 First time I've been invited to the lanes and better be worth my time You see that's your weakness Marcus. You carry your chin so high you fail to see the opportunity below Who are you? You're looking for four children. The ones running circles round Pildover's finest. What about it? You don't look so concerned I'm about to make your day Now I don't know about you, but I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall for this conversation So in episode 2 of Arcane, Marcus makes a deal with Silco We don't ever learn the specifics of that deal, but we can assume that Silco bribed Marcus to bring Vanda to him From Marcus's perspective, we can see why this might have been an attractive proposition In Act 1, Marcus has a very black-and-white view of morality Either you're an upstanding member of society or you're a criminal And if you're a criminal, it doesn't matter what nuances there are to your situation The severity of the crimes committed or the societal structures that led to you committing those crimes Regardless, you should be punished Well, his superior Grayson is older and wiser and understands that sometimes compromises need to be made in order to maintain the peace Marcus doesn't and we see his impatience with both Grayson and Vanda as a result of this As far as he's concerned, Vanda is the leader of the lanes in the undercity, an area where crime is rife You people down here are all the same Mistaking arrogance for bravery You think you're standing up for something But we all know there is a crime behind every coin that passes through this place You're just a small man in a little hole the world forgot to bury Therefore, he might as well be a criminal underlord and deserves to be locked up Ultimately, if Vanda is put away, this is a good thing So does it really matter whether Vanda goes to Stillwater or to Silco? And if Marcus can make a little money from the deal, why not? Unfortunately, Marcus discovers very quickly that there is a difference His deal leads to the death of Grayson, Benzo and another enforcer And when he sees the monsters Silco is able to create with Shimmer, he starts to realize what he has unleashed After the time skip, we then see Marcus in what seems to be a state of perpetual penance It's clear that he hasn't forgiven himself for what happened to Grayson It's clear that he detests Silco and all the compromises he needs to make for him, even if it led to him becoming sheriff But it's also clear that he feels powerless to change anything He has no influence on Silco, despite the charade that they are working in some sort of partnership And when he imagines pulling the pin on one of Jinx's grenades and killing them both, he can't go through with it This has gone too far Hmm? Imagining yourself a hero One final act to make you the martyr you've always seen yourself as Now, this might just be because it takes a certain type of person to take this level of action to become a suicide bomber But there could also be an element of Marcus not knowing if this would change anything If Silco goes, who would take his place? Could it be someone even worse? And what might happen if Marcus isn't there to reign him in? Admittedly, he isn't doing much to reign Silco in, but having an enforcer to keep an eye on things would be better than having no one from Piltover being involved So we have this strange situation where Marcus is in a state of penance but he's unable to complete it The idea of penance is to feel regret or sorrow for the actions you've taken And then to take action to atone with the understanding that you won't do the same thing in future We can see this in Christianity where people confess their sins, are advised on the actions they can take to atone, usually prayer, and are offered absolution In this sacrament, people are able to be cleansed of their sins You could also argue that the criminal justice system has a similar approach People either plead or are found guilty for their crimes, and an attitude of repentance could lead to a lower sentence They then carry out the prescribed sentence and are able to return to society with the understanding that they won't commit the same crimes again And yes, I know that this is an oversimplification and that the justice system is complex and flawed, but that's not the purpose of this video The goal here is to illustrate the ritual of penance So we can see that there are four steps involved in the process First, the feeling of remorse for the sins committed Second, confessing those sins Third, taking action to atone And then fourth, the result is absolution What is interesting about Marcus' character is that you get the sense that he wants to do penance He wants to atone But he is stuck on the first step of the journey, the feeling of guilt and remorse Rightly, he feels remorse for making the deal with Silcoe so many years ago But who can he confess to And what action can he take to atone And without taking those steps, he won't achieve absolution Now, Marcus isn't the only character to have made a grave mistake in Arcane However, he seems to be the only one who is stuck in this loop Vanda says he has never forgiven himself for what he did to Silcoe Until this conversation, though, it doesn't appear to have any impact on his day-to-day life So we can assume that, even if he regrets betraying Silcoe, he has compartmentalized this so he can lead the lanes effectively You could potentially argue that even though Vanda thought his actions