Powder’s Transformation into Jinx in Arcane

Who is Jinx/Powder in Arcane?

Powder, later called Jinx, is one of the many characters that populate the disadvantaged Undercity in Piltover’s shadow. As Powder grows up in a traumatizing, hostile world, her personality becomes fractured. A homicidal personality emerges: Jinx.

What is Jinx’s motivation?

As an unstable person, Jinx has several competing motivations. She has always been deeply insecure about being valued by her loved ones. She desires to be valued by Silco, even when this directly opposes her desire to be valued by Vi.

Before she confronts Silco and Vi, a small voice can be heard whispering, “It’s time to leave them.” This may represent a third motivation, to actualize herself away from everyone she once depended upon, whom her paranoid mind cannot trust.

What are Jinx’s strengths?

Powder’s greatest strength was one that blossomed in childhood: her proficiency to manipulate, reverse engineer, and create technology. This was not particularly valued by the men in her family, who celebrated Vi’s athleticism instead.

As Powder grew into Jinx, she honed her athleticism to rival her absent sister’s. Silco nurtured her STEM side, which became even more potent. A strength that emerged from her uniquely fractured personality is unpredictability. Jinx often surprises her enemies, even before they know they are her enemies.

What are Jinx’s weaknesses?

Powder has many cracks in her personality, which only deepen as she transforms into Jinx. From her earliest days, she has had an anxious-preoccupied attachment style, which makes her dependent on others in an unhealthy way.

She has a lot of insecurity about her place in her family, her worth as an individual, and being valued by the ones she loves. She has little sense of self or personal conscience, which she will bend to please whoever is kind to her. As an adult; unreliability, paranoia, and a weakening grasp on reality layer on to her other weaknesses.

Analyzing the Transformation from Powder to Jinx from Arcane

An Innocent Beginning

Powder / Jinx is one of the most talked-about characters in Arcane. She begins the story as an innocent, sympathetic orphan whom no one would expect to fall into such darkness. Yet looking carefully, one can see that young Powder carried the seeds of her future darkness inside her.

Young Powder was insecure. She had little sense of self or personal conscience. Moreover, she had an anxious-preoccupied attachment style. This attachment disorder develops in some children whose caretakers are absent.

Symptoms include an increased need to feel wanted, jealousy, idolizing loved ones, obsession with relationships, and the need for constant reassurance. It is also typical for such a person to quickly replace a loved one who becomes absent, quickly developing an obsessive bond with whoever is available to fill the loved-one’s shoes.

The Cracks were always There

These characteristics left Powder vulnerable to manipulation by whoever happened to bond with her. When her first caretakers, her parents, became absent, Powder put Vi on their pedestal. She emulated her sister and valued what she valued. When Vi became absent, Powder quickly replaced her with the next available person, Silco. It hardly mattered that Silco was diametrically opposed to Vi; he was there, and Vi was not.

One wonders what might have happened if a different person found Powder after Vi’s departure. If an ice cream truck happened to be driving by, Powder might have grown up to be the most fanatic dessert purveyor in history.

Jinx Sought Stability in Silco’s Love

Powder replaced her earlier values with Silco’s, becoming comfortable with the destructive Shimmer trade and ruthless violence. Silco also amplified her abandonment issues by overlaying them with his mistrust of others.

Their bond was double-edged. With one hand, Silco pulled her close with one hand and gave her the reassurance she craved. With the other hand, he pushed others away and cut her off from any sense of community. “Everyone betrays us, Jinx, but I’ll never forsake you,” he said, and they both came to believe it.

The Price of Love for Powder in Arcane

Jinx’s panicked pursuit of love didn’t happen in a vacuum. The cost of her fall is embodied by Ekko and the Firelights. Jinx’s actions destroyed their community, leaving them in a Shimmer-addicted hellscape. When Jinx and Ekko fight in episode eight, viewers are reminded they were once on the same side. They can still care for each other, and, had Jinx made different choices, they could have remained friends.

Who Replaced Whom?

When Vi returned to the scene in Arcane, Jinx’s mental state plunged to new lows. She seemed to be suffering from paranoid delusions. Her insecurity and regret came to her in Mylo’s voice, constantly deriding her and fanning her worst fears.

