Cataline Recommends: The Order

Yeah, this one took me by surprise too.

Honestly, I thought it was going to be mopey CW angst fair but shockingly it’s one cut above that. I mean yeah that atmosphere is present but the writing is a lot tighter than just thirty minutes of filler romance between characters I don’t care about, stapled to ten minutes of actual plot.

The genre is urban fantasy set at a non-existent Ivy League university. And yes, it’s obvious that this started life as some American girl’s Harry Potter fan fiction.

Unlike Magicians, this show moved quite a bit beyond the Potterverse.

At Bellevue University there is a secret society called the Hermetic Order of the Blue Rose. This society is clearly based on the legends of Yale’s Skull and Bones. The Blue Rose members are by in large the children of wealthy elites and are destined, because of advantageous birth, for great things.

Out protagonist is Jack Morton. He and his grandfather Max Headroom are trying to find out what connection there is between the Blue Rose and the man who drove Jack’s mother to suicide, namely Jack’s biological father whom he has never met.

Jack’s efforts to get into the Order, initially meet with failure largely due to class segregation. Jack is a Townie and most of the Order’ members are Legacies.

The Class struggle is honestly it’s weakest point. The rich kids spend a lot of time being arrogant dislikable assholes who look down on the “Townies.”

Now, this bad relationship between Ivy League students and whatever town they live near is well known but it doesn’t have anything to do with top hats and monocles. The “Townies” dislike the students because they are drunken morons who have been let off the leash for the first time in their lives. The students dislike the “Townies” for the simple reason that they dislike them.

There is a series of student murders around campus, while seemingly random they do have one thing in common. These students are all initiates into the Order.

Jack thinks there is a werewolf that’s responsible but he’s dead wrong. Although there are werewolves around but they are actually the good guys.

What I like the most about this show is the humor. It also does a very good job on giving you a feel for modern college life. When Jack is checking in he is given both a rape-whistle and a pamphlet on ‘how not to commit rape.’ There are quite a few jabs at woke culture throughout the show.

Don’t get me wrong this isn’t a show made by secret Right-wingers. But The Order is funny and well written with a protagonist who isn’t a Mary-Sue and does have an actual story arch. It sets up it’s payoffs and pays off its setups.

Cataline Recommends with Confidence.