Riot Games co-founder and League of Legends creator Marc Merrill has cleared up confusion surrounding Arcane’s ‘five-season’ plan, saying that the Netflix series was only ever going to be two seasons long.
In response to an article that suggested Arcane was two seasons long because there are ‘other stories to tell’ in the League of Legends universe, Merrill replied on Reddit: “Arcane was always written to be two seasons.”
On the five-season rumor that has continued to do the rounds – perhaps due to Variety’s report on the show’s $250m budget mentioning that Arcane was ‘initially budgeted for a five-season arc – Merrill wrote, “The confusion is because internally there was a budget conversation about ‘approving 5 seasons’ – which simply means we were setting aside a bunch of money for lots of development and is completely irrelevant to the Arcane creative. The creative and making something great is what the priority should always be for Riot and our teams.”
Merrill added, “We have also always envisioned telling more stories and continuing to expand the universe. That hasn’t ever changed – people just jump at rumors or misleading headlines and Riot didn’t correct them – but given those rumors gained momentum, happy to clarify.”
Despite Merrill outlining intentions to ‘expand’ the League of Legends universe with more film and TV projects, don’t expect them to be rolled out for the sake of it.
As Merrill explained, “Just because that is our intent, doesn’t mean it’s easy or that we can pump these things out like a factory – just like making games that are worthy of players time / love is really hard, so too is telling great stories and making incredible shows / films (especially when we are building it from scratch for the first time).
With Act 3 – and Arcane’s final episodes – just over the horizon, the furore over Arcane’s $250m budget rumbles on. While one anime director has pointed to the Netflix series costing 25 times more than his own show, co-showrunner Christian Linke defended the budget in an interview with Animation Magazine, saying, “no one has ever made a great thing by not taking bets.”
Arcane is currently streaming on Netflix. For more on the show, check out the Arcane season 2 release schedule and a breakdown of the Black Rose. Then dive into our picks for the best shows on Netflix and best anime on Netflix.