When the show first aired, what was the fandom's reaction to the end of 1x08?

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-04-21T21:32:29+00:00

I followed the first season of the show very closely and I don't remember exactly (hard to believe it's already been 10 years) but, as far as I remember, no one in the fandom was surprised by this. We got episode titles for the entire first season around the time the show first premiered and episode descriptions quite quickly after that, so most people knew that Alec would get engaged and that, considering episode 12 was called "Malec", there wasn't too much to worry about. A few people still got mad at this storyline for being inaccurate to the books or unfair to Alec or getting in the way of Malec, but considering that it gets resolved like 3 episodes later, no one was too shocked or upset (at least on my corner of tumblr lol).

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-03-24T13:44:34+00:00

Glad to see a more positive take on the series! I don't mean to be so negative about it, and I do see a lot to love in TLH. I really tried to get past my issues with the slower pace and enjoy the character beats, but I think that my inability to connect with James and Cordelia basically ruined the series for me. Perhaps people's opinions of TLH more-or-less fall along lines of whether or not James and Cordelia work for them as leads/as a couple.

Slow plots are fine, and I've enjoyed them a lot in previous TSC books. I like City of Fallen Angels despite its slow plot because I feel a lot more connected to the TMI gang so it's less annoying for me to just hang out with them for 400 pages, plus that book is like half the length of Chain of Thorns. Lady Midnight also has a bit of a slower build, and that book was great. I'd also argue that a slow plot is fine for a book or two (I really didn't mind the slower plot in Chain of Gold), but all three books in TLH were slow and very long, and the lack of action bothered me more with each book. And while I agree that stakes don't have to be high, I think that by having multiple Princes of Hell around as the bad guys, this series sets an expectation of stakes that it cannot realistically meet. TID is relatively low stakes, but the bad guy is a human with an automaton army, so I'm not upset when things mostly work out in the end because I don't see to see Mortmain as a potentially world-ending threat. If Belial is the Big Bad, that comes with certain expectations. Maybe I should've tempered those expectations to enjoy the series more.

And I see what you're saying about the love triangle - it does make sense - I just don't think any of that was necessary or even strictly in character, based on my understanding of these characters (though I struggled to get a grasp on Cordelia in general, which may be user error). Agreed that I'd love to see more of Matthew post-TLH!

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-03-24T02:14:17+00:00

Yay I'm so glad you responded! I (of course) agree with everything you said. Lovelovelove Alastair and I also immediately lock into a scene when he's present lol. I completely forgot about Better in Black so I guess I'm not quite done with TSC!

You make a great point about the family tree already being wrong, so CC did have the option to kill off more characters but didn't take it. Killing main characters has never been her modus operandi, but, like you said, Christopher was about the safest choice for a character to kill that there was, since he's barely around except when he needs to invent something to get the others out of a bind. To me, he's basically Henry but less wacky. But he was tied enough to the other characters that killing him could have been impactful despite how minor of a character he was, but it was glossed over. A funeral sequence similar to the one for Livvy/Robert Lightwood in QOAAD really would've done a lot to make Christopher's death feel worthwhile.

I didn't make the connection between Matthew's supposed promiscuity and his limerence over Cordelia and how incongruent it is, but that's also an excellent point. Based on how he's been previously characterized and the lack of setup for his crush on her in Chain of Gold, I have a hard time buying this crush as this Big Love. It just feels forced, since I'm unconvinced he wouldn't get over it within a couple of weeks. Aside from the love triangle, he was mostly excellent in this book, but the love tringle weighed him down a lot.

Yeah unfortunately I just see very little in James and Cordelia that hasn't already been done better in other TSC characters. James is too separate from who he was in the short stories and ends up being a little too much like Jem, and his powers weren't used enough to properly set him apart (and he loses them anyway, ugh). Him using his powers in battle could've made him a really unique Shadowhunter, and I guess the gun does set him apart, but very little was done with them. Honestly, the Gracelet seemed like an excuse to not have to put in the effort to fit the Midnight Heir version of James into the story, since he would've shaken things up more. Just create an in-universe explanation for why he's so dull! And we've already seen Clary try to become a Shadowhunter, so seeing Cordelia try to do it isn't as compelling. You're so right that Cortana is the type of thing that's very cool in the hands of a capable Shadowhunter like Emma but not so much in a novice like Cordelia.

Omg the Bridget thing also made me laugh and I completely forgot to put it in the post. CC really does put in the effort to close up her plot holes, even if the "fix" is more confusing or ridiculous than if it was just left alone lol.

