In the explosive Arcane Season 2 finale, Jayce appeared to sacrifice himself to save Piltover (and all of humanity) from Viktor’s “glorious evolution” – but what if he’s still alive?
Jayce went through a lot in Arcane Season 2. After he was sucked into the anomaly (alongside Ekko and Heimerdinger), he embarked on a pilgrimage through the wasteland of Piltover’s future, discovering the identity of the hooded figure who introduced him to magic: it was Viktor all along.
“I thought I could bring an end to the world’s suffering…. there is no prize to perfection. Only an end to pursuit. In all timelines, in all possibilities, only you can show me this,” he told Jayce, who emerges from the anomaly with one goal: stopping Viktor and shutting down the Hexgate.
Arcane Season 2 Act 3 pitted the two partners against each other in a brutal, emotional fight, culminating in an extraordinary sacrifice for the greater good – or did it?
What happened to Jayce and Viktor?
Jayce manages to make Viktor see the error of his ways, and the pair embrace in the anomaly’s astral plane as they’re sucked into Jayce’s rune, seemingly dying while saving Runeterra.
Jayce appeared to kill Viktor in Episode 6, but Singed/Corin Reveck revived him, allowing him to transform into the Machine Herald. After Ambessa, Cait, and Mel’s fight, Viktor’s humanoids flood Piltover and connect hundreds of people to the hive mind.
Meanwhile, he’s hellbent on reaching the Hexgate core, and Jayce can’t stop him – until Ekko throws his Z-Drive at him, shattering his armor and freeing Jayce from his grasp.
Jayce makes one final attempt to convince Viktor to stop. “You’ve always wanted to cure what you thought were weaknesses. But you were never broken Viktor, there is beauty in imperfections. They made you who you are and what I admired about you,” he tells him.
It works, with Viktor realizing how his actions would doom Piltover, Zaun, and all of Runeterra, and they embrace as they’re sucked into Jayce’s rune.
Is Jayce dead?
Jayce could be dead – but he may have been teleported to another realm with Viktor, and they could both return in another League of Legends show in their Ascended form.
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We already know that other LoL TV shows are in development (Season 2’s ending already set up the next villain), so there’s a possibility the two characters could show up again somewhere down the line.
It’s become a subject of debate and theorizing among fans, with one speculating: “I personally think they are alive. To me it seemed like they were teleported somehow, and I think I read somewhere that Viktor will make an appearance again in later shows, so why not Jayce.”
They also pointed out a key quote from Singed: his cure was “dependent on Viktor’s survival”, and considering we see his daughter Orianna, that could suggest that Viktor is still alive in some way – which bodes well for Jayce.
“I also think and hope they are not dead, but got sucked into the crystal and most likely ended up in another dimension/timeline,” another viewer wrote.
“I think they’re not dead because, if those two were dead, there would be a lot of lore conflicts with many characters who use Hextech. Those two are the only people who can develop Hextech. However, we don’t know when we’ll get a lore update for each character from Arcane,” a third commented.
“I imagine that they are now just going back and forth through time, eternally responsible for making sure the bootstrap paradox they created actually happens,” another fan speculated.
Sadly, there won’t be an Arcane Season 3, with the show’s co-creators Christian Linke and Alex Yee intentionally setting out a “beginning and end with the character relationships that we had in mind, especially for Vi and Jinx and for Jayce and Viktor.”
However, Arcane is only the first entry in Riot Games’ planned League of Legends cinematic universe, so don’t give up hope just yet.
You can also find out if Jinx died in the finale, and read more about why the Orianna twist was deeper than we thought, how Heimerdinger may still be alive, and the best animated shows to watch next.