Jinx became convinced that Vi had replaced her—ironic, since Jinx was the one who treated loved ones like interchangeable parts. Vi came to Jinx with love, forgiveness, and acceptance—everything that Jinx craved. Yet, Jinx was unable to see it. When she finally embraced her darkness and rejected her Powder persona, she blamed Vi, saying Vi had changed.

Jinx as the Monster Vi Created

As Jinx makes her choice, a song, which Sting had written explicitly for Arcane, plays. The lyrics justify Jinx’s viewpoint, accusing Vi: “I am the monster you created …For me to live, I gotta kill the part of me that saw I needed you more .. you broke me and left these pieces. I want you to hurt like I hurt … Why don’t you love who I am? What we could have been?”

Tropes for Jinx’s Character in Arcane

Jinx from Arcane embodies the trope “ambiguous disorder,” displaying the symptoms of many psychological disorders before and after the time skip. Some viewers infer Jinx from Arcane has paranoid schizophrenia, PTSD, a dissociative disorder, or many other labels. Her mental instability is played for drama.

Her older self follows the “Ax-Crazy” and “Putting the laughter in Slaughter” tropes, showing delight in violence.

The Cain and Abel trope (brother against brother, sister against sister) runs deeply throughout the show. In Arcane, Jinx’s opposition to Vi is one of the more shining examples.

Interesting Cinematic Moments for Jinx from Arcane

The rendering of Jinx and her perceptions is the most surprising and memorable animation technique in Arcane. It really pushes the show beyond expectations, showing an art form that is totally new to most viewers. It is primed by showing the viewer the character herself creating art in a distinctive style: childishly crude, childishly particolored, and yet sinister.

Later, Jinx’s scenes are overlaid with 2D effects in this same style. Jinx’s art has lept off her page and distorted her world. In the words of Barthelemy Maunoury, Co-director and head of animation at Fortiche, "We usually use that 2D/3D mix for effects like fire, gunshots, smoke. Here, the idea was to use 2D animation and film scratches to make you enter Jinx's mind. It’s like the scene you’re looking at is the movie of her life that Jinx is editing herself with rage, scribbling directly on the film!”

Jinx’s Plotline in Arcane

Powder’s Harsh Beginning in Arcane

Powder, later called Jinx, is one of the many characters that populate the disadvantaged Undercity in Piltover’s shadow. Viewers first see Powder as a young child wandering the bridge between the Undercity and Piltover.

The bridge is a battlefield. Vander’s Zaunite insurgents fought Piltover’s enforcers at the cost of many lives. Powder and Vi’s parents were killed in the chaos. Seeing their suffering, a remorseful Vander picked the two children up and carried them away from the battlefield, symbolizing his permanent departure from the Zaunite movement.

Powder in Arcane as a Little Sister Trying to Keep Up

Viewers next see Powder having grown a few years in Vander’s care and under her elder sister’s wing. In this scene, Vi and their adopted brothers, Mylo and Claggor, gracefully free ran through Piltover’s roofscape, pulling moves a young Ryan Doyle would be envious of.

Powder followed behind them, much younger and more fearful than they, but still performing feats an ordinary girl her age couldn’t hope to match. Yet throughout this scene, Mylo quickly scoffs at the younger girl and criticizes her for not keeping up. Arcane Vi, on the other hand, was supportive and encouraging.

On a lead from their friend Ekko/”Little Man,” the four went to the home of Jayce Talis, believing it to be a promising target for burglary. Once inside, Vi implied that Powder was better able than the others to discern valuable loot from junk and so set her to the task.

The teens marveled at the richness of the Talis penthouse while Powder discovered something important in a back room: the Hex Crystals. Much of Arcane’s plot turns on these crystals and their later forms, Hex Tech and Hex Gemstones. Powder hurriedly scooped the crystals into her satchel, separate from the other loot. Suddenly, Vi heard someone coming, and Mylo jammed the door shut. Powder fumbled one of the crystals, causing an explosion that destroyed the penthouse and nearly killed her siblings.

Authority as the Enemy

The four burglars fled through the Piltover streets as the explosion caught an enforcer's attention. They jumped over a gap in a retractable bridge, ducked down alleyways, and slid down a sewer. Mylo quickly blamed Powder for the explosion, although he didn’t see her cause it.

