Could they work? I'm sure they could. Will they? Hard to tell.

There is definitely groundwork made in S1 that would make a romance / friendship not look out of place BUT they made Jinx hurt Ekko so bad in S1 that if they planned a romance all along it's just kinda weird?

Ekko/Jinx definitely have the most parallels out of any other pair in Arcane and it's not even close. There are definitely going for a ying-yang kinda bond with these 2 .

But i think in Arcane they don't seem to planned for Jinx to have much happiness. I think they will keep on telling her story has extremely tragic and full of despair and a romance would kinda kill that?

Plus there is no way you could have a romance between these 2 without it being an extremely slow "slow burn" and by the way they are rushing through the story i don't see them taking the time for it.

Now i definitely disagree with people claiming Ekko hates Jinx but convincing people that he can love her so soon after all the stupid shit she did will be a tough job to do (which i feel arcane writers could do it ) but who knows if its worth for them to take the time for that.

Just wish Riot would stop make Ekko being the biggest Jinx simp if they don't plan on them ever being a thing because all the voice lines and official art they put out don't help with the allusion of this ship lol.