While nothing is wrong with liking one more than the other, it’s a little unfair to compare which is “better” directly. Last of Us is translating something that once a video game, directly into a TV show. Arcane simply took some of the lore in the world and crafted a whole new story.

The writers had far different jobs. For Arcane, they could make a story from the ground up that works perfectly for TV. They didn’t really have to worry about staying “faithful” besides making sure the lore itself was faithful. Meanwhile The Last of Us had to take an entire story that was written for a video game and rework it to fit as a TV show. And that doesn’t just come with the challenges of changing the story to work in the format. You also have to deal with constant comparisons. If a character is even slightly different than in the game, people while hyper fixate on it and nitpick every change. With Arcane, it’s a whole new story, so people could just see if they enjoyed it. There wasn’t a whole discussion of how “game Vi is better than show Vi”. Arcane made a great story and is amazing, but The Last of Us definitely had a ton of hurdles and restrictions that Arcane didn’t.