What they pull out of Clary is the fact that her father is Valentine, a fact which Luke and Jocelyn apparently chose to discuss over a sleeping Clary. Between that and Dot whispering to comatose Jocelyn after escaping her cage in Chernobyl instead of, you know, escaping to go get help, these people are a bunch of morons. The Silent Brothers use a dangling sword to pull erased memories out of people. Since Pandemonium was cleared out in a hurry by warlocks fleeing the Circle members, Jace suggests going to the Silent Brothers, a group of creepy underground-dwelling dudes who look like this: She seems to have maybe died for real now, at Valentine’s hand, so I guess that settles that anyway. Too bad as a warlock helping out a Shadowhunter (something they implied via Magnus’ disdain was unusual), she could’ve had an interesting dynamic with the rest of the kids.Īfter Clary and the gang fail to rescue Dot following Clary’s necklace-induced visions of Dot in danger, Clary decides that she needs to get her memories back ASAP. Was anyone else surprised to see Dot alive after the fight in the premiere? I was fairly certain she was dead at that point, for some reason.
He deserves better than both Clary and Izzy, at this point. I do enjoy Simon and Alberto Rosende’s portrayal of him, though. Izzy is far more bearable when she’s platonically interacting with Clary. The “pep talk” scene between the two was very cute. I’m not sure if it’s the writing or the acting (or both), but every time Izzy interacts with Simon all I can think is, “Oh my god, is she going to eat him?” She’s scary! Their interactions are not coming off as alluring at all. Sizzy (the Simon/Izzy ‘ship) is so clearly going to be a thing, but I can’t take Izzy seriously at all. Unfortunately for female viewers, Izzy is still a sauntering human sex doll at this point. The portrayal of this character is so disappointing. While Jace and Clary are touring the Institute, getting things explained, Izzy entertains Simon. I admire the chutzpah of the show, telling all of its secrets so quickly! I hope that they haven’t front-loaded all of the good bits. It’s not like they could have uncovered this information naturally!īetween this early-on reveal of Jocelyn’s past and Valentine’s motivations, and Clary’s later discovery that Valentine is her father, I’m honestly not sure what other twists could be coming down the pipeline. The exposition is just too important for him to shut up, guys. The Mortal Cup can create more Shadowhunters/control demonsĪll the while, Hodge is in tremendous pain because of a mark that flares up whenever he talks about the Circle.Valentine was presumed dead in a fire years ago.Valentine is a really bad dude whose plans would mean the death of most of humanity.Conveniently, Hodge knows exactly who Clary’s mother is (they were best friends, naturally) and Hodge explains the following: One example is the scene with Hodge Starkweather, the ex-Circle member turned weapons trainer, in the training room. Of course, there’s still the occasional overwhelming narrative clunkiness. Now that the show has slowed its roll significantly, it’s much easier and more palatable to digest all of the information being presented.
Maybe it will all click into place later?Ĭlary and Simon spend some time in the Institute, getting debriefed on a bit of Shadowhunting 101. They’re hitting all the beats, yes, but he still just seems like a caricature of an overdone stereotype to me.Īs revealed in this episode, he’s got a murdered dad, a dead/vanished mom, and a quest for vengeance against Valentine, the man who killed his dad. He’s the rough-around-the-edges badass guy with a tragic past, who melts for the first girl to truly get him. Listen, I understand perfectly well what they’re trying to do with Jace. I call him that because I detect no other personality traits yet. On the one hand, her BFF Simon, who is very reasonably alarmed and disturbed to have been brought in to this Shadowhunting world. This episode picks up precisely where the last left off, with Clary caught between the two men in her life. Worst case scenario: nobody in the writers’ room knows what pacing is. Best case scenario: the show just wants to get all of the background “out of the way” (so to speak) to clear time to do bigger and better things, fully immersing us in this alt-New York. The breakneck speed of action and exposition definitely slows this week. Long story short: I’m actually mildly impressed!
But after the train wreck that was the series premiere, my expectations for “The Descent Into Hell Isn’t Easy” were at the sub-basement level. Don’t get me wrong there’s still a lot not sitting right with me. Shadowhuntersundergoes quite a bit of improvement in its second episode.