Powder is Shielded by Her Sister at Her Brothers’ Expense

Once back in their native Undercity, or Zaun, as some called it, the four burglars caught the unwanted notice of a rival gang. Deckard, the gang leader, hinted that he knew about the trouble in Piltover, and that Vi’s group must be carrying valuable loot.

Instead of giving him the loot, Vi began a brutal fight with him and his gang, dragging Claggor and Mylo to her defense. Vi tossed the loot bag to Powder to keep it safe, with the full expectation that Powder, as usual, would avoid the fight.

While the others were fighting, Powder had a struggle of her own as one of the rival gang members chased her down. She attempted to use a homemade gadget against her attacker, but it failed. In a desperate move, Powder tossed the loot irretrievably into deep water, destroying the larger boy’s motive to chase her. She returned to her siblings in shame.

Mylo’s Resentment of Powder in Arcane

Mylo griped at Powder and mocked her defective invention. “I get my face bashed in, and she just gets a pass? Every time she comes, something goes wrong. She jinxes every job.” Vi stood up for Powder against Mylo, citing Powder’s young age as a fair reason for her to lag behind. Surely a tiny girl couldn’t have fought the nearly full-grown men who had attacked them. Still, Mylo’s words cut Powder deeply.

It was to her great relief that later, she would find the Hex Crystals forgotten in her satchel, not lost with the rest of the loot. She offered the crystals to her sister as proof of her worth. Although Vander in Arcane had warned Vi not to hold onto anything that would tie them to the Piltover explosion, Vi told Powder to keep the crystals. This proved a mistake, as the enforcers were highly invested in finding the burglars who’d caused the disaster.

As Ever, Powder’s Actions in Arcane have Unintended Consequences

Later, the four orphans laid low in an arcade, hoping their escapades topside would soon blow over. Vi practiced boxing against a giant punching-bag robot, showing her true martial arts prodigy. Powder was not skilled at boxing, but she dominated a sharp-shooting game.

Suddenly, an enforcer tossed a local Undercity man through the arcade window. Since Powder was still carrying the Hex Crystals, which would link them to the penthouse explosion, the four had to flee the enforcers. They escaped with help from Ekko.

A Father Figure Humiliated

Soon after, Powder and Vander’s other adopted children watched their father mediate a sort of town hall meeting at his bar, The Last Drop. Vander was the de facto leader of the Undercity, having retained the role from his days as a revolutionary. Unknown to the other Zaunites, Vander now cooperated with the enforcers to maintain peace between Piltover and Zaun.

Vander was, as usual, dissuading everyone from fighting the Piltovers, urging them to wait for things to blow over. Angered by his passivity, Sevika challenged Vander’s authority and led some others in storming out. Powder and the other orphans wondered at Vander’s pacifism, but Ekko explained: Vander had a deal with the enforcers. This undermined the trust and respect that the orphans had for Vander.

This wedge was driven in more deeply when an enforcer, Marcus, came to the Last Drop to search for them. The youngsters hid while Marcus blustered around in the bar, openly disrespecting Vander, who would not be goaded into violence.

Vander Passed His Strong Conscience onto Vi, not Powder in Arcane

After this humiliation, Vi angrily told Vander that she would fight to protect Zaun if Vander refused to do so. To explain his motivations, Vander took Vi to the place where he’d had his change of heart: the bridge between Piltover and the Undercity.

Here, where Vi’s parents had died, Vander said everything he could to teach Vi the human cost of war. As he explained it, “Nobody wins in war.” This conversation is an example of the special attention given to Vi, not Powder.

Vander saw Vi as the leader of his children, and he often led his children through her. However, this approach left Powder unmoored from Vander’s point of view, and she missed out on gaining his strength of conscience.

Vi will Not Sacrifice Powder within Arcane’s Storyline

Later that night, Powder was giddily working on IEDs, one full of nails to impale enforcers with. Vi handed her an important totem: a bunny doll that had once been stolen from her by bullies. Vi had used this doll in the past to encourage Powder.

It demonstrated that even Vi was weak once, so Powder could yet hope to grow strong. Vi gave Powder some encouraging words, and Powder did not realize that her sister was saying goodbye. Convinced of Vander’s pacifism, Vi intended to give herself to the enforcers as a peaceful means of protecting Powder, Claggor, Mylo, and all the rest.

