#grishaverse spoilers

[ekbelsher]

Alina and Mal get attacked by volcra, and her Sun Summoner powers finally show up (for the Litjoy Shadow and Bone box set)

[to-be-a-dreamer]

I’ve been reading the Grishaverse books/watching the Netflix show for the first time over the past couple weeks or so and I just have to say that I think it's so funny whenever Kaz gets snarky about Inej's proverbs or Matthias's religious talk or Jesper’s Jesperisms or anyone else being even slightly philosophical or theatrical or whatever because Kaz Brekker is the most dramatic bitch in all of Kerch. Like. I'm pretty sure this kid graduated top of his class from the School of Dramatic One-Liners with a double major in "Commit to the Aesthetic" and "Writing Epic Love Poetry Whilst Maintaining the Bad Guy Reputation". Dude wanted to impress a girl and wasn’t sure if getting the whole ass king of Ravka to find her long-lost parents was enough so he bought an entire warship from his friend who absolutely would have just Given It To Him but noooooo Mr. Protecting-My-Investment over here had to pay a fair price otherwise it doesn’t count.

The only, and I mean the ONLY reason I don't say he's the most dramatic bitch in the entire Grishaverse is because Nikolai Lantsov exists and that man once wore his entire army uniform under his jacket to go volcra hunting in the Shadow Fold on the off chance he would get to make a dramatic reveal at the end. He put a spring-loaded curtain in front of the weapons rack on his personal ship just in case he had guests he wanted to show off for. I wouldn’t be surprised if he did the dramatic flourish every time he opened those curtains for literally no one but himself. I also wouldn’t be surprised if he made that set up after he had guests he wanted to show off for. That curtain either went up two hours before he used it or it was the first thing he built on that ship there is no in between.

I need copious amounts of Expo markers, PowerPoint slides, and glitter to figure out which one of them takes the title it is CLOSE.

[lilisouless]

"LEIGH BARDUGO IS A MISOGYNYST! ALINA SHOULD HAVE BEEN POWERFULL AND LIVE AS THE CONSORT OF A KING INSTEAD OF A DOMESTIC LIFE WITH HER HUSBAND!"

"LEIGH BARDUGO IS A MISOGYNYST! NINA ZENIK SHOULD HAVE LIVED A DOMESTIC LIFE WITH HER HUSBAND INSTEAD OF BEING POWERFULL AND LIVE AS THE CONSORT OF A KING!"

Yeah, i am starting to think its really not about the endings , but about people not being able to separate them from their ships

[dacianacresswells]

leigh writing a story where wylan had a one night stand is just validating me as a whore wylan truther. That boy slept with his tutor. He slept with other men in the barrel. He grew up so severely restricted and with major daddy issues and those are always the ones that go wild the first time they're free.

[inwhichiramble]

Well, everyone but Kaz. His ghost won’t associate with Kaz’s ghost.

[the-girl-in-the-box]

The Darkling in Rule of Wolves when his cult want to spend the night in the Fold so they can commune with their Starless Saint and he’s Right There Actually

[olskuvallanpoe]

the whole gang is invited (officially or unofficially, take your pick) to nina and hanne’s eventual wedding, and you will NEVER convince me otherwise. this is canon to me.

[bella-rose29]

been thinking about pirates and privateers and the difference between them

privateers need a license and can only operate during times of war, and pirates operate at all times and have no license

licenses (letters of writ) had to be signed by the monarch

so does that mean that

a) Ravka was at war with someone (I'm pretty sure it was anyway but I can't remember)

b) nikolai got his stepfather to sign his privateer's license???

c) when he then became king and Sturmhond was still active, did he sign his own license???

I need the answers because the image of a Tailored nikolai going to see the king of Ravka to get his privateer's license signed is ridiculous to me

[carlando]

i have this terrifying issue where i can’t understand why i like all three of alina’s partners in the show:

mal is just wholesome and increasingly fleshed out as a caring and selfless character with logic and his own belief in living a good life. alina to him is more than a partner or a saint, she’s just alina. protects her because she is apart of who he is, his nature. loves her for not her ambition or belief but her care and the love she carries. for her bravery. it’s a “you have a piece of my soul in the palm of your hand” type of thing.

aleksander’s a product of choices which he made out of pain, devolving into a monster who manipulates, lashes out and calculates inhumanely. to only have a connection and vulnerability in hundreds of years with the one person (alina) who knows what it’s like to have this power, to be feared and hated. he has this respect for her resolve and i think he genuinely does love and care for her even though he fails at this. you can see that he is lost to his trauma and notions. i wish they met in another time, because if given the chance, it’d be a “you make me lose my mind and help me find my thoughts” type of thing.

then nikolai who is comedic and a lost individual who feels a great need to help people but struggles with being good enough for his post. he cares deeply about correcting his family’s sins and his country’s wounds. he is just as giving, even when he’s falling in love with this saint who is so similar to him in principle and belief. alina is honest and open with him, as he is to her. a weight to bring peace to a nation rests on their shoulders and i think they help each other carry it. like a “we hold each other up and end up holding each other for too long” kind of thing.