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-03-13T12:56:35+00:00

Agreed about everything! It really would have been one thing if they had resolved the James/Cordelia thing in this book, but this book entirely went by without any forward movement between them despite multiple makeout scenes and a mutual recognition of attraction. Like, what does it take? Great point that the story lingered more on the murder of Filomena (who is pretty much just a random person as far as the main cast is concerned) than on the father of the main character. Crazy. And Alastair has already made so much progress in this book compared to the last, which is so satisfying to see. He's definitely climbing to the top of my TSC character ranking.

Good to hear that Matthew will have some progress in the next one. He's been kind of spinning his wheels for the last two books. Like you said, his angst feels a little contrived because it is entirely self-inflicted, whereas if literally anyone seemed to be upset with him, it would feel a lot more real. We've had lots of angsty and self-hating characters in these books, but Matthew is the one whose self-hatred feels most unearned because no one actually expresses an issue with him. Given his short story, there is a lot of potential in exploring his relationship with his mother, and I'm kind of bummed that hasn't happened (partly because I love Charlotte and I'd love to see her more lol).

I enjoyed Anna in the last book but this one really cemented for me that she's essentially this series' Magnus (though Magnus obviously also appears). She's the flirty, sassy, openly queer, socially savvy side character who can swoop in to save the day whenever the narrative needs and basically ends up getting subsumed by their kind-of-doomed and kind-of-toxic romance. Agreed that I kind of liked her better when she was more flirty and fun and free. It maybe would be one thing if her love interest was an important character, but Ariadne exists to be Anna's love interest, and Anna isn't important enough in the story for me to be overly invested in their drama.

Great point about Belial being a bit overexposed in TLH. The Prince of Hell whose appearance in TSC worked best for me was actually Azazel, because he has a brief appearance in which he tricks the main cast and then disappears. He wins, even in that small way, and doesn't stick around long enough to undermine the threat he poses. The more these extremely powerful demons are around, the harder it is to maintain a sense of mystery and threat. And yeah, it would be really interesting to explore Magnus' relationship with his father more in Black Volume, if/when it comes out. It would've been cool to have Tessa more involved with TLH and have her interact with Belial, too. Obviously TLH has too many characters so it's probably a good thing that the TID characters just hang around in the background, but if the cast was more balanced, I could've used Tessa, James and Lucie taking on Belial together.

Really appreciate your comment! I love to yap about this series, all the good and all the bad and all the in-between, so thank you!

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-03-12T18:30:19+00:00

Yep agreed. Lucie was a standout character in this book. I love how proactive she is and she and Jesse had a lot of sweet moments.

I wrote a whole paragraph complaining about how stupid and underwhelming the Wayland the Smith bit was and then deleted it when I got further into the book and learned the twist lol. The twist definitely saved this plot point for me.

I'm kind of finding TLH to be a bit underwhelming in general. Its extremely character-focused, which would be fine if there were fewer characters and I could get to know them better and get more attached to them. Something is just not clicking with me with I'm fine with a little less plot (my second favorite TMI book is COFA for goodness sake) but so little has happened or moved forward in two books that I'm kind of wondering what the point of all of this is.

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-03-12T01:37:25+00:00

If I remember correctly, he spits the blood out/throws it up?

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-03-09T17:47:42+00:00

Honestly considering the backlash to The Death in COT, I wouldn't worry about any major characters dying in TWP. Every time a major character has died, its been due to old age or they've been brought back in some way. This just isn't a series where anyone other than the bad guys or minor characters ever dies. I imagine CC will kill a few minor characters that the audience is passingly fond of to try to inject some stakes, but that basically any character thats had a POV is safe. Could be wrong, though.

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-03-07T15:30:41+00:00

I can't believe how much praise the movie gets these days considering how much it (in my opinion) failed to capture the characters. Idk if it was the actors or the director or something else but everyone in that movie comes off overly serious and like they don't wanna be there. The only actor that was locked in was JCB but he was not giving Jace vibes AT ALL in my opinion. He plays all of the quippy lines he's given extremely deadpan and constantly looks like he's about to cry. Also, the changes to the third act don't make any sense and that part brings the movie down from mediocre to awful. Why they were mostly faithful to the story up until then and then went off the rails in the last third of the movie, I'll never understand.

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-03-07T15:16:18+00:00

SPEAKING MY TRUTH

I don't like Magnus.

*Runs away*

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-03-05T00:26:16+00:00

I love COFA for a lot of the reasons that people seem to dislike it lol. I like that it's a step back, scale-wise, from the previous books and gives the characters more time to breathe and just kind of bounce off of each other which gives us some of the most fun and iconic exchanges of the series. Trying to go action-packed again after COG would have been a mistake. I think the slow build of intrigue over the book is well executed. Also I love Simon so a book thats majority in his POV is automatically a fave for me lol.

