#the genya pov story is Very Good and Very Feelings for a lot of reasons that have nothing to do with horses

[goblins-riddles-or-frocks]

So many languages and you spoke to spit facts ✊🏻. I myself lean on he didn't plan on doing that to Genya because well if he wanted a spy to sleep with Tsar he could have also sent an adult woman .. it's not like supernaturally beautiful grisha will have difficulty in catching an old bastard's attention but once that happened he definitely could have easily gotten her out of that situation instead of the manipulative crap he pulled to turn the situation in his favour. I also think Genya was slightly ooc with regards to her apologizing to Alina and everything but when she put the bastard (as if the most heinous thing he has ever done is existing) in hie place, that was 👏🏻👏🏻. Oh wait another thing that was slightly ooc for me was everybody being so keen on eternal suffering for him because well eternal suffering is eternal and i pictured them to be more conflicted (hate him and he deserves to suffer but this is a bit much and also their compassion and gratefulness (he saved the world) colliding with their hate and betrayed feelings. Anyways.)

re: this ask (I’m assuming)

I agree, I really don’t think he planned things to go down like that with genya. but he probably thought it was advantageous! the tsar is more important than the tsaritsa anyway and like genya was already losing favor with her. for all his manipulation, I do think he was mostly just incredibly callous and was like “yeah I gave her an out and she very conveniently didn’t take it but that sets my morals at ease.” and just didn’t think about it further? I really think it’s a case of him not needing to think about it because he is secure and powerful and has lost touch with any sense of danger or vulnerability. but if he like remotely cared at all he wouldn’t let things get to that or would have her extracted immediately in a way that doesn’t seem to imply upending everything she’s ever known. (I’m putting a lot of weight on him being like “you won’t have to wear those colors or any colors” as implied like total abandonment)

idk claim you need a tailor for a super secret espionage thing! make some sort of trade. and it’s very strongly implied that the tsar isn’t exactly picky on who he’s preying on and that it’s not just genya being singled out. so it’s definitely not like that is their only possible chance for a honeypot scheme ever and otherwise all their plans will crumble.

anyway I didn’t think the apology was really ooc tbh because genya’s just working through so much and from her pov in the tailor we know she was feeling VERY guilty. so I think she would say that!

and I do get your point about the eternal suffering. but also they do kind of just… immediately resolve to save him. so genya having that sort of anger and conviction in the moment makes sense— and I don’t think it would even be that odd for her to simply want him to literally burn in hell forever, but the ending frames it super impermanently. and I feel it’s believable that zoyalai in that moment are both just too busy being relieved that it didn’t have to be either of them. so it feels more like a particular burst of feeling, then thinking about it for awhile longer and being like. sigh. guess this isn’t tenable. and I can buy that!

anyway idk a lot of RoW did just feel deeply inorganic to me. the way that characters got into situations and what plot points were going down often felt forced? but the contents of the scenes themselves didn’t feel flagrantly ooc from a character standpoint. I don’t think any character said anything they wouldn’t typically etc. I just had trouble buying that they were in those situations at all? it reads very like… fanfic of itself to me. like put that on ao3 and I would call it very good and ic fanfic but the trajectory is something I just struggle to buy at all for a definitive published story. so that’s the flavor of annoyance I generally have with it.

I was about to end it there but actually shdgd one more thing! this has been on my mind for fic reasons but it’s topical here: I do think there was an avoidance with engaging with any vestigial complicated feelings zoya or genya might have about him though, and that got frustrating. it feels in keeping with how alina runs after the fete makeout scene, on the precipice of having slept with him but not having actually made that plunge, and from that point on it’s like a switch has flipped in her feelings. she was pulled back before she could cross any too emotionally compromising lines and then after she just always has her hackles up.

leigh bardugo seems very interested in stories about manipulation and abuse but seems really uncomfortable with portraying the actual manipulation and effects of it without pulling punches or flinching away imo. she tends to keep her characters kind of aloof and removed even when it seems like they ostensibly wouldn’t be.

