About:
Shadowhunter of the Week: Jace
Previously: The potion that Jocelyn took is traced back to the Book of the White, which belongs to Camille; Alec breaks off his marriage to Lydia because MALEC; and Hodge steals the Cup for Valentine.
What Happened
Since Raphael won’t grant Clary an audience with Camille, she hatches a plan with Simon and Izzy to break Camille out of Hotel DuMort, effectively shattering the alliance between shadowhunters and vampires. In return for Camille’s cooperation, she demands a Writ of Transmutation to exonerate her for breaking the Accords by turning Simon into a vampire. It takes a little bit of digging at Camille’s place, but Clary finds the Book of the White, which Magnus uses to perform the spell that wakes Jocelyn up.
Upon discovering an unconscious Lydia, the Shadowhunters realize that Hodge has been Valentine’s mole all along. Except Hodge is def. more into this friendship than Valentine is, since Hodge gave his “old friend” Valentine the Mortal Cup, and Valentine can’t even be bothered to protect Hodge from the wrath of the Clave. And then Hodge has a run-in with former pupil, Jace, who proceeds to chop off his hand, so things are extremely not coming up Hodge, who gets apprehended by the Clave.
Things are also not going well for Jace, who blames himself for sparing Valentine’s life and doubts his entire identity due to the revelation of his paternity. This gives dear ol’ dad the opportunity to threaten the rest of the Shadowhunters’ lives and coerce Jace into joining him at his side — and at the command of an army of new Shadowhunters created with the Mortal Cup.
Oh, and remember the wedding that didn’t happen? Unsurprisingly, Mama Maryse is none too pleased re: Malec — not because Magnus is a dude, but because he’s warlock lothario, Magnus Bane — and Camille makes Magnus feel insecure about his capacity for love. Then there’s also the issue of one of them being immortal and the other totally not, which is way too much baggage for two people who haven’t even gone on a proper date yet. GO ON A PROPER DATE ALREADY.
Shadowhighlights
- I didn’t mention it in the last recap, but Alec’s wedding hair looks super cute on him.
- CAMILLE’S LIBRARY. And she has even more rooms like that?! SWOON.
- Jocelyn’s finally awake! Fingers crossed that she’ll have something to do next season, aside from lying perfectly still.
Shadowlowlights
- Our Shadowhunters might be all broken up about Hodge going to the dark side, but those relationships were never developed enough to make me care about this betrayal.
- This is the second time that the Shadowhunters get out of a jam at Hotel DuMort by cracking open a wall. Invest in better building materials, vampires!
- … But seriously, there is SO much paperwork and political talk when it comes to the vampires. Why is it so difficult for them to just be cool and immortal?
- Weapons that seem cooler in theory than they are in practice: Hodge’s disk things, which look kind of goofy (or, at least, he looks goofy using them); and Izzy’s whip, which is pretty slow to employ and can easily be used against her.
- Me, whenever Malec appeared onscreen together: MAKE OUT MAKE OUT MAKE OUT. That long-awaited date is still so far away!
- WHY DID SIMON SIGN THE WRIT SO SOON, YOU SILLY RABBITS? I know it worked out in the end, but there wasn’t even proof that Camille had it in her possession at that point. Y’all are terrible at trades.
Shadowhunter of the Week
Poor Jace; saving his friends might have been the noble choice, but father-son bonding time with Valentine might be too steep of a price. (On a completely unrelated note, the leather jacket that he was wearing throughout this episode looks like it was a strange fit. Or maybe it was just the emphasis on heavage due to the v-neck underneath.)
Say What?
Alec: “I might be able to ask Magnus for help.”
Jace: “You need to stop thinking with your stele, Alec.”
LOLOLOL JACE. And please never stop thinking with your stele, Alec.
Camille: “I’d say he’s about twenty years from male-pattern baldness.”
YOU SHUT YOUR DAMN MOUTH, CAMILLE. Alec’s hair is a national treasure!
Swimfan Says
Here’s Shadowhunter Chronicles expert, Meredith (@legallyblonde), with her thoughts!
- The Book of the White masquerading as a cookbook, Valentine’s base of operations being a military-esque ship, and Hodge’s weapon of choice in the fight with Jace are all great nods to the books.
- In both of their one-on-one conversations, Magnus’ immortality and Alec’s lack thereof are mentioned and/or discussed, and that becomes an Important Thing in later books.
- Jace and Valentine’s conversation, where he does NOT agree to join Valentine, is similar to one in City of Ashes (Book 2), but it fit in really well for the finale. Jace going with Valentine to save his friends did NOT happen in the books, and I am very concerned about Jace now.
- Jocelyn isn’t woken until City of Glass (Book 3), and it’s not as happy a reunion, but this version definitely works better with the show. I’m curious how this will affect next season.
- Given how things went down, I’m not entirely sure what’s all going to happen next season, and I actually really like that. The show’s done a great job overall (they dropped the Chernobyl crazy, for example) of introducing new material but staying true to the spirit of the books. I do want to see Jace as a double agent-type and an Alec/Clary team up, though.
Burning Questions
- This may have already been covered by the show before, but I need to go over it again: if the Cup can control demons, then wouldn’t making more Shadowhunters to fight said demons be sort of redundant?
- So, uh, the Mortal Cup purifies a tank of blood into some sort of yellow liquid… ? Pardon me if my thoughts immediately went down the toilet (pun intended).
- Will y’all be back for Season 2? As a viewer, I definitely am; the cast is so enjoyable (and obvs, Matthew Daddario is my new fave in life), and I’m excited to watch as a complete noob since I don’t know any specific storylines beyond the first book. As a recapper, I’m basically just waiting for confirmation of Season 2’s episode count before fully committing. So I’ll probably see y’all back here for next season, whenever that’ll be!
