#anti alina starkov

[obikonans]

Alina Starkova could’ve been badass revolutionary but chooses to be peasant(who the fuck would be peasant in a country that likely has serfdom) and be m*l’s donkey

[black-rose-writings]

TGT and the Nikolai books in a nutshell.

[stromuprisahat]

I've been reading a lot of criticism about Alina lately, and while I agree that she is a shitty protagonist, but the main problem I have with saying that she is the true villain of the story is that... no one told her? No one talked to her about Grisha persecution? Yeah, we hear about it vaguely in TGT, but it isn't until SoC when they find the burnt corpses and the kefta mural that it truly starts to sink in. It's not until you read DitW that you realize how desperate the situation was (and still is, in some ways). It's not until the Nikolai Duology that the true horror of the Shu experiments is brought to us. We see nothing of it in TGT, so maybe... Alina just doesn't know?

Yeah, sure, she has been around Grisha and is one of them now, but hear me out, it's like white people who say they don't have a problem with POC but they don't realize that it doesn't negate the fact that POC still face racism from others. Add to the fact that nowhere do we see newspapers and as an orphan Alina is definitely less aware of social justice situations than your average white guy- how is she supposed to know? All that she sees is the luxury of the Grisha- their tents their bulletproof clothes, etc.

Just a thought about how the story might have gone different if instead of the crows, it was Alina who found the three burnt bodies while chasing the stag and had to put one of them out of their misery. And how the story might have changed if Alina truly understood the situation.

I'm almost halfway through Siege and Storm, so I’ll talk from this perspective.

I’d say it’s the same issue as anything with Alina- she doesn’t want to know.

She’s almost murdered by a guy yelling “witch” in her face. Funnily enough- at this point it’s still in English (Ravkan), not drüsje, but witch:

I twisted and kicked as the yellow-bearded man grabbed hold of my legs. I looked desperately down to the glen, but the soldiers and Grisha below me were fighting for their lives, clearly outnumbered and unable to come to my aid. I struggled and thrashed, but the Fjerdan was too strong. He climbed on top of me, using his knees to pin my arms to my sides, and reached for his knife.

“I’ll gut you right here, witch,” he snarled in a heavy Fjerdan accent.

She gets safely to Little Palace, mentiones this whole experience twice and that’s it. It wouldn’t even take that much to get back to this topic- next chapter she learns such attack isn’t anything unusual for Grisha:

“ ... Other countries don’t treat their Grisha so well as Ravka,” he said grimly. “The Fjerdans burn us as witches, and the Kerch sell us as slaves. The Shu Han carve us up seeking the source of our power. ... ”

Alina sees there’s a difference made between Grisha and other Ravkans, but never connects the dots. It doesn’t concern her, she’s doing the same after all.

She isn’t interested in situation, not only the wide picture, but more personal perspective- we don’t see her ask her “not-friends” anything about them. Their lives, families... You won’t hear a scary story if you won’t ask or listen...

She got study materials on Grisha history, but that's just that. Words on a paper. Something she repeats when she remembers she's supposed to be hunted, although the reasons don't quite click.

She goes from being prejudiced herself to staying that way. Why would she change? She went from denying being Grisha to being Saint and that’s a completely different thing. The only person she truly cares about is an otkazat’sya, so why would she consider wrongness of slurs and disdain?

She was told, but the Darkling "never tells the truth" and she doesn’t feel the need to ask anyone else.

She hears First Army soldiers insult Ivan for refusing to share information with them, and doesn't blink an eye.

She hears about First Army slaughtering Grisha, and thinks "good, I'd do the same".

She only cares about Grisha being potentially mistreated as long as it's the Darkling harming them (Genya's punishment, Grishenka in R&R).

When forced to face other harm partially caused by Grisha status of slaves in Ravkan society, the circumstances allow her to ignore that aspect (Genya's abuse).

I don’t think she needs anything more explicit. She’d just find the way to blame the Darkling, or forget it ever happened as soon as it was out of her sight.

Burned Grisha corpses?

Some foreign tradition. Or barbecue gone wrong...