like we know zoya was fanatical enough in her faith in the darkling that the only thing that bothered her about novokribirsk was that her own aunt died there. personal loss was the wake up call. genya was willing to overlook it entirely, iirc she was willing to believe it was an accident? either way she’s still very much team darkling in S&S and ostensibly would have remained so if he hadn’t mutilated her for failing to stop alina from running away. he essentially throws her out. but there’s not much focus on any sense of abandonment. but yeah they’d both been hardcore drinking the koolaid! I can believe that they’d intellectually be at a point where they’re like “hate that bitch!!! hope he dies horrifically (again!)” but I just think there would be more general emotional turmoil. if nothing else I think there should just be more of a consistent vibe of like acknowledgement of a past warped perspective that they no longer hold. like the starless could have been such a good foil! zoya’s utter hatred for them does already read to me like mortification at how that basically used to be her? but I’d just like it to be explicit and unpacked more overtly! I want genya to just have more she’s working through. like would she have turned on him if he hadn’t set the nichevo’ya on her? does that question haunt her?

I personally haaaate and do not agree with the criticisms that either of them were ooc or like co-opted to be author mouthpieces in RoW when they say they hate him! first of all, I absolutely do not think leigh bardugo hates him lol. that is a character she basically broke her entire series ending to bring back from the dead, to then give him a big hero’s sacrifice ending that’s not even going to stick! because the protagonists are going to fucking save him!! it’s such an absurd choice like I would argue that the KoS duology was actually stunningly soft on him! so I want to be clear that’s not my problem here, but I just wanted it to be messier and to have room for more complexity

#grishaverse #shadow and bone #king of scars #rule of wolves #i ramble sometimes #all the bendy punctuations #a mysterious stranger has appeared #long post

[goatsandgangsters]

one of my wishes for s&b is that they include some variation on the scene from the genya pov short story where she’s trying to talk to the darkling but he spends the whole conversation petting his horse and whispering sweet nothings to it 

we deserve Weird Horse Girl darkling content, we just DO 

#shadow and bone #the darkling #the genya pov story is Very Good and Very Feelings for a lot of reasons that have nothing to do with horses #but every time I think about That One Page where it's just like #'I was talking. the darkling was petting his horse. the horse is pleased to see him.' #'I asked him a question and—ohhh look now he's talking baby-talk with the horse. alright.' #I LOVE IT #grishaverse #the grisha trilogy

[mysaldate]

what are your thoughts on kaigaku as a character? your analyses are always interesting to read so i'm curious to hear what you have to say about that... special... boy.

I'm putting this one up front since it's analysis and not headcanons (and also because he's an interesting character).

If you've seen my demon POV masterpost, you already know the outlines of what I'm gonna talk about. Kaigaku, like many other demons, suffered from the POV the story is told from. Furthermore, we didn't even get to see his side of the story, just Zenitsu's. And since we know Zenitsu is the character we're supposed to feel sorry for, I think it's safe to say most of us viewed Kaigaku as little more than another wrench in the lighning boi's life, thus there was little sympathy for him. Ever. Much less when we found out he became a demon.

But there's much more to Kaigaku than a prideful jerk, regardless of what the fandom might tell you. After all, we've been over fandom interpretations that omit backstory for the sake of painting a character in a worse light and Kaigaku's case is no different. But I said there's more to him than that because he certainly is a prideful jerk no matter how you look at it.

Guess what, that doesn't make him a bad guy, not in the slightest. You know who else is prideful? Most the pillars to a certain degree. You know who else is a jerk? Sanemi Most the pillars to a certain degree! That doesn't make them the bad guys in the slightest because somehow their position makes us feel like they have the right to be like that. It's a classic double standard, nothing too unusual both in fiction and real life. We forgive people above us way more than we would ever let slide if it came to someone we consider inferior to us. That might be the main issue with Kaigaku's character as well.

From the very first glimpse we get of Kaigaku, it's clear he respects their teacher way more than Zenitsu does in spite of having none of the warm familial relationship those two have. He scolds Zenitsu when he feels like he's not showing their elder enough respect and we don't see him ever allowing even himself to call Jigoro anything but master up till the moment where he feels neglected and underprecciated.

