Legends Rising Q&A: Uncovering pro stories

A couple of weeks ago, we launched Legends Rising, a documentary series following five of the world's most prominent League of Legends pros. The series, taking inspiration from last year's Road to Worlds (and launching just as this year's race to Worlds hit full stride), examines not only the competitive scene and the teams fueling it, but the players who help shape professional League of Legends. These are meta-setting players, capable of igniting Twitter with one staggering, logic-defying play. 

Over six episodes, Legends Rising provides a behind-the-curtain look at what inspires SwordArt, Uzi, Bjergsen, Faker, xPeke, and brTT to be the best in the world -- and the challenges they face along the way.

We met up with Legends Rising director Daniel Stolzman to talk about why he and Riot’s documentary team decided to turn their lens toward specific individual players instead of focusing on entire pro teams.

1.  Why did the documentary team decide to move away from a film about pro teams, similar to Road to Worlds, and instead shift focus to individuals?

Road to Worlds essentially wove together two connected stories: On the one hand it told the history of the competitive LoL scene, from its early days up until season four. The series also told the story of several pros, their ups and downs on the Rift, and their personal backgrounds.

I think for many Road to Worlds viewers, the history was fascinating to relive, but it was really the pros’ personal stories that resonated most. The audience was starting to connect emotionally to the pros because they were learning about their passions and their humanity.

So this year, when we started building the idea for Legends Rising, we decided that in order to take it one notch further and capture something that was more intimate and personal, while also deeply connected to the game, we had to choose one player from several regions. 

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2. Of all the pro players from every region, why SwordArt, Bjergsen, Faker, Uzi,  xPeke, and brTT?

Choosing the cast of the series was probably the most difficult part of the process. We did factor in how each pro was viewed in their leagues and how much players wanted to know more about these pros. But we also tried to balance a mix of personalities, play styles and personal backgrounds as well. We had to make some very tough choices because there are many compelling pros and stories in each league, and we knew we could only choose one in each. We were very lucky that these six special guys agreed to let us into their worlds.

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3. For many of these pros, this must have been one of the first times the camera was solely on them and not their respective pro teams. How'd they handle the spotlight? 

For the most part the players were extremely flattered and accommodating. I think there were times they probably felt uncomfortable having more of the spotlight than their teammates. But I think over time, the players and  teams got used to us being around and managed to forget about us, especially when they were focused on their practice and games.

4.  As you filmed Legends Rising, five pros featured in the series moved on to Worlds playoffs, while Uzi didn't make it. Did that change the storylines you guys were filming at all? How did the timing of Worlds alter your stories if at all?

One of the most poetic aspects to documentary filmmaking is that no matter how much you prepare via research and planning, life happens and you have to go with it. We never in a million years could have predicted that Uzi and OMG would have had such a tough season. Every week the story changed and we had to follow it.

We knew we wanted to air the series before the Worlds tournament in October. So we decided to essentially split up all the storylines into two parts, with episodes 1-3 representing the first part, and episodes 4-6 representing the second. This allowed us to spend the first half of our production window capturing and showcasing these pro stories.

As the editors finished those, the production team was out shooting episodes 4-6 for the later half of the season. It was a fast turnaround. We definitely did a lot of advance planning, and we had to edit the episodes even while the end of the story was unknown.

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5. This is the second League of Legends esports documentary you've done, the first being Road to Worlds. Since that project launched, have you seen the pro esports scene evolve?

Several of the veteran players I have spoken to have mentioned that it’s more competitive, more cut-throat, and the stakes are higher than ever. This might just be me, but it seems like the sport has become more globally connected than ever before, with star players switching leagues and fans watching regions other than their own. It seems like the outside interest in the Korea’s LCK and China’s LPL leagues has really grown. I think this year’s Worlds tournament is going to have a ton of surprises for people.