#in the end he was just wylan

[natmadethis]

love this little dude, here’s a silly doodle of him since i’ve been obsessed with six of crows recently

[jude-jespernumber1glazer]

Sun : Kaz, Jesper, Nina

Moon : Inej, Wylan, Matthias

[sprnklersplashes]

Imagine if instead of working at the tannery, Wylan had held onto his flute and made his living busking in the Barrel.

Which means Jesper comes across him one day and then constantly asks Kaz “don’t you think the Crow Club could use some live music? Something classy. Like I don’t know, a flutist perhaps?”

I might write this

[musicalmelody001]

Jesper: If I had a kruge for every time a friend was dramatically revealed to have faked their death and assumed a new name, only to embark on the path of vengeance via an incredibly complex illegal scheme, I would have two kruge.

Jesper: Which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it's happened twice.

[heartrender6]

!!six of crows spoilers!!

Kaz raised a brow. “Ever had your pocket picked, Wylan?”

“I … not that I know of.”

“Been mugged in an alley?”

“No.”

“Hung over the side of a bridge with your head in the canal?”

Wylan blinked. “No, but—”

“Ever been beaten until you can’t walk?”

“No.”

wylan was literally so fucking suspicious at the beginning of SOC like how did no one notice

[crowshoots]

man. sometimes i think about the end of soc and about the possibility of jesper leaving. but because he wanted to see this through, because he wanted to right things, because he wanted to see inej again and know she was safe, because he wanted to show his father that perhaps he wasn’t entirely a failure who only did reckless things, because he wanted something more for his friends. he went on

[shoujoegg]

ive rlly enjoyed jesper's charisma and banter established w/ kaz in s1 it's very clear why he's #mr. brekker's-right-hand-arm-man so what happened in s2!! 😭😭😭

[borbealis]

reading crooked kingdom rn and i just got to the part where wylan supposedly spills the whole plan to van eck and i just don’t want to believe that kaz didn’t see that coming but also i can see everything lining up for disaster and i’m afraid for inej because i know the white blade dunyasha or whatever is most likely going to intercept her again and i have so much anxiety for the characters and the plot right now i can hardly read

[casthecryptid]

Quote from crooked kingdom (six of crows book #2)

the belief that no matter the odds, somehow they would win.

[brownheadedcowbird]

s3 king of scars + ice court heist combo PLEASE do you know how much I would scream. if Netflix cancels it I’m going to riot. also not zoya literally saying I COULD FIX HIM

[evellynssocbrainrot]

So I have been minorly skimming some stuff on YouTube and TikTok about SOC, and I cannot believe some of the things that people say about Kaz and the Crows.

One point I tend to hear from Six of Crows critiques a lot is "The Crows act older than their supposed age, especially Kaz"

And... Seriously? Did we read the same book? The Crows are constantly making jokes and bickering. Do you think people who are in their 30's or even their late 20's would say shit like "jogs the liver" or "I need a cup of the darkest bitterest coffee or a real punch to the jaw" or "my ghost won't associate with your ghost" or "a hive of bees in your dresser drawer"? THEY WOULDN'T. (Actually, they can, but maybe not every single sentence and not as impulsively) These are things only dramatic teenagers would say. Not to mention the way the Crows handle their traumas is extremely immature and they're awful at communicating. The Crows actually act more like teenagers than 90% of teenagers in YA novels. The only reason why they seem older is because they have skills.

Another point I tend to hear a lot from critiques is "Kaz never faces consequences and he always wins and he's perfect"

What!!???? Just what!!?? In what universe? Once again, did these people read the same book as us?? Kaz is always facing terrible consequences. He is on the edge of losing his own crew every other chapter. His own crew is not afraid to call him out on his shit when he does it. The trauma he has doesn't glorify him, it makes him look pathetic and weak next to the other Crows. Kaz himself is deeply ashamed of it and he's lonely and isolated because of it. He is restricted from hugging his crewmates, he is restricted from kissing Inej and that kills him. He is broken and miserable because of it. But simultaneously, the trauma is his problem to fix. Nobody fixes it for him.

And yes, Kaz is highly intelligent and incredibly skilled and strong, but trust me, he does not always win, and he isn't perfect. If I remember correctly, his first plan for the Ice Court was a failure and they had to improvise from there. But the final plan came at a cost, and that was Nina using parem. Towards the end of the book, Kaz was wrong about predicting that Van Eck actually loved Wylan enough to not kill him, and it cost him everything. The first plan he made to take down Van Eck in the middle of CK was a complete disaster. The crew ended up stuck in the Geldrenner hotel. Kaz was clearly dangling so far off the point of utter insanity that he actually resorted to giving himself up for the crew and only resigned because the other Crows stopped him. And for the final plan of the book, Kaz ended up using every single resource he had left, which once again, subtly implies how desperate he was. He gave up all his assets, he used his old home, he used his original surname, he injured himself a lot in order to recruit more people for the plan. It took him a great deal of time, effort, and thinking to finally put together a plan. AND EVEN THEN, it came at a terrible cost which was the life of one of his Crows.