Honestly, much like in Kyogai's case, much of Kaigaku's anger and many of his actions are caused simply by feeling shunned but unlike with Kyogai, we never got to see a full backstory (+ there's the thing where we're supposed to like Zenitsu so we get to see this from his eyes rather than Kaigaku's). Kaigaku worked really hard and there was just a single technique he couldn't master. Meanwhile, Zenitsu was always crying and running away and didn't properly appreciate their teacher and only ever managed to learn a single technique — and he couldn't even use it consciously on top of that. By plain logic alone, Kaigaku was superior in every possible way. And yet, Jigoro decided to make the two of them equal, make them both become his successors together, thus completely destroying any feeling of achievement Kaigaku had.

And don't get me wrong, you can see where he was coming from too. It wasn't meant to harm Kaigaku or make him feel like whatever he was doing was not good enough for his teacher. But intentions and actual results may often clash. And that's completely fine, that's just how life works. And Kaigaku was mad and wouldn't understand the point of this. That's also fine, that can also happen and we've seen it on the human side of our cast many times already (Sanemi and Genya being the most notable example). Here lies what I believe might be the most controversial part of the backstory though.

We saw how quickly Jigoro got attached to Zenitsu despite Zeni having absolutely no qualifications, no redeeming qualities and no wish to become a slayer. He was a pathetic loser, incapable of even defending himself from an unfair debt. Jigoro not only took him in and cleaned up his mess after him but quite obviously cared for him very deeply.

With Kaigaku, we didn't really get to see much but the fact that he wouldn't ever think of calling him anything other than master (until he became a demon) and even scolded Zenitsu for showing such disrespect hints on a lot. Kaigaku's relationship with Jigoro was strictly proffessional in order to make him strong. There was no tender patient care like with Zenitsu. After all, while Zeni was allowed to only learn a single move, Kaigaku was refused his one ambition because he failed to learn one technique even though he mastered all the others.

It's obvious how this may seem as a double standard, especially if you put yourself in Kaigaku's position. Because it was pretty unfair, let's be honest here.

Of course, we know how this story ends. Kaigaku almost gets killed by Kokushibou but in the last minutes, Koku actually recognizes his strength and offers him blood. Kaigaku, who was already bitter and feeling rejected and shunned, and now also scared of dying, gladly takes him up on the offer. And we can't really blame him for that, we saw people turning into demons for less (playing outside with other kids in Rui's case for example). Not to mention, the rage he feels towards Zenitsu, the way he sees him as something less, that is very similar to how Kokushibou saw Yoriichi. Yet, you don't see people complaining about him being a jerk, at least not so much as you see it with Kaigaku.

And guess what, even as a demon, his eventual inferiority to Zeni is just as much of a burden as it has always been, perhaps even more. Forget the fact Zeni could only master one technique, forget the fact he was a cowardly crybaby up till now. No, in the final arc, he suddenly gets over his issues all at once. Suddenly, he's all brave and selfless and even comes up with an entirely new technique we have never even seen him train or attempt and-

You know what, I'm bitter about what a rushed arc Zenitsu's personal one was. It was out of nowhere, bland, boring and with no build-up. Zenitsu was an annoying character who only ever cried and ran away and hit on girls (and not even normally hit on them, he just went Mr. Creepy on them) and then, one meditation later, he's suddenly badass who is dedicated to a revenge plot? Look, I don't necessarily dislike comedic relief characters and if a character starts like that and then gets developed to be deep and cool, that's even better. But there's just so much cringe and out of nowhere sudden development for Zenitsu that I feel honestly cheated.

TLDR: Kaigaku doesn't deserve the shit he's getting because he's basically Koku but with more reasons behind his jealousy and also because his supposedly better counterpart is objectively worse than him in every way while Yoriichi was at least praised for his actual skills.

#kny #fandom discourse #kny discourse #kaigaku

[remainingso]

WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON KING OF SCARS???

HELLO FRIEND okay so uhhh i hope you wanted (-checks word count-) nearly 2.5k of meta. Because. That’s what I have. I clearly have so many thoughts on King of Scars. 

So without further ado, let’s dive in!!! (spoilers ABOUND like literally EVERYWHERE under the cut) 

To start: I wanted to love this book so, so badly. In fact, I find it basically unratable? I loved the first 50% with my entire heart and the latter 50% just felt like… the world’s longest disappointment. Ultimately I think this book could’ve been so much more, and the reason I’m kind of mad at it is that it promised me so many things that it never ended up delivering on.

