How to tell a Visual Story: Arcane and Verticality
Visual entertainment such as TV shows and films possess a unique advantage that literary mediums do not. With cinematographic decisions that appear consistently throughout the work, the director can convey a consistent theme that embellishes the main story. For the first three episodes of Arcane, the common theme that looped the two major subplots was verticality. The vertical difference between the physical placing of the characters in the scenes reinforces the story shared between the outcasts of Piltover and Zaun. This theme also adds further contrast to the diverging progression of the subplots as Jayce ascends above the archaic, rigid rules of Piltover while Powder initiates her descent into the terrorist Jinx.
To show the need to climb up the disparaging world of Arcane, it is integral to present to the audience the sheer difference between the “have” s and “have not” s. Arcane uses masterful visual exposition to convey most of this without using a single word of dialogue during the first three minutes of the show. As Vi is carried away from the bridge, the audience witnesses the remnants of the massacre from her perspective. She looks up to see a towering statue. [Figure 1] Its stern face mirrors the hostility of the Piltover enforcers that murdered countless citizens from the undercity, and the message they collectively convey is presented in the following shot. [Figure 2] The separation of the two worlds could not be more evident from the visual perspective. Piltover’s white and golden buildings under clear skies loom over the blood-red smokes that contain the piles of corpses of people who attempted to cross the line. Through this short introduction, Arcane successfully establishes the class conflict that will predominantly shape the narrative for Vi and Powder. The contemptuous expression on Vi’s face towards Piltover further supports her character arc of rebellion seen in the first three episodes of the show. The very next scene shows Vi and the gang climbing up the buildings of Piltover with a Robin Hood-esque motive to take from the affluent and share with the impoverished. The almost-identical panoramic shot at the beginning and the end of the first episode with Vi and Powder solidifies the determination of the sisters to climb up the ranks of their hostile world. [Figure 3 and 4]
Jayce and Viktor’s success in their collaborative research of hextech are first shown through the perspective of Heimerdinger, the renowned scientist of Piltover and the leader of the Academy. Upon entering his lab, he looks up to see both of his students floating around the arcane orb. [Figure 5] Its mysterious power is emphasized through the celestial symbols revolving around the magical sphere, something that even the centuries-old scientist cannot fully comprehend. The vertical difference between them is emphasized further as the shot goes to an omniscient point of view to show the entire laboratory. The division between the two factions is vertical and horizontal with Heimerdinger on the lower-left where there are very few particles of hextech and the duo on the upper-right surrounded by the wonders of their discovery. With solid proof behind his lifelong research, Jayce’s triumphant face alludes to the new era of Piltover with the power of hextech.
Powder’s devolution into Jinx is, in contrast, shown through the theme of descent. With the explosion of the arcane crystals, Powder falls off the cannery, where Vi and others attempt to rescue Vander from Silco. [Figure 6] Here, the audience is shown the other side of the arcane that Heimerdinger warned about. The explosion injures and murders the ones caught in the blast, while Powder’s expression of glee is shown simultaneously to the death caused by her gadget. [Figure 7] The arcane that allowed Jayce to climb up the ranks of Piltover act as a tool that starts Powder’s descent towards madness. With the loss of Vander and her friends, Vi cuts ties with Powder and leaves her alone in the burning ruins. Powder’s eyes of hatred at the end of the episode allude to the beginning of her transformation while completing the divergent parallel of the two subplots.
Arcane presents a world foreign to most of the audience, as the general expectation should be that the mainstream media consumers aren’t familiar with the lore of “League of Legends.” The creators’ masterful exposition and cinematographic decisions are essential in conveying the dual narrative they have established. The first three episodes have securely established the base from which the characters can thrive, and it’ll be interesting to observe these plotlines’ development.
