Riot Games and Netflix on Saturday confirmed that “Arcane” will return for a second season.
The animated series created by Christian Linke and Alex Yee will bring back voice actors including Hailee Steinfeld, Ella Purnell and Katie Leung in their recurring roles in the show, which is based on characters and storylines in Riot’s popular “League of Legends” video game.
The show, which debuted earlier this month and dropped the final episodes of the first season on Saturday, has been a breakout success. This week, the streamer reported that the first six episodes were watched for 34.1 million hours globally, making it the second most-watched Netflix show for the week of Nov. 8.
“We’re beyond happy about the positive response to ‘Arcane’s first season and are working hard with the creative wizards at Riot and Fortiche to deliver our second installment,” Linke and Yee said in a statement.
“Arcane” follows the story of two orphaned sisters amid a war between rival cities. The show is ranked No. 16 among IMBD’s top 250 TV shows. Riot also streamed “Arcane” to its followers on Twitch and netted 1.8 million viewers at its peak, which Twitch said is the sixth-highest peak of all time for a single trending category term. Gamers have even noticed that the show’s characters Jinx and Vi are being used in the game far more frequently than before as a result of its popularity.
The final three episodes of the nine-part “Arcane” dropped on Netflix on Saturday.
“Arcane” is gaming company Riot’s first foray into the TV world — and marks a departure from other video game producers, which have licensed out their content to be developed into scripted films and TV shows rather than developing it in house. The gaming industry in 2020 saw revenues that for the first time surpassed the revenues both film and sports combined — growing 20% to an eye-popping $180 billion as COVID stay-at-home orders led to more engagement by fans.