Just look at her reaction to Harshaw's story in R&R:

I thought of the dream the Darkling had once had, that we might be Ravkans and not just Grisha. He’d tried to make a safe place for our kind, maybe the only one in the world. I understand the desire to remain free. Was that why Harshaw kept fighting? Why he’d chosen to stay? He must have shared the Darkling’s dream once. Had he given its care over to me?

Zoya's the one, to note how fucked up it is. Alina's concern is possible responsibility. There's no horror, there's no resolution to take over Aleksander's efforts. The goal remains the same- hunt down the Firebird, kill the Darkling, destroy the Fold.

Even when talking as Grisha, Alina doesn't act like one.

[is-today-tomorrow-in-nz]

Why I cannot accept Alina Starkov as a protagonist

I have a love-hate relationship with Alina's character. Mostly hate though. I loved the few bright moments she had but I absolutely loathed the moments where she was came off as an utterly selfish, unsympatheic, sanctimonious brat which dried up the any pity I had for her.

When I think of Alina, the analogy that comes to my mind is elephants. When elephants are tamed their handlers use an interesting strategy. The handlers use the heaviest iron chains that are too strong for the young calves to break away to tether them. The young calves try as they might to break free, soon realise that the chains are stronger than them and give up. They slowly start to live within the limits of the chain. However as the elephants reach adulthood, the trainers switch to normal, lightweight chains to tie them up because, by now the elephants have been fully trained to believe that they are too weak to breakaway. So the elephants rarely ever attempt to test the strength of the chains or even attempt to escape. The elephants having forgotten the strength they posses, learn to live within the limits of the chains.

Alina is just like those elephants. She has the power of the Sun coursing through her veins and yet instead of raising up to the situation, she actively chooses to remain stagnant. She remains tethered with her one-sided affection for Mal, her crippling self esteem issues, her shame of having 'impure thoughts' and, her fear of becoming something more than she had imagined. Eventhough the chains does not help her realise her true potential or even give her room to breathe, she is unable to comprehend anything beyond it and remain fearful to breakfree.

Had she been a side character, then, all of these flaws would not have mattered. But she is the protagonist and the entire triology moves forward through her. I'm not belittling her fears but the problem with the Chosen One trope is that at one point, the Chosen One is supposed to break away from their shackles and overcome these fears as the story progresses. Because, the story is not about the Chosen One, it is about the cause they are representing. But with Alina we never see that growth and so the cause she represents remains unfulfiled. Rather than becoming the one moving the story forward, she becomes an elephant in the hands of her handlers- Nikolai, Mal, Zoya, Apparat etc. She goes where they direct her to.

We see her passiveness cause actual detriment to the story as she is directed to side with the 'good guys' instead of representing the suppressed people who sees her as a beacon of hope. And in the end her life or death did not impact the cause she represented.

People may say that she suceeded in killing the Darkling and took down the Fold. But neither was her true purpose. She was supposed to be the one who bridged the gap between the otkazats'ya and the Grisha. And so, her victory in the final battle does not satisfy the end goal as the person she killed also wanted the same.

By defeating the Darkling, she no longer becomes the Chosen One. Instead she becomes an instrument of the oppressor who actively wants to maintain the status of the monarchy which in turn thrived on the Grisha serfdom. From a passive protagonist she becomes a passive antagonist. And in the end of it all she serves no purpose to herself or the people she was supposed to uplift and goes back to her chained elephant life with Mal as her new handler.

And this is why I could never accept Alina as the protagonist.

[sad-outsider]

Why I didn't like the ending of R&R. Part 3. The heroine fights not with the cause, but with the effect

Destroying the Fold and the Darkling was tantamount to trying to heal an open fracture by applying plantain to it.

Do you know why the Darkling is not considered a villain, despite everything he has done? Because he fights the source of the problem - the oppression of the Grisha, the wars tearing Ravka apart and the parasitic monarchs. Is he being cruel? Absolutely. But does anyone else in the trilogy struggle with the above problems? No. Draw your own conclusions.