were wrong, they were for the sake of a greater good Peace and safety in the undercity Because of that, yes, there could have been a better way to resolve his conflict with Silcoe But he has been atoning for it ever since by being a good leader, which has given him some level of absolution Next up, we have Jinx In Acts 2 and 3, it is clear she is still traumatized by the bomb she made in Act 1 And the consequences of the explosion Unlike Vanda, she hasn't successfully put this behind her, and it's easy to see why There was no way for her to get closure The explosion didn't serve a greater good And it would be hard to argue that the actions she takes in Acts 2 and 3 as Silcoe's daughter are a form of atonement Consequently, the explosion continues to haunt her But unlike Marcus, she doesn't seem to be sitting in a state of self-flagellation Instead, she is trying to outrun the monsters, outrun the guilt The impression is that if she moves fast enough, works hard enough, they won't be able to catch her If she runs fast enough, she won't have to atone Interestingly, Silcoe does try to help her find some form of absolution Rather than finding a way for her to repent her sins though, he thinks it's a matter of letting power die This would have a similar outcome to what happened with Vanda For Silcoe, letting power die in Jinx's triumph is the greater good It's the outcome that justifies the pain of her past And the ritual in the river can be seen as a form of baptism, one where power dies and Jinx is reborn However, for as long as there is some hope of reuniting with Vi, this isn't possible Not until she is the one to choose Jinx over Powder in the final episode And then there's Vi, who regrets leaving Powder alone and vulnerable to Silcoe Vi is an interesting case because, for her, this doesn't feel like a past mistake One where it's too late to recover and make amends Instead, Vi's journey was paused while she was in prison And when she gets out years later, it could just as easily have been the next day given her attitude and approach For Vi, this is a recent wound, one that is still open rather than one that has scarred over It's something she can still heal and make right So unlike Vanda, Vi still feels the pain of this past mistake which makes her similar to Marcus and Jinx in a sense However, unlike Marcus and Jinx, whose mistakes are in their past and there's no way they can fix them To Vi, the mistake feels like it's in the present This means that there isn't a need to be absolved for her sins Because the sins haven't really happened yet or they haven't been closed In Vi's mind, she can still fix things And if she does, then maybe it will be like she never made the mistake in the first place So we have four characters who have all made grave mistakes in their past But only one of them seems to be stuck in this cycle of penance So the question then is, is there any way Marcus could have gotten out of it? I think there was, and whether it would have worked or not is another topic and I would love to hear your thoughts on this in the comments But I do think there was a third potential path, one beyond assassinating Silco or continuing to partner with him This path is illustrated by Caitlyn Caitlyn genuinely wants to make the world better And while her impact is limited due to her ignorance early in the story, she believes the law is the way to do it No one should be above the law and she isn't afraid to find the truth In fact, her attitude is quite similar to Marcus's when he was younger, when it comes to having black and white morality In episode 4 we see how little patience Marcus has for Caitlyn He sees her as a nuisance more than anything else and wants to keep her as far away from anything related to Silco as possible But what would have happened if they had teamed up instead and might it have been possible to take Silco down? This is a very complicated question It doesn't solve the problem of who would have taken over after Silco was gone or the systematic inequality between Piltover and the undercity It could also make Marcus's daughter a target, as a key difference between Caitlyn and Marcus is that Caitlyn has no interest in self-preservation and arguably a lot less to lose However, if they were able to find a way, I could imagine a different outcome for Marcus One where he returned to Grayson's grave and while acknowledging that he had made mistakes in the past and that nothing he could do would bring her back or erase the years of working with Silco He was also able to find a sense of peace, because in the end he made it right Unfortunately, this doesn't happen for Marcus He dies having never atoned for what he did, arguably leaving the world worse than how he found it So the question from here is what will happen with the other characters in season 2 For Jinx, I can see her in a similar space to Vanda, obviously being the loose cannon but having compartmentalized that part of her life where she did make a mistake that there's no recovering from And for Vi I could see her getting stuck in a similar loop to Marcus where she is still in the space of remorse and guilt but doesn't know how to make up for it And maybe that's what ultimately leads to Vi becoming an enforcer Anyway, I would love to hear what you think on this, so please share your thoughts in the comments Thank you for this patience while I was getting this video up, work has been crazy over the last month And I will see you next time, bye