Wow. Wow wow wow. This was the best episode of The Vampire Diaries that we've had in a long time. Probably for the past two seasons. Things that haven't been interesting to me thus far suddenly became interesting. Let's start with what happened.
Whitmore College is having a big corn maze party. Elena invites Liam (the boy who kissed her last episode) to come along. While there, Elena also reveals a plan to set up Alaric and Jo. As everyone runs around in the corn maze, Caroline is forced to stay at home and look after new vampire Ivy. Stefan had brought her over to Caroline, asking Caroline to help train Ivy in how to be a vampire. Stefan asks Alaric to compel Ivy to get control on her vampirism, and then to get far away from Stefan. Alaric refuses to help Stefan with his breakup. Stefan gets angry, asking why he'd erase Damon from Elena's mind. Alaric accuses Stefan of forgetting about Damon, too, by not continuing to look for ways to bring him back.
Ivy escapes from Caroline and ends up feeding on someone. She comes close to killing her first meal, but manages to tell the person to run away. As Tyler is driving towards the corn maze, he nearly hits someone running out into the road. He swerves, and runs his truck right through the corn maze, injuring tons of people. Elena, Liam, Alaric and Jo all immediately start to help the injured. Tyler is in big trouble: if anyone dies, it will trigger his werewolf curse, since he was the cause of the accident. Elena is able to use her vampire blood to heal a couple of badly injured people, while Liam proves to be quite the hero as he performs a field tracheotomy and saves someone's life.
However, there's one injured person who isn't going to make it. Tyler despairs, knowing that his werewolf curse will be triggered. But Liv, who has been trying to help Tyler with this victim, makes an impossible choice: she suffocates the man, being sure that she is the one to kill him. Tyler is saved. Later, Tyler wants to talk to Liv about it, but she's closed off. Alaric realizes that it's too dangerous for him to be with Jo, and attempts to compel Jo to think that the night was horrible and that Rick is boring. However, Jo is not compelled - she won't be chased away so easily.
Caroline keeps calling Stefan to come help her find Ivy. Stefan finally turns up, angry at Caroline for losing Ivy. Stefan tells Caroline that he was on his way out of town when he got her messages. She is furious, telling him that she's done missing him, and that he should leave. Ivy, after nearly killing someone, calls Caroline to come pick her up. Caroline goes to do so, but she is just in time to see Tripp take Ivy and put her in his car. Caroline watches on, horrified.
While all of this is going on, Damon and Bonnie are getting ready to get out of their hell and back into the world. Damon is optimistic that they'll make it out, but Bonnie is more hesitant - Kai won't tell Bonnie the spell to get them out, and she wonders why. Eventually, she confronts Kai and realizes that he doesn't know the spell. She kills him. After experimenting with the device Kai gave them, Bonnie realizes that Kai was never going to hurt her - he needed a Bennett witch to get the spell to activate. As the time approaches, Damon and Bonnie get ready to leave. However, Kai turns up. Turns out, he can't die in this place. He attacks Bonnie and Damon. Bonnie manages to get to the device, while Damon struggles with Kai. Bonnie, fading fast from an arrow wound, uses her magic to push Damon into position and give him the device. She sends him home even as she collapses to the ground. Kai screams in despair as the device shatters, taking away his chance to get out. Bonnie is trapped as well.
The episode ends with THE BEST THING I'VE EVER SEEN - ahem. Stefan talks out loud to his family crypt, saying that he's not doing so well without Damon there to help him. However, as Stefan throws his bottle of gin across the room, Damon appears to catch it. Stefan is shocked to see him there, and Damon explains that he's not dead - it's a long story, but... "I'm back." Stefan, hardly daring to believe it, reaches out and touches Damon on the shoulder. He then hugs his brother, sobbing in relief.
