Two childhood friends reunite…

Shadow and Bone has arrived fully formed, fully fleshed out and ready to go. Based on the YA novels by Leigh Bardugo, this first season has 8 episodes running to about 50 minutes each.

In trying to explain to my significant other the world in which this story takes place the best I could manage was to say “Think of Avatar the Last Air Bender crossed with The Witcher.”

The setting is richly detailed and very loosely based on northern Europe with a version of Amsterdam at the height of its trading powers and a Russian empire before the revolution. There are other nations hinted at or talked about but we do not really get to see them. Tech wise we’re kind of heading into early twentieth century but without electricity.

The biggest critic for this in the house is my daughter – who has read all the books and holds them dear. So when we sat down to watch the first episode it could have gone either way. However, I’m delighted to say that everybody thought the show was a lot of fun and had a lot of potential.

It doesn’t feel like there’s a huge amount of originality here – we are seeing alternate takes on European nations, familiar magic systems and tropes that are peak young adult. Yet the popularity of the books will attest to the fact that seeing old ideas done really well is just as satisfying as coming across something you’ve not seen before. Bardugo and the principal showrunner Eric Heisserer have done a super job in delivering a well scripted, fully fleshed out world.

The books in the ‘Grishaverse’ cover a number of different characters and crews who do not necessarily overlap. For whatever reason the decision has been made to bring all of those different characters together and explore their storylines in one place on the screen. The first episode gives us multiple points of view and this feels like a real ensemble piece. All of the characters are recognisably the ones in the books and if you don’t know that, then they are also distinct and recognisable on the screen from the first time you see them. Whether it is the Crows from Ketterdam or Alina Starkov and Mal from Ravka.

From this first episode it is not clear how much they have changed the story from the source material but as a viewer coming to it cold that should not matter and in watching this first episode I was happy it stood on its own. Having said that, the show does very little in this first episode to explain how the world works and what is going on. There are hints of wars and politics and magic and history but there is no lengthy exposition. I wonder about its accessibility but not overly since I prefer this type of immersion straight into a world where it’s just going about its life and not having to explain itself to the fourth wall.

One thing I do want to say is that I love the clothes and my daughter and I spent much time talking at the screen saying which coats we wanted to wear and which hats we thought we would look best in.

As the show moves to more illustrious locations I suspect the fashion based drooling will only increase.

Verdict: Overall this first episode is a good opener that provides plenty of action and character building so you leave at the end of the credits with a solid idea of who is who and what they want to do with their lives.

Rating? 7 charming gunslingers out of 10.

Stewart Hotston