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Jinx: I'm pretty sure this is not our first date, Little Man.

Ekko: Jinx, those were playdates.

Jinx: Wasn't it the same thing for us??

LOL after months of being inactive, I've been revived by TB Week. Go and check the even out and our TB discord server at https://twitter.com/TlCKINGTIMEBOMB?t=JdPwqjWWYZAkgtpt935brw&s=09 !!

#arcane #ekko #ekko the boy who shattered time #jinx #jinx fanart #jinx x ekko #timebomb

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dear friend across the river

This is all just pointing out the obvious, but I love how well Arcane seeds its final tragedy even from its first few moments.  There are multiple excellent relationship arcs in play leading up to the end, of course, but even from the very beginning we can see the effect that the violence of the world has on Powder and everyone else growing up in the Undercity. 

Vi no doubt told Powder to keep her hand over her eyes and not look on the bridge, but it’s clear even at this age - even before their personal loss is revealed - that she’s fully aware of the conflicts and the cost of the war being waged and the unflinching brutality of the Enforcers, and a part of her is already deeply wounded by it - right from the very start are the same jagged mental sketches we see later on, superimposed on the world whenever Jinx is having a particularly bad time. 

It isn’t just one chance flip of a coin that leads to disaster, but the escalation of tensions over time.  Vi and Silco’s choices and actions played a role toward the conclusion, but the seeds were sown much earlier than that.

It isn’t even a direct line of fault from the top - Jayce and Mel weren’t anywhere near positions of power when the last bridge riot was so violently halted, and Mel has already proven that she will choose mercy over caution when push comes to shove, even to her own detriment. 

The closest there is to someone who had power at that time was Heimerdinger, and he’s as gentle, benevolent and concerned with the greater good as anyone could be.  A young Powder would probably get along with him just as well as Ekko did later on.  But he wasn’t there, and by the time he realized that caring about the Undercity might be a good idea, it was a decade too late.

We even are shown that the Enforcers aren’t the faceless, unstoppable monsters that Powder knows them as.  Some are greedy and underhanded and brutal, out entirely for themselves, while others are simply working for a system they’re not in charge of, trying to keep a peace they are well aware is untenable.

The system was broken, and hurt itself as much as anything or anyone in the pursuit of power and control, and Jinx is the ultimate expression of all of that.

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Theory: From Jinx's point of view there are next to no upsides to being Powder other than that Vi would love her.

1.) Powder was already mentally ill as we can see from the scene opener where Powder on the bridge has similar hallucinations to what Jinx has. The enemy music video also suggests this. So "going back to when I was not mentally ill" is not an option/an association in her mind. Powder was already suffering from mental illness.

2.) Powder to me comes across like a shy kids who didn't have many friends. We only see her be friends with Ekko and I would suggest that body language in the Enemy music suggests that maybe it was initiated by him. Plus we know based on his Firelights that he's a naturally social person. So "having friends" might not be an argument in Powder's favor in her mind because Powder already was somebody with few friends outside her family. so pretty similar to the situation Jinx is in.

3.) Jinx is a brutal criminal, Powder wasn't. But we don't know for sure that this really matters to her. I would argue that various camera choices suggest that Jinx enjoys at least the cat and mouse part of her violence. And the fact that none of her new victims (Firelight girl, enforcers) join the chorus of voices in her head suggests to me that she does not feel bad about these crimes the way she feels bad about the deaths of Claggor and Mylo. Like if every crime caused her voices, her hauntings to get worse, I would agree, going back to not being violent, not adding new voices would certainly be of interest to her. But that doesn't seem to be the case. Also note that Episode 2 Powder wanted to put nails into her bombs to kill enforcers:

In the enemy video she's also seen fantasizing about taking down enforcers as Jinx.

4.) Both the enemy video and various Act 1 events suggest that Powder was unhappy with her life and felt weak. This is something that bothered her even before Silco came along and added his own "overcoming weakness" ideology.

IMO Jinx has wrapped a lot of her guilt over Mylo and Claggor up into Powder. While it would certainly healthy for her to face those guilt, I think it's understandable that doesn't want to/shies away from it. Especially when from her point of view there are not that many upsides to "being Powder"/"living like Powder again" other than "Vi would love me again like she used do". (ie it's probably highly doubtful in her mind that Ekko would love her again like before because her various Jinx crimes still happened)

So from her point of view, being Powder means doing something she doesn't particularly want to do (experience her guilt) just to be somebody she doesn't want to be (a mentally ill, weak girl who has troubles connecting to others, also somebody arguably worse equipped to handle the violent world they live in) with the only upside being Vi loving her.

IMO Vi has very positive memories of Powder (and so do we because the show is largely told from Vi's perspective), but she didn't actually have to be Powder/she doesn't know what it was like to be Powder (IMO the Enemy video comes closer to telling the story from Jinx's point of view rather than Vi's). So Vi's view on Powder is probably a lot rosier than what Jinx's view on Powder is.

My take is that Powder was already pretty unhappy with her life and that being Jinx allows her to do things she already wanted to do as Powder but wasn't capable of doing.

Note that that is less "Powder and Jinx are separate personalities that Jinx and switch back and for of" but more "Jinx has good reasons for why she isn't too keen on accessing the more Powdery aspects of her personality".

