Shadowhunters Episode 2&3: Review

I hadn’t realized I was already a week behind when I watched Episode 1 so I had to watch 2 and 3 back to back. This will be a clunky review for that reason and I’m sorry that I’m going to get off track and stand on soap boxes while doing it.

To start with I shall say that I do not like this show. I give a 3 episode window for any show to improve and I give stays of execution when I do not have a strong tendency either way. It’s why I managed to watch a whole 2 seasons of The Blacklist uncertain if I should stop – I’m glad I didn’t because it became absolutely fantastic but before that I just watched it to see James Spader chew the scenery every moment. It was not a bad show to start with at all but I’ve seen a lot of crime TV and they all fall on a similar area of the bell curve.

Shadowhunters Episode 2: “The Descent into Hell Isn’t Easy”

…and neither is this show. I have several people I know that adore anything at all related to this show. This review is not for them. They have heavy, heavy beer goggles on when it comes to this show and they have exalted on Facebook at great length about how hot the cast is and how perfect the actors are in every way but completely ignore the bad acting, story skimming, heavy handed dialog and the slew of other issues that never went away from the pilot.

First: Hodge is some hot dude of manly muscles. Maybe I didn’t read the books well enough but I thought Hodge was an older, graying and tweed loving bookish fellow with serious anxiety and agoraphobia. I placed him in his fifties. He was a father or even grandfather type with a lot of wisdom to impart on this young group of Shadowhunters. He was tortured by his past demons, was fallible but in the end redeemable as he was only trying to do what he could even if it was wrong.

The TV show makes him a literally tortured blonde emo who pants a lot and so far his only contribution is to say he did bad things, the Circle did bad things, Clary’s mom did bad things and if he tries to tell anyone about them his rune will do bad things to him. The Clave putting that rune on him makes no sense to me. “What happens in the Clave stays in the Clave.” The guy can’t leave the bloody Institute so the only people he CAN talk to are CLAVE members. If the Clave were trying to find valuable information regarding former members of the Circle at any time and he could provide it they are basically cutting off their only supply of valuable information.

Isabell Lightwood I didn’t notice it because you barely talked in the first episode but you sound like you have a Spanish accent. Why? You are blood related to Alec and he has a distinct lack of Spanish accent going on.

The City of Bones had an incredible lack of BONES. I did really appreciate the Silent Brothers and how they were portrayed as far as creepy, eyeless, mouth sewn and looming guardians of a boneless bone yard go. That was the highlight of the show for me even though the onscreen time for them was only a couple minutes. I was confused about how disgusted Jace looked at going into the City of Bones. In the books he had a deep respect and reverence for the place since he is very proud of his heritage and one day expects to be placed among his ancestors there. Here he basically looks like Clary let one go and he’s trying not to react.

Then along came some vampires and kidnapped the only credible actor in the main cast.

Shadowhunters Episode 3: “Dead Man’s Party”

Here’s a check list leading up to a moment that if I had been any kind of vested interest in this show would have taken me right out of it. In my case, it was the deciding reason why I don’t like this show, don’t want to watch it anymore and think everyone involved needs a solid rap on the nose followed by “No, bad! Bad, person.”

• girl that can’t fight out of a paper bag and accidentally kills people by them walking into the blade she’s holding in episode one.
• People continue to walk into accidentally held weapon in episode two.
• Episode three has a vaguely sexual encounter with boy that holds weapon and says nothing of tactical relevance for fighting or shows her any appropriate stances or swings to help her not die.
• Boy must assume people will continue to walk into girl’s sword to help her out.
• 5 minutes of viewing time that is, objectively, about an hour or less in Shadowhunter reality passes between least effective weapon technique lesson ever and showdown at the Apollo a la Vampire Hotel.
• Girl suddenly walks around corner in slow motion with 3 Shadowhunters looking determined and bad ass and SINGLE HAND WEAPON FLIP CATCH.

Yep. Clary in little less than an hour of time goes from falling on her ass unable to defend herself against a passing breeze to being able to have a dexterity bonus so high she can flip a sword around her hand and not slice a few fingers off. Ok, there were a few scenes in between the “lesson” and the 2 second hand flip like Clary getting glittered on by a cracked out looking vampire because Jace wanted to use her to steal the guy’s bike. How chivalrous!

Simon also gets vamp raped as well and sucks on vampire blood straight from the proverbial teat…or neck as it were.

I also had a second moment where I really fell out of the enchantment of this show (just like Simon suddenly does from the she-Vamp for no discernable reason at all. I mean, Clary had to have Jace save her to stop ogling at the Crack Vamp but Simon has a much stronger will?). In the big end battle scene where everyone is popping tops left and right you could really tell that the fighters were overlaid. To explain: Jace’s actor was clearly fighting thin air when he was doing his moves and then the person he was fighting was filmed separately and the two parts combined for the finished product. The awkward placement of his sword and arm on “impact” left no room to actually damage anyone making it look bizarre and the same happened when Clary had yet another person magically fall on her sword for her.

So then the save Simon but only because Raphael (vampire that initially kidnaps Simon and wants the Mortal Cup for reasons never explained) returns Simon to them in exchange for Jace to think kindly of him later on. So I guess he’s cashing in some chips early for pay off later if things go south although brownie points for kidnapping, raping and not killing your victim don’t seem to be plentiful.

An extremely awkward scene where Clary does everything a suddenly realized lover would do upon the return of her one true love happens but ends with Clary saying something like “Let’s braid each other’s hair for all eternity. Friendship!” and then kisses Simon on the cheek. So the very accurate look of his soul being crushed as he hugs Clary was totally accurate for Simon at this point. He should definitely rip out her jugular like he appeared to be planning at the end scene.

The whole episode ends with a lot of longing stares. Clary at Jace, Alec at Jace, Simon at Clary, and Izzy probably at herself as she contemplate why she is so Spanish in an all American family.

I think I found my reason to keep watching this show. In retrospect it’s hilariously B rated like watching a poorer adaptation of anything Bruce Campbell does.

 

–Krysil