Arcane: Bridging the Rift | Part 2 - Persistence (Or When Your Best Still Sucks) 

Everyone's talking about Christian, and he totally deserves the praise, but shoutout to Amanda and Melinda who genuinely saved and helped create the beautiful work of art we got

Huge credit to Riot for not accepting "good enough" and being willing to stall the project in the pursuit of excellence. It doesn't happen nearly enough in movies and television.

"if you're working on something with no pressure, or no feeling of being overwhelmed at times, you're working on something the world is gonna forget." I'm holding on to these words for the rest of my life..

Dude when Christian got pranked about the funding I imagine him laughing it off in the room and then leaving through the door and just collapsing immediatly from terror and relief xD

Crazy that Arcane initially failing led to what are probably the two most beloved animations that Riot have produced

You realize you are now OBLIGATED to publish the Director's cut version of the KDA

Love the feel Melinda gave when she showed off her Annie Award she earned from before and how proud of it she was. Then Arcane went on to sweep the Annie their first season. Incredible.

So we have Amanda to thank for sustaining the Vi and Caitlyn relationship Xx

Its crazy hearing how close to collapse Arcane came. It's heartwarming hearing that trust between members of riot, fortiche, and others that kept their dream alive. Ya'll killed it. We'll wait as long as you need to have it all again in season 2.

Amanda is the writer we deserved but never knew we needed!!!

Melinda literally came in their like Mom and picked everyone up.

i feel like arcane is a really important turning point in western animation. it shows that animation doesnt always need to be directed at children. as an aspiring animator i really hope ill get to work on something as amazing as this some day

Christian Linke is basically an anime protagonist, dude's a legend.

Really puts in perspective how long they've been working on this when you're told "Rise" and K/DA as a whole wouldn't exist if it wasn't for the struggles they had working on Arcane

If I'm honest Arcane was the first tv series I watched without skipping parts of episodes. I normally get so bored when watching series but everything about Arcane was just breathtaking. I never watched anything better

Amanda thank you for Vi's fight scene and for focusing on putting Vi in Cait's thoughts, we love them together so much

Who came up with the idea for this documentary? Everything coming out of Riot right now is straight fire.

I love watching behind the scenes of anything, but Arcane? I would happily watch hours of behind the scenes of this. Tell Christian that he's a legend. Literally. Fortiche too. 👏👏👏

WE LOVE AMANDA!!!! GOD that final words from jinx moment is soooo powerful!

Melinda sounds like such an empathetic and beautiful person, Im so glad all these incredible people came together and persevered through all the obstacles that were between them and the realization of the truly great series that Arcane came to be. Truly a story worth telling on its own!

6:54 the director's cut of the KDA song is just magic, i beg you to release it xDDDD

I have no doubt the whole arcane process was hard af, and I think we can all agree that we appreciate how it all ended up and that you kept persistent and kept going no matter how hard things got and how little motivation you must’ve had at times!

So grateful that all this effort is being shared with us. Thank you to everyone that was involved and please take your time with season 2 of Arcane!

36 years old. Never once played or even heard of League of Legends besides whispers of a weird MOBA that webs play. I stumbled across Arcane months after it released, and during the time In between never got any general buzz from it. Finally gave it a chance and was completely taken back on how absolutely amazing this show managed to be in the current climate of culture. It really nailed it. It instantly made me a life long fan of the franchise and company Riot. I sit here eating this behind the scenes emotional about how crazy this show is.

The parallels between Viktor and the show’s development journey is actually super interesting

I want the full version of "POP/STAR DIRECTOR'S CUT"

I loved seeing how the women on the team drive the emotional care in the series characters, and the work environment

Props to Riot for saying no early on. Props to Fortiche for hanging in there. Props to all the awesome women highlighted in this vid who were originally outside of both teams to help them figure out how to do specific things better.

It's so cooool when the writers get in the shoes of the characters in order to understand them completely!!