Do you know how this could be fixed? Do you know how to make the Darkling the villain that the narrative so strenuously portrays him as? Make the Fold the cause of oppression and war, not its effect. But, again, this is a problem with the entire trilogy.

What do we actually see? At the end of the trilogy, the Fold, which, admittedly, was indeed one of Ravka's problems, but by no means the main one, does not exist, but at what cost? The Second Army, which, let me remind you, together with the Darkling himself was the main military power of Ravka, actually no longer exists, Ravka itself is in debt, like silks, the wars have not stopped, the Grisha are oppressed even more, if you believe the Six of Crows, and the country is led even though resourceful, but still inexperienced children. Nikolai and the Triumvirate might as well have sent Shuhan and Fjerda an invitation to conquer Ravka, because that's exactly what was supposed to happen in reality.

Alina not only didn’t help, but did even worse, destroying the only person who, although not by the most noble methods, could really change the situation in the world along with Ravka’s only effective weapon. After this, monuments should be erected to her in Shuhan and Fjerda, because the “noble” Sun Saint made their life so easy!

As for the Fold, it was not necessary to destroy it at all, just to make a passage through it in order to open a free path to West Ravka. The Fold itself could be used as a defense. How? It's simple - expand the Fold to the borders with Fjerda and Shuhan. With a high degree of probability, this will stop the war, because sending your soldiers through a death trap inhabited by cannibal monsters in order to kill or dissect a couple of Grisha is political suicide no matter how you look at it.

But hey, this is a fantasy for teenagers, here the “bad guy” must be punished, and all the heroes will undoubtedly be fine in the end because they are so good, what am I even talking about?

To be continued in part 4…

[darklinaforever]

Me thinking about the fact that Alina never knew about the death of Marie, her so-called friend, who died because of the Crows, with whom Alina calls herself friends today...

[illicthearts]

They honestly murdered Nikolai’s character. This character is being the only monarch who cares about his country and his people. The whole reason he created Sturmhond, the whole reason he’s a privateer, the whole reason he works for the Darkling and kidnappings Alina. This entire character is based on his love for his country and him doing anything he can to make it better for his people. It’s the whole reason I fell in love with his character, I love that he was an inventor and a strategist prince with military experience, everything you look for in a leader. And now you’re telling me that he has to be convinced to save Ravka?! It was Alina in the books who need to be convinced to save the country. Don’t ruin his entire character just to make Alina look better. No matter what you do you won’t make me like her and now they made me hate the only protagonist I liked. Fuck you.

He was the perfect balance between Alina and the Darkling. And the only hero I liked. He should be the one ruling Ravka not Zoya, he was the perfect man for it, I can’t believe LB threw away his life goal, the everything he worked for away just to have Zoya “can’t control her anger” Nazyalensky on the throne, it’s fucking ridiculous. Like Nikolai had a whole plan for democracy. 

[marvelmusing]

“You may have needed me, but I never needed you.”

Okay Alina sure you didn’t

You’d just be murdered by Drüskelle

Or by Zlatan’s assassin instead of poor Marie

[ember920]

What is Leigh Bardugo’s problem with writing women? She can’t seem to write (successfully write) a woman learning about her agency without shaming her in the process. She can’t let her female characters (notably Alina and Genya) find their way in the world and be independent. LB seems to barely be able to have a few female villains! I want an evil girlboss. I like the villains in fiction, I like how they are morally grey. It sucks that the Grishaverse has almost no villains that aren’t men. It does make one wonder… why? Is LB afraid of writing female villains? Shadow and Bone deals (or tries to deal) with complex themes of morality. She tries to show a young woman dealing with greed and attraction to power, but the narrative always seems to shame Alina in a very puritanical way. She must be loyal to one man (Mal, obviously). The Darkling (who seems to often represent sexuality and liberation) is evil and is corrupting our fragile main character.