So! Sections, because I’m articulating my salt, dammit.

on breaking open your world

One of the things I loved the most about the first part of this book was the sense of scale we were finally getting from the world. it made sense for Ravka to be isolated in the original trilogy—the whole plot was about getting rid of the Shadowfold to open it back up to the rest of the world. And we got glimpses of the wider Grishaverse politics in Crooked Kingdom especially. I thought King of Scars was going to finally be the book where we go GLOBAL in scope. I adored all the political talk early on—I genuinely thought we were building up to some sort of fantasy World War I! The Zemeni navy starting to challenge the Kerch hold on the seas! Messy alliances between the countries!

I wanted so much more of that—I wanted to know more about why there was war brewing. A lack of resources? The Zemeni new and hungry and eager for more? Fjerda wanting a holy war against the Ravkan Grisha presence? Kerch Greed? I wanted to see what Ravka looks like at war with something outside of itself. I wanted to see Nikolai struggle over how to protect his people and his land. I wanted to see him mess up. I wanted to see him make difficult decisions about how to govern.

Instead, I got half a book of…training montage.

And instead of widening the world globally, we got a lot of Lore.

(Just so much Lore. I really didn’t need to know the origins of why the Grisha are named after a diminutive of Grigori, man. That felt lame and kind of defensive after years of that criticism lol.)

Right off the bat: I didn’t like the revelation of the Saints being real. I didn’t like the weird in-between location Nikolai and Zoya spend literally half the book in. First of all, I never thought that Bardugo’s magic system was built on the most solid of foundations, and I think that this attempt to deepen the mythos, essentially, does more harm than good. I end up with more questions than answers: how does it count as mutual sacrifice when you make an amplifier if you don’t actually die and there’s one obvious dominant consciousness? How does it work that you can become one with an amplifier and then someone else can then become one with you+amplifier? Is there a limit to how many times you can do that? WHY were these particular Saints drawn to the shadowfold? And, beyond that, what are the Saints in service to? I think Bardugo tried to dig into the nature of her religion, but I don’t understand the fundamental Core to this belief system: who’s god? Without god, who are the Saints being martyred for? And when people pray to the Saints, what values are they purporting to uphold? I feel like these are all sort of central questions you need to make clear when you go deep into religious world building, and because she focused so much on the Saints without answering those questions for me, it ultimately felt kind of cheap and hollow.

And because Nikolai & Zoya are…basically stuck there for the whole second half of the book, we don’t get to see them actually interact with Ravka as it is? There’s a lot of narration about Nikolai thinking of what Ravka means to him, but that’s ultimately meaningless for me if I don’t see him make any decisions in service to her. He’s isolated and cut off from the government! This is a book about a King who never does any real King-ing.

the feminist aesthetic

This book has a very empowering aesthetic. And by that, I mean it claims to be empowering without actually supporting that with textual events. There are a lot of nice quotes about powerful women, but at almost every single turn, it undermines the power the women in the book have.

so Let’s Talk About Zoya

I love Zoya! I think YA needs more girls like Zoya, who are unapologetically mean, who gets to be ruthless and prickly and aren’t seen as wrong for it. I love that Nikolai clearly wants her to step on him. I love so much about her.

What I don’t love is how the narrative treats her.

I don’t like that she lets herself be drowned over and over and over, all so Nikolai can level up—and she doesn’t even punch him in the face for it after? She just literally smiles and lets it happen. Why does she have to be reduced to the precious thing he’s fighting for? Why does she have to suffer to force him to action? I love that Nikolai thinks Zoya can be Queen—but, does he really? He says he does. But he literally doesn’t listen to her a single time in the book. And she has good suggestions! Killing his dad? Would’ve solved their problem at the end where he aligns himself with the Fjerdans. Not listening to Yuri? Would’ve solved their entire Darkling problem by the end. Pick a bride? Stay in Ravka? Kill the Darkling at the end? All really good ideas! The book tells us that Zoya can be queen, and then spends the entire run-through relegating her to support role. What does Zoya do for herself? I don’t like that in order to have her “level up” they took away her power, and then had a man give her his power in order for her to thrive.

