The Mortal Cup
- Episode aired Jan 12, 2016
- TV-14
- 41m
IMDb RATING
7.1/10
4.4K
YOUR RATING
On her birthday, Clary Fray discovers she descends from a long line of Shadowhunters: human angel hybrids who hunt down demons.On her birthday, Clary Fray discovers she descends from a long line of Shadowhunters: human angel hybrids who hunt down demons.On her birthday, Clary Fray discovers she descends from a long line of Shadowhunters: human angel hybrids who hunt down demons.
Mouna Traoré
- Midori
- (as Mouna Traore)
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaThe outside of the church used for the institute is the same church used in the mortal instruments movie when Jace, Clary, Alec, and Izzy go to get weapons to fight the vampires.
- Quotes
Valentine Morgenstern: Just because you couldn't find it doesn't mean it isn't there.
- ConnectionsFeatured in MsMojo: Top 10 Best Teen Drama Pilot Episodes of All Time (2021)
- SoundtracksMonsters
by Ruelle
Featured review
Better than expected, still not too good.
In the first episode of "Shadowhunters" we meet Clary. Clary is your ordinary teenage girl, but on her 18th birthday, something happens. She gets to know Jace. He is part of the Shadowhunters (people who keep humanity save from demons etc.), and through him, she gets to know that she is one to. There happens a lot in this episode and I am afraid I am going to spoil things. So that was my synopsis without spoilers.
The directing was fine, nothing too special. There were no Shaky cams, which was a good thing. It were almost (no sure though), steady cams. As I have said in my pilot review of "the last kingdom" I like it when they use hand-held camera, but this isn't my favorite style. Hand- held camera is my favorite style. In this way you see everything way better and makes it look like everything is way more modern. Now something about the 'you see everything way better' part, in this episode that wasn't always the case. This came through the editing and filming overall. They had some close up of the fighting scenes, which made it harder to follow, and through the fast editing. It wasn't a disaster or so, there are a lot of movies who do it way worse, so don't get me wrong on that one. But overall the directing and cinematography was fine. The set design. Here is one of my complains with this subject. The HQ of the shadowhunters didn't fit the theme for me. It felt too modern for those people. The hyper-modern screens and slide out the wall closets didn't fit for me. The clothing wasn't that great either. It all looked to new, not worn at all. The swords used by the shadowhunters looked to much like lightsabers. They should have taken real swords or something like that. The special effects were good, especially for a TV-Show. Of course, it looked fake, a lot of the time, but for me it was good enough.
The acting was just OK. The actress who played Clary is called Katherine McNamara. She was like I said OK, there were some moments I thought she wasn't even trying, but at other moments she was fine. Her Character is likable, not very well developed in the first episode (more on that later on) I think that we will get to like her more throughout the rest of the season. The next person i am going to talk about is Alberto Rosende. He played Simon. Simon is the best friend of Clary. He was my "favorite" character if I had to choose one. He acted the best, but still not that amazing. Likable as well. Now we have the actor of Jace. I actually didn't like him that much, I haven't seen a lot of him yet, so I can't really say. But the actor was fine. The rest of the supporting cast was fine. No other character really stood out to me.
Now the screenplay. Oh, God. This was cheesy as hell (no pun intend). Sometimes I just rolled my eyes. I am trying to explain what I mean: When a character said something that is going to happen in the future, but says that it wouldn't happen at all, and you know that it is going to happen. I hope that it was clear? This happens a lot in the first 20 min. There are also some cliché, as you could have guessed. As I have said earlier, there is little character development. You didn't really care about the characters. I hope there will be a character driven episode in the future. Another thing that bothered me was that they tried to put a lot into this episode. Due to this everything felt to rushed.
Overall this was a fine pilot. I went to watch it with zero expectations, I thought all the trailers looked bad, just as the photos I have seen, but I was pleasantly surprised. If you have read the books I think you won't like it that much.
6.75/10
The directing was fine, nothing too special. There were no Shaky cams, which was a good thing. It were almost (no sure though), steady cams. As I have said in my pilot review of "the last kingdom" I like it when they use hand-held camera, but this isn't my favorite style. Hand- held camera is my favorite style. In this way you see everything way better and makes it look like everything is way more modern. Now something about the 'you see everything way better' part, in this episode that wasn't always the case. This came through the editing and filming overall. They had some close up of the fighting scenes, which made it harder to follow, and through the fast editing. It wasn't a disaster or so, there are a lot of movies who do it way worse, so don't get me wrong on that one. But overall the directing and cinematography was fine. The set design. Here is one of my complains with this subject. The HQ of the shadowhunters didn't fit the theme for me. It felt too modern for those people. The hyper-modern screens and slide out the wall closets didn't fit for me. The clothing wasn't that great either. It all looked to new, not worn at all. The swords used by the shadowhunters looked to much like lightsabers. They should have taken real swords or something like that. The special effects were good, especially for a TV-Show. Of course, it looked fake, a lot of the time, but for me it was good enough.
The acting was just OK. The actress who played Clary is called Katherine McNamara. She was like I said OK, there were some moments I thought she wasn't even trying, but at other moments she was fine. Her Character is likable, not very well developed in the first episode (more on that later on) I think that we will get to like her more throughout the rest of the season. The next person i am going to talk about is Alberto Rosende. He played Simon. Simon is the best friend of Clary. He was my "favorite" character if I had to choose one. He acted the best, but still not that amazing. Likable as well. Now we have the actor of Jace. I actually didn't like him that much, I haven't seen a lot of him yet, so I can't really say. But the actor was fine. The rest of the supporting cast was fine. No other character really stood out to me.
Now the screenplay. Oh, God. This was cheesy as hell (no pun intend). Sometimes I just rolled my eyes. I am trying to explain what I mean: When a character said something that is going to happen in the future, but says that it wouldn't happen at all, and you know that it is going to happen. I hope that it was clear? This happens a lot in the first 20 min. There are also some cliché, as you could have guessed. As I have said earlier, there is little character development. You didn't really care about the characters. I hope there will be a character driven episode in the future. Another thing that bothered me was that they tried to put a lot into this episode. Due to this everything felt to rushed.
Overall this was a fine pilot. I went to watch it with zero expectations, I thought all the trailers looked bad, just as the photos I have seen, but I was pleasantly surprised. If you have read the books I think you won't like it that much.
6.75/10
helpful•11
- midas-jacobs
- Jan 17, 2016
Details
- Runtime41 minutes
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.78 : 1
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