Yes I don't think anyone has escaped the fact that I embarked onto a reading venture where I decided to read all the Grisha books before the show aired because I wanted to understand the hype over them. I talk about it here and here are my reviews of the duology. I reviewed the books in more detail on my instagram if you want to read those there .
Anyways, last Friday the show dropped and I was ready to hit the play button the first thing I did in the morning. Sadly my reality isn't that I can drop everything I know and binge tv, something I only ever really want to do when I am extremely into something, which isn't often. I watched 6 episodes on Friday and the last two on Saturday and it was an extremely enjoyable ride I must say.
Now if you're not familiar with the show or the books here is a little summary I copied off imdb because I am too lazy to write one up myself.
"Dark forces conspire against orphan mapmaker Alina Starkov when she unleashes an extraordinary power that could change the fate of her war-torn world."
Now admittedly the show is quite different to the books. Particularly Alina's trilogy becomes much better, much more enjoyable and much more in tune with the times we live in, while The Crows dulogy become a totally different thing. That's what the hardest thing to wrap my head around is, that the books and the characters from the duology are very different here than what I imaged them and how they were portrayed in the book. We must start off with Kaz, also if you want to read furthere there will be SPOILERS so don't read any further now if you don't want them. Ok, so Kaz is admittedly one of the most difficult characters ever to adapt onto the screen especially when it had be done this way. This kind of works as a prequel to The Crows in the books as they have been made to fit into Alina's books and what happens in them here on screen. Kaz isn't the bastard of the barrel we know him as in Six of Crows, notorious gang leader, ruthless and uncompromisingly cold in his approach to everything. In Shadow and Bone he is softer much less put together and less in control of everything and not ten steps ahead of everyone like he is in the books. His relationship is very different with both Inej and Jesper and because of that it changes the whole dynamic for all three of them. I don't dislike this, but I've had to sit with it for a while that Show Kaz and Books Kaz are two very different people and get on board with that and move on. I think Freddy Carter is AMAZINGLY cast as Kaz Brekker, the way he looks is very much spot on how I imagined Kaz looking in the books, it is incredible. It is very funny to me though that The Crows really didn't manage to achieve anything on their little quest, other than look cool as hell and fail, that has made me laugh a lot.
I think that Jesper is the absolute highlight of this show though. Kit Young plays him magnificently and seeing Jesper come to life this way is glorious. I can even say that he is even cooler in the show than what he is in the books and I did absolutely love him in the books. He is comedic genius, super badass, queer, cool, funny and he has great chemistry with anyone that is on screen with him and I loved every second we got to see him. The little hints and teases about him being a fabrikator are also laid out throughout the show and I don't think you will pick up on it without knowing, or you will suspect something if you really loved the show and became obsessed with it, then every time he and Ivan clash you'll know something is up.
Inej was super awesome too. I do feel her arc is much darker in the duology books and I do hope going forward that we might explore that some more. It took me a while to take to her pov in the books but once I did I loved spending time with her calm, wise and beautiful inner voice and her suli wisdom she offered up both to the characters in the world and us readers. Her relationship to her religion and how it ties into Alina is beautiful and I loved how they approached it for the show.
The crows are all great, it's just a very different story than what I expected/wanted it to be. But it is in no terms a bad one.
Ok, so onto Alina' arc and the Shadow and Bone storyline. I'm not he biggest fan of these 3 books. They are fine, they have some cool moments but they are very much your standard YA chosen one fantasy story and it's not my favorite thing. Show-wise it definitely gets better. I absolutely loved Jesse Me Li as Alina, she is so warm and sweet and charming it very much works. People have hated Mal in the books, even I couldn't escape that when I was reading them a while back, and that was a long time after everyone else. I never did dislike him to be fair, I actually quite like him and his arc in the third and last book and I feel Archie Renaux played him super charmingly and compellingly as well. I definitely believed in his and Alina's friendship on screen and he came across as a genuinely good guy.
Some scenes just like the books are very rushed here too, some relationship scenes and some building or establishing scenes as well. I feel it could have done with one more episode where Alina spent time in the Little Palace, working on her powers, getting to know the people around her and establishing the character more. David and Genya's relationship feels very rushed, I never got the sense like I did in the books, the pressure Alina feels to perform and be able to use her powers and understanding the life around her, that did disappear a bit in the show and that's a shame. I also think the world and the politics might be super confusing because the show does not have a map and it makes it hard to follow if you don't already have previous knowledge from the books.
Ok we have to talk some about Ben Barnes as the Darklingđ€€ hahah the emoji sums up what I feel about him. I disliked the Darkling a lot in the books, he is problematic as hell and super toxic and creepy and it set off all the alarms bells in my head. In the second book he is the absolute worst. Now Ben Barnes is one gorgeous man, with his wavy hair, sexy voice and beautiful eyes and all that definitely helps the case of the Darkling in the show. I think they have added some more layers to him, stripped away some things that were just inherently creepy about him and given him a backstory so that you can at least understand some more where he is coming from. Now, I will never want Alina to be with this man but they show at least did a good job of changing some of the more problematic aspects of him and it makes the show a little bit better too.
It's been compared to Game of Thrones which is just ridiculous, they are two very different shows for sure. But it's been a while since there was a lavish, stylish and beautiful fantasy world on our screens so the comparisons come natural to many I guess. I think this definitely have some things that are actually way better than GOT because GOT is also problematic as fuck.
Oh I haven't even mentioned Nina and Matthias! AH. Ok I loved them in the books, they are the superior enemies to friends to lovers couple and they gave me all the feels in the show. Their love story is definitely the most compelling one to watch out of everyone's, and the actors had some insanely good chemistry between one another and it was lovely to watch it play out.
I hope this show gets a season 2, I want to come back to this world and watch some of my favourite characters grow some more in the screen format.
Some other really good things about this show:
❂ The normalisation of queer relationships and characters that are just there existing. Ah it makes my little heart happy.
❂ Non english fantasy world because we have seen enough of that for a life time
❂ Diverse and nuanced characters with trauma across the spectrum. It feels very representative for the time we are in now
Ok there are more, but basically just watch this show so we can get to a season 2 where Wylan and Nikolaj can show up. That is what I want!
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