Powder’s Father Figure was Taken away Again

Vander thwarted Vi’s plan at the last moment. Vander knew it should be him if any of his family were to take the fall. He hid Vi in a closet just as the enforcers arrived to arrest her.

However, the plan was double-thwarted when a more sinister presence arrived. Silco, a local kingpin with bad blood against Vander, intercepted them with a monster at his side. Deckard, the youth who had fought Vi and the other orphans over their loot, had been transformed by an experimental drug into a powerhouse of hard muscle.

On Silco’s orders, Deckard murdered the enforcers, including Sheriff Grayson, the influential enforcer who once helped Vander preserve peace. Deckard overcame them easily, to the horror of Vi and Ekko, who watched nearby. Benzo, Vander’s right-hand man, was also killed. Vander was carried away, leaving only Marcus unharmed.

Putting aside pretty words, Vi doesn’t trust Powder to help

Vi, Claggor, and Mylo hatched a plan to rescue Vander. However, Powder was left out of it. Despite her encouraging words, Vi knew deep down that Powder was not ready for such a difficult task.

This left Powder to wonder if Vi believed Mylo’s taunts that Powder was a jinx and would ruin any job they took her on. This precipitated the first of many unhinged moments the audience sees of Powder in Arcane. She raged and wept without restraint.

Powder’s Disastrous Attempt to Save Vander in Arcane

Powder secretly followed her siblings to Silco’s lair. After seeing her family embroiled in a losing battle, she deployed one of her oft-failed gadgets to save them. Unlike her past inventions, this one was powered by a Hex Crystal.

Powder’s device detonated, causing a series of explosions in the warehouse. The first killed both Mylo and Claggor and trapped Vi under the wreckage. It nearly killed Silco, but Sevika, who had forsaken Vander for Silco in Arcane, pushed him out of the way. Sevika lost her arm in the process.

The fight continued, ultimately costing Vander his life. With his last words, he instructed Vi, “Take care of Powder.” Of Powder’s adopted family, only Vi survived. This set the stage for the moment Powder would relive many times in Arcane: her abandonment.

Powder’s Abandonment in Arcane begins Her Transformation into Jinx

Powder, oblivious, found Vi outside of the wrecked warehouse. She began to boast of her success giddily. Horrified, Vi asked, “You did this?” as Powder looked past her to see Vander’s corpse and Claggor’s bloody goggles.

Realization dawned on Powder that she had killed her family. Through gasps and sobs, she rhythmically chanted, “I only wanted to help.” In a moment of rage, Vi struck her sister, bloodying her nose. Powder didn’t hit back, only continued to sob and beg for forgiveness. “You’re a jinx!” Vi shouted. “Mylo was right!”

Vi immediately regretted her outburst and stepped away from Powder, taking a moment to collect herself. She had every intention of returning with a kinder mien, but before she could, she was abducted by the enforcer, Marcus.

Powder did not realize that Vi only meant to step away temporarily. She saw it as willful abandonment and total rejection. She wailed and shrieked, “Please, Violet, I need you. Please.” This perceived abandonment became a cornerstone of her adolescent personality.

Silco was There to Pick up the Pieces (and Assemble Them However He Liked)

It was in this unhinged state that Silco found her. Still hoping to kill Vi, Silco asked Powder where her sister was. Unexpectedly, the child threw herself into Silco’s arms. “She left me. She is not my sister anymore.”

Having just relived his fraternal betrayal, Silco was moved to pity the girl. He took Powder in as his daughter, and thus began an intense, codependent, toxic relationship between the two.

The Ugly Duckling becomes a Psychotic Swan

About seven years passed offscreen. During that time, Powder’s father-daughter relationship with Silco had deepened. She continued to advance her engineering skills until she could create deadly and complex gadgets for battle. In fact, she had outgrown her adolescent clumsiness and become an incredible fighter and free runner.

The Past Torments Jinx

Powder, now called Jinx after Mylo’s curse upon her, had suffered immensely over those seven years. Exhibiting signs of paranoid schizophrenia, she was haunted by voices and images of her past. She often thought she could hear Mylo condemning her.