I don't know that I have a single real complaint. I suppose there's one thing I could say... Bonnie sacrifices herself for someone else. Again. Jeez, this girl is unbelievably selfless. It's getting to the point where it's sort of silly, to tell the truth. I guess it's just another example of poor Bonnie getting nothing while everyone else gets to be alive. And happy. And reunited with their loved ones. And there's Bonnie, dead. Again. With nothing to show for it. Again. Blarg.
But let's talk about how awesome this episode was. I'm seriously happy right now.
First of all, you've got Elena and Liam. Now, in the past I said I wasn't interested in this relationship. And, yeah, he's still not the most interesting character around. However, now I see the real value in setting up Elena with a love interest. Seeing Elena, this girl who has been through so much hardship in her young life, find a simple, quiet happiness is actually really nice. There's this uncomfortable part of me that roots for Elena and Liam, because he makes Elena happy, and it's not dangerous or complicated. Now that Damon is back, we've introduced a real conflict into the story - should Elena get her memories of him back? Should she want to? If Liam didn't exist, we wouldn't have this tension to explore. I loved the way that Liam stepped in and saved a life in the corn maze, despite Elena's attempts to step in and use her vampiric abilities. It was a good reminder that maybe these vampires shouldn't always take the easy way out.
Then we've got Tyler's story. I'll admit, when he first drove the truck through the corn maze, I didn't think about the implications for him and his werewolf curse. But when I realized it, I was really intrigued by the story's possibilities. The urgency to save lives now operates on two levels: the first, obviously, is just a desire not to see people get hurt. The second is in connection with a character we've known for years, now. If anyone dies, Tyler's life as he knows it is over. I tend to root for the few human characters remaining in this show, so I was very happy to see that Tyler won't be back to his werewolfing ways. And my goodness. I actually like Liv and Tyler now. I didn't think this was possible, because thus far I was completely uninterested in their romance. But what Liv did for Tyler was so complicated and kind and horrible and traumatizing and about fifty other things. This single act could end up pulling them together, or pushing them apart permanently.
Alaric and Jo also became much more interesting to me. This was another moment where perhaps I should have waited a bit longer before making judgments, because I actually really enjoyed the chemistry that these two characters had. They seemed to get along really well, and when disaster struck, Jo was a really competent physician, which I think Rick really liked. Of course, Alaric is still having trouble with his blood lust, which adds a layer of complication into the possibility of a relationship. And now there's a new mystery - does Jo have vervaine in her system? Who is this woman, and why did Alaric's compulsion not work on her? Or is he losing his ability to compel people? What would that mean for Elena and Damon?!
Then we must talk about the Stefan and Caroline business. If you don't look at the further complexities, you have to admit that Stefan was a total jerk in this episode. Not only does he drop Ivy off with Caroline, giving her no choice but to miss a party with her friends in order to take care of his mess, he then proceeds to just take off, with no intention of helping with the problem! Wow, Stefan. Not cool. Caroline was totally right to tell him to leave, but at the same time, she was obviously really torn up about it. Now that Damon is back, and Stefan will probably be sticking around, we'll have to see what that means for Caroline and Stefan. She is well within her rights not to forgive him for the way he's behaved.
But then we get the conversation between Rick and Stefan, which I think handles the complexities of this situation really well. Stefan is angry at Alaric for, essentially, taking away the one person who could share his pain and grief over Damon - i.e., Elena. But Rick doesn't see it that way - he saved Elena from unimaginable pain, whereas in Alaric's eyes, Stefan just ran off. He accuses Stefan of forgetting about Damon. Stefan replies "He was my brother," while Alaric reminds us: "He was my best friend." As someone who loves Stefan, I'm inclined to cut him a little slack. We know he's grieving for Damon. We know he's in a lot of pain, and he's not handling it so well. Was he right to run away and leave his friends? Well, maybe he could have said goodbye and tried to explain things a bit better. But I don't think it's so wrong of him to try for a fresh start. Where does he go wrong? Well, dropping off a new vampire on Caroline's doorstep and then bolting is certainly crossing the line.
