#sab2 spoilers

[bookishbunnies]

Okay, so rewatching the earlier season Wesper scenes is a million times funnier now I know they straight up fucked already and Jesper doesn't fucking remember. Wylans face, every time, is such a mix of 'I'm I'm love with this man' and 'wtf why do I feel like this for a fucking idiot' and 'does he seriously not remember me???'

[turtleofdamascus]

In praise of the non-canon moments in sab2 and my ratings:

Just want to appreciate these moments the writers added cuz idk I feel like they do understand the characters. It’s like watching fanfic. Hot take: I sometimes like them so much more or just as much as the canon scenes taking place.

kanej chapel scene in s1

iconic. One of the best non-canon things they added to show Inej's first kill. And it be for Kaz. AHH and in a chapel. The symbolism. The emotion. And of course the delivery of Kaz saying "Look at me" while leaning in but not touching. 10000/10

Nina and Kaz fake couple scene

I'm dying I cannot with this scene. This is perfect. I always wanted a fake dating scene in the books. And this was perf. "He's all hands" and Kaz's face looking slightly terrified and horrified. Also ahhh him having to take off his gloves to do the tea ritual. I gasped. It was so surreal. And then Inej watching tear tear. 9000/10

Kaz panicking at tea time

I gasped when I saw this. I think this was insane. Cuz in the books, all we get that is similar is the... prison carriage scene. But this- this seems even more exposed. Kaz panicking and then putting his hand down and then, Nina putting her hand on him and Kaz looking terrified then running through the streets and then Inej carrying him and... then him curled up holding his cane without his gloves and Inej being there to give his gloves and witnessing it. Ahhh like first of all, looks like a nightmare for kaz but dang idk if we get such a scene capturing the vulnerability of kaz ahh. The writers knew exactly how to torture him. It's so crazy bc Freddy can play him with nerves of steel but then in a puddle of fear and I'm in awe. The shaking and the curling up in the corner. I'm in tears. 10000!/10

Wylan monologue on butterflies

This was hilarious and very Wylan. So nerdy. 900/10

- feeding the team butterflies… ummm

I don't know if this brought me out of the show, bc it was so bizarre. But ahhh Inej on top of kaz trying feed him a butterfly while he's having a nightmare was just-- ahhh most strange situation I could think of but also ahhh the angst. I was screaming no don’t touch kazzz. I guess the scene was another excuse to torture Kaz and I ate it up. AHHH the fact the only inej could help him. 900/10

-the Jesper and wylan piano tuning

Also such a random scene but I loved it so much. Lol the fact that wylan pretends they're piano tuners bahaha. And then he congratulates Alby's playing and then proceeds to show off. Such a fun scene. 9000/10

Jesper being in prison carriage scene

Screaming crying and throwing up. when i saw this in the first episode. I gasped and in the first 5 minutes AHH. What. Idk i kinda loved that jesper was there. There's so much trust in their relationship and seeing kaz struggle right in front of jesper was so painful. Ahh him gasping for breath and trying to hide it. Is heartbreaking. And then Jesper being like "boss", and then "kaz" and his eyes being so concerned for his friend and calling for help. I cry. 10000/10

Hallucination scene

Once again performed beautifully. The stares. The "May I" and then gently pressing Inej to him. The hand on the cheek. And Inej giving him the intent stare. The soft kiss. UMM. I don't like that it's a hallucination. But i do find it fascinating to compare the "I want you" of this and the actual "I want you". THEY are BOTH delivered similarly. So in some ways,,,, I see this as a look into a future. Not unrealistic. If we never got a "real" I want you. I would be angrier. so for that it gets points back. WHAT DID WE DO TO DESERVE A KANEJ KISS> 9000/10

Also some thoughts on canon moments brought to life perfectly:

Kanej "I want you" church scene

“You,Inej, you…. To die buried underneath” Kaz never said it but ahh his eyes looking so ... distant and his lips forming the words and then the delivery of the "To die buried..." with his eyes rolling upward. Perfect. Perfectly delivered. AHHH. Freddy understands Kaz.