Okay so this line: “Men looked at her and wanted to believe they saw goodness beneath her armor, a kind girl, a gentle girl who would emerge if only given the chance.” I LOVE this idea so much. I love the notion of like a girl who doesn’t need to be saved, because she isn’t soft underneath; she’s all steel. But I can’t help but feel like the scene where Zoya confesses how she got her amplifier in the first place basically entirely undermines this concept. I thought, going in, that we were going to get a story about baby Zoya who snuck out in the middle of the night to stake a kill for herself, a baby Zoya who stole the tiger out from under everyone’s nose because she was wanted to show them all she could do it, and she didn’t mind the blood on her hands. I don’t like that we got a story about how she wanted to protect the baby cubs instead! I don’t like that this bonding moment between Zoya and Nikolai is one where she…reveals the kind, gentle girl underneath her armour. I didn’t want the story of how she got her power to be rooted in her secret maternal compassion for baby cubs; I wanted her to be ruthless. I wanted her to have killed and regretted it, maybe. I wanted that moment between them to be one where she tells him about her raw ambition and bite, and he understood that about her.

I’m not super here for all the… women have to suffer in order to Overcome vibe either? I mean it’s Bardugo’s prerogative, and I’m not saying it’s problematic or anything, but just that she has a history of making female characters necessarily suffer for growth (see: Genya, Inej) and I don’t like how Zoya’s trauma backstory with being exploited by a shitty man falls into that pattern. Why can’t she have been just angry? Why does she need a reason?

the shu han problem

I’ve had a long-standing issue with the way the Shu have been depicted in the Grishaverse, and this book did nothing to alleviate that. To start off, the strange Mongolia-China mashup culture is problematic in and of itself. In the Original Trilogy, we get the sole asian martial artist teacher trope full blast; not good! I never talk about this, but I actually hated how the Shu were treated in Six of Crows. I really do love that duology, but I sure don’t like that the Shu are…basically one dimensional villains throughout. The committee gets called “greedy” explicitly out of all the other committees present at the auction in Crooked Kingdom? Kuwei doesn’t get to speak for himself, and his entire storyline is basically a proxy for Jesper and Wylan to get together. I still don’t even know what his personality is like.

So I went into King of Scars hoping for…something more. Something better. And I mostly came away cold.

I still feel like we don’t know anything about Shu Han. Sure we know they have poetry. And a single instrument. But the matriarchy thing is so often used as a lazy shorthand to make a foreign country seem interesting and more foreign that I feel like it doesn’t tell us anything. What’s their word for Grisha? What’s their relationship to the Grisha? Are they evil, like in Fjerda? Wanted, like in Ravka? What’s their religion? What do their people believe in? Why do they want to go to war with Ravka? We’ve seen nuance in how a country can be a beautiful place even if its government holds terrible tenants: look at Fjerda. Why don’t we have the same nuance here? Sure, Tolya and Tamar exist, but they’re framed as like traitors? And on the Good side because of that? I don’t like that their number one allegiance is to a white girl, in the end. I don’t like that we got almost nothing from either Ehri or Mayu about their relationship to their country. I don’t like that Mayu was basically forced into helping her country, so we still have this… villainous view of the government & everything it stands for. I don’t like that Ehri is literally still a disposable girl, DESPITE that we supposedly have this matriarchy happening. I don’t like that they’re literally forcing her to marry Nikolai. I don’t like that they framing is the benevolent (white) protagonists, swooping in to save this naive princess from her monstrous home country.

I think Isaak’s POV is ultimately kind of useless and only there so we feel sad about him dying at the end. Functionally, we don’t need Isaak’s POV to know that there’s a fake Nikolai, and not much actually happens that only he can know about. Why couldn’t we have gotten Mayu’s POV? We know Nikolai’s elsewhere; so as soon as “Nikolai” shows up we’ll know he’s a fake. Why don’t the Shu get a voice?

the man of the hour

hey if you’ve made it this far, I’m going to talk about the Darkling now! (…yay?)

