Shadowhunters Review: Bad Blood (Season 1 Episode 8)

I think what Shadowhunters really needs is about 150% more Alberto Rosende per hour.

“Bad Blood,” with its cute little cheeky episode title, primarily deals with Simon’s sorta-but-not-really-death and Clary’s choice regarding his fate. In essence: should Simon stay or should he go? It’s up to Clary, apparently.

Surprising absolutely no one, Clary makes the objectively bad and transparently selfish choice. On a rational level, it is easy to sympathize with the choice she makes. She feels guilty for dragging Simon into the Shadow World and by extension his death is her fault. So she aims to rectify it the only way she knows how: resurrecting him as a vampire.

Unfortunately, Katherine McNamara is not very convincing or sympathetic as Clary. Even when she’s upset and crying, she’s just kind of… annoying.

Naturally, this course of action is 100% not what Simon wants. And Clary, being the best friend and all, would obviously know that. Heck, I knew that Simon would react exactly as he did, and I’ve only known him for eight episodes. Clary and Simon, with their years of close friendship, should be more on the same page, don’t you think?

Regardless, after being dead for most of “Bad Blood,” Alberto Rosende totally killed it (hah, pun!) in that closing scene, as Simon breaks down over his wretched transformation. In a neat twist, Raphael turns out to not be so bad after all. He is the one to bring Simon, “killed” (ish) by Camille, back to Clary and to present the choice for Simon’s fate to her. He also promises to watch over a spiraling Simon once the baby vamp freaks out and speeds away shortly post-resurrection.

Camille is an interesting character, but her motivations don’t quite make sense. Why would she risk her position of leadership and her life just to kill Simon? What is he to her? I hope that the show explores her motivations, because right now, it’s extremely unclear what she stood to gain by turning Clary’s BFF into a vampire or killing him and breaking the Accords.

Was it just poor impulse control, or did she have some kind of long game in mind? She is hundreds of years old, so I’m hesitant to believe that Simon was just so scrumptious-looking she couldn’t control her appetite.

Also, did she die? The vampires swarm her in the cemetery and then it feels like there is one entire scene missing from the episode that allows the scenes before and after it to make cohesive sense.

Back at the Institute, Izzy is still in Strictly Business mode, with the turtlenecks and the no-nonsense lab coat (she’s still wearing cute heels though, so points to Izzy). The whole Lightwood clan is still hanging around, stressing over the honor of their family name and something something deeds something something. (Is anyone following this? They keep talking about deeds and honor and it’s just not registering. Did they do something super important at some point in the past that made everybody love them?)

New character alert! Because the Clave suddenly hates all of the Lightwoods, they send over Lydia Branwell, a no non-sense chick with a sad backstory and a dead husband. She can catch arrows mid-shot though, so she’s pretty fly in my book.

Lydia and Alec bond, sort of, when they go to retrieve a dead Forsaken creature from Jade Wolf. The beast had been sent by Valentine to take out Luke. The makeup and styling of the Forsakens is actually pretty cool. The show does best when it minimizes its CGI/special effects and uses good old fashioned make-up for its monsters. (Cough memory smoke monster cough cough).

By the episode’s end, Lydia is put in temporary charge of the New York Institute. After a tete a tete with Magnus, Alec somehow wholly misinterprets the warlock’s “Follow your heart” spiel and decides that the best course of action is to steer directly into his parents’ marriage plan and propose to Lydia. The rationale here is that their union would allow Lydia to run an Institute (which she’s always wanted) and would keep the Lightwoods in a position of power.

This is extremely confusing because they play it as though Magnus got through to Alec. But then… Alec does the exact opposite of follow his heart. Because, you know, he’s a gay man asking a lady to marry him for political reasons. That’s, like, not a heart-following thing whatsoever.

Oh, Alec. Poor, sweet, pectorally-blessed Alec. You have a long way to go this season.

Meanwhile, Valentine is apparently injecting Forsaken (I guess they are kind of like fast zombies?) with angel blood. It takes Izzy about 4 seconds too long to realize that he is doing this so the Forsaken can get past Institute security measures to take out ex-Circle Members. Alec’s quickness with his bow manages to save Hodge. Which is great because Hodge is quite nice to look at.

Stray Thoughts:

• For somebody who considers Simon to be “like his son,” Luke sure can’t be bothered to muster up any kind of facial expression when he hears that Simon died.
• Serious, what is it with this show and its actors being unable to express any kind of realistic emotion? Jace appears to be trying to look “pained” or “overcome with emotion” at various points throughout this episode, but what actually comes across is “I just sucked on five lemons and they were, like, really sour.”
• Lydia doesn’t seem all that bad to me. Am I broken? Why do I keep not picking up what the show is putting down and picking up what the show is telling me is bad? My favorite characters so far are Camille and Lydia. I’m completely serious.
• Thanks to big mouth Lydia, Maryse and Robert Lightwood are outed (to Alec) as former Circle Members. Gasp! (Not really. It seems like most named adults in this world were, at some point, Circle Members.)
• Jace makes a snide comment about “real” vampires not being these sexy Twilight glittery vamps. Dude, hello, have you seen Camille? And Raphael, who is standing literally right there?
• Valentine is still not scary. At best (worst?), he just seems like a creepy ex. Hovering over his ex-wife’s unconscious body and repeatedly making shady comments does not a Big Bad make.
• Izzy is an expert pathologist. Color me impressed.
• I’m starting to be embarrassed for the rest of the cast on Alberto Rosende’s behalf. Does it feel awkward for him to know that he is actual orders of magnitude better at acting than any of them?

What did you think of this episode of Shadowhunters? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

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Shadowhunters airs Tuesday at 9/8c on Freeform.

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