Shadow And Bone, Netflix’s adaptation of Leigh Bardugo’s “Grishaverse” novels, has become one of the streaming site’s most anticipated upcoming shows. The series doesn’t come out till April 23, but fans of the novels can now have a sneak peek in the newly released teaser.
The teaser introduces heroine Alina Starkov (Jessie Mei Li), who discovers she has a mystical power that’ll become instrumental in helping her country. But there’s a lot going on, including Alina meeting General Kirigan (Ben Barnes), the Gisha leader who takes interest in her powers and will serve as a guide to her along the way. But in case you’re not familiar with the novels and have no idea what’s going on in the trailer, Li broke down the gist of what happens to her character in an interview about the trailer with IGN.
“Alina is a cartographer in the army and she then discovers that she has this mythical power to summon sunlight, which of course from the trailer you can see that the country of Ravco is split in two by this enormous expanse of darkness so it is then Alina’s responsibility to vanish the [Shadow] Fold with her newfound powers,” she explained.
As for General Kirigan, Barnes explained that Kirigan “has been hoping to be able to banish the Fold, and to be able to bring peace to the country, that is a very war-torn country.” Upon meeting Alina, he realizes that her powers combined with his own are what’s needed to combat evil.
Netflix also shared the official synopsis and it looks like the series is staying mostly loyal to the titular novel:
Based on Leigh Bardugo’s worldwide bestselling Grishaverse novels, Shadow and Bone finds us in a war-torn world where lowly soldier and orphan Alina Starkov has just unleashed an extraordinary power that could be the key to setting her country free. With the monstrous threat of the Shadow Fold looming, Alina is torn from everything she knows to train as part of an elite army of magical soldiers known as Grisha. But as she struggles to hone her power, she finds that allies and enemies can be one and the same and that nothing in this lavish world is what it seems. There are dangerous forces at play, including a crew of charismatic criminals, and it will take more than magic to survive. Shadow and Bone is a Netflix production from 21 Laps Entertainment, starring Jessie Mei Li (Alina Starkov), Archie Renaux (Malyen Oretsev), Freddy Carter (Kaz Brekker), Amita Suman (Inej), Kit Young (Jesper Fahey), and Ben Barnes (General Kirigan)
Bird Box and Arrival writer Eric Heisserer is the showrunner for the eight-episode series, so it seems to be in good hands.