Usually, the best episode of every Arcane Act is the last one.
Well, this trend changed with Episode Five “Blisters and Bedrock”, which is not only the best episode of Act Two but also the best episode of Season Two so far.
It begins with the same pit fighter Vi tease we got before Act One released.
In this scene, we see Vi at her lowest.
She has lost Caitlyn and now spends her nights fighting for money, wasting that money on getting blackout drunk, pushing away any friends she has, until she even starts losing fights.
It is at rock bottom where Jinx finds her, returning to tell her about Vander’s return.
Naturally, Vi does not take too kindly to seeing her sister after their last, violent interaction.
Still, seeing her start to strangle Jinx was pretty uncomfortable, and the following shot of Vi’s face in the cracked mirror shows just how far she has fallen.
It is a good thing that the episode works towards bringing the sisters together.
But, since this is the best storyline of the episode, I will save talking about it for later.
First, I will talk about Ambessa recruiting Singed.
I had a feeling she would, given how desperate she is for a weapon to combat the Black Rose.
Her recruiting him also lead to quite a few revelations about Singed.
We learn from Caitlyn that his name used to be Reveck, a once respected doctor in Piltover who was banished for a crime that was buried, most likely by Heimerdinger.
Singed tells Caitlyn he committed many unspeakable acts “for love” and then reveals his daughter to her and Ambessa.
Like Mr Freeze, he has sealed his loved one away, all in the hope of eventually curing death itself, only to become more of a monster with each passing day.
Because, as Silco said back in Season One, “Is there anything so undoing as a daughter?”
Singed is not the only character we receive a few revelations about this episode because we also see what has happened to Mel after being kidnapped by the Black Rose at the end of Episode Three.
She is locked up in an Oculorum, a chamber used to seal away false prophets.
Or, as Mel’s fellow prisoner calls it, “the fancy pits peacock princes like to toss their friends into.”
This line causes Mel to realize that the man is her brother, Kino, thought dead by their mother.
Sadly, it turns out that Kino most likely is dead because the brother Mel is seeing is later revealed to be a hallucination made by the Black Rose to try and get whatever power Mel has.
The Black Rose, disguised as Kino, tells Mel that what she inherited, “is of terrible interest to our captors.”
When the disguise is broken, whoever is holding Mel captive also calls her “sister”, but it is unclear if this person is her actual sibling or just referencing Mel as Kino’s sister.
Either way, there are a lot of mysteries to unpack her, and we will have to wait until Act Three to have them answered because this is the last time we see Mel in Act Two.
At least we have one answer, which is how she and Jayce survived Jinx’s rocket at the beginning of the season.
When she is held by the Black Rose’s chains, Mel’s eyes start to glow, and her golden armor shines before releasing a wave of power which frees her.
This pretty much confirms this power is what saved her and Jayce, and I am very interested to see what it is and why the Black Rose want it.
With Singed and Mel’s storylines out of the way, I can now get to discussing the main storyline of Jinx and Vi searching for Vander.
Traveling down into the mines below Zaun, the two sisters quickly begin to bicker.
In my opinion, Jinx easily wins the comeback duel, hilariously referring to Vi’s gauntlets as “bitch mittens” before proving she can last one second in a fight against her.
Isha quickly gets involved in the fight on the side of Jinx, and Vi hits her, resulting in a bloody nose.
I cannot help but wonder if that brought Vi back to the night when she slapped Powder.
Jinx references that night, saying she recruited Vi to help Vander so things would end differently this time.
“Besides,” she says. “He’s your father too.”
This was a great scene between the sisters, and the use of mushrooms which glow whenever someone claps or lands a punch was a nice touch.
Eventually, the trio find out why Vander fled into the mines.
This place used to be a hideout for him and Silco, and we see a letter Vander addressed to him, apologizing for his betrayal and telling Silco he knows where to find him, meaning the Last Drop.
The letter makes me think Vander attacked Silco after the Bridge fight which orphaned Vi and Powder.
