@D-magic said:

Season 2 still has amazing animation, cool action and interesting characters. There is even an expansion of the world to show all the magical and strange stuff. And the story arc itself is quite good if you describe it on the high level. The main conflict between Jayce and Viktor started already in season 1 and developed in season 2 to be the center of the story, and overall the writing is still good. However, the biggest issue in season 2 is related to the direction and the people that decided how to tell the story. And a lot of the director's decisions were either weak or just wrong.

The biggest problem for me was the overload of the pathos and the melodrama, with long and super dramatic closeups on random characters we see for the first time and over abuse of the slow motion in unnecessary situations. This felt empty and hollow, many times interfering with the flow of the story. It gave false importance to mundane situations and it was very bothering.

Another big problem was the constant side switching and very volatile relationships between the main characters. Season 1 was more relaxed in this aspect and the relationships were dramatic, but not so forced, not so explosive and not so sudden without any preparation. Many times in season 2 it was very chaotic with little justification, which made the characters look stupid and too capricious. Once scene the characters express mutual affection, and the scene after they fight and break up over some small misunderstanding. Or vice versa. This really affected the characters and made them too shallow.

And there are more smaller problems, like overload of the information from one side and complete lack of the explanation for some events on the other. Also bothered me super fast solutions to the obstacles, like when Ekko was teleported to that alternative reality. It seems like it took them few days to build the device and just few hours to scale it up to bigger size. While it took years for Jayce and Viktor in season 1. This unrealistic approach makes the world too shallow and superficial. The story itself is good, it was great to see Ekko discovering such reality. But the handling of the story and how to show the events and how to reach the solution was done quite badly.

I think season 2 was rushed too much to get new season in time, which affected the creative work and forced half-baked solutions, while trying to hide it with chaotic visuals. There could be season 3, but I hope the creators will take more time to prepare better. Because if season 1 was like season 2, not sure the show would've been such a hit.

Arcane S01 was a solid 9 for me. S02, however, I could rate as 7 easily. Agree with everything you said. If this finale could be worked on with an interlude season, maybe the delivery would be way better. I still don't understand how Ekko fell in love with Jinx/Powder, delivered a time-warp machine and saved the world in the course of a few days. This is just lazy writing.