Literally started crying at the Jinx monologue. It's awesome to see the people behind this, the creative minds who made the show so good.

The more you learn about the history of the production, the more you get astounded that this even happened at all. The sheer combination of unlikely unique circumstances is mind boggling.

And this is why Arcane is great. It contains a shard of soul from everyone working on it.

Arcane is the best animated series I've ever watched.

Maybe one of the reasons they do this is because a lot of people think that riot is the only company who created arcane. but man, kudos to all people who make arcane possible and set a new high standard in the animation industry. I've never seen such a masterpiece like this.

This was such a heavy episode, thank goodness for Amanda and Melinda for saving the series and boosting the team. Everyone did so good in keeping their hopes up when all things are crumbled. Would also love to read this in writing, with more behind the scene concept art. Please release an artbook Riot/Fortiche PLEASE!

The directors cut K/d/a video is pure gold. It really shows how much fun and passion they have with the project.

Christian is a National Treasure that *NEEDS TO BE* protected at all cost!!!

It requires any creative project so many elements go right. Imagine how many good idea projects go into scrap just because certain element doesn’t go as planned. I am glad Arcane didn’t fall through.

I’m so happy it’s being normalized to post this behind-the-scenes type content, as an aspiring writer it’s interesting to learn the process of writing a series

After watching this episode, it now makes the Arcane finale even more poetic because of the constant feeling of losing and failing successfully. Arcane had to lose to gain wins along the way and culminated into a spectacular explosion of emotional chaos. I had no idea that RISE and POP STARS came from the ashes of the Arcane production halt.

Right now, I'm a crying little girl. Thank you to each of you for holding on, for going all the way to give us Arcane. I hope I'm not being too mean by saying that your sacrifices weren't in vain. Every fall was worth it. The result is perfect, you are perfect. Thank you for everything. So you hear that, guys ? If it's going to take time to be good, then it will take time. No need to shout "we want season 2 faster", it's useless to add this pressure to them. If you have a bit of understanding, and I'm not even talking about empathy, you'll just be patient.

We’re here for the hints and extra content about arcane, we stay for the incredible story behind it

so glad amanda and melinda were brought onto the team! they really helped transform crucial parts of the show and make arcane into the amazing series that it is!

Love how many women worked on this project and were a huge part of bringing it all together!

6:48 I will keep this in my nightmare tonight.

I honestly need a book with every single detail on this show

Arcane is one of the few, if not the only series that I can think of that I've willingly rewatched. Breaking Bad, Scrubs, Band of Brothers. I love them all to bits but Arcane somehow is the one series that had me coming back for round two.

The opening scene in Arcane is one of the best opening scenes I've ever seen Massive props to Amanda

No way, Christian is behind everything that I love about League of Legends? Absolute legend

i would kill to be a writer on this team. this is where u go to ascend to the writing of legends. The animators are geniuses the Rioters are smurfing and the Writers are unbelievable. this might be the only game that could legit have an endless series forever.

Thank you to Melinda and Amanda for making this series happen👏 The pure JOY in Amanda's voice at the scenes she's proud of absolutely pour through the screen. I was just as gitty watching her gush about being able to write it as when I watched the scene for the first time. It truly is so momentous and I can't express how happy I am to imagine how many girls and women are inspired by those characters.

As a 8 years LoL player, I want to say: Thank you Riot, thank you for loving us. Thank you for making this happen.

Is it a coincidence that the feelings and words of the characters in the series feel so close to part of what we see here? The answer is pretty obvious. This series shows how much love everyone put into their work, and even the luck they had at some moments, fortunately, or not you only can keep walking at some point and hope for the best, but even then... you need to have tried first. This whole crew is a treasure.

Glad to know they had such confidence that season 2 was already green lighted even before season 1 came out.

So freaking admirable that no one gave up on this. Literally the best series I've ever watched because of the depth, nuances, and attention to detail in scenes and areas that wouldn't be seen unless you looked super hard.

