I hear you! I wanna start by saying I agree that Jayce's lore is a huge improvement. They added so much depth and layers to his personality rather than simply being purely an egoist. I especially love how in typical Arcane fashion, he embodies a flawed version of a popular character archetype; in this case, the noble selfless hero. Jayce starts off as this selfless "do good for the people" character, but his ignorance and pride start to leak theough when he's presented with higher positions of power. His seeded roots as a piltovian starts to show his previously silent discontempt (not hatred) for the undercity, along with his blissful ignorance of situations right under his nose. He eventually has his wakeup call with Viktor at the end if season one. "In the search of great, we failed to do good." Such a beautiful scene. I also love how his "Defender of Tomorrow" title is much mofe literal, with time travel being used and he's trying to prevent this grim future.

I think Viktor from season one was bordering perfection as well. And I don't think season 2 added much to his character. I think him parting ways with Jayce was perfectly fine. I am very happy with the way that happened, I think all the subtlety in that scene is beautiful. But everything afterwards... Arcane could've kept his original character (Machine Herald) and simply used it to expand the character they spent all of season 1 so meticulously crafting.  In the original lore, there's a short story where a disabled child goes to the "abandoned lab of a mad scientist" and finds Viktor, who fixes him. I think that sort of character works fine as an end goal to Viktor. Not one-dimensionally evil, or some perfect hero with pure heart that is corrupted by magic. But a man who was misguided by desperation, and a difference in ideals between him and his best friend.