"I want you" - Idk how freddy can go from being the most monstrous looking person to turning his eyes into these round boyish eyes. So... open and round. And ahh you can see Kaz trying... so hard to show he's giving his all. And then when he takes his gloves away and you can see his shuddering breath. Ahh

"Gloves on" delivered so sadly and brutally. Amita's eyes so... yearning but letting him down. Ahh felt like a breakup. Almost made me wish they cut the line. Because the show!kaz was trying to hard. I kind of wish in some way they didn't say this canon line lol. I want Inej to see he's trying.

And then when Inej leaves... and we are left looking at Kaz. His eyes watering. And looking so heartbroken. Stab me.

This was delivered perfectly. I-chef’s kiss.

The Dregs fight

Ahh the fight was amazing and stunning with the speed ramping. And kaz using his cane to lift a chair and slamming his cane into people faces. Chef's kiss. Freddy giving his all. THIS IS BRUTAL KAZ I NEEDED. YESSS feral kaz. How did i deserve this 100000/10

Pekka Rollins revenge scene

UMM... Freddy/Kaz gave it his all. And I bow before him like Pekka. AHHHH. The glares. The delivery of every line from the books UMM. Praise. "Buried." "Six feet deep" . Also seeing Kaz getting beat up was so painful but ahhh performed so well. The framing of the shot where Pekka bows before him... and it's silent almost. It looks like a painting. I'm stunned. Also the delivery of the line "quitclaim for inej ghafa" AHHH. Ahh idk... the protectiveness. 10000000/10. AMazing showstopping. I can't believe they plucked it from the books.

[calliope-king]

I absolutely love that they made Wylan and Jesper fuck before season 2 and that by its end they were already in a relationship. First of all, I thought it was so funny that Jesper fucking forgot ahhh. Also!! Just think about how much more dramatic the Van Eck reveal will be! And the Kuwei and Wylan face swap! And the accidental Kuwei kiss! It’s gonna be gold!

[witch-at-the-edge-of-the-wood]

In the last episode Matthias wanted to go the her.

HE WANTED TO GO TO HER

He wanted to go to Nina...I-I'm crying... It's just so much pain

I can't wait for one year or more to find out what happens next

[mermaids-ate-my-dinner]

I just don’t get how Pekka Rollins is the king of prison all of a sudden. What happened there? Prison riot? sure sure sure! But why does he have all the guards under his control? Did I fall asleep and miss something?

[ineffablelvrs]

mhm im choosing to ignore the show's pronunciation of jurda parem and gonna be a slav and read it like i always have (rolling my rs and pronouncing j like y)

[theres-a-bea]

RULE OF WOLVES LORE ?! ????? THIS EARLY ?! NETFLIX WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING

[bookishbunnies]

Kaz pretending like he's not the number 1 Wesper shipper, taking any opportunity to put them together 😅

SHADOW AND BONE (2021-) - live Kaz reaction

[bookishbunnies]

Okay. I'm finished. Finally.

I have thoughts. Many.

First, holy shit it's a heckin good time to love Wesper.

And they've clearly set it up for the ice court heist. But, they've fucked up parts. Theyve fucked up the Wesper slowburn, the 'not just girls' scene (which is probably why Kit and Jack did it in the interview). Also kinda fucked up the Kanej slowburn but not as badly. Kinda fucked up the Jesper is a durast thing, but it'll be interesting to see the heist with a Jesper that is proud of his powers and knows how to use them. Interestingly they've still got the Helnik part of the plot pretty much on track.

They've fucked up hopes for Crooked Kingdom. They could still do it sort of. But Rollins position has changed, Inejs position has changed, and they've already used up like half the book.

Tho noticeably they did not say a thing about Wylans family. That is still completely under wraps. And that'll be very interesting to see on screen.

They've also fucked up any hope for King of Scars. Sure they've got the Nikolai part, but my hope for KoS died with David.

All in all, I know a lot of people probably aren't gonna like the last episode and how a lot of different things ended. And I definitely understand that. But more importantly we all want to see the Ice Court heist. So we need to ignore our feelings about how this season ended and stream this season as many times as we can this month to make sure we get the Ice Court heist.

We need to see Matthias and Nina's story play out.

With the changes we might actually eventually get to a healthy Kanej relationship (as healthy as it can be anyway

With the changes it'll mean we get to see many many amazing scenes of Jesper and Wylan, being absolutely adorable and also being absolute badasses and so incredibly proud of each other.

