Oooooooookay then? What the what?! Things got weird this week, and there are some parts of this that I'm not actually all that thrilled about, to be honest. But in other ways, this episode certainly shook things up and got me very interested in where we're going next.
Cons:
Caroline is apparently pregnant with Alaric's twins. At the wedding, the Gemini Witches in attendance were chanting something to save the babies, apparently transferring them into Caroline. I have had my fill of creepy vampire babies from Twilight, thank you very much. And while I'm sure this will be quite different from that, I'm still more than a little annoyed, if I'm being honest. It's just... weird. Caroline didn't have any say over this, and it's creepy and weird that she's suddenly carrying Alaric's children.
Faux-Jo dying so quickly was also a bummer. Apparently, since Jo is human and the soul inside her was a vampire, Jo's body can't withstand life for very long. While the scene of Faux-Jo dying was quite touching, it was odd to me that they wouldn't try and drag this out a bit longer. I was excited to see an interesting sort of friendship develop between Alaric and this person. It could have been a continuing plot thread for sure, and it's odd that it was discarded so quickly.
Mary-Louise and Nora continue with their own petty relationship drama, using a party thrown by Lily as the platform for their silly antics. It seems that Julian is a master manipulator, making sure that both Mary-Louise and Nora think he's on their side. I was interested in these two for half a second a few episodes ago, but this week they were just a bore, distracting us from more interesting goings-on. Sometimes this show tends to invent convoluted excuses to throw a fancy party so that everybody can be dressed up, and this was a particularly weak excuse.
Pros:
One of the main thrusts of this episode was Damon and Stefan's plans to kill Julian. Damon has this whole vengeful idea of letting Lily find true happiness with Julian again, let her start to hope for forever, and then kill him. He wants to wait six months or so. Meanwhile, Stefan, having learned what Julian did to his unborn child, wants him dead now. Of course, Stefan doesn't tell Damon the truth - partly because he promised Valerie he'd tell no one, and partly because he's sort of embarrassed by how much this piece of information is affecting him. I mean, it happened 150 years ago. Lily holds a party and invites everybody to come so that she can show what a peaceful Mystic Falls could look like. The whole party devolves into Stefan trying to kill Julian, and Damon getting in the way. Matt vervaines Damon so that Stefan can kill Julian, but he fails, Lily coming in to stop Julian from burning to death just in time.
After this, we get all the bromance. Damon is pissed as hell that Stefan would go after Julian like that. He says that he misses the days when Stefan let his big brother handle everything. Aww! And then, Stefan tells him the truth. The two of them end up talking about their hopes and dreams of being fathers. This episode actually begins with Stefan having a dream where he has a little boy named Jacob who he's teaching to shoot out in the woods. He begins yelling in terror when Jacob disappears. I feel so bad for Stefan here. It's even worse when you realize he had no one he felt he could confide in. Thank God Damon handles it well. The two of them talking about wanting kids was the saddest moment ever. Damon decided he'd help Stefan kill Julian as soon as possible. These two are the heart of the show now, and I'm loving it.
As always, the flash forward is what's keeping me the most interested. This time, we have a continuation of Damon visiting Alaric. We learn that apparently Caroline's fiancé is Alaric himself. These two are together?! The end of the flash forward shows Caroline on the news, blood dripping down her face, announcing that she has an important message for Stefan Salvatore. Dun dun dun... We learn from this flash forward that Damon came to Alaric's house needing to get a hold of Caroline because Stefan's life is in danger, and Damon figured Caroline might be used as bait. What happened between Caroline and Stefan that broke them apart? Who's trying to kill Stefan? It's all just so freakin' interesting! I want to get to this point in the story sooner rather than later.
I have to give a shout-out to Matt Davis, who plays Alaric. Even though it was annoying to lose Faux-Jo so quickly, his acting in the scene where he told her goodbye was seriously brilliant. I got goose bumps and felt my eyes start to water. Seriously. He was just so happy to have heard Jo's voice again. Ugh. Heartbreaking.
Bonnie and Enzo! I guess I'm determined to ship them for the sake of the narrative or something. I actually thought they were pretty darn adorable in their brief scenes together in this episode. Bonnie helps Enzo to make Lily feel jealous, but it's obvious that it's not working all that well. Still, it was surprisingly intimate, watching Bonnie fix Enzo's tie like that. I wonder what happens that finally pushes these two together in the future?
Lastly, we get a disturbing discovery about the Heretics. Matt and Bonnie follow a compelled human party guest to the high school, where they find him and dozens of other humans hooked up to blood bags, draining their own blood and sitting in a compelled haze. Uh oh! I liked watching Matt and Bonnie sleuthing together. I wonder who it was who compelled them, and if these actions are sanctioned by Lily. I guess we'll have to wait and find out! This is a new and particularly gruesome new way to use vampiric powers, and I'm kind of excited about the sort of evil we're getting here.
That's what I've got. While I'm annoyed about Caroline's creepy pregnancy and a few other little things, this episode was definitely an improvement a lot of the season thus far. I think there's still some salvageable moments in this season. As long as they have a plan, I'm willing to stick it out.
7.5/10
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