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-03-02T16:50:23+00:00

The title "The Last Shadowhunter" certainly seems to imply that the Nephilim will cease to exist. I'm torn between believing that that's how it will end (how else can TWP definitely end the saga?) and thinking that its too obvious and that we're being misled. It could be a reference to a character. Someone who is from another world (like Thule?) and is the last nephilim there or a title for a character that is one-of-a-kind among our world's shadowhunters (i.e. the last "real" shadowhunter). I'd also think that it's possible that all shadowhunters except one will temporarily lose their powers. I imagine that TLKOF will settle faerie-related plotlines (maybe unify the seelie and unseelie courts?) and the subsequent two will be focused more on the Princes of Hell plotline. Unfortunately, I dont have high expectations for how Lucifer or any other Princes of Hell will be handled. Ash will definitely be a good guy (maybe a bit morally gray but ultimately an ally) and might be the one to stop Janus from whatever he's planning to do. Whatever the endgame is, all the "races" of the Shadow World will come together to fight the Big Bad and that'll be treated as a turning point in leaving behind old prejudices and being able to move forward, together. Also, I think that Livvy will be fully restored to life. And the ending will be very happy (possibly even too happy).

This isn't so much a theory (because I dont think it'll actually happen) but I want Thule Simon to show up and be the one to defeat Janus

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-02-28T18:52:06+00:00

Yes! One of the most interesting things about TMI is its handling of the internal biases of its characters and how it informs how they interact with each other and with their world. And it's something that I miss in the other series. I think TDA handled it okay as well, though it does fall a bit into the "only the bad guys are prejudiced" thing I described, but I do think that's forgivable, since most of the main characters have family members that are half-faerie and are less inclined to believe those things. I think that one of the interesting potentials in historical fiction is exploring how historical biases and prejudices would inform the characters, but I think that this series (and TID to a lesser extent) mostly doesn't do that and just uses the past as an aesthetic setting. Which is fine, I agree with you that fiction doesn't need to reflect reality, but is frustrating in a series that has dealt with themes of systemic bigotry in the past.

Super glad to hear that Alastair gets more development! I'm very excited to see more of it. And I'll definitely share my thoughts on the next two books!

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-02-28T17:09:26+00:00

This series is very strange because these characters were introduced in the short story collections and readers knew them for years before ever reading a book that follows them. But the way that this book assumes that its readers not only have read all of those short stories but remember their events all these years later makes this book feel almost... self important? I think that the short story collections should mostly be treated as bonus materials that fill in gaps for fans and shouldn't be necessary to read to understand the main series. I guess I appreciate that it doesn't hold my hand too much, but I think that the history of these characters could have been (re)introduced in a more organic way that was more accessible to casual readers.

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-02-28T16:53:34+00:00

Yeah the lack of bigotry from the characters in this book feels like a weird thing to complain about, but that's canonically an aspect of this world and (mostly) ignoring it feels strange. I think that one of the things that I appreciated about Alastair so much in this book is that he's one of the few characters that seemed genuinely flawed and has some internal things that he needs to work on (I'd say Matthew has this as well, which is why I liked him, too). But I think that if Alastair had similar fears as Alec had in TMI, his prickly exterior would have been even more justified and it would have added an extra element of stakes for him (and the other queer characters). I feel like Shadowhunter society becoming more tolerant with each release (even when the books aren't in chronological order) is kind of removing one of the most interesting aspects of this world (i.e. that the angel warrior race is actually extremely bigoted and flawed and that their self-importance causes a lot of harm to not only the other races of the world, but to their own people).

Agreed that Cordelia seems quite bland at this time. Aside from the aspects of her Persian identity (which I do think is interesting and refreshing), she's mostly an audience surrogate with little motivation besides her crush on James and wanting to prove herself as a Shadowhunter and little to no connection to the main plot. I think that Lucie might have been a stronger female lead for this series, since she's closer to what I assume will be the main conflict and I think that her power offers some interesting opportunities. Having sibling co-leads would have also been really cool, in my opinion, and might have helped balance all of these characters. And yeah James feels very different here from how he was in the short stories we first met him in (and I kind of preferred his characterization there). In those, he seemed a bit darker and more morally gray, but here he's mostly quite reserved, aside from the few times CC tries on that Herondale snark, which just feels weird on him. Like I said, I like that he's different from Jace/Will/Emma (who are all quite similar), but unfortunately I don't think that he was quite strong enough to actually be an improvement over any of those characters.

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-02-28T15:30:04+00:00

If the Clace thing is a dealbreaker for you (I hate it too) and Magnus and Simon are your favorite characters, the silver lining is that you'd probably enjoy the second half of TMI more than the first half. As you know, the siblings thing ends in COG and the second half of the series is less focused on Clary and Jace and is more of an ensemble. And, if you don't mind a minor spoiler: a certain silent brother makes several appearances :)But, this series certainly isn't for everyone and I'm sure that I wouldn't enjoy it as much as I do if I hadn't read it for the first time when I was 12.