So this book spends like 90% of its run subtly reinforcing that the Darkling was Wrong and his ideas were dangerous and that overall he was bad for Ravka. it’s hard not to see this in a sort of metatextual bent—a lot of what Yuri espouses is what the fandom reaction to the original trilogy was and continues to be: That he could’ve ruled Ravka and led them into glory. That he was misunderstood. That he deserves to be worshipped. And I thought the existence of the Cult of the Starless Saint was a clever nod, a sort of guiding hand for Bardugo to reinforce the message of the original trilogy. That message being that like, guys, he’s kind of a shitty dude. And would’ve been a bad leader. I thought there was something really interesting she was doing here about how people always will gravitate towards powerful demagogues. That powerful men often are heard above all.

But I thought she was going to like… refute that. Alina’s entire war was to get rid of this fucker. The original trilogy told us that powerful men can be defeated. That who we should want to emulate instead are the girls who fight against them.

And now he’s back.

I can’t help but feel betrayed. I can’t help but feel like bringing him back, especially as the culmination of the book, reinforces the idea instead that, actually, the whole goddamn grishaverse revolves around him. That Yuri was right. Because he was. He was right about the visions, he was right about the return of his saint, and so what does that mean this book is saying about the voice of this powerful men? That it deserves to be heard? The Darkling gets the very last word of the book—it’s hard not to think that this is what the whole thing has been building up towards, in the end.

I don’t actually think that Bardugo is trying to say that we should all worship the Darkling. But I do think that this was a clumsy move that inadvertently muddles so much of what came prior—and for what? A cheap twist?

on expectation and disappointment

again, at the end of all this, my point is that the core of my issues is that the book simply doesn’t deliver on a lot of what it set up. It feels like I read two different books. I don’t expect this book to be perfect, but I find it hard to forgive a lot of the faults I find when the feeling I came away from was ultimately…dissatisfaction. I felt empty, finishing. I feel empty thinking about it. I’m just really sad about all the things it could’ve been—because I think it could’ve been so great.

There’s so much I loved! Like I said, the entire first 50%? Gorgeous, magnificent, showstopping. I adored all of it. The underground bunker! The science and magic mingling! Nina and Matthias!!! And there’s stuff I don’t really want to get into because it gets nitpicky lol (some logistics stuff with Nina’s plotline near the end). But basically I likened reading this book to feeling like I was on a rollercoaster, and super enjoying the cranking climb upward for the first half, and then, instead of the swooping, exhilarating fall, the entire track just collapsed underneath me.

So that’s where I’m at. I’m happy to talk about it and I really enjoy discussing the parts I loved! And I’m happy to field anyone who wants to tell me why they loved it, because, again, I would love to love this book. Please. Convince me. But at the end of the day, I’m sad and I’m mad and I’m disappointed. What a bummer.

#king of scars spoilers #Anonymous

[aion-rsa]

Shadow & Bone: Ranking the Ships

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This Shadow and Bone feature contains MAJOR spoilers for Season 1.

Netflix’s Shadow and Bone adaptation is rife with excellent shipping options. Adapted from Leigh Bardugo’s Grishaverse YA book series, there is an embarrassment of riches when it comes to romantic relationships. Whether you’re into the Enemies to Lovers vibes of Nina and Matthias (aka Helnik), the Slow Burn angst of Inej and Kaz (aka Kanej), or you just like to see Jesper having fun with the hot stableboy, Shadow and Bone has you covered. In the interest of covering the wide swathe of romantic ships on this show, and recognizing that everyone has their own subjective taste when it comes to storytelling, Den of Geek editor Kayti Burt and Den of Geek contributor Lacy Baugher are teaming up to discuss loving the love of Shadow and Bone. Welcome to our discussion, and feel free to share your own thoughts in the comments below…

Question: What was your favorite ship in Shadow and Bone Season 1?

Lacy: Matthias and Nina are my favorite ship in the books, and my favorite ship in Shadow and Bone. I’m actually kind of surprised by this though, because there are just so, so many ways that their storyline here could have gone off the rails and been truly awful to watch. Instead, their connection is really natural and develops carefully throughout the season. (I was really afraid it would just be some insta-attraction, but that’s not what happened at all.) 

From Nina’s capture and  imprisonment aboard what is essentially a Grisha slave ship bound for Fjerda to Matthias over the top hatred of her “kind,” there’s just so much goodness for those fans— like me, lol—who love a good enemies to frenemies to OTP forever style romance. They’re both so good for each other, and I love how thoughtful the show is about showing us how they’re each expanding one another’s experiences and worldview. Also, waffles!!! 

