SHADOWHUNTERS – “The Mortal Cup” – (ABC Family/John Medland)
KATHERINE MCNAMARA, DOMINIC SHERWOOD,
I really wanted to like The Mortal Instruments: City of Bone. The casting was good, the budget has respectable and the finished product hit most of the key moments in the book – but it just didn’t click because moments don’t make a movie; the connective tissue that makes those moments a story, that’s what makes a movie. And let’s face it – the movie lacked the connective tissue.
Shadowhunters (Freeform, Tuesdays, 9/8C) does not have that problem. It may not have the budget, but it has everything else (and if you’re amazed by what can be accomplished on a TV budget these days, you’ve just not been paying attention). While it’s difficult to judge a series on the basis of one episode, The Mortal Cup is good enough that if the rest of the season matches it, it will be superb.
The Mortal Cup opens with a middle-aged Asian man heading towards a club, Pandemonium, and being followed by a trio of extremely able and beautiful young people. He changes form not once, but twice, settling on a tall, beautiful brunette – but he fails to lose his followers.
As they follow him into the club, one of them bumps a redheaded girl and keeps on going – to be brought up short when she calls him out for being rude. He turns. ‘You can see me?’
Flash title card.
Cut to earlier that day…
Clary Fray (Katherine McNamara) strides into the Brooklyn Academy of Art where she totally fails to impress the panel interviewing her and examining her work until they see some art from a graphic novel she’s working on with her friend Simon. It gets her in.
SHADOWHUNTERS – ABC Family’s “Shadowhunters” stars Emeraude Toubia as Isabelle Lightwood, Dominic Sherwood as Jace Wayland, Katherine McNamara as Clary Fray and Matthew Daddario as Alec Lightwood. (ABC Family/Bob D’Amico)
Stoked, she heads home and gets ready to go out with Simon (Alberto Rosende) to celebrate – but her mother, Jocelyn (Maxim Roy) wants to talk to her. It’s her eighteenth day and Jocelyn has something she needs to tell her – but Clary is intent on getting out and celebrating her birthday and getting accepted at her school of choice. Even the arrival of Luke (Isaiah Mustafa) can’t dissuade her.
Events unravel in a sequence that leads her, Simon and his band mate, Maureen to Pandemonium and we’re back with Clary and rude boy – who turns out to be Jace Wayland (Dominic Sherwood) and, other being surprised that Clary can see him, is not the least bit apologetic. Which leads to Clary, Simon and Maureen entering the club – and while Simon orders drinks, Clary follows Jace and her whole world changes.
Meanwhile, back at the Fray apartment, we’re learning more about Jocelyn, too – and witnessing what will be some pivotal events in both Fray women’s lives.
Written by Ed Decter (who developed the series for television) and directed by McG, The Mortal cup introduces all the characters we love from the books – Clary, Simon, Luke, Jace, Alec (Matthew Daddario) and Isabelle (Esmeraude Toubia) Lightwood, Magnus Bane (Harry Shum Jr.) and more without feeling overly crowded or unnecessarily rushed.
We find out, along with Clary, just how and why her world is changing.
McNamara makes a genuinely endearing Clary – she’s talented and pretty and seems like (beneath the bewilderment the upheavals in her life are causing) smart and tough. She might be innocent but she’s certainly not naïve – and completely capable of adjusting to her new circumstances (or at least a lot better than Simon, who can’t initially see what she sees).
Rosende makes Simon’s feelings for Clary so plain and obvious that when she calls him out for not realising that Maureen is totally smitten by him we want to scream, ‘Pot! Kettle! Black!’ It’s also clear that he’s an intelligent, talented person in his own right so that, when he has to make some adjustments to his personal worldview, we know he’ll be up to it.
SHADOWHUNTERS – “The Mortal Cup” – (ABC Family/John Medland)
MAXIM ROY, KATHERINE MCNAMARA
Sherwood definitely captures Jace’s self-involvement/ego, but also his ability to see past that when needs must – like when a pretty mundane turns out to be able to see him despite, well, measures being taken… He walks that fine line between arrogant and self-confident that makes the character so much fun in the books. He also seems to be unaware that a specific person is mad about him…
Daddario captures the flamboyant, but controlled flair of Alec – and his acceptance that Jace will never see him in that particular way; though their friendship will always be rock solid (they are after all, parabatai – it’s explained, trust me).
Toubia’s Isabelle is, if anything, even sassier than in the books – and just as deadly. See, too, is smart and tough, but where her twin has flair, she has style.
Season one of Shadowhunters will be, we are told, mostly based on the first book of The Mortal Instruments series, but there will be changes to accommodate translation to television – some of which will involve reordering events and perspectives – which we can see almost right away.
Technically, The Mortal Cup is extremely sound: costuming, props, sets, effects, all are well designed and executed. Decter’s script is tight and McG’s direction provides the kind of visual muscle and epic fantasy like Shadowhunters needs to keep the material firmly believable, no matter insane it gets.
As a fan of the books, who was disappointed by the movie (as many were), I’m pleased to say that I couldn’t be happier with the series premiere of Shadowhunters. I also believe that, even if you’ve never read the books but love a good fantasy adventure, you will find a great deal to love here.
Final Grade: A+