As someone who works IN the animation Industry this stuff is always so fascinating because no 2 productions are the same and I knew riot was a company thats never made a series and Fortiche mostly only did music videos and was small so all those growing pains were a huge part of the time it took but didn't know how close they were to this not ever being made! Can't wait to keep watching the behind the scenes!

I love how those two music videos had lyrics that connected so much with the team's current situation. "Rise, they will remember you" "Ain't nobody bringing us down" I wonder if that's why we all connected so much with those songs

"It's ambitious and crazy, but we need you to trust us...and he did!" this Emotion-Ball Guy is so touching at this crucial moment... Beautiful Video. 🙂🌎🇲🇫⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

i trust this team with season 2 of arcane. seeing truly how much work goes behind creating something like this show, i believe season 2 will be amazing, if not better. i hope riot games take their time with it like they did with the first season, because i know so many of us will wait however long it takes to see these characters back on the screen. sending strength and love to the whole team

I love that the general theme of this video is "X team was struggling and then they brought in an amazing woman who led them to victory"

It's so inspiring to get to know the story behind Arcane. Knowing what challenges these amazing people had to endure and overcome just for the sake of it's players made the show feel more special than it already is. Arcane is truly not just any other series, instead it is a testament of love to animation, gaming and storytelling! "If you're creating something without the feelings of pressure, stress, and feelings of getting overwhelm; then you're creating something that the world is gonna forget"

As someone who is so fascinated in animation and is my dream career, I love this series so much! I love arcane and just listening to the 2 parts…just everything that went behind it, I’m so amazed. Thank you to all the creators and minds that go/ went into creating arcane, music videos, etc…yall are so amazing! Thank you!!

In the pursuit of great, they failed to do good. Instead they went above and beyond greatness and created a masterpiece!

This brings Rise and Pop Stars lyrics to a new deeper level considering what the studio and teams were going through at the time. Amazing work!

i love how Fortche’s style is so real it feels like i can just hold out and touch everything on the screen

This is an awesome behind the scenes look. As an author, I especially loved the deeper look into the writing procedures and to find out they're pretty much the same way I write. 😊 Half of my notes are like "Something about Caitlyn here," and I'll figure it out later. Amazing how close we came to just never getting this incredible, incredible show...

i hope we get to see a recording of them finding out how well the show was recieved on launch.. with this documentary in mind, seeing all the struggle they went through, i'm tearing up just imagining how relieved they must have been when the show launched and sky rocketed in popularity.

I could probably listen to all of them for hours. It's very clear that everyone involved is immensely passionate for what they're doing. From what I can tell it looks like Arcane has the potential to not only be one of the most ambitious and (well-deserved) successful animation series so far, but to also completely revolutionize a whole industry.

"We all want to take animation to this place of mature drama..." 👏👏👏 Thank-you for doing it.

its crazy how little they were working with and how amazing the season 1 ended up being. I think it changed my life tbh, what a fantastic show.

Fun fact: The same models they used for the K/DA video of the artists they also used in Arcane. It was in episode 1 where a guy got kicked out of the brothel and episode 4 where you could see them again in a small airship saying "happy progress day!"

You guys absolutely nailed Arcane, me and my friends have watched it like 4-5 times with different people, we love it and had never been a part of League beforehand. This show is a 10/10, take as long as you’re any with Season 2

The behind the scenes story of the making of Arcane is almost as wild as Arcane itself. Glad you stuck out the hardships on continued fighting, because Arcane turned out amazing. (And also thanks for Rise and Pop Stars)

the animated producers dancing for KDA is the cake of this video

I don’t know you guys but AMANDA was so enthusiastic writing those VI and CAITHLIN ‘s scenes , and I love it !!!!!!

Seeing how bringing Arcane to life was such a Challenging and Draining thing, and yet the team managed to create something so Awesome and incredible enough to pull people who had never heard of League before is incredible and inspiring.