She had hallucinations that filmmakers rendered in Powder’s distinctive art style: pastel and parti-color like a child’s toy, crude like a child’s handiwork, and yet sinister. When Jinx experienced such hallucinations, crude images of people from her past, especially Mylo, would impose themselves over her true surroundings. The imagined voices all had the same message: Jinx was worthless, a screw-up fit for abandonment; people were plotting against her; and no one loved her.

To the confusion of her listeners, Jinx would often interrupt the normal flow of conversation to address these voices, usually telling them to “shut up.” She drew immense comfort from her new father figure, Silco. He was always there to defy the voices, telling Jinx that she was perfect and that he, at least, would never betray her.

Jinx always Craved Esteem, and Finally, Silco Values Her

Despite her mental instability, Silco drew Jinx fully into his enterprise. He installed her as one of his most senior subordinates in a criminal empire that filled the power vacuum left by Vander’s death. Silco’s goal was to free the beleaguered Undercity from its Piltover oppressors. To do that, he would stop at nothing.

Singed, a scientist in his employ, developed the drug Shimmer that rocketed Silco to power in two ways: first, it could transform his henchmen into super soldiers, and second, it was a highly addictive and pricey commodity. With Jinx’s help, Silco grew rich and powerful off the Shimmer trade.

Jinx does Not Care that Silco’s Agenda Destroyed the Undercity

Unfortunately, the Shimmer epidemic further deteriorated the quality of life in the Undercity. Massive ghettos filled with hopeless addicts replaced the once lively streets. Silco built an empire on the backs of exploited Zaunites. However, this did not seem to trouble Jinx in the slightest.

She was more concerned with Silco’s opinion of her than of her position in a moral landscape. Powder always had a poor sense of self and little moral compass, taking on the values of whoever cared for her.

Under Vi’s care, she had emulated her sister and became a thief. Her family valued physical strength and agility, and since Powder lacked those, it made her devalue her natural STEM talents and feel insecure. Under Silco’s care, Jinx adopted a new value system. On the bright side, she became more confident in her engineering, which Silco highly praised. On the dark side, she helped him distribute the addictive drug and profiteer on the desolation of her community.

She happily killed those who stood in the way of the Zaunite movement or Silco’s agendas. She seemed to feel no guilt about violence towards her father’s ends, only regretting the violence she committed by accident.

Partners in Crime

While Sevika was Silco’s faithful right-hand woman (pun intended), even she could not say a word against Powder without risking his deadly ire. Jinx was mentally unstable and reckless with the lives of her fellow gangsters. Yet, even when she caused severe harm, Silco would defend Jinx from Arcane against anyone else in the gang.

He trusted Jinx so wholly that he even allowed her to administer his medication, which had to be injected in a vulnerable spot: his eye. This interaction came to symbolize the trust and vulnerability between the two.

I’m Bringing Home a Baby Bumblebee

Jinx caused trouble for Silco and his gang when, on her initiative, she murdered half a dozen enforcers in a terrorist attack. However, this was in pursuit of a great boon for her father: a Hextech Gemstone. Smuggling between the undercity and Piltover temporarily halted while a new councilor in Arcane, Jayce Talis, investigated Jinx’s attack.

When Silco went to confront Jinx over the trouble she had caused, his angry demeanor was quite in contrast to his calm defense of her in the presence of others. She dismissed him with a smirk, looking for once like the archetypal snotty teenager and him, the stern father. His gripe was forgotten when she presented him with the Hex Gemstone, and he accepted a tender hug.

In Arcane, Jinx Trusts Silco to Tear Her Vulnerability and Failure

Not long after, Jinx listened to a meeting between Marcus and Silco. Marcus, who had risen to sheriff, demanded that Jinx be arrested for killing the enforcers. Silco needed something to appease his Piltover masters and obfuscate his relationship with the kingpin.

Silco refused to betray Jinx, putting forward another gang as a possible scapegoat. This gang, the Firelights, held disrupting the Shimmer trade as their major objective, so their downfall would be of double benefit.

After Sheriff Marcus left, Silco told Jinx that the Piltover man was faltering in his role as their collaborator, and so she had better hurry up weaponizing their Hex Gemstone. Jinx admitted that she was having trouble with the project. Whenever she worked on it, she was distracted by painful visions of the last time she’d tinkered with Hex Tech—the night she had inadvertently used a Hex crystal to kill most of her family. She urged Silco to give the project over to Singed. However, Silco insisted that Jinx was the only one he could trust with the gemstone.