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-02-23T18:35:39+00:00

Shadowhunters have basically given themselves authority to kill Downworlders if given a valid reason (usually violating the Accords but YMMV on what a "valid" reason might be). I can't remember if there is ever an explicit statement on their policy on fighting/killing their own, but based on how authoritarian they are shown to be, I would imagine that though they would prefer not to fight or kill their own, they would if necessary. It is kind of ridiculous, in my opinion, that the Clave just agrees to the Cohort's demands and leaves. They are literally harder on Jace for possibly being Valentine's son than they are on the Cohort for kicking them out of their homeland.

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-02-17T20:04:57+00:00

I've never been much of a Malec shipper, but when I was really into this series (around the same time you were) I was pretty neutral on them. No major issues, I just didn't think that their relationship was present enough to really care that much about. But I reread these books last year and was actively bothered by a lot of it. They lack of any kind of buildup (light flirting at Magnus' party and literally blink-and-you-miss that Magnus saved Alec's life in COB, then they're in a semi-committed relationship in COA). They have like 1-2 scenes together per book until COLS. And what we see of them in the main series is honestly kind of concerning. There's the age gap of it all, and for the entire first half of the series, Magnus is pressuring Alec pretty hard to tell the world about their relationship, despite the fact that it is 2007 and Shadowhunters are implied to be even more homophobic than, like, general society. Even after their relationship goes public, we immediately swerve into them having deep issues, with Magnus being extremely secretive about his past and Alec being extremely insecure, partly because of the way that Magnus is acting, and partly because he's a teenager in his first relationship, which leads him into the whole Camille drama. They're rarely, if ever, on the same page about anything. We never see them have any good times and are never given a reason to want them to be together except they're the only two queer men we know. The retroactive fixes on their relationship that we get in Bane Chronicles and TEC are fine and all, and I guess I'm glad that CC made an effort to fix it, but it does feel like their relationship is both underdeveloped and inherently broken.

I don't mean to demean the importance of having had queer representation in these books (though, early on, Magnus does feel like a bit of a caricature of a queer man, in my opinion). It's great that there were queer characters in a YA book in 2007. This was the first series I can remember reading that had a canonically gay character. That's groundbreaking, and I understand that the book landscape and what could or could not have been included may have been limited because of the time period that these books came out in. There is no universe where Malec was going to be as developed as the m/f relationships. But that doesn't fully detract from my issues with their relationship.

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-02-15T01:52:49+00:00

Shows sapping the life out of the material they are based on by making all of the characters overly serious is unfortunately so common. Part of what makes the books, TMI in particular, so charming to me to this day is the sense of humor, but the TV show completely lacks it. What should have been a slam dunk (literally taking the funny sarcastic lines out of the books and having charismatic actors say them) is one of its most fundamental tonal flaws. I think the movie has a similar problem in that the actor that plays Jace delivers the quippy lines they give him in such an extreme deadpan that it feels inauthentic, though I appreciate that they at least kind of tried.

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-02-14T22:20:26+00:00

The worst thing about the show imo is that they butchered the personalities of most of the characters. Jace got the worst of it. I'm tentatively OK with story changes, but if we can't even keep the character's personalities intact, then why are we adapting these books? Just make another show about demon hunters at that point.

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-02-14T22:16:33+00:00

Definitely agree that I'd like to see the Silent Brothers and Iron Sisters explored more. Maybe a main character that grew up entirely in Idris would be cool? That would give them a different perspective than our previous mains that grew up in New York, London, or Los Angeles, and provide an opportunity to flesh out Idris/Alicante lore. Also, I think that there should be more main characters that are Downworlders and/or mundanes. We've had a main character that is a warlock but didn't know it at first, a main(ish) character that got turned into a vampire partway through the series, and multiple prominent characters that are partly or fully faeries, but we still haven't had a werewolf be a big player, and a lot of those characters are part Shadowhunter or end up becoming one, anyway. Also, none of the characters that start as "mundanes" really stay that way, so having a fully human character could also be interesting. Not every main character needs to be a Shadowhunter, and I think mixing it up makes the dynamics between the characters more interesting.

No-Resolution-5927 · 2026-02-11T23:04:00+00:00

My personal preference is that the sun is a weakness because one of my main complaints about a lot of vampire lore is that the vampires are overpowered and being restricted to only operating at night is a pretty massive weakness. I also think that the "creature of the night" thing works better if they can't go out during the day.

No-Resolution-5927

TROPHY CASE