Kayti: From the get-go, I was pretty much all in on Alina and Mal (aka Malina), which surprised me because they are… fine in the book. The decision to play this romantic connection as so obviously reciprocal from the beginning, even if Alina cannot see how Mal feels about her (and maybe vice versa), was so smart. In the first half of the season, which was the weaker part of this story for me, the yearning between these two is the narrative aspect that kept me emotionally engaged, even when the Little Palace stuff wasn’t as interesting.

Lacy: I love how hard Alina fights to go with Mal into the Shadow Fold in the first episode. That isn’t the way that happens in the books (they’re both basically just ordered to go) and that choice sort of crystallizes for me all the right things that this series does with their relationship. They’re both really active about how much they mean to one another and are constantly fighting to either stay together or get back to each other, I find that so romantic.

Question: What was your least favorite ship in Shadow and Bone Season 1?

Lacy: I find the idea of Alina and the Darkling (aka Darklina) really off putting for many reasons, not the least of which is the fact that his desire for her is almost completely and utterly self-serving. I know there are a lot of Shadow and Bone fans who love it for whatever reason and I support anyone shipping whatever they need to ship. (Also, Ben Barnes is certainly a looker.)  But, for me Alina deserves better than a man who seems to think he has some kind of right to her simply because their powers are similarly spectacular and rare. It is fully not Alina’s job or responsibility to save this man from his own darkness or loneliness or however he would describe the many moral failings that he expects her to somehow magically cure.

Plus, well, he’s a remorseless murderer who is basically trying to take over the world. But even if he wasn’t, the Darkling is still someone who lied to and manipulated Alina for his own selfish ends, and then forced her into compliance with his desires against her will. There is truly no aspect of that story that’s romantic for me, and I think trying to pretend that he’s in some way good for her is downright dangerous at points. 

Kayti: Yes! It is not Alina’s job to fix the Darkling. She deserves support and love now, not some time in a possible future when she has managed to coach Aleksander through his pain. (That being said, Ben Barnes is an utter delight and I love him.)

I will say that, even though I don’t personally like this ship, I love how the series handles it. As a story, I don’t think the adaptation really ever romanticizes this relationship as anything other than what it is: a toxic, manipulative dynamic that, for Aleksander, is always about power and never about love. The series’ contextualization of their relationship (it only ever briefly entertains the idea of these two as a proper couple) honestly feels somewhat radical, especially because Alina/the Darkling is such a popular ship in the novel.

Additional note: I am not here to murder anyone’s ship. If you’re into the Darklina of it all, I say go for it. Shipping fictional characters is different than perpetuating toxic dynamics in real life, and if shipping Darklina brings you joy, I say go for it!

Question: Which ship gets the “Most Improved” award from the books?

Lacy: 100% Mal and Alina! I’ve written about this at some length already, but I’m honestly a bit stunned by how well the show adapts this relationship for the screen. I did not expect it, but I love it and I honestly can’t wait to see how the show handles the events of the second book.

Mal and Alina’s relationship is so much more complex and interesting here than it is on the page, from the changes to their shared history (Mal and Alina aren’t just from the same orphanage, they’re both the only mixed race kids there who get bullied for being part Shu-Han) to the increased depth Mal’s presence throughout the story lends to his character. These two make so much sense as a couple here, and it’s all very natural and earned to me – and doesn’t at all come off like they’re only together because they books say they have to be.

Kayti: Agreed! The adaptation made Mal a protagonist in his own right, outside of his value as a romantic interest for Alina, and it made their relationship so much more interesting to me. Getting to see Mal fight to get back to Alina, all while she thought he had given up on here, was quite powerful.

Lacy: Right? Like Mal is also…fine in the books, but he really comes into his own as a character for me here. I know part of that is just that the books are primarily Alina’s POV so she can’t know what she doesn’t know when it comes to him, but the downside is that Mal really comes off as a jerk at multiple points. (Like, oh, now he’s suddenly jealous of the Darkling? What?) 

Plus, I just love the repeated imagery of them choosing each other, not just once, but everyday. That’s what real love is, in my book—the decision to be with someone that’s a constant, conscious part of your life that you choose to uphold in big things and in small.

