Tag: Freeform

Shadowhunters: Parabatai Lost – Jace and Alec (Recap/Review)

DOMINIC SHERWOOD, ALISHA WAINWRIGHT

Shadowhunters “Parabatai Lost” picks up after last week’s escape from Valentine’s boat. Clary is missing from the shore, but Jace and the dead body of Gretel are laying beside the water. Jace has lost his stele.

A jogger believes Jace to be responsible and shouts for someone to call 911.

Jace runs off and ends up in a werewolf bar. Maia recognizes Jace and after allowing him to use the bar’s phone, lets the other wolves in the bar attack him  for killing Gretel.

Jace escapes and Maia follows the shadowhunter. He falls and a mundane calls 911 for the wounded young man.  Simon wakes to find that he has received 30 calls from his worried mother. He calls off his search for Camille to see his mom.

Raphael is not pleased at this and tells Simon that not only will he outlive his mother, but he will soon forget her. The new vampire goes to see his mother only to find that she has apparently been drinking. She is also missing. He panics and calls Clary for help.

At the Institute Magnus is failing to bring Alec back from his parabatai search. His partner is semi conscious and Magnus’ magic is not working apart from sustaining the fallen shadowhunter.

Aldertree refuses to allow Alec to leave the Institute and Izzy, along with Magnus, spirit him out leaving Raj in his place. The new leader of the Institute is furious but allows Izzy to make a deal to keep Alec and Jace alive.

Luke and Maia find Jace at the hospital. Maia turns to attack the shadowhunter and Jocelyn manages to get him out of harm’s way before the werewolf can harm him. Jace rushes to help Alec but is stopped by Maia and her little pack.

Luke, Clary and Izzy step in and Luke backs the pack down.  Jace then tries to bond with his parabatai at Magnus’s. At first it does not work, but at the last moment Alec returns from the limbo he was trapped in.

The second  that Alec recovers Aldertree and his follows arrive and take Jace captive. The new leader charges him with treason against The Clave.

Throughout the episode, there are flashbacks that show a younger Alec and Jace bonding and then undertaking the parabatai ceremony.  It serves as an excellent reminder that Alec has loved Jace since they were kids.

Alec loves Jace so much that he tries to stop the parabatai bond from happening. It is a young Izzy who convinces him to continue with the ritual.

Meanwhile, Simon starts to tell his mother the truth, that he is a vampire, after Clary persuades him to. When he finds Elaine, Raphael has beaten him to the punch and lied. Claiming to be Simon’s band manager, he tells the woman that they have been on tour.

Raphael makes a veiled threat, indicating that he will harm Elaine if Simon does not find Camille.

This season sees the former leader of the vampires out of sight but definitely not out of mind. Camille’s presence looms large in the verse as she builds an army to fight the shadowhunters.

Kudos to the writers and Harry Shum Jr. for that touching moment where a desperate Magnus tries that fairytale kiss to bring Alec back. It was tenderly done and spoke volumes of his love for the younger shadowhunter.

Shadowhunters airs Mondays on Freeform. Tune in and see what will happen to Jace now that the Institute have him.

Cast:

 

Guest starring Alisha Wainwright as Maia Washington, Leonidas Castrounis as young Alec, Alex Eling as teen Alec, Christina Cox as Elaine Lewis and Joanne Jansen as Gretel.

Shadowhunters: A Door Into the Dark – Jace and Clary (Review)

NICK SAGAR, ALBERTO ROSENDE

Shadowhunters “A Door Into the Dark” reveals quite a lot while managing to take Clary right back to where she was in season one; when Jocelyn was missing. She no longer feels a part of the Institute or part of the Mundane world. Jace, meanwhile, is still accepting the lies that his father Valentine has fed him, until the very end of the episode at least.

Aldertree is turning out to be the best “man we love to hate” by picking on the weaker members of the downworld community. He zeroes on on Simon and, after questioning, the newest member of the vampire community inadvertently shops Raphael as being the leader of the vamps.

Raphael confronts Simon, immediately after he is picked on by Luke’s pack of werewolves again. The white haired female really has it in for Simon. Later she will be stabbed by Valentine after Clary stops Jace from doing it.

Magnus takes Simon to India to hunt for Camille, after Raphael tells him to bring her back to face charges of breaking the Accord. Once there, Simon finally gets his Encanto on and Magnus finds all the stuff that Camille took from him.

Dot is still alive, although Valentine experimented on her. It seems that Jace and Clary’s dad cannot help himself. She enchants Clary making it seem that the downworlders are going to murder every last Mundane until they are all gone.

Jocelyn, turns out to believe wholeheartedly that Jace/Jonathan is evil to his core. She shows her daughter the moment when baby Jonathan’s eyes turned jet black and he sucked the life out of a flower. (It does seem a little bit of an overreaction on Jocelyn’s part. After all it was not like the tyke sucked the life out of a puppy. Just saying….)

Valentine proves that he is still a rotter at the core and has been lying to Jace about everything. On top of that, Valentine’s shadowhunter creations are stealing top fighters from bare knuckle events, Dojos and so on. The process of being turned into a shadowhunter is just too hard on regular mundanes.