And we might even get to see Zoya and Nikolai.

[turtleofdamascus]

ahhh The fact that instead of kaz carrying inej in soc, We got a scene where kaz panicked and inej carried him to safety. I-... please excuse me as I cri. The role-reversal. Ahh and then him curled up trembling holding onto his cane and Inej giving him his gloves. Cry cry. Why was it so good. The hurt. The comfort. The vulnerability. Freddy’s acting. Ahh Inej being there. Tears Tears.

also kaz and nina acting as a couple is def a fanfic trope i love and so funny that that showed up in the show. KAZ’s face when nina said he was “all hands” bahahaha. They have such a sibling older sister/younger brother dynamic bahaha 

[calliope-king]

Anyone else disappointed Kaz didn’t just pull the pen to sign the murder confessions out of Pekka’s ear?

[ineffablelvrs]

im sorry but alina using the cut to kill someone and then smirking is so out of character for her

[big-cheesy-productions]

SXSG - RADICAL HIGHWAY Analysis

Okay, I absolutely love all of the "Black Doom just really likes Radical Highway" jokes, because same, bud.

But, like, I'm actually obsessed with the symbolism of it and its inclusion.

It makes sense for the game to keep coming back to this level for a number of reasons. It was Shadow the Hedgehog's first level in his first game. Of course it would be a central callback in the game, just like Green Hill Zone appears again and again for Sonic, and celebration of his first appearance. This is the nostalgia and callback game after all (and it does it so well). But the way Radical Highway is included and used in SXSG is actually so brilliant.

Okay, bear with me while I talk about Radical Highway as a level and its symbolism originally in Sonic Adventure 2 (My favorite game ever of all time) to set the scene.

Radical Highway is the second Dark level in the game, and the first Shadow level, and the way this level perfect sets up Shadow as a character and how he compares to Sonic is *chef's kiss*.

Sonic's first level is the famous City Escape. City Escape takes place on the San Francisco-inspired streets of Central City. Sonic is on the streets, running past houses and cars, through parks and neighborhoods. It feels grounded (literally and figuratively). Sonic is among the people. There's a small G.U.N. presence, as they are trying to capture Sonic, but it's a pretty peaceful, sunny day otherwise. Perfect introduction for our boy, Sonic.

In stark contrast, Radical Highway is the complete opposite of City Escape in every way. While City Escape was on the streets of Central City, Radical Highway is above it. There's no cute townhouses, no cars going about their day. It's on high, Golden Gate Bridge-inspired streets, in the dead of night. While City Escape had a small G.U.N. presence, Radical Highway has fighter jets dropping bombs on you as you sprint through the streets and there are G.U.N. robots EVERYWHERE. Even the music is the opposite of City Escape, which is upbeat and campy, with famous lyrics we all know and love. Radical Highway’s music is purely instrumental and has a darker tone, and a more serious hint of urgency (while still being a banger of course). 

While City Escape serves to set up our beloved blue leading man as the carefree speedster who goes where the impulse takes him, Radical Highway sets up everything for Shadow. Assuming you play the Hero Story first, you really don’t know much about Shadow, other than he serves as a rival for Sonic. He only has a few scenes where he crosses paths with Sonic, and in all put the last one, he is always positioned above Sonic, until their final confrontation where they are on even ground, literally and figuratively, because Shadow sees Sonic as an equal in the end, whereas before, he saw Sonic, and everyone else in the world, as beneath him. Hence, the brilliant symbolism of Radical Highway being above everything. He literally starts the level at the highest point on the bridge while looking down at the G.U.N. forces and calls them “pathetic.” (This is where that all began.)

He’s above it all, he’s disconnected, he believes himself superior, and in the cutscene before this level we learn about Maria, and her death, for the first time. We see a flashback to that canon event and when we come back to the present, Shadow promises her revenge, and we learn Shadow’s goals aren’t what they initially seemed when Eggman released him.

It is not until the Final Story that we learn what is going on: Shadow was not originally made as a weapon, but Professor Gerald modified him after the ARK incident and Maria’s death, including modifying his memories. The Shadow we see in Radical Highway is not really Shadow. It’s Gerald, in his insanity and grief, in his righteousness and fury. The promise for revenge is Gerald’s, not Shadow’s.

