Should the Darkling & Alina be endgame?

[[deleted user]]

Jininn wrote: "They must be together! There is no other way!!!:)"

Agreed... The way it happened with juliette and warner

[Faye :)]

Im really sad on what happened to The Darkling. I love him! And I want them(Alina and him) to be together. Even though he didnt actually or directly say "I love you", "You complete my life", other common, cheesy and corny things that everyone expected. That everyone requires before they consider it as love. For me, even though without all those things, they are perfect for each other. The Darkling is far beyond agony, grief, hate, and greed. But I still see in him a hope and chance to change. He love his mother Baghra. And if only Alina ends up with him, he can be redeemed. That's what I expected. Not totally he will suddenly become extremely kind, but atleast not monstrous to as everyone see.

I really dont like Mal! Seriously. Why? I'd rather choose Prince Nikolai if not The Darkling.

[Megan]

Faye :) wrote: "Im really sad on what happened to The Darkling. I love him! And I want them(Alina and him) to be together. Even though he didnt actually or directly say "I love you", "You complete my life", other ..."

Same here. I hope Leigh publishes more short stories about the Darkling, Genya and Nikolai before the events in the trilogy occured. I want to know what the Grisha palace life or Little Palace life was like for them.

[Michael]

Personally I don't think Alina needed to be with anyone in the endgame.

The Darkling, while cool and interesting, is beyond bad news and shows his true feelings for her at the end. (view spoiler)[ She loses her powers and he completely loses interest in her, now feeling totally alone. He didn't care about her, he cared about the fact that she was another very powerful individual who he felt could understand him since she had a similar power lust. Without that, she was just, well, a regular girl and thus nothing. (hide spoiler)]

Prince Nikolai would be the politically astute and more mature choice. It would go a long way into bringing Ravka back on its feet, however it's not the "romantic" option.

Mal is... well, Mal. It's complicated. Is it just me or as the story progressed did the two of them start to realize that while they do love each other, they're so different and live in such different worlds, enjoy such different things, that they'd never really be happy together? (view spoiler)[ The actual ending with Mal really annoyed me. Not only did it devalue his sacrifice, since he never "really" died, but it kind of neatly wrapped everything up in a convenient little package. It'd have been way more interesting, and would've shown even more strength on Alina's part, if she basically had to get over Mal's death, deal with her conflicted emotions with the Darkling, and accept the responsibility that being the Sun Summoner entails and learned to live with it and use it to right all the wrongs that the war with the Darkling caused. (hide spoiler)]

Really enjoyed the series, not so much the ending.

[Megan]

Michael wrote: "Personally I don't think Alina needed to be with anyone in the endgame.

The Darkling, while cool and interesting, is beyond bad news and shows his true feelings for her at the end. [spoilers remov..."

Have to argue with you on the Darkling. I don't deny his interest in her has started with her power, but in an interview, Leigh did confirm that he did have feelings for her.

[Michael]

Megan wrote: Have to argue with you on the Darkling. I don't deny his interest in her has started with her power, but in an interview, Leigh did confirm that he did have feelings for her.

Never read/listened to any of her interviews so I don't have her insight on his feelings for her. To me it just looked like he had feelings for Alina as the Sun Summoner, the immortal nigh-omnipotent unique power that could be with him forever, who would make sure he wouldn't be alone (which was his greatest fear) as opposed to being in love with Alina as a person, outside of what she could do to assuage that fear.

If she didn't do what she did, would he feel the same way about Alina (view spoiler)[the Otkazat'sya, because without any powers, that's pretty much what she became (hide spoiler)]? Could he? It just looked to me that the answer would have been a resounding "no".

But that was just my interpretation. I can be totally wrong.

[Megan]

I like to believe that he developed feelings for her as the series progressed. But then everyone has different opinions

[Michael]

I like to believe that the Darkling is so manipulative, so charming and sly, so damn good at reading and playing people to the tune he needs them to that he not only had Alina all in confused knots of feely-feels, but also had a large chunk of the fanbase willing to look past any of his actions, no matter how vile, to the "good" inside and that he's also convinced the author that he has real feelings. The author. The woman who wrote him.

Now that's Inception levels of manipulative, suave game. A villain's villain. Totally badass. I mean, even at the end he made sure to leave Alina with a nice shard of feely-feels lodged in her heart. Bwahahahaha!

[Molly]

Faye :) wrote: "Im really sad on what happened to The Darkling. I love him! And I want them(Alina and him) to be together. Even though he didnt actually or directly say "I love you", "You complete my life", other ..."

IK!!!! I was seriously crushed after I read the ending. They would be perfect for each other. There powers seemed to align somehow. The Darkling actually did have feelings for Alina. He was jelous of Mal. It's not fair to say just because he did all those things he's uncapable of loving. Mal is annoying and he is always pissed about something. Nikolai is still better by a ton but I'm on team Darlina!

[Hithere]

Has anyone here even read the series. First off, Mal married Alina. Second, the Darkling is completely evil. He committed countless murders, destroyed entire villages of citizens, blinding his own mother, and was even the one responsible for the Shadow Fold in the first place. Also, he is a shadow creature now, and possibly dead. So, that's not happening.

[elle❤️]

Ohmaigah! I thought I was the only one that secretly rooted for the Darkling!!! But not only is he super hot, he’s also into Alina. He’s drawn to her, and he doesn’t even try to hid it. And as far as power, they’re both in the same game. I honestly ship them and I think, had they ended up together, it would have been a super plot twist and I would have squealed ALL THE WAY!😍😍