League of Legends is one of the most popular game titles worldwide, with over 100 million users playing this strategic MOBA game at least once a month. The game developer, in collaboration with Netflix, decided to turn this power into series production two years ago. “Every legend has a beginning,” Riot Games said of the first trailer released on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of the popular game.
The Arcane series takes viewers in three acts into a world called Runeterra, home to the rich city of Piltover and the poor foothills of Zaun. Tensions between the regions escalate into an open war.
During the nine episodes, the audience will get acquainted with a total of eleven champions. They will get to know the stories of two heroines, Jinx and Caitlyn, to whom the British actresses Ella Purnell and Katie Leung lent their voices. You may know the former from Miss Peregrin’s Orphanage for Strange Children or The Army of the Dead. Leung is best known for her character as Cho Chang in the Harry Potter films that a young wizard falls in love with.
Jinx is known as the blue-haired criminal from Zaun. She has a huge arsenal of weapons, she likes explosions and destruction. Her most popular weapon is a deadly missile. At the same time, Jinx doesn’t like boredom, which is confirmed by her dabber Ella Purnell.
“She is crazy and evil. But it was a lot of fun to play her. I have an extreme understanding for her because she has a really cruel fate. It was enough for one thing to happen differently in her life and she would not be the Jinx, “explains Ella Purnell, one of the heroines of the series exclusively for the E15 daily.
Opposite the mad criminal is the famous guardian of order Caitlyn in the series. “I would describe her as a black sheep, she is tight and very educated,” Katie Leung describes her character for E15. The Sheriff of Piltover can outsmart criminals by setting various traps for them, but she’s not perfect either.
“She’s a shooter and a super tough guy, but she makes bad decisions, just like all of us,” says Leung, returning to her first meeting, when the British actress was most impressed by the heroine’s image: “She was wearing a uniform and her rifle, the one the costume was incredible. ”
The visual side of the series is praised by both actresses. The French company Fortiche Production, which has been working with Riot since 2013, worked on the animations. At that time, their first music video from the game League of Legends called Get Jinxed was made. Later, Fortiche made a music video for the official song RISE for the 2018 World Cup.
In addition to Riot Games, the production company has in the past merged with other game studios such as Ubisoft or Carbine Studios.
It may seem that the series is here mainly for millions of League of Legends players. According to actresses Purnell and Leung, the series will also entertain viewers who have never turned on the game. The two of them haven’t played a single minute in League of Legends yet.
“They often ask us, and I’m more and more ashamed when I have to say no,” laughs Purnell, but then adds that he sees it as an advantage. “If I knew the game, I would have to be scared to play the role of Jinx,” he returns to the unpleasant nature of her character.
The creators of Arcane also warn that the story will be understandable to everyone. “You know champions as League of Legends fighters, but do you know what they do when they don’t get their noses in the game?” says executive producer Christian Linke.
“We always wanted the series to be accessible to viewers regardless of the relationship with the game,” adds another author of the series, Alex Yee.
Both Yee and Linke know the world of League of Legends very well, they have worked in the Riot Games studio for over 11 years. One as a designer, the other in the position of creative director stood at the birth of individual champions. “We’ve been trying for a long time to find another way to tell people a story,” says Yee. “But the game has different needs in terms of what you can do with the characters. At Arcane, we can go deeper, ”adds Linke.
Another reason why the Arcane series was created was offered by the head of the sports division at Riot Games, John Needham, for the Washington Post. The American company does not want to keep the League of Legends brand only in the field of computer games, but it wants to become an entertainment company of the twenty-first century, which is deeply rooted in games.
The premiere of the Arcane series is thus associated with a number of other activities that connect the series and the world of video games. On Saturday afternoon, the finals of the Worlds Championship in the League of Legends will culminate, and before the Damwon and Edward Gaming teams share the title, the bands Imagine Dragons and PVRIS will play in front of them, as well as singer Bea Miller and rappers JID and Denzel Curry. serial soundtrack.
Netflix has also, for the first time, exclusively teamed up with Twitch.tv and Chinese Tencent Video to broadcast the opening episode of the series on these platforms. Viewers can play Arcane for free at their favorite streamers and watch the first episode together.
Already during this week, a three-minute trailer for the series also appeared on the world’s tallest building, the Burj Khalifa in Dubai.
Subsequently, the digital celebrations will continue at the RiotX Arcane festival in League of Legends, Legends of Runeterra, Teamfight Tactics or Valorant, where various parties will take place and players will receive special game items. As a result, Riot will bring his characters to other games, for example, the character Jinx will appear in the Fortnite shooter from Epic Games.
The next three episodes of the Arcane series will be released in a week on Sunday, November 14, and a week later Netflix will present the final three episodes. Along with that, he will also publish the songs that will be heard in the series; in addition to the already mentioned bands, the English singer Sting also took part in the soundtrack.