Silco Baptizes Jinx in Arcane

To help Jinx through her creative block, Silco took her to the river where he had experienced a fraternal betrayal. This river was where Vander had once tried to drown him. He drew similarities between that event and Powder’s betrayal by Vi, believing that the pain of Vi’s betrayal was holding Jinx back.

He then told her something new: in this river, the old Silco, the weak Silco, had died. A new Silco was reborn, one without the fear of pain. He encouraged his daughter to let “Powder” die and be reborn as “Jinx,” a strong, perfect woman not controlled by fear. He then gently baptized her in the river.

Silco Senses a Threat to His Relationship with Jinx

This baptism seemed to be the breakthrough Jinx from Arcane needed. Shortly after, she made great headway on the Hex Gemstone. However, Sevika brought Silco unwanted news that night: Vi, Powder’s sister, had returned to the Undercity.

Silco’s usually relaxed demeanor cracked in the face of this threat, a threat to what had become the most crucial relationship in his life. If Jinx returned to Vi, would she turn her back on him? Silco ordered a search for Vi and her companion, Caitlyn Kiramman, a former Piltover enforcer in Arcane.

Keeping Secrets Drives a Wedge between Silco and Jinx from Arcane

Despite Silco’s best efforts at secrecy, Jinx learned of Vi’s return from Sevika. “She’s with some girl enforcer, guess she replaced you,” Sevika mocked. Jinx was thrown into turmoil at this news. One half of her longed to be reunited with Vi and be her eager little tagalong again. Her other half aligned with Silco, yet was furious at him for keeping secrets from her.

Silco had taught her to distrust everyone but himself, and now, his secretiveness felt like a betrayal. Jinx left Silco a disturbing message in his office. She trussed up Sevika’s brutalized body, hung her from the ceiling, and wrote LIAR in her distinctive, particolored scrawl. When Silco saw that, he knew exactly why Jinx from Arcane was angry with him.

Silco’s Calm Mask Cracks

Silco had been trying to deal with Vi’s return quietly. However, her presence had begun to unravel him. Her repeated interference drove him into an uncharacteristic rage, during which he brutally beat and kicked one of his henchmen. His control over his organization was also slipping.

Some of his captains grew restless due to the economic hardship caused by the increased scrutiny in the wake of Jinx’s terrorist attack. Silco reminded them of their place, but their unrest would later escalate to his peril.

Vi and Jinx’s Reunion in Arcane

Meanwhile, Jinx reunited with Vi, who showed her all the forgiveness and grace Powder could have hoped for. Jinx wept and hugged her sister, confessing that she had changed for the worse in Vi’s absence. However, Jinx’s insecurity and paranoid delusions derailed the meeting. She saw Caitlyn with Vi, which confirmed her fear that Vi had replaced her. Mylo’s voice echoed this fear, and the rattled Jinx began pointing her weapon at the two women. “Did you only come here for this stupid stone?” she asked.

Vi reassured her that she had come only for her and fearlessly faced down Jinx’s weapon. Vi unflinchingly repeated a message of love and acceptance. It was then that the Firelight gang interrupted them, attacking them from the air.

Jinx’s new delight in violence was on full display, shocking Vi as she skillfully fought the rival gang. The firelights took the Hex gemstone and kidnapped Vi and Caitlyn before the sisters could resolve their differences, leaving Jinx frustrated and enraged.

A Complex Confrontation between Silco and Jinx in Arcane

Jinx went to confront her father about his secrecy, waiting to ambush him in his office. He was resignedly preparing to inject his medication, a job which usually fell to Jinx, when she suddenly appeared, snatching it out of his hand.

He did not physically resist her as she used the sharp point to torment him. Instead, he used emotional manipulation to talk her around. He reminded Jinx of how he had cared for her, protected her, and needed her. He cast doubt on Vi’s intentions, suggesting that Vi only wanted Jinx’s gemstone, not Jinx herself.

He predicted Vi would betray Jinx a second time and that only her father would stay faithful to her. Jinx’s anger was replaced with anguish, and she seemed to at least partially accept Silco’s words. After properly administering his medication, she left him.