Question: Which ship has the most potential to be The Best Ship moving forward?

Kayti: As someone who has yet to read Six of Crows, I was very into the Inej/Kaz dynamic, which is more of a pre-romantic relationship in this first season. I love the angst of a Slow Burn, and I imagine this is one of the benefits of bringing in the Six of Crows characters ahead of the main plot of their books: we get to see how these characters’ relationships develop before their arcs come to fruition, or even properly begin. I also am glad these two didn’t start anything when there is the messy power imbalance inherent in Kaz paying off Inej contract. This will still be a factor moving forward, but feels less squidgy when Inej has the option of leaving.

Lacy: I think that the answer is probably also Mal and Alina? I can’t quite figure out how Shadow and Bone will incorporate the elements from Six of Crows moving forward so I’m not sure how big of a piece those characters will play in any second season—though don’t get me wrong, I am very much looking forward to however Nina manages to get Matthias out of Hellgate prison. 

But, given the tensions that arise between Mal and Alina in the book Siege and Storm, I’m very curious to see how—or even if—the show handles/presents some of them. I fully expect that the more layered presentation of Mal we saw here will play into this, and I think that’s going to make a real difference in the story. (Which, unfortunately, often comes off on the page like romantic conflict that exists for the sake of propping up a love triangle.) 

Question: OK, rank your ships. Go!

Kayti: Why did I give us this question? It’s so hard! And now, since gushing about Mal and Alina at the beginning of this conversation, I have talked myself into Inej and Kaz as my #1. Plot twist! This just goes to show how many great romantic relationships (and other kinds of relationships) there are in this show. Here goes…

Kaz/Inej

Mal/Alina

Nina/Matthias

Jesper/that stableboy

That ship they all end up on at the end

Genya/David

Alina/Aleksander

Lacy: There is Matthias and Nina and there is everyone else. 

This show has made me a hardcore Malina shipper though. So that’s new and exciting! 

I do have one shipping-related complaint, however, and that’s that Genya and David are a favorite pairing of mine from the books and I am truly not sure that they exchange more than a dozen words in the entire first season of the show? I fully believe there are viewers who probably can’t even easily identify who David is. (Unless you’re armed with the book knowledge that he’s the one who fuses the stag’s antlers to Alina’s shoulders.) 

Kayti: Yeah, justice for Genya/David.

I love how much you love Nina and Matthias, and also think your enthusiasm has kept me from writing too much about them in favor of highlighting other ships. But let the record show: I am here for these two. Of the Six of Crows crew, they had the best and clearest arc, which is how their connection manages to support a whole subplot all on its lonesome. I wrote about this in our other Shadow and Bone conversation article, but these two give me Jon Snow/Ygritte vibes in the best possible way (hopefully, they get a better ending!), but I haven’t mentioned that watching them share that floating detritus post-shipwreck helped soothe the Titanic trauma I still hold from watching Jack freeze to death because he can’t fit on that door with Rose. (Um, Titanic spoilers.)

Read more

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Shadow and Bone Review: Netflix Adaptation Brings the Magic

By Lacy Baugher

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Shadow and Bone: Why Netflix Cast Its Fantasy Adaptation With Relative Unknowns

By Kayti Burt

Question: Any final thoughts?

Lacy: Romantic or no, I just love the care that Shadow and Bone takes with all their relationships. Nothing happens on screen simply because it does in the books and everything feels really organic and true to who these characters are. 

That’s not easy, and there are a ton of shows—let alone adaptations—that are really, really bad at it. Shadow and Bone is really good at it, and I can’t wait to see what happens as things get more complicated from this point forward.

Kayti: The relationships on this show, brought to life by this charming and talented cast, are the heart of this adaptation. So many epic fantasy series brought to the screen bring the world or the plot without giving us a reason to care about the people, and that is a dealbreaker for me. One of the strengths of YA has always been the prioritization of relationships and emotional interiority, and to see those narrative priorities brought to the screen in an epic fantasy story makes me so happy. 

Lacy: It’s such a rare thing, when you find a show where you can literally ship almost everyone in virtually any sort of arrangement or permutation, but if the entire cast just suddenly decided to make out I would not be mad. 

Kayti: The perfect conclusion to our conversation… and the show?

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