Shadowhunters "Of Men and Angels" Review: Angry Racist White Men Ruin Everything

"Clary, listen, you cannot wear white after labor day! God, it's like you were raised by a demon or Donald Trump." "Magnus, they're the same thing."

Another week, another adventure for Shadowhunters. Well, sorta. This episode was slowed down a lot and jam packed with exposition. "Of Men and Angels" answered a lot of questions nonreaders (and even some readers) have been asking, while setting up plot lines for the second half of the season. For as much exposition that was put into the episode, there was still a lot more fun than I expected.

The good:

• Would you look at that? Another episode with barely any Clace interaction. I love these two taking breaks from each other but still being there for each other. It's a nice breather for the viewers and it's the perfect way to have them hang out with other characters and explore new dynamics.

• I'm glad that Alec has finally had it with all the rules. Whenever a rigid rule-follower goes through a rebellious phase, it's nice to watch. He's followed the rules, kept everyone alive, and tried his best yet he's still going to be forced into a marriage that he doesn't want. So naturally, his response to this is to go flirt with Magnus and try to explore this secret part of himself that his family is unknowingly trying to crush. I can't wait to see Alec grow and learn from Magnus how to stand up to his parents and the Clave.

• Max Lightwood is tiny and sassy and honey, you've got a big storm coming.

• I actually like Robert Lightwood? He's a lot less of a dick than he was in the novels, and though we readers know there's something that he's done in the past that is all sorts of fucked up, he's still a likable character because unlike Maryse, he treats Isabelle like she's actually his daughter and he doesn't make her feel bad for being herself.
• We barely got a glimpse of it, but Alicante (that's the city in Idris where the shadowhunters live) looks really cool (sorta, more on that later). But as far as the landscape (AND THE DEMON TOWERS!), I really want to see more of the land. When I read the books, it was hard to picture the place because it was kind of medieval but there was a city made of glass. I'm from a huge city so I was picturing all of our skyscrapers and businesses as looking like glass but smacked down into a medieval location and it just didn't make sense. From the .5 seconds we saw of the glass city, it's too early to tell how the show is going to mix these two things together, while adding shadowhunter technology on top of it, but I'm going to keep my fingers crossed that it's done well.

Hello, I'm here to be dramatic and ruin everything.

• One thing I had been looking forward to with this series was a lengthy flashback about The Circle. In the film, all we got was Valentine looking shady, stealing the Cup, burning his house down, and Jocelyn vanishing, which left a lot of moviegoers (myself included) hella confused. Now, we've got a coherent version of the story and it's dumbed down enough that nonreaders can follow what's going on. There are still some questions (will they ever explain the rest of the Mortal Instruments? Why is it taking so long to make Valentine's Downworlder-human army?)

• The origin of The Circle is told by Magnus and Luke, which is important because Luke told Clary in the novels and he was close to Valentine so obviously he'd be the best person to know all the details. But having Magnus talk about the discrimination and racism is important in a bigger way. Here we have a bisexual man of color talking about how an Angry White Man was so jealous of the racial minorities that he decided to exterminate them, and through his charisma and leadership qualities, he managed to get a lot of good people to support him. And then the story goes to Luke's narration, in which he says the reason Valentine went from B- evil/angry to A+ evil/angry was because he saw Luke and Jocelyn growing closer. Valentine completed his "supernatural Hitler" transformation because he saw a black man "taking what was his"*. I'm not sure if the show meant to go this deep with this, but these writers are smart, and they know what they're doing with their social commentary. They know what they're doing when they show a mean character slut shaming Isabelle, they know what they're doing when they cast actors who are PoC to play this shows' version of minority groups, they know what they're doing when they make Valentine the fantasy version of a white supremacist. I love that this show is not afraid of weaving in these social messages while making them a part of the story. All these people are getting killed, lives are being destroyed, because a white man can't control his rage, and having PoC being the ones to tell a white character (Clary) about it is so much more powerful than white people telling white people about how much white people are fucking up. No one cares what white people have to say about white supremacy because they aren't the victims. The minority voice matters most, the Downworlder voice matters most. It's a very small part of the episode, just a tiny detail, but I'm so happy the writers decided to use this detail to say so much.

"Hey girl, wanna touch my mango?"
"What is it? Like a paperweight?"

The bad:

• I am a sucker for Jace/Simon. Their banter is hilarious, and Dominic Sherwood and Alberto Rosende have great chemistry together. However, I felt like their scenes in this episode were not needed. It was important that they had the "Clary treats you like a lap dog" "that's how you treat Alec" moment but the rest was just pointless? We don't need Jace friendzoning Simon FOR Clary, the audience can already see that Clary has no feelings for Simon, it doesn't have to be spelled out for us. The ending scene where Simon sees Clary and Jace having a moment, and Jace looking sadly at Simon would have been subtle enough, but having them vocally argue about this love triangle just doesn't work. Here's hoping this is the last we see of that.**

• I know they had to have a way to show that some scenes were set in Idris and that's why they had the bluish tint but I am going to be annoyed if that's how all the Idris scenes look, especially since most of book 3 takes place there and I'm sure the show is going to have the gang go to Idris like the books say. It'd be pretty lame if they didn't. But anyway, I thought it looked cheesy. I would've preferred for them to put an "Idris, 1997" caption whenever they did flashbacks, and just kept everything normal looking but oh well. They can't change that now. But for future reference, they need to fix the blue because I don't think anyone wants to see bluish tint for a full season. 

Alec Lightwood trying and failing at containing his thirst

Summary: A solid, emotional episode, this had a little banter, as to be expected from Shadowhunters, yet it was mostly full of the Lightwood parents fucking up their kids, Downworlders being pissed about Valentine, and the early stages of certain plot lines that some fans are looking forward to. "Of Men and Angels" is Shadowhunters at it's most serious but now it seems we're finally going to be getting the Cup, more history about Clary's family, and in a perfect world, skipping the whole "_____ was/is J.C." story and going straight to everyone's favorite piece of angsty garbage, Sebastian. This episode gets an 8.5/10 from me.

* Jocelyn didn't belong to Valentine, people can't BELONG to each other (I mean, they can but I'm 97% sure it's illegal). It's just that Valentine sees her as a possession and got mad when Luke a.k.a Mr. Steal Yo' Girl swooped in.
** This isn't the last we're going to see of it, I know, but let a girl have her dreams, okay?

All Shadowhunters reviews can be found here