Seeing the deaths his revolution had caused, Vander decided to live a peaceful life.
The only problem with that was Silco wanted to keep fighting, leading to Vander attempting to drown him so the peace he was attempting to forge could be maintained.
He only realized the enormity of what he had done after it was over and left the letter to Silco in the hopes of patching things up.
Unfortunately, Silco never went back to those mines so never read the letter.
If he had, as Jinx says, “everything might have been different.”
During this moment, we see the first sign of the bridging rift between the sisters when Vi almost puts a comforting hand on Jinx’s shoulder but stops herself.
They leave the hideout, but the three are quickly confronted by Vander, who was drawn in by Isha’s blood.
Vi understandably does not recognize Vander under the bloody visage of Warwick, and fights him off, only for Jinx’s pleading to convince her to reach out to him.
In an imposing shot, Vi faces off against Vander, shouting his name, which draws us into a flashback before Vi and Powder’s births.
We see that both Vander and Silco were close with the girls’ mother, Felicia.
As she dances to “Our Love” from Season One, she tells the two of her pregnancy, putting them on the hook to look out for her kids.
She tells them, “You two are gonna figure this Zaun thing out. I don’t care if you have to carve it out of the bedrock, covered in blisters. You’re not allowed to fail anymore. For her. For me.”
Along with delivering the title for this episode, Felicia’s lines also add another layer of tragedy because Vander and Silco did fail.
Their fallout led to the tragedy that separated Vi and Jinx, a separation which is only now just beginning to heal.
Although, the flashback does end on a hopeful note, by revealing that Vander was the one to name Vi.
The scene then cuts back to the present day with Jinx and Isha alone in the darkness, unsure of the fates of Vi and Vander.
They walk through the dark, until they find the two in an embrace.
Vi reaches a hand out to Jinx.
“What are you waiting for,” she says, paying off Jinx’s earlier statement. “He’s your dad too.”
And, with that, the water works officially started.
Yeah, I was a mess during this scene.
Seeing the sisters reunite and embrace their father after so much tragedy just broke me.
But this is Arcane so, of course, something bad is on the horizon.
We see Salo, who has been cured of his paralysis thanks to Viktor, attempting to take something from the Hexgate’s failsafe.
This coincides with the return of Jayce from whatever alternate dimension he, Ekko and Heimerdinger were trapped in at the end of Episode Three.
Jayce has clearly had it rough, what with his grizzled appearance, beard, and even his arcane crystal infused into his hand.
As for Salo, he is oddly upbeat, a complete turnaround from his prior personality.
You could say that he is just happy to have the use of his legs back but, as some Arcane fans have pointed out, Salo is not breathing.
We have seen the breath of every character in this room, whether it be Jayce, Ekko or Heimerdinger.
Salo is the only character whose breath we do not see, suggesting a much more sinister nature to Viktor’s cures.
Backing this up is Viktor’s creepy takeover of Salo’s body to talk with Jayce.
Through this, we can see how the two’s perspectives have flipped.
Viktor originally wanted the Hexcore destroyed, but now he uses it to help others, or at least that is how he sees it.
Jayce used the Hexcore to save Viktor but, through whatever traumatic experience he has had, now realizes the danger of all Hextech, wanting to destroy it.
The episode ends with him killing Salo, another showcase of his development.
Back in Season One, he told Vi he could not allow her to leave with the gauntlets but, in the end, relented.
Jayce does no such thing now, killing Salo without hesitation and, on that grim note, the episode ends.
Overall, I would say that “Blisters and Bedrock” is the best episode of the season so far.
Mel’s storyline deepens the mystery of the Black Rose.
Singed’s storyline perfectly falls into Arcane‘s theme about the lengths fathers will go to for their daughters.
Speaking of, Vi and Jinx reuniting with their adopted father got the tears flowing.
To top it all off, the episode ends on the dark return of Jayce, building to his and Viktor’s meeting in the next episode.
“Blisters and Bedrock” is not only a fantastic Arcane episode, but the first one that was the best of its Act without being the final episode.