Netflix ‘Shadow and Bone’ Season 2: Bens Barnes’ Darkling to get ‘very gaslighty’

Showrunners for Netflix’s popular fantasy show Shadow and Bone revealed what fans can expect from the upcoming Season 2.

Series creator Eric Heisserer and fellow writer Daegan Fryklind shared in an interview with Netflix, hinted about the growing connection between the show leads lina Starkov (Jesse Mei Li) and antagonist, the Darkling (Ben Barnes), via Collider.

An adaptation of the trilogy, of the same name, authored by Leigh Bardugo, the story is set in a war-torn world in which a cartographer, Alina Starkov, who realises she has extraordinary powers that could be the key to setting her homeland free from a dark entity called The Fold filled with monstrous creatures called volcra.

However, she has to face off with the powerful Shadow Summoner who created The Fold in the first place. At the end of Season 1, after Alina’s epic face off in the Fold with the Darkling, he emerges once more, this time more powerful, angry and with a motive to wage war.

In the new episodes, the duo will be closer than ever despite being physically apart. They will find a connection through a mental space, dubbed as the ‘Mind Palace’ in the books.

When describing Season 2, Heisserer and Fryklind stated that one of its arcs will centre around the continuous growth of Alina, who became more and more confident as a Sun Summoner across Season 1.

“The stag is strength, the sea whip is anger and rage, and this is part of Alina dealing with her past trauma,” said Fryklind.

“And the firebird is love. Those three things together really create a perfect arc for her. [However] there was a residue from the stag amplifier that remained with Kirigan when it was removed at the end of Season 1.

“That residue has created a mental tether between the two of them, that he is the first to figure it out. At first, it’s dreams, and then he figures out this is something more than dreams, and that he can use this tether to get into her mental space and try to influence her thoughts. Very gaslighty.”

Shadow and Bone Season 2 will premiere on Netflix on March 16th, 2023.