With Genya, she was repeatedly violated by the King. She had an opportunity to exact her revenge, and she took it. She poisoned him. She stole years off his life. LB writes this in a way that makes it seem like she has committed some great evil. Later, she is obviously made to regret her choices and side again with Alina. Poisoning the King is bad. Getting back at the man who has hurt you time and time again is wrong. But it’s obviously not. Poisoning people is bad, but the story doesn’t seem capable to handle the fact that while poisoning people is bad, so is violating a young girl. The King of course faces no real punishment for his crimes and is sent on his merry way to live in the colonies.

Genya is made to feel bad in Siege and Storm for ever hurting Alina. Alina tells Genya that it was a betrayal that Genya sided with the Darkling. Maybe. But Alina also never acknowledges that this was the way Genya could get her revenge.

It’s another question of why would any Grisha side against the Darkling, but I won’t get into that.

So this brings me back to the question of why does LB not tackle these themes? She introduced these problems, and then she just ignored them. She could of written a wonderful, morally grey book series. Instead though she gives all her female character problems, but then has the characters simply be shamed and feel guilty for ever having these problems. This, at least to me, makes the entire thing look ignorant. Why can’t LB just… write female characters? Why can’t she do that? All these women are just shamed for ever having problems to deal with in the first place. Alina for greed. Genya for revenge. Both of them for daring to take agency and independence.

Sorry if this made little to no sense. Just a rant about LB’s weird writing choices.

[avengers-rule103]

"your obsession with the fold is naive, destroying it won't solve ravka's problems. they've hated us and hunted us long before the fold existed. i know. i was there."

i just love this quote. i love this quote so much. i want to marry this quote. and then i want to slap alina upside the freaking head for not listening to him.

[ackermental]

The pettiness and jealousy Otkazat'sya feel towards Grisha over them having cool powers, nice home and pretty clothes is absolutely disgusting. This show is disgusting. Alina is disgusting.

Oh, but if only Darkling took away their identity and made Grisha play with people who were mocking and harrasing them for centuries! With people who were only accepting Grisha's presence because they were isolated and used as tools of war by the Tsar.

If only Darkling thought about making peace with them during all those long centuries and it didn't kick him in the ass in the end. Oh, my mistake. It was his fault and Alina knows this for certain because... Some old, mad lady, that was beating and offending her for months, told her so.

If only Sasha married some Princess over those long years!

I'm sure it would've stopped the genocide and cured the racism! After all, it worked so well with Alina and her orphanage.

I'm certain that the point this show was trying to make in season one, was that a kid who called Alina 'rice eater' turned out to be a decent citizen and is now telling all Ravkans to lay down their arms and embrace Shu Han as any loving neighbour should 🙂.

Just wait, we will meet him in season three and he and Alina will become best buds, until he obviously also falls in love with her and they make a Grisha-Otkazat'sya baby, ending all wars for the rest of days.

Anyway, we should totally start the change by remaking the entire Grisha community. Beginning with the nomenclature, because this is twenty first century America, not a kingdom based on Tsarist Russia. Totally not by educating Otkazat'sya. They are not the actual problem 🙂. At all.

[piolhyna]

you know what, LB decided that Alina Starkov was going to be the "anti-Chosen One" and her character was designed to refuse and not fit in the Chosen One path, which would be a perfect doylist explication of why sometimes Alina is so frustrating to the reader: her character is literally designed to not embrace their chosen path. But then I think by the duology she kinda forgot about it lol

[stromuprisahat]

Aleksander: “Perhaps now you're getting an inkling of what it's like to be hunted. But you still have no idea what it means to fake countless deaths, to have to reinvent yourself after every rebirth, to lose every loved one to sickness, desperation, hate, and time.”

Alina: “Is this how you justify your actions? Your loneliness? A wound that won't heal?”

Aleksander: “You've yet to see the full shape of things. My Alina, you live in a single moment. I live in a thousand.”

Alina: “You're already dead.”

I might be getting old, but one of the qualities I appreciate most about characters is empathy. When you show me “villain”, who has plenty of it, and “heroine”, who has none, it’s an easy enough choice for me. And I WON’T be rooting for her.

Aleksander lived through countless horrors, but he doesn’t make it about himself, he’s telling Alina it’s awaiting her too. He’s warning her. She hears only excuses for perceived wrongs and doesn’t concern herself with future that far.