Alec and Izzy start hanging out at these fight contests and try to question one of Valentine’s lackeys. The guy slits his own throat rather than talk though.

Clary heads back to the Mundane world to do a little artwork and Jocelyn, along with Luke, catch up to her. Clary is less than pleased with both her mother and Luke and leaves. Right after storming out, Dot, complete with scary black veins all over her face, takes Clary through a portal.

They arrive on Valentine’s ship where Dot give Clary a false vision of the future. Luke gives Jocelyn a gem that Alec can use to find his parabatai. It is a dangerous undertaking and despite Izzy being totally against it, Alec uses it to find Jace.

Clary, with a little help from Dot, manages to get Jace away from his father. Dot will be punished for this transgression as Valentine is clearly furious with her intervention.

Though Isabelle had little to do in this episode of Shadowhunters she did at least get to kick a bare knuckle fighter’s arse in an amusing scene. This season seems to be taking a huge step backwards. Clary is back to being disoriented, disenchanted and disowned by the Institute again.

Alec has resumed hating Clary with a vengeance  and Dot has been brought back from the dead. All very first season but without the kick-arse pilot episode with all the uber cool action and music.

Still, the move to bring Jace and Clary back together, not as a couple but as a brother and sister bound together with the same mission, is a good one. The chemistry works better when these two are working on the same team.

The incestuous overtones are now gone, but not forgotten; as Valentine pointed out last week, the demon blood in Jace means he will always fancy his sister.

By the end of the episode Jace has escaped with sis, Simon has learned how to do the Encanto and Valentine is massively annoyed.

Shadowhunters airs Mondays on Freeform.

Cast:

Shadowhunters: This Guilty Blood – Hunting Jace (Review)

HARRY SHUM JR., MATTHEW DADDARIO

The return of Shadowhunters “This Guilty Blood” sees Jace still with his father Valentine. Alec has his first fight with Magnus and his mother goes behind his former fiancé’s back to take control of the Institute via The Clave’s “company man” Victor Aldertree.

Aldertree questions everyone and puts Jace on a most wanted poster, he forces Clary and Jocelyn to stay on lockdown and banishes Simon and Luke. He threatens to de-rune Isabelle and Jace learns that he has demon blood.

Valentine injected his son while still in utero and infected him to make Jace the perfect warrior.

The season two opener of Shadowhunters proves that the more things change the more they stay the same. There is still a power struggle going on in the Institute and Maryse works hard to protect her own standing in the community by following Aldertree’s orders to the letter.

At the start of the episode, Jace pulls a Hamlet and kills his father twice. Alas, poor Jace is only killing replicas as the real deal watches how well his son does in combat. Later, after being beaten repeatedly by Valentine’s minions, Jace is released and he tries to kill his father again.

Jocelyn has some catching up to do and the first shocking thing she learns is that Jonathan, aka Jace, is still alive. She agrees with Clary that lying is not something she should continue to do.

Luke allows Simon to stay on the docks but his followers chuck him out of the restaurant and put him in the storage room. Clary, after getting a hint from Isabelle, leaves the Institute and finds Simon. Jocelyn arrives shortly after and takes her cell phone and stele.

Clary’s mother is hunting Jace and when she finds him, along with Valentine, she tries to kill him. Valentine leaps in front of his son and take the crossbow bolt meant for him. As she re-arms the crossbow Jace takes his wounded father and escapes through a portal.

Alec and Magnes make up and just as the magician begins helping Lightwood to find his parabatai Alec senses Jace on his own.  But by the end of the opening episode, Jace has vanished once again, this time voluntarily, with his father.

This season of Shadowhunters starts off with a few instances of characters changing their appearance. Valentine puts his likeness on some of his demon army followers and Clary takes on the appearance of Aldertree to escape the Institute.

It would not be too farfetched to believe that the “Jocelyn” who tricked Clary and tried to kill Jace is not the real article either.  There is also the new interference of The Clave, whom Maryse called in to replace the new leader, which will obviously be a continuing problem this season.

This second season seems to prove that the younger members of the Shadowhunters cannot trust anyone over 30 (except for Luke) or anyone who represents The Clave. There are also plenty of Shadowhunters who willingly follow whomever is in charge. This puts Isabelle, Alec, Clary and Jocelyn in a very small minority.

Jace’s father also explains that the reason he “wanted” Clary is because of the demon blood he injected into him. It will, says Valentine, always make him want her.

Valentine then tricks Jace into breaking the Accord, aka the rules, before being wounded. The end of this episode feels like another Valentine trick, or set up, aimed at forcing his son to side with him.

Shadowhunters airs Mondays on Freeform. The next episode airs on January 9. Stop by and check out this “good-looking” cast and the demon war they are trying to prevent.

Cast:

Dead of Summer and Guilt Get the Freeform Axe

ZELDA WILLIAMS, MARK INDELICATO, PAULINA SINGER, ELIZABETH LAIL, RONEN RUBINSTEIN, ELI GOREE, ELIZABETH MITCHELL

According to SFGate, Freeform have given Dead of Summer and Guilt the axe after one season.  While ABC, according to Variety have cut down their order for Conviction and Notorious.

