Shadowhunters arrived at New York Comic-Con in full force with the main cast attending along with director McG, showrunner Ed Decter, and author Cassandra Clare. The show will be premiering on ABC Family/Freeform on January 12, 2016 with a special “Making of Shadowhunters” episode airing beforehand on December 6.
The Workprint chatted with series stars Dominic Sherwood and Katherine McNamara who play Jace Wayland and Clary Fray. Jace is a bit of a wunderkind and is considered one of the best young Shadowhunters in The Mortal Instruments universe. Clary in the meantime is an artist thrust into a warrior’s world that’s full of supernatural creatures. The two characters unexpectedly meet and the pairing known to fans as Clace is born. Sherwood and McNamara certainly have great chemistry and were both excited to talk about the the upcoming show.
Who in the cast is most like the character they’re playing?
Dominic Sherwood: All the characters change and kind of evolve within their own worlds so I think from like day one, I’m gonna go episode one Alberto has some pretty similar traits to Simon. He’s much more popular, much more cooler than Simon is uhm but I say he is the most similar at that point in episode one cuz I mean I don’t have any angel blood so I’m not that similar to Jace, I don’t use swords and have never seen a demon before and so I am not that similar to him in that way. But I think Alberto is probably the closest.
Katherine McNamara: I’m gonna say though that everybody is extremely well casted in their characters. Everybody has embodied, whether or not they did from the beginning everybody has come to embody their characters and I see it in everyone just hanging out. It makes it fun to read the books now because I read the books and I see Dom as Jace, I see Harry as Magnus and Matt as Alec and all the rest of the characters.
For your characters this season what would you say is the biggest internal conflict?
Katherine McNamara: There’s so many!
Katherine McNamara: For the both of us.
Katherine McNamara: Everything is Clary’s fault!
Dominic Sherwood: Everything was fine before Clary turned up. But Jace was a very good place in his life, he was good at his job, he was a good Shadowhunter, respected within the world uhm he had best friends, he had a family, he had people who loved him and he was happy where he was and then Clary turns up and his world, the carpet it pulled out under from who he is and everything changes for him. So this very quickly you start to see that this arrogance and confidence he has is shaken at its core. So for me it was like character traits that started to change with Jace and who Jace was as a person or as a Nephilim or whatever quickly became kind of changed because he had this new thing in his world that was completely unknown.
Katherine McNamara: And Clary from the beginning has everything taken away from her from the first ten to fifteen minutes of the show everything she knows, everything she loves, her entire world is turned upside down and changed. And from that point she really has to fight her way back from the ashes and find some kind of strength in her to overcome everything that’s happened but she’s lucky to have people like Jace and Simon and all of the other Shadowhunters around her to show her the way and to guide her through all of the internal conflicts she’s in.
Can you describe your characters in five words?
Dominic Sherwood: Five words, the last time I was here it was three words. Even that was tough to do. Jace is ah confident, arrogant, snarky, uhm vulnerable and vicious at times.
Katherine McNamara: Clary is ah strong, vulnerable, selfish, loving, and stubborn.