It seemed like a given, but now it’s official: Netflix has renewed Shadow and Bone for a second season. The show’s mashup of author Leigh Bardugo’s Grishaverse books has been viewed by 55 million accounts since its April 23 premiere.
Shadow and Bone‘s first season roughly follows the plot of Bardugo’s first novel, also titled Shadow and Bone, but also brings in the protagonists of her Six of Crows duology. Discovering how the threads connect is a big part of the fun of the first season, which focuses on the fate of Alina Starkov (Jessie Mei Li), a young mapmaker who discovers she has the nearly mythic power to summon sunlight.
The central cast—Li, Archie Renaux (Mal), Freddy Carter (Kaz), Amita Suman (Inej), Kit Young (Jesper), Ben Barnes (General Kirigan), Danielle Galligan (Nina) and Calahan Skogman (Matthias)—are all set to return for season two. (As Barnes says in the cute little video Netflix produced for the announcement, spoiler alert! The Darkling isn’t quite done for yet.)
Presumably breakout stars Ugri and Bugri, who played Milo the goat, will not return, but one never knows—especially given that Netflix is spending today pretending the goat is answering questions on Twitter.
the G.O.A.T. from Shadow and Bone, Milo is in the house for #GeekedWeek answering all your questions! reply to this tweet with your questions and he'll be answering them LIVE later today.
— Netflix Geeked (@NetflixGeeked) June 7, 2021
There’s no word yet on production timeline, but season two will also have eight episodes. Bardugo remains an executive producer along with continuing showrunner Eric Heisserer. While you wait, you can of course revisit season one—and read Sylas K. Barrett’s take on the adaptation!
I enjoyed Shadow and Bone, the costumes are terrific and I’m always a sucker for world building. But the chosen-one trope in fantasy is as rampant as the superhero’s obligatory origin story and I’m old and grizzled and too tired in invest in something that feels like I’ve seen it a hundred times before. The volume of television I consumed under lockdown (hey, it was that or gin) hasn’t helped. No matter how competent the production, there needs to be something special to hold my attention. For me, in Shadow and Bone, it was Kit Young’s performance as Jesper. He infused every scene he was in with energy. He crackled. It took me a while to recall where I had seen him before. He was Lysander in Nicholas Hytner’s Midsummer Night’s Dream. For all my geriatric ennui, that’s a play I never tire of and Hytner’s version is one of the best I’ve ever seen. Check it out! Come for Gwendoline Christie as Titania, stay for Oliver Chris and Hammed Animashaun as Oberon and Bottom. And, of course, Mr. Young’s Lysander.
If this site ever does an article about the top five fantasy characters you’d like to do pub crawl with, Jesper would be on my list. Who else? Tyrion certainly. I will have to ponder on the other three.