Later games have Shadow rebuild his memories and sense of self in the wake of all of the meddling from certain Robotniks. Shadow the Hedgehog ‘05 and Sonic ‘06 leave us with a Shadow who is still devastated by his losses, but his mind and convictions are his own, and a Shadow who remembers Maria’s true, unadulterated wish (2010s Sonic games go on to forget all of this, but we’re not talking about that right now). He might not know exactly where his place in the world is, but he knows who he is and what he fights for.

Okay, now where am I going with all of this with SXSG? Why does Black Doom keep bringing Shadow back to Radical Highway, from a storytelling perspective?

Black Doom is manipulative. It’s his whole schtick. Shadow ‘05 constantly has Black Doom trying to use the ARK incident to bring Shadow over to his side and serve him. He is trying to use Shadow’s traumatic memories to get Shadow to remember his hatred for humanity, but good/True Story playthrough Shadow recovers his true memories and remains true to his convictions (God, that game would be so good if it was good). Black Doom’s manipulation doesn’t work and Shadow defeats him. 

Now, in SXSG, Black Doom is back. He knows he can’t use the same tactics as last time. Shadow has his memories. There is nothing that could convince Shadow to willingly join Black Doom. Shadow never flinched when Mephiles was trying to manipulate him in Sonic ‘06. So what does Black Doom do? Memory manipulation is still his thing, so he decides to drag Shadow to Radical Highway, to this moment in time instead, because this moment represents everything that went wrong.

In this moment in time, Maria is dead, Gerald is dead, Shadow’s mind is not his own, he has initiated Gerald’s plan to destroy the world, and the promise he made to Maria is corrupted. And now Black Doom is here too, further warping this memory. There’s definitely a theme of autonomy in many of Shadow’s stories: He was made as a cure for Maria, Gerald modified his mind, Eggman did too, and Black Doom tries to enforce a claim on him. 

Black Doom is trying to psych Shadow out, because he knows he can’t claim him through pure force. There’s definitely a theme of autonomy in many of Shadow’s stories: He was made as a cure for Maria, Gerald modified his mind, Eggman did too, and Black Doom tries to enforce a claim on him. And he’s using this memory of Radical Highway to push this, to drag him back to his past he’s trying to move on from, to say “you are just a weapon. You are just a tool, to be used and modified. You were never anything more.”

But then, Maria and Gerald are there, saying “you are so much more.” Gerald is there calling him “son,” saying he’s proud of him, and asking him to live for himself. Maria is there saying “you are more than your anger, more than your past, more than what you’re made of.”

And all of this is represented by Radical Highway.

I fucking love Radical Highway.

[bookishbunnies]

Omfg yeah, I just realised, yeah they fixed Jespers absolute fuckup. Oh that's hilarious 😂

So... i saw a spoiler

I don't know how to feel about the thing, i will when i have the context but the memes are the memes

[bookishbunnies]

Now that I've finished I'm going back and rewatching most of the wesper scenes, taking more time. And my gods I'm so glad I am. Wylans facial expressions at everything is fucking top tier.

The way he looks at Jesper everytime he's trying to figure out where/how they've met before

The little shake of his head, the face of absolute 'oh ffs' when Jesper asks if they'd met before when talking on the carriage about how Kaz found Wylan at the tannery

The absolute terror on his face when Alby walks into the room. Wylan, it is simply a kid, you don't have to be terrified 😅

The wincing at the kid playing the piano 😂 yet trying to be so supportive 😂

The way he looks up at Jesper after playing the piano

The little lean in and back when he asks Jesper if he's worried about him 😍

The way he's looking at Jesper so concerned, trying to figure out if he's gonna give Kaz the kids name. And the subtle look of betrayal and Jesper does

The look and the little silent 'what??' when Jesper refers to him as a total stranger

The little look and emphatic nod when Jesper finally realises they have met before while laying on top of him under the carriage

The look of 'are you fucking kidding me' when jesper mentions the stroopwaffles

Look I could go on, but that's gonna be way too fucking long a post 😅

[bookishbunnies]

Yup, when I say I don't mind shows changing from the books sometimes I am 100% talking about Wesper in Shadow and Bonr season 2

Honestly as much as i loved the slower burn of wesper in the books i can NOT pretend i dont like the way the show took them ngl.