Now we've got to switch over to Bonnie and Damon's stuff in their little purgatory. Again, I loved it. Bonnie has been getting more attention on her character in these past few episodes than she has in a long time. I loved the moment of hope as they get ready to go home, and then Damon yelling "no!" When he realizes that Bonnie won't be coming back with him. These two formed a really close bond, and it'll be exciting to see how it continues. If, indeed, it does continue... is Damon going to be able to find a way to bring Bonnie back? Great twist, what with Bonnie actually killing Kai (sort of... can you die if you're already dead?) and then Kai coming back, proving that he can't. Does that mean Bonnie can't die of her wounds either? We'll see!
This brings us to the last scene of the episode, which is honestly everything I ever could have hoped for. You know, the thing with this show is... I don't think it's really that great. I watch a lot of shows, and most of them are of a higher quality than The Vampire Diaries. I'm just being honest, here. There are only a few reasons I keep coming back to watch this show. The first is that, despite its many flaws in terms of story, it has great acting, and some great characters. I still maintain that Elena is one of the oddly more feminist protagonists we have in television today. The other reason is about my personal love for the bromance. Specifically, Damon and Stefan's relationship. This show has never been about the Salvatores, the way that, say, Supernatural is about the Winchesters. Damon and Stefan's relationship has certainly gotten a fair bit of screen time, but much more attention has been paid to Elena's relationships with each of them in turn. And hey, that's fair! Elena is our protagonist. It's her show. But the thing is... I'm really only here for the broments. Let's be real. Any time we get even a hint of Stefan and Damon love in an episode, I become a blubbering mess. They're each other's longest relationship - they have been brothers for longer than the rest of these characters have been alive. Through all the ups and downs, they always find their way back to each other. I can't resist crap like that. So, week after week, I come back to collect the small morsels of Stefan and Damon. I get disappointment after disappointment, such as the lack of a scene between Damon and Stefan in the finale last year, or the fact that even when they talk about their connection, usually they bring Katherine or Elena into the mix. And then? They give me the ending to this episode.
Honestly, I think this was the scene I've been waiting for all these years. Six seasons, and it's finally here. I've been hoping and praying and waiting waiting waiting for Stefan and Damon to reunite, ever since the finale last season. Let's take a look at how it's done.
Stefan has a sappy speech, all about how messed up and lost he feels without his big brother around. Then, Damon appears. Stefan's face when he says Damon's name is too much for words. He looks like a scared, lost little kid. He can't believe his eyes. He thinks he's hallucinating. Damon, for his part, starts off joking. He makes a crack about the gin, and then an "I see dead people" joke, but as he continues to look at Stefan, he becomes more earnest: "It's a hell of a long story, brother, but... I'm back." I love how Stefan has to touch Damon to convince himself that this is actually real. And then, once Damon gives a little nod and says "yeah," as if to say "it's okay, you can let go, Stefan..." Stefan does. All of his reserve and his cold attempt to hide his pain from others just comes crashing down. He freakin' lunges for his brother and wraps his arms around him and he's gasping for breath and it's just so goddamn beautiful I want to cry just thinking about it. Damon looks like he's going to start crying, too. His eyes get all watery and he repeats the most important thing: "I'm back, Stef." He looks sort of bewildered at Stefan's reaction, but also he's relieved to be back where he belongs.
As you can tell by these long paragraphs, I could talk about that last scene between Stefan and Damon forever. But I should probably stop before I get too carried away. I would be inclined to give this episode high marks just for how much I loved that ending scene, but actually, all of it was good. The three romances (Elena/Liam, Alaric/Jo and Tyler/Liv) that I didn't much care for before this episode are now becoming really interesting. We got some great moments between Bonnie and Damon, some new interesting drama between Rick and Stefan, as well as a continuing feud between Stefan and Caroline... we have more trouble with Tripp and Ivy... and we have the best reunion scene I ever could have hoped for. I'm happy!
10/10
No comments:
Post a Comment
I'd really appreciate hearing what you think!