Jinx’s Paranoia Turns Her against Vi

Jinx observed Vi, Caitlyn, and her childhood friend Ekko as they tried to transport the Hex gemstone across the bridge into Piltover. Piltover enforcers heavily guarded the bridge, and due in large part to Marcus’s double-agent status, a fight broke out between the enforcers and Vi’s group.

When Jinx from Arcane saw Vi running towards danger in defense of Caitlyn, Jinx joined the fight. She sent a horde of tiny explosives disguised as fireflies, killing many Piltovers, including the treacherous Sheriff Marcus.

In the aftermath of the explosion, Jinx coldly executed one of the wounded Piltovers, then took possession of the Hex gemstone. On seeing Vi help a wounded Caitlyn, Jinx hallucinated that Caitlyn was smirking at her, boasting that she had replaced Powder in Vi’s heart.

Out of control, Powder turned her weapon on Caitlyn and even on Vi. Ekko flew to the rescue and confronted Jinx in what became the most iconic battle of Arcane.

Jinx vs Ekko, the Boy Savior in Arcane

“Oh, look who it is, the boy savior!” Jinx sarcastically declared. Ekko pulled out his watch, suddenly reminding them of an earlier time when their rivalry was child’s play. A fierce battle played out between them, interspersed with childhood scenes of better days and kinder feelings.

Their fight highlighted how far Jinx had fallen from her days as Powder and how much Ekko had grown during Arcane. It also hinted at Ekko’s League of Legends ability to manipulate time, simulating one way a battle might play out, then projecting himself backward to a time before the fight turned against him.

Ekko was on top of Jinx in a flash, brutally beating her about the head. Jinx started up at him in helpless despair. On seeing her face cast in a more childlike expression, Ekko hesitated. The former friends seemed to have a moment of connection, but that didn’t stop Jinx from triggering an explosive, suicide bomber style. Both she and Ekko were left alive but badly hurt. Jinx was unable to leave the bridge under her power.

Silco’s Love for Jinx in Arcane is Proven by How He Acts when She is Unconscious

Silco arrived and found Jinx lying among the dead. His eyes widened in panic as he called her name and rushed to her. He saw that she was breathing and pulled her into a hug. He stared down Vi over Jinx’s shoulder, holding his daughter in a possessive manner.

He barely glanced at the hex crystal that still lay clutched in Jinx’s hand, focusing instead on Jinx and her dire condition. Although his larger and stronger henchmen were there in support, Silco carried Jinx off the bridge personally.

He carried her to Singed’s laboratory. When he arrived, his calm demeanor was utterly fractured. His habitually neat hair was in sweaty disarray. He was panting from exertion and wild-eyed with distress.

Singed seemed to perceive this and knew that an overly emotional Silco would hinder Jinx’s treatment. He prepared a sedative and asked Silco, “Are you prepared to lose her?” When Silco answered negatively, Singed sedated him, saying, “this is for your own sanity. I, too, once had a daughter.”

Singed proceeded to operate on Jinx in Arcane while Silco was unconscious. It was a tortuous process, during which Jinx again hallucinated that Vi was replacing her with Caitlyn. However, she endured and emerged from the surgery alive. Afterward, her eyes retained a purple, shimmer-like glow. She left the operating room before her father awoke.

Silco is Offered Everything He Wants in Exchange for Jinx’s Head on a Platter

Around this time, Silco received an incredible offer from Piltover councilor Jayce Talis. They met to discuss the conflict between their two cities. Silco, believing he had terrorized the Piltovers into giving significant ground, made bold demands: free trade routes, blanket amnesty, unrestricted access to the Hex Gates, and most importantly, Zaun sovereignty.

Astonishingly, the councilor did not even haggle against Silco’s list, only meeting it with demands of his own: to discontinue the production of Shimmer, to return the gemstone, and to surrender Jinx to the Piltover authorities for punishment. Silco objected to the last request, but the councilor left the meeting, seeming to believe they agreed.

Arcane Jinx Misunderstands Silco’s Confession

Silco still had not seen Jinx since her traumatic surgery. He went to a statue commemorating Vander, the one-time beloved leader of the Undercity, to mull over his feelings. He told the absent Vander that he had long imagined gaining the sovereignty of Zaun, but never at such a price.