I'm so glad we're getting a behind the scenes series for Arcane. Love seeing all the people who made this masterpiece and changed my life in a way. I really appreciate all their hard work and am so glad they didn't give up on Arcane.

This teared me up, I never knew how hard and tough Riot and Fortiche has been working until now.

"The pursuit of creative work is complex. If your expectation to work on something creatively is where you're going to have no pressure or no feeling of being overwhelmed at times, then you're working on something the world is going to forget."

This is showing it's a lot about having the right people at the right time, and a good mix of personalities, is absolutely essential to pulling something this amazing off.

OMFG watching this episode made me feel so emotional about the struggle to bring Arcane to us. I am immeasurably grateful to the ENTIRE team for putting their heart and soul into this production and making it something so special and so nuanced. I was reluctant to watch the series at first because I have never played the game, but I was ABSOLUTELY hooked halfway through the first episode. There is SO much feeling in every second of every episode. I am eternally grateful that you persevered through the struggle to create and release a series that has changed my life in so many ways.

To the Arcane, Riot and Fortiche teams I sincerely thank you and wish you all the best

6:49 OKAY BUT THIS IS ICONIC

I'm so glad their doing this so we get to see all the heroes behind the screens that made this production come to life. I hope they know how much we as a fanbase appreciate the love they put into this show.

I'm really thankful you're letting us fans get a peek into your creative process. It really helps us appreciate the blood, sweat and tears you've poured into this masterpiece of animation. I eagerly look forward to seeing what you have in store for us in season 2.

I´m glad we get to see this, honestly, as someone who loves animation as a medium and the love that I personally have to the story and the world of Runaterra that so many rioters have crafted over the years. To see the amount of effort that you guys put on Arcane to make it like no other animation series with the detail on every single aspect from production, animation , storytelling, characters and ambient and how it really paid off all that effort from the trust that you had between yourselves in every member of the team, and to see it in this series as highlights from the very backbone of the production procces, I cannot but say thank you for creating the series and thank you for letting everyone see the behind the scenes, and every single person who worked on this are legends for daring to create something that has never done before and thank you for feeding the love that I have for the League IP and it´s amazing world. Amanda, Hervé, Christian, Alex, Melinda, Nicolo and everyone at Riot and Fortishe are legends.

It's so amazing that when any other studio would've totally just shelved this due to any problems, minor or major, Riot allowed them to keep going. I know I'll say this til I am blue in the face, but props to every single person involved with this show. And whoever handles the money at that studio, thank you for allowing a dream to live.

Boi I got goosebumps when Jinx started speaking. That was such a tear-jerker scene

People don’t realise how France is insanely good in animation

A decade, I have wished for this after watching LOL cinematics for years. I will wait a decade more for another season of this masterpiece.

Arcane is in my top 10 of all time, right up there with Casablanca and Inception. All the risk taking and hard work and emotional labor really made something exceptional.

I find it so interesting and inspiring that the guys working on this were told the intial script was bad after working on it for so long. Some people would have given up there but continued to work on it and not give up

I usually dont watch documentaries but dammit am i in love with this one

Seeing this... seeing the creators go through the motions really validates my journey as a writer. I feel seen 😭❤ Thank you for this.

I'm SO happy Vi and Caitlin's budding relationship was pushed for💗 One of the most interesting parts of the show. It really adds heart to both of their characters. Beyond excited for s2!!!!

I always said that while episode 1 was good, it was by far the worst episode of the season, and this really explains why. I am seriously glad you guys took the extra time. You went from something that would have still been decent to something freaking amazing. Whatever else anyone can say about Riot, you guys always make a quality product your number one concern, and it shows. Thanks for everything guys. You're awesome.

This is incredible… thank you all so much for creating such a masterpiece. You guys killed it with Arcane.

I didn't even need to watch this to know that the show was made by very passionate and talented people, i love you guys s2

20:57 Thank you Amanda, for that Caitlyn thinking about Vi shower scene

The show was close to dying prematurely, and now I'm in love with the show. I'm looking forward to the next season!