Even the revenge he took against Pekka wasn't that worth it as Pekka still couldn't remember Jordie's name, Jordie was still dead, and Kaz's trauma and pain didn't get any better than it was before.

Kaz is not at all a perfect guy who always wins. He is deeply flawed, twisted and is always losing something even when he wins a bit. I don't understand how some of these SoC critiques didn't understand this.

[dasiesanddarkness]

y'all dont understand, hearing "In the end, he was not Nina or Matthias or Kaz or Inej or Jesper. He was just Wylan Van Eck. He told them everything." in Jack Wolfe's voice isn't a want it's a NEED

[dcvina-claires]

i love that one of the main messages in six of crows is just that some people don’t deserve forgiveness. kaz dedicates his whole life to destroying pekka rollins, and people may not understand it, but no one tries to change his mind. when he finally tells inej that pekka killed his brother, she responds by telling him that they’ll destroy him for it. inej, the kindest and most mature character, doesn’t believe that powerful men who prey on children deserve mercy. and she has her own demons, too. she handles them a bit better than kaz, but at the end of the day, she dedicates her life to hunting down people like the ones who hurt her. nina and matthias never stop haunting jarl brum. matthias is a country traitor dating the most “unnatural” grisha the world has ever seen. and nina… of course it’s nina who destroys him in the end, tearing him down and then dating his child. because that’s the story that jarl laid out for her. one of his soldiers killed matthias so she uses her second chance at love as her vengeance. even wylan, who believed that he deserved what happened to him, learns to hate his father. if not for himself, than for his mother. “i’m here for her” repeats in his head like a battle cry. he was content on disappearing until he finds marya and decides, “no, jan van eck isn’t going to get his wish. i’m not going anywhere.” and he tears down his father’s reputation and takes his place in the merchant counsel and becomes his father’s greatest nightmare. all this, i guess, to say that there is no perfect victim. and if the only reason you’re still living is out of spite, it’s okay. because at least you’re living

[totallyboatless]

All of the actors for the Six of Crows storyline are remarkably well cast, but gonna focus on Kit Young for a second because that dude has something so fucking special. There's a subversive joy in his choices as Jesper that just kills me. Like at the end of season one with the line: "Tell me you have a plan. I don't care if it's a lie."

Reading that in your head without having seen his interpretation, the instinct is to go a little ragged, sardonic, exasperated - something to tell us that the character does actually care but just fucking can't deal with this shit right now. But Kit puts a pleading inflection on the line, his Jesper truly wants to be lied to, bringing it around to comedic desperation.

And it's not just with this line delivery, those facial expression reactions he does elevates every scene he's in. My favorite underrated moment is when he gives Wylan a confident wink and thumbs up when they're both getting the shit beat out of them. The juxtaposition of Jesper indicating "this is going exactly according to plan" when it's clearly not brings so much fun to the scene.

But the scene I keep coming back to over and over that I'm blown away by is under the carriage, when Jesper remembers Wylan. I could see so many actors taking those line directions and putting some angst behind them. We know Jesper was hurt when Wylan left in the morning, we know he blocked it out because his ego was bruised and he didn't want to face the pain of it. It would have made perfect sense for the line reading to have an edge to it, any indication of a grudge.

But Kit's face is lit up with nothing but fondness and joy as he remembers. And obviously actors aren't islands, the writers and directors have big influence - and they clearly are in line with a joy-filled Jesper, since the first thing they have Jesper say isn't "and you left me," it's "and you brought me stroopwaffles."

Jesper isn't a clown, but he's allowed to be one when he wants to be, and Kit leans into choosing joy with such effervescence. It only serves to make the dramatic scenes that much more heart wrenching. I hope we get a lot more Crows on screen, but whatever happens I'm excited to follow Kit's career, what a talented dude.

[she-posts-nerdy-stuff]

There’s an alternate universe where Kaz has very different coping mechanisms and just blurts out his life story in random nonsensical bursts like Phoebe in Friends, and I’m imagining it looking something like this

Kaz: Give him a break, it’s hard being on your own for the first time

Wylan: Thank you

Kaz, cheerily: I remember when I first came to the Barrel. I was nine; my father was dead and we’d just been conned out of all our money, and I ended up living behind a bunch of old of crates for a while with my brother before we caught the Queens Lady Plague and he died, and then I joined the Dregs and found these guys - so I totally get what you’re going through

Wylan: 😯😧😨

Jesper: the word you’re looking for is… anyway,

[crowshoots]

thinking about how jesper is the embodiment of ‘this is me trying’