He mused aloud, “What do I lose but problems? Is there anything so undoing as a daughter?” referring not only to Jinx in Arcane, but also to Vi. Vi had been Vander’s undoing under similar circumstances. Vander had once led a violent rebellion against Piltover, championing the Zaunite cause, until Vi became personally important to him.

Vander turned his back on the cause to protect her and the other orphans. What Silco had once seen as a loss of nerve, he now understood to be fatherly love. And now Silco’s dedication to the cause was being undone, too, and by the same feeling. He would not betray Jinx.

Unbeknownst to Silco, Jinx was lurking nearby and overheard his remarks. She mistook his words to mean that Silco intended to trade her to the Piltovers in exchange for Zaunite sovereignty. Silco, the father who had pledged never to betray her, seemed to be throwing her away.

Jinx at the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party

Jinx was in a heightened state of paranoia and despair, partly due to the tortuous surgery and Shimmer injections she endured at Singed’s hands. In this frame of mind, she kidnapped three people: Vi, Caitlyn, and Silco. She staged a dramatic confrontation between them all at the site of the tragic explosion which had first set her in Silco’s path.

The captives found themselves at a parody of a child’s tea party, with dolls representing Claggor and Mylo also in attendance. The madwoman had set two places at the table for herself. She told them that this moment would decide her fate: would she be Vi’s Powder or Silco’s Jinx?

Vi and Silco Argue for Powder’s Soul in Arcane

The madwoman put a gun in Vi’s bound hands and urged her to kill Caitlyn. She reasoned that if Vi would choose Powder by killing Caitlyn, then the two sisters could resume where they had left off. Vi, of course, refused. She offered to take Powder away from the city and put everything behind them, including Silco.

Silco, bound and gagged, let out a muffled objection. The madwoman finally ungagged him, and he made his case. He said that this woman was Jinx and would never be Powder again. Moreover, Vi would realize Jinx’s true nature after spending time with her, and on realizing it, she would abandon her sister in disgust.

Silco made a heartfelt appeal, telling Jinx that he would never trade her to Piltover, not even for Zaunite sovereignty, which he had pursued his whole life. He told Jinx again that everyone would betray them, and only they, as father and daughter, would remain faithful to each other.

“You’re perfect.” Silco’s unconditional love for Jinx

Before the madwoman could come to a considered decision, Caitlyn freed herself and threatened her with a weapon. Powder disarmed Caitlyn with lightning-quick moves, seemingly empowered by the Shimmer injections from her earlier surgery. In the confusion, Silco also got hold of a gun.

Vi pleaded for Powder to remember her family, calling them each by name. This backfired, as Vi had never understood how deeply Mylo’s and the other’s doubts had wounded Powder. Jinx imagined her former family as demons that tormented her. When Silco fired his weapon at Vi, the hallucinating madwoman responded in panic and confusion, spraying Silco’s side of the table with bullets.

Vi was unharmed, but Silco had been mortally wounded. His daughter immediately regretted it, rushing to him, weeping and apologizing. Silco, a man whose life was a treatise on brutality, spent his last words on love and forgiveness: “I never would have given you to them. Don’t cry. You’re perfect.”

Jinx Chooses Her Darker Side and Sabotages Peace Efforts in Arcane

Vi tried to comfort her sister, saying, “Powder, it’s okay. We’ll be okay.” However, Jinx sat at the chair she had set aside for her darker identity. “I thought maybe you could love me like you used to, even though I’m different. But you changed too.”

With those words, she took up the Hex Gemstone and inserted it into her completed weapon. She fired the projectile at the Piltover Council chambers with all councilors, including Mel Medarda, still in it. Unbeknownst to the attendants of the mad tea party, the Piltover Council had just voted to pursue peace and set the Undercity free.

Whether any of the council survived Jinx’s attack remains unclear, but it is evident that her actions have undermined the peace and sovereignty that both of her fathers had wished for.

Who is Jinx from Arcane?

Jinx is the most dynamic character in the Arcane TV show. She transforms from a scared and pathetic little girl into a self-sufficient, fierce, albeit insane woman who held an entire city hostage.

Jinx survives the conflict in Arcane's first season. We can’t wait to see what is in store for Jinx and all of our other favorite characters like Viktor in the second season of Arcane!

If you are also a League of Legends fan and are looking for the best Jinx build in LoL after watching Arcane, we've got you covered!

Images Courtesy of Riot Games and Netflix.