[quitschekaetzchendebugging]

[orniithology]

i will never not be so mad that david died. literally why did leigh even do that

but like????? no fr why did this happen. he didn’t have to. saints know neither he nor genya deserved this. they’d just started being able to breathe after the darkling they’d just started a life together they’d just gotten married and it all got ripped away and i am Furious about it. they should have been happy. she Just did this with matthias we didn’t need a repeat. genya has been through so much why would you do this to her she deserves better she deserves david she deserves love

i read row like over a year ago and i am still so upset and distraught and wondering why this had to happen

[ekbelsher]

Nina buries Matthias, and his white wolf shows up 🌷😢🥀 (for the Litjoy King of Scars box set)

[lilisouless]

Mal: It´s true! i saw an unicorn back in Novyi Zem

Alina: Mal...we were starving, tired-

Nikolai: i want what you were smoking

Mal: I saw it! it was with that kid we meet

Zoya: you think unicorns are real? how old are you?

Mal: you are right! its impossible! thanks for telling me that Mrs Dragon Queen with her were demon husband, when are you writing to your zombie raising child? Because my former sunray wife that i was born to amplify would love to meet her and maybe visit my half siren long lost cousin! Maybe i should tell her that her brother is a tree now

Alina: "snikers" Baghra fucked a fish

Zoya: just because SOME crazy stuff exist doesn't mean everything will ,some things are fictional, like unicorns.

---

Wylan: Why do you never take off her hat?

Jesper: Molly is very attached to it, it makes her feel complete

Jesper whispering to the horse´s ear: its okay, he is trustworthy, the secret is safe with him

[mentallydatingahotcelebrity]

[hyper-fixated-princess]

It’s 4 am and I just finished King of Scars.

Can I just say… *clears throat* WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK IS GOING ON??!!?!

[lestatslefttit]

Please stop beautifying mutilated characters

TW: major spoilers for the Shadow and Bone trilogy (post Siege & Storm/book 2) and minor spoilers for Sally Face

Very random rant about smth that’s been bothering me for a while.

Why can’t people just let “disfigured” (I looked for a different word that explains what exactly I mean and couldn’t find it, but I’m aware that it’s not okay to say that about someone, I’m just trying to express what I mean as specifically as possible) be “disfigured”???!!

I’m so tired of seeing people draw characters like Sal Fisher and Genya Safin as just pretty faces with a couple scars. Can we be for real for 2 fucking seconds? I don’t wanna put any of the fanart I’m talking about in this post because I don’t wanna call out any artist in particular, I’m sure most, if not all, mean well doing this, I just think it’s a little fucked.

Sal’s face was messed up when he was a kid. Canonically a whole piece of his jaw is missing. The cartilage of his nose is at least partially missing. He is not a pretty anime boy with a few lines on his face. And there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. That’s doesn’t make him a better or a worse person, it’s just a fact about his appearance. It says absolutely nothing about who he is but it is an important part of his character and definitely impacts his actions and personality.

When Alina first sees Genya after what happened to her, this is how she’s described (literally copied and pasted from the fucking book)

“It was not Baghra. I didn’t know what it was. The bites were everywhere, raised black ridges of flesh, twisting lumps of tissue that could never be healed, not by Grisha hand or by any other, the unmistakable marks of the nichevo’ya. Then I saw the faded flame of her hair, the lovely amber hue of her one remaining eye.”

She looks so different that Alina doesn’t recognize her. At first she describes her as a “what”, because that’s how affected her appearance was by that happened to her. So you’re gonna sit here and tell me that it’s perfectly sensible to draw her (post nichevo’ya) exactly the same as before but with a cute little eyepatch and a few lines over her face? Stop trying to beautify characters that have had accidents like this. They’re not conventionally pretty and that’s not a fucking character flaw.

I absolutely hate policing people’s art. Draw thin characters fat, give able bodied character disabilities if you want, make characters black or Asian or whatever you want, I’m all for representation, but please don’t erase this important part of who they are. Because it is an important part of who they are. It impacts so much of their lives in canon. And we can still love them exactly how they look. We should still love them exactly how they look, without trying to erase these horrible things that happened to them.

I chose to focus on these two characters in particular because they’re the ones I’ve seen this being done to the most, but this is true for any characters who have suffered through horrible things that heavily changed their appearance.

And before someone comments on this saying that it’s just fictional characters and all that bullshit, I’m well aware. I’m also well aware that this post is not gonna change jack shit and people are still gonna draw Genya and Sal and any other characters who don’t look “normal” as pretty, conventional faces and there’s nothing I can do about that. I have no intention of fighting with any artist that chooses to do this. I’m just asking that if you are one of the people who choose to erase these kind of physical characteristics about these characters, that you ask yourself why you feel the need to do it. If you like the character enough to want to draw them, why can’t you actually like them how they are? If you read all this and still don’t give a shit, good for you, that’s not my business. I just thought it was worth bringing this up.

Anyways, if anyone wants to actually have a discussion about this I’ll be happy to, this has just been bothering me for a long time and I felt like ranting about it. Hopefully at least one person actually stops to thinks because of this post. Maybe no one will. That’s okay.

If you have had an accident that left your appearance similar to one of these characters, I hope you can still see representation in them, no matter how their appearance is treated by the fandom, and I hope you know that you are worthy of love no matter what you look like.