Portraying Disability: League of Legends' Multifaceted Approach Across Game, Lore, and Media

Abstract

This study examines the portrayal of mental health and disabilities through a transmedia lens, investigating how the League of Legends’ transmedia universe shapes and evolves the representation of disabilities across its various platforms. Focusing on Jinx (mental health) and Viktor (physical disability), this analysis follows the characters throughout the game League of Legends, the tv show Arcane and other additional transmedia narratives. A textual and transmedia analysis was used to examine how these characters and their disabilities are portrayed in League of Legends and how this is translated across its transmedia extensions. Findings reveal that the original portrayals in the game lack depth and dimensionality, employing superficial disability tropes. The transmedia expansions, particularly Arcane, evolve these portrayals and provide more opportunities for representation through character backstories and nuanced physical/emotional depictions. This analysis highlights how transmedia storytelling allows for layered disabled characters, which could help improve representation in future media.