Rather interestingly, Freeform waited well beyond the normal time frame to make up their minds about three series up for renewal. Stitchers was kept hanging on the fence for ages while the network dithered about. It seemed they had their hopes set on Dead of Summer being their answer to MTV’s Scream.

Guilt, the Amanda Knox styled thriller set in England never really took off for a number of reasons. While Dead of Summer took too long to catch fire. The latter series crept along and never really made the most of the two “names” attached to it. Horror icon Tony Todd and Elizabeth Mitchell were little more than add-ons in the juvenile heavy cast.

ABC, after deciding to axe Hayley Atwell’s Agent Carter have shown little enthusiasm for the English actress’s next project, Conviction. Variety reports that the initial 13 episode run has been cut down to 10 with no chance of a back nine being ordered.

That networks other starter, Notorious has not had any more episodes ordered and the series numbers seem to indicate that Piper Perabo may face a similar fate to Atwell.

ABC are said to be “keeping their options open,” but the reduction of episodes for the Atwell vehicle is a clear sign that the network have lost faith in the show.

Conviction starred Atwell as a former “first daughter” who breaks as many laws as she upholds. She is blackmailed into working cases that may have resulted in miscarriages of justice.  While Hayley’s American accent was passable, the storylines were a tad humdrum.

Notorious is based on the real life relationship between criminal defense attorney Mark Geragos and the award-winning cable newsproducer Wendy Walker.

Neither of these shows caught the eye of the audience and while ABC have not officially announced the show’s cancelations it is good bet they are both going to go.

Freeform’s reluctance to renew Stitchers (A show where a group of 20 something specialists help Kirsten Clark “stitch” into the minds of the recently deceased.) seems to indicate a reluctance to stick with original shows.

The other two contenders for renewal were either influenced by real life events, Guilt, or were an attempt to jump on the small screen slasher train, although Dead of Summer used the trappings of a slasher flick and morphed the whole thing into a “ghost story.”

Freeform also cancelled Recovery Road. The network is putting all their new ratings eggs in one basket with  Pretty Little Liars producer I. Marlene King’s new series Famous in Love,  starring Bella Thorne.

The newly renamed network, Freeform was ABCFamily previously, have made a few miscalculations on what their youthful demographic will actually like.

There will be plenty of slots left to fill after these cancellations as well as a chance to fill the Switched at Birth time slot once the last season finishes in 2017.

 

Stitchers Gets Third Season

Emma Ishta

After a very long wait, Freeform has given the greenlight for fan favorite procedural drama series, Stitchers. This means the show will have a third season and executive VP of Programming and Development Karey Burke made the announcement on October 6.

This makes it official and all the fans who complained about the amount of time it took Freeform to renew their favorite series can now smile.

Stitchers has a very vocal and passionate fanbase, Burke said. She also revealed that the show has been proven hit.  The series has performed strongly and Burke revealed that the network was very proud of the Stitchers focussing on #smartgirls “everywhere.”

In the Adults 18 – 49 demographic, Stitchers comes in as the firm number two new series of the past two seasons. The show came in closely behind Shadowhunters.

Only Pretty Little Liars and Shadowhunters came ahead of Stitchers making the sci-fi, drama show the number three original series across digital platforms.

The lead character, Kirsten Clark is uber smart and intelligent. Add to that  a stubborn resistance to giving up and you have one formidable young lady hacking into the memories of the recently murdered victims.  The Stitchers program is part of the NSA and thus far the team have no real idea what the hacking technology is really going to be used for.

Neuroscientist Cameron, a brilliant and dedicated teammate who has an encyclopedic knowledge of pop culture works along side Kirsten. They also have a “connection” that tantalizes fans enormously. Camille, an expert computer graduate and hacker extraordinaire  works with Clark and she is romantically entangled with…

Linus who is  another pop culture aficionado and the team engineer and comms expert.  Maggie runs the show and she also looks out for the younger members of her team.  Detective Fisher is a new yet important part of the team.

The season two finale saw another cliffhanger and fans are desperate to learn more about “Camsten” and the mystery behind Kirsten’s father and what really happened to her mother.

Stitchers is executive produced by Jeffrey Alan Schechter, who is also the show’s creator. Jeff is also well know for Overruled.  Jonathan Baruch and Rob Woken also executive produce the series.

Freeform have not explained why they took so long to renew the series. Fans, who were impatient to learn their favorite show’s fate,  created petitions for a third season. Social media platforms were used to query  why there was no immediate renewal of the show.

Regardless of the reasons, Stitchers is now going to return and fans will hopefully learn more about the characters and where they are headed next.

There is still so much for Kirsten to learn about her father and what his true intentions are/were. Many questions still need to be answered and more layers peeled back to reveal secrets that have been hidden throughout the first two seasons.

Many fans want to see Cameron and Kirsten get together as a couple and it will be investing to see what Jeff and the writers come up with this season.

Congratulations to all the cast and crew for finally getting the greenlight for season three. Suffice to say, we cannot wait.

The Cast:

 

 

 

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