirmation that Jinx has always wanted to hear, “Don’t cry. You’re perfect.” Though Silco himself is far from perfect, his love for Jinx makes his death scene, and his entire performance throughout Arcane truly meaningful.