Alina’s the one to drag Darkling’s “actions” into conversation, but the fact those were designed with certain goal in mind doesn’t matter. Somehow the end of wars is about Sasha’s loneliness. I fail to see how...

Alina calls Aleksander “dead”, yet he’s the one who keeps sacrificing his lives for his people. If he were as heartless as she wants to believe, he could simply fuck off to trip over the world instead of dealing with blind, stubborn, entitled smartass.

[lightninstrikedragon]

Theory time!!!

I thing that Alina isn't acctualy the queen. And I have a theory for this. But before this I don't want anyone, especially Alina stans, to attack me for writing this.

So, in the final we see that Nikolai is crowned as the king, but i don't see Alina beeing crowded as the queen. This is a big questioning mark for me. Maybe they tought that it is oblivious that she is because she is betrothed/married to Nikolai. I didn't even saw the emerald back on her finger. I thing is something like "let's gave them something that makes it oblivious, but in fact is not". I think Alina wears a bigger crown because she is a living saint, the sun summoner, not because she is the queen. I thing the relationship between Nikolai and Alina is just political alliance and just that. Now that Alina is a part of the Triumvirate, she can't be queen too, right? It would be a little too much I guess because this way, the writers gave her too much credit for what she've done and uplifts her without having a good reason.

Also, I don't thing they will start season 3 with the KOS plot because:

1. Soc didn't happend and Nina isn't in Ravka (because she goes in a mission in Fjerda with Adrik and Leoni)

2.There is a gap of 2-3 years after the events in Ruin and Rising, witch in this time it happens SOC and CK

Even though we have hints about KOS (the bee lending on Zoya shoulder, the hint on Zoyalai at the end and Nina saying those things to Zoya about love), I thing they will try to fill those 2-3 years in Ravka that we don't have so many informations about.

[sad-outsider]

Why I didn't like the ending of R&R. Part 2. Undeserved victory

The main character did nothing herself to win, except for killing Mal (whom I, frankly, wanted to kill myself most of the time) and her Twin Flame (the Darkling).

Seriously, we still need to look for a more passive heroine than Alina. In the plot, she is literally dragged along by everyone who is not too lazy (and even those who are too lazy I look at Baghra and Mal) - the Darkling, Baghra, Nikolai, Apparat, and even damn Mal (although the latter more often pulls her back, but this is the topic for a separate conversation)! What did she do herself? An army of fanatics was gathered to her by the Apparat, amplifiers were literally brought to her on a silver platter by the Darkling, Nikolai and Mal, she led the Second Army reluctantly with Nikolai’s light hand. By God, throughout the trilogy I wanted to poke her with a stick and say: “Finally, do something yourself, stop beating yourself up!” And the fact that she is only 17 does not justify her, because by the standards of the Grishaverse she is considered an adult, but she behaves all the way like a capricious child and this flaw does not change. But these are the problems of the entire trilogy…

Returning to the theme of the finale, Alina's main goal was to destroy the Fold. Well, there is no the Fold at the end, but this is not the merit of Alina, but of her fanatic followers (who, again, were not gathered by her). Great, because why do something yourself when you can dump all the work on others?

“But she killed the Darkling!” - someone will say. Yes, because killing a desperate person who is already dead inside due to the loss of his mother and his Twin Flame and probably might as well just commit suicide is certainly an achievement (no).

Here's meme for you, see you in part 3…

[darklinaforever]

Damn, Alina, why choose Mal when you literally had a choice between the Darkling and Nikolai !?

Frankly, let's be honest, she should have ended up with one of the two. (Especially the Darkling, who was literally his symbolic soul mate, as well as its equal)

And if the goal was absolutely for Alina to end up with a good guy, then again, why Mal ?! He is not a good guy ! Nikolai is ! (Damn, he really respected Alina ! It felt so good !)

Where then they should have been a couple of three ! Problem solved like this ! We put Darklina, Nikolina, and Darkolai in agreement like that !

Do I ship all 3 ? Yes quite ! (even if, you can imagine, I still have my preference for Darklina)