on having the herondales front and centre really hurt tlh narratively? i think you've said this before but there absolutely should have been more focus on gideon + gabriel's families. maybe in chog we could have focused on haywood's death, they're separated from each other in london/idris, tom's resentment towards his label of 'the kind one', etc. 1/?
I love unhinged ramblings about the Lightwood, as I've said before they're my favourite tsc family <3 (and as I'm just now realising, the only one of the big 5 to never be a main character...... screaming crying etc etc) (ignoring the eldest curses btw because it's not a main series)
Honest, I think The Last Hours as a series would have really benefited by not having main character(s) at all. It would have worked quite well as a proper ensemble series, where everything is spilt up fairly evenly. Instead of James and Cordelia taking up large sections of the book doing??? while other characters get consistently shoved to the background. The only thing would be that the TLH gang is really big 😭 idk who to you would make a part of the core cast.
by giving character like Thomas for example a central role from the beginning, I think it would be really easy to implement a lot of the things you mentioned. Like fleshing out Barbara, Thomas' arc, seeing more of their family etc.
Kit as a character is a little all over the place. He doesn't really have a coherent character arc, and mostly just exists as a plot device. It kinda bothers me that he's just the sciencist™ which mean he really good at all science. Like what specifically interests him?? couldn't tell you. I think for COG, I would have really liked to see him doubt his abilities to save everyone? like he's never dealt with anything like this before, it's out of his comfort zone, Henry's stuck in another country so he's on his own; that a lot of pressure! it would also make the scene where Thomas convinces Alastair to let him in to finish the antidote even more meaningful; that he fully believes that Kit can cure everyone even when he didn't believe it himself. (also Kit being involved the necromancy is not something I've considered 👀👀 but that could have been so interesting & I think it would've built a better foundation for his relationship with Grace then what we got. like if they became friends before she got sent to silent city. also incredibly messy <3)
also the fact none of the tid characters got poisoned in COG is a crime. like it's not like they did anything anyway, and most of them were shuffled off out of the country. Why not nearly kill one? up the stakes? my vote is for Cecily, just because it would be very on brand for Tatiana to try and kill her brother's wife who also happens to be Will Herondale's sister. Everyone suffers!! also in Kit's flash fiction the first time he kinda questions/wants to use something other than weapons to fight demons is when his mom gets injured and I love parallels <3 also between Ari, her mom, and later Kit Anna would be having the worst time of her life. that could have interesting ramifications 👀