TV Review: Shadow and Bone Season 2

 

I mean, you probably shouldn't read it anyway if you haven't even watched season 1? so....

I love book adaptations. I’m a rare breed, I know. But I look at boom adaptations as one really long book trailer, which is why I usually read the book after watching the adaptation. Sometimes it works in reverse when my favorite series is adapted into a movie after I’ve read it (here’s looking at you, Vampire Academy movie that I will never forgive). Since I tend to not read a lot mainstream, this doesn’t happen to me often.

In the case of Shadow and Bone, it did. It’s been so long since I read the series that I don’t remember much of it (thank you, goldfish brain of mine). I do remember absolutely falling for the Darkling, convinced he was going to be my new book boyfriend. I do love a mysterious brooding character just trying to redeem his family’s legacy by righting the wrongs of his ancestor.

OH WAIT.

That was him. He IS the ancestor who created the fold and is responsible for more atrocities than are probably even depicted in the books or show. I’m not usually one to get side swiped by a character reveal, but damn did that one come out of nowhere for me. Obviously, I knew it was coming in the show. 

Even knowing that, I still found myself captivated by the Darkling (to be fair, LOOK at him ^^^) and feeling so bad for him, especially in season 2. The grief he depicted after losing Bagda, the anger over Elena breaking his heart (not saying it was her fault), and the obsession with creating a safe space for the Grisha despite the costs—there was so much raw emotion there. It would have been too easy to create this hollowed out version of the Darkling that we knew from the books, but instead the writers and Ben Barnes brought him fully to life. We see his charisma, his shadows, and his trauma. They laid it all out to bare. 

I don’t remember much else from the books. I remember feeling pretty meh about Mal and Elena then, and the show was no different for me. I loved, loved, loved the Crows even though I remember nothing of them from the books. I guess it’s time for me to throw on my kafta and pull the books out of storage for a reread to hold me over until season 3.