Two years have gone by since the first season of Shadow and Bone hit Netflix on April 23rd, 2021. Fans of the books and the show have been eagerly waiting for season 2 since, and on Thursday, March 16th, all the waiting finally paid off. My sister—who took off work—and I binged most of the show together the day it was released, and I was not disappointed. This is the official spoiler warning for this article, so proceed at your own risk.
The TV show Shadow and Bone is based on the Grishaverse, a universe created by author Leigh Bardugo. This book universe includes the original trilogy Shadow and Bone, as well as the two duologies, Six of Crows and King of Scars. The TV show, knowing how beloved the characters from each series are, combined the storylines and characters from all of them. I was nervous about this at first, but the show does a brilliant job at taking pieces of all the series to make every character feel important, but not take too much to take away from the plot. I have only read the two duologies, but I’ve heard the original trilogy is represented well throughout the show.
This season made me extra nervous about combining the books because I wasn’t sure what parts of the Six of Crows series would be represented. The first season had the first book from Shadow and Bone shown and all of the flashback content from Six of Crows. This season covered the last two books in the original trilogy, but didn’t use much material from Six of Crows in terms of the plot. They snagged some ships getting together, and a couple of key lines, but not much else.
There are a couple of key players to know when trying to understand the show (if you’ve seen/read the universe’s content, feel free to skip). Alina Starkov is the main character—a hidden Grisha that is known as the Sunbringer. Her direct foil is Aleksander Morozova (i.e the Darkling, General Kirigan, The Black Heretic, etc.). They control light and darkness, and are thought to be the most powerful Grisha to exist. Mal is Alina’s childhood best friend, and her boyfriend in this season. Other important characters are Zoya and Genya, Alina’s friends and other Grisha, as well as Prince Nikolai, the Prince of Ravka where the Grisha reside. The important characters from Six of Crows are the crime gang The Crows. It’s made of the mastermind Kaz Brekker, marksman Jesper Fahey, knife wielder Inej Ghafa, demolitions expert Wylan Van Eck, the group’s Grisha Nina Zenik, and the soldier, Matthias Helvar. There are a bunch of smaller characters as well, but too many to introduce.
There were so many good things about this season. There are going to be some that I miss, but I want to discuss the highlights that really stuck with me. The first standout part of the show was the fight scenes. In season one, there were some good fight sequences, but it felt as though the drama was more intellectual and emotional. This season, there was at least a fight scene in every episode, and it felt like every character got a moment to shine. For example, Mal had an amazing fight and chase scene through a city. He had some action last season, but he really got to shine in Season 2. This is true of many characters. Inej had a surplus of stunts to do with her knives. The most interesting development in the show was the increased amount of group scenes. It was awesome to see the stunt coordination that had to account for the larger groups and the more intense effects.
The relationships in this season were also on point. One of the main relationships involved Alina and Mal. To say something very controversial, I always preferred Mal and Alina over Alina and the Darkling. It truly is the battle of the enemies-to-lovers versus the friends-to-lovers tropes. This being said, even if I hadn’t preferred Mal, I think the scenes from Season 2 would have won me over. The connection between Alina and Mal was so endearing, and you could tell he really loved her. This romance between them made me care a whole lot more about that half of the show. Unfortunately, the season ends with the two broken up because they doubted whether their love was decided by choice or destiny.
Kaz and Inej have an extremely beloved arc in the books and the show delivered. Full of all the longing stares and encoded wishes in misleading sentences, the show captured the “will they won’t they” energy from the pages of Six of Crows. They also ended the season on a separate note, but I have faith that the next season could bridge the gap between them.
The last couple that needs attention is Helnik, the ship made of Nina Zenik and Matthias Helvar. This relationship was the reason I got into the books, and in turn, fell in love with the show. In the first season, we got to know the characters through their enemies-to-lovers arc. The Grisha are hunted by Mathias’ people, so the two characters meet on a boat with Nina as his prisoner. They then escape a shipwreck and have to survive in the wild together. This leads to love, and then a necessary betrayal when Nina turns Mathias over to the police. She does this because Grisha showed up to kill Mathias, but Nina didn’t want him dead. Season 2 picks up right after the end of Season 1, so Mathias is in prison for a crime he didn’t commit and blames Nina. There were only two scenes with the characters together, and even then they were separated by bars. This was my main complaint of Season 2. While I understand the tension the writers needed to build, and even though I thought the actors did amazing separately, I was really bummed by the lack of interaction, and the lack of Mathias in general.
The romantic relationships were not the only dynamics I appreciated. The new season was bringing together several characters that hadn’t interacted in Season 1, and I think the writers blended everything successfully. For example, Nina and Mathias were not with the other Crows in Season 1, but this season Nina got to join the gang. In Season 1, Jesper was the comedic relief, but in Season 2, he shared that role with Nina. It was an interesting way to see new character pairings banter with each other. We also got to see more friendship between women in this season, especially between Nina and Inej within the Crows. Originally, Inej had just been with Kaz and Jesper, so it was nice to see her interact with other strong women.
The last thing that I want to rave about was the set-up for the next season. As the original trilogy is completed, the show has introduced the Six of Crows plot line that is full of nefarious governments, heists, romance, and an ineffable love of waffles. These books were responsible for me falling in love with reading again (and they were my first venture into fantasy), so I was so excited to see the perfect transition into this plot line. The violent and jarring transition was only the ideal way to show the urgency of the upcoming plot, but it also successfully combined the two series once again. It was also an interesting way of passing the baton to the Shadow and Bone trilogy crew to have an unknown plot line written for them instead of following source material.
I was extremely impressed with Season 2 of Shadow and Bone, and I’m so excited at the prospect for more. Both seasons of this show are available to watch on Netflix, and I couldn’t recommend it more.