I think there is a way to view Jinx as a bit of a coping mechanism (even if not a terribly healthy one), but not just as "she wants to avoid the pain and guilt of having killed Claggor and Mylo" but also "it makes it easier for her to be confident and do the things she years to do and come out of her shell" (think ... Beyonce and Sasha Fierce maybe).

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@stealthily requested: ↳ Vi + hugs

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It makes me sad when people think that Jinx’s creativity is just part of her mental illness like it’s all just part of her being “crazy” when Jinx/Powder has always been shown to be a colourful and creative person from the beginning.

Vi’s flashbacks in episode 6 show us how even before her parents died, back when she was basically a baby, Little Powder coloured on the walls and drew pictures of monsters.

Her love of bright colours is something she carries with her throughout her childhood.

Her room at Vander’s is similarly full of colours and drawings, she has a whole box of crayons that she seems to use on everything, not just her bombs but basically every surface around her.

We even see hints that Jinx/Powder has a love of mechanics that goes beyond just bomb making.  She’s excited to find the Valdiani at Jayce’s lab and she’s already talented enough to build in entire arcade game in a basement, her shooter game also show how much she loves drawing and colour outside of just decorating her weaponry. 

Powder/Jinx was always an artist, an inventor and a creator, she has always loved colouring the world around her. It’s an innate part of her personality, it not just “lol crazy Jinx is crazy”. It’s actually part of her character’s tragedy. She’s so talented and creative, Vi remembers little Powder lighting up their dark home and adding colour to their grey world but the circumstances of growing up in Zaun meant that she never got to be an artist or inventor or anything like that, instead she’s just left to be a part of the endless cycle of violence in Zaun and Piltover.  

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Happy Valentines Day!!!

#arcane #timebomb #jinx x ekko #jinx #jinx fanart #ekko the boy who shattered time #ekko #ekkoxjinx #arcane fanart

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So, I was telling one of my friends who watched Arcane about the theory of Ekko checking on Jinx and moving her after their fight. And, because I'm  a stubborn Timebomb lover I gave myself the task of finding more prove for this theory.

The argument against the theory I mentioned is that Ekko must have jumped off the bridge to save his life. This counterargument is backed up by the fact that there's no evidence that he was on top of the bridge after the explosion...but is there not?

After Jinx's bomb explodes, we see a knocked out/almost dead Jinx laying on the floor of the bridge and Ekko's watch as a representation of him. In the context of the chapter, this was used to create the false idea that Ekko had died, using it as a catching cliffhanger for the next episode.

However, this was not the only purpose  of this scene. It was also giving us a hint of what happened after the explosion (and what we didn't see). If Ekko had jumped, it would make much more sense to animate the watch sinking into the river or it just floating out of the water. But no, we're specifically showed that the watch is on the bridge and on the same floor Jinx is laying on.

Now, let's  say that Ekko had jumped and had left his watch behind. This could make sense...if the animators hadn't intentionally showed us that he took his watch back to the Firelights hideout at the end of chapter 9. Not only that, but also the fact that it seems way too important  to just be a quick indicator of something. The camera doesn't  show us the watch in the background or hidden somewhere, but in the foreground. Making it even more important at the end where the focus of the camera goes from Ekko and Heimerdinger to his watch...and ONLY his watch.

I'm not sure if someone  had pointed this out before. But as a visual storyteller this just rings so many bells. The way the camera deliberately focuses on the watch in those 2 scenes seems to be way too intentional not to have another meaning behind it. (Maybe foreshadowing some flashbacks from a certain fight that we are dying to know how it really ended on S2?).

#arcane #jinx x ekko #jinx #arcane theory #ekko the boy who shattered time #ekko

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What if she considered missing each other when fighting as another of their games and felt like Ekko broke the rules of it when he hit her? Feeling that he betrayed her last little connection to him to protect the inforcer who had taken her sister away from her for the third time?

Thinking about how Jinx deliberately missed Ekko with her opening chomper-grenade attack during the airship fight.

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I LOVE THIS WITH ALL MY HEART. JUST LOOK HOW HAPPY SHE LOOKS #ICraveHappyJinxContent

A rendering paint over I created based on an Arcane AU I created with friends.

What if after the events of Episode 3, Powder was found by Viktor and was taken in by him and Jayce?

She still has her mischievous chaotic creativity but is in a more positive environment that supports her inventiveness.

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#SOBBING

❝ powder’s gone, vi. all that’s left is jinx and she belongs to silco. ❞

THE BOY SAVIOR ARCANE (2021 - )

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#I'm here for Jayce Slander and sister bonding

Gonna be posting lots of arcane shit

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They'd be beasties bullying Jayce behind his back. I just know it.

#arcane #doodle #viktor #jinx fanart #vi and jinx

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Jinx: How do you know what’s inside you unless you test yourself? Don’t do one pushup. Do 100. Don’t run one mile. Run a marathon. Don’t have one family. Have a second family after the first one gets killed. Don’t just have a second family. Have a third family after you accidentally blow up the second. Don’t just let your second adopted father walk out of your life. Take his life from him. Don’t just start a civil war. Commit a war crime with a stolen weapon of mass destruction. Don’t just let anyone have closure by apologizing. Send a message that you’re not afraid of Hell.

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i don't think you guys understand the death grip this man has on my brain

#viktor #arcane #beautiful

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TIMEBOMB.

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absolutely never going to be normal about Jinx’s psyche because LOOK AT THIS NOTES!!!

guilt can be such a terrible thing to feel through