tonight, this icon is mildly amusing.
Watching this show after reading the books is like--you know how, in the Family Circus, Jeffy goes to get the mail or something and inside of going house to mailbox and back, he ends up going all around the goddamn neighborhood? But he still goes to the mailbox and gets home, he just makes weird side-trips? THAT’S WHAT THIS SHOW IS. They’re probably gonna hit all the shit you remember, but if you go in thinking you know what’s going to happen and in what order, you will be sadly mistaken.
First: ALARIC GODDAMN SALTZMAN. In the books, Alaric is the replacement history teacher who “happens” to show up after Tanner is killed; he’s really a parapsychologist from Duke University who finds out that OMG VAMPIRES ARE REAL and promptly a) shits himself and b) tries to stop animals from attacking the winter dance via a remarkably ineffective Tibetan dispersal spell. He also ends up dating Meredith, who-let’s remember-is SEVENTEEN. (He gets engaged to her sometime before Dark Reunion, off-panel, and is in Tunguska researching psychics when Nightfall happens. I love him. He and Meredith have the healthiest relationship in any of the books.) On the show, they’re faking us out to think he’s a vampire. (Spoiler alert: I really think it’s a fake-out. Besides, we’ve done that before.)
In practical application, Alaric Saltzman is GODDAMN AWESOME. He’s self-deprecating about his name! His family is from Texas by way of Boston! His wife died in an open accident in North Carolina! Ten bucks says his wife’s name is Meredith and she’s a vampire he keeps in his basement! I LOVE THIS SHOW!
(That said, I would maybe be okay with Jenna/Alaric, mostly because I really like Jenna, for all that the interesting parts of the plot kind of drag when she’s around, and I really like Alaric, who has a big fuck-off Salvatore-esque ring and tells his students to call him Rick. For the record, I will not be calling him that. I don’t care how much easier it is to type.)
Show of hands: who here learned about “shadow reckoning” in school? Yeah, that’s what I thought.
As I mentioned earlier, Emily Bennett is played by Bianca Lawson, aka Kendra, the Vampire Slayer. This automatically makes the show seventy percent cooler.
So apparently at some point, the town was known as Fell’s Chuch-now “old Fell’s Church”-and its remains are mostly the Salvatore house. What kind of fire did you people fucking start back in the day? Jesus.
“This is where it started. And this is where it has to end.” I like that they tell us where the season finale fight is gonna happen.
Tanner had a jackass file. With a label. This does not even remotely surprise me.
Also! I am kind of pulling for Caroline/Matt! I kind of--I really want to like Caroline, okay? And Matt would be so much more fun if he was less emo! It’s a nice reminder that not everyone is a werewolf or a witch or a vampire. Sometimes you just have to worry about prom.
“I won’t be coming to school anymore.” Stefan! I’m not saying that you should in any way emulate Edward Cullen, but at least his family understands how to blend in. (To be fair, the giant piece of wall art made of graduation caps makes that a total lie.)
“Believe it or not, Bonnie, I want to help you.” Ahaha. Ahahahahahahahah.
Door open! No overt threats! I want to like you so much, Bonnie/Damon, but oh my God, this episode made that hard. I do love that even when Bonnie is clearly freaked right the fuck out by Damon, she doesn’t actually back down from him. That’s my girl! (Also, I will need wallpaper of that stat, because Ian Somerhalder + Katarina Graham = IT’S SWEEPS, WHY ARE NEITHER OF YOU TAKING CLOTHES OFF.)
“You’re sleeping at my place tonight.” ...where Damon’s allowed in. Oooookay, Elena. Right church, wrong pew.
The dueling Stefan-Damon impressions killed me. Stefan does a surprisingly good Damon (which makes me really want to see P. Wes do Damon), and Damon immediately goes to the forehead place. “You’re really hard to imitate, and then I end up going to a lesser place.” HA!
For the record, Stefan and Damon are splitting a bottle of Kentucky sippin’ whiskey.
“I can’t talk to you! You don’t listen!” Which...is kind of Caroline’s whole thing? I’m starting to actually like her, but you get the feeling a lot of what she hears comes out like Charlie Brown’s teacher until she hears a name or word she recognizes.
Stefan wants to bond! Not that this is a transparent attempt to weasel out Damon’s diabolical plan! CERTAINLY NOT. (Hilariously, Damon knows it is, but still plays along. You guys, he misses his brother! It’s really kind of sad if you think about it!)
“I have an idea! Let’s have a séance.” Caroline, you are formally no longer invited to have ideas anymore, JESUS CHRIST.
I’m taking vampire football as a hilari-terrible shoutout to Twilight’s vampire baseball.
“Downside of my diet: getting hit actually hurts a little.” Stefan! Why can’t you be entertaining every week? Look at your brother: sure, he’s evil, but he’s amusing. I give you a lot of leeway for that.
Okay, so: DAMON’S DIABOLICAL MASTER PLAN FOR WHY HE IS IN MYSTIC FALLS: [deep breath]
At some point, there were a lot of vampires in Fell’s Church. (I suspect this was Katherine’s fault. Maybe she just wanted a good place to raise kids. IDK.) The town, not loving this, banded together to get rid of the vampires; I’m reasonably sure it was the Forbes, Gilbert, Lockwood and Fell families, and maybe even the other Salvatores. 27 vampires ended up dead; Katherine and a number of others were presumed dead when trapped inside a church and lit on fire.
HOWEVER: Damon had already made a deal with Emily, Katherine’s handmaid and a witch, to save her. In exchange for saving Emily’s line-which he did; Damon saved her children-Damon made Emily trap Katherine safely in the tomb beneath the church. Emily couldn’t really discriminate, so she had to take the other vampires in there with her. So for 140+ years, there’s been a number of starving vampires trapped beneath Mystic Falls, waiting to come out and feed.
I repeat: Underneath Mystic Falls are any number of starving vampires, just waiting. Including Damon and Stefan’s ex-girlfriend. WHAT.
Okay, so: supposedly without the crystal, there’s no way for Katherine and the others to get out, but if you believe that, I have some delightful land to sell you. It’s in a swamp.
(Seriously, I’m mostly convinced that Katherine’s already out, or someone is, because if Damon had eaten Brooke and Darren from the pilot, or that idiot couple that went camping, they would have shown it. They haven’t had any problem showing it so far.)
Emily flung Damon’s ASS around those woods, didn’t he? I think I love her, for all that I don’t love that she possessed Bonnie.
I would pay real money for official wallpaper of Damon and Emily/Bonnie in the woods, in the pentacle of fire. The lighting! The wind! The misery on her face contrasting with the total calm on hers! GAAAAAAAAAAAAAH.
...and then, just when I felt for him, DAMON GOES AND BITES BONNIE, WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK. NOT COOL, OLDEST LIVING SALVATORE.
(Then Stefan rips open his wrist and gives Bonnie blood, so she’ll be fine, and Damon’s half-broken right now so it’s not like he’s really gonna try to finish the job, but still, that shit broke my heart. Dear Kevlie: you know that redemption arc you keep teasing us with? Fucking get on that.)
So Vicki’s gone, I’m pretty sure Mr. Donovan is dead, and Mrs. Donovan is off with her boyfriend Pete. Uh, who the fuck is raising Matt? No, really. Does he have a job or something?
So Damon knew everything the whole time-or so he claims-and never got whammied; he always loved Katherine for exactly who she was. I have doubts about that, but not as many as you’d think; his quiet, broken “I’ll leave now” sold it like it was a house.
He loves Katherine, the bone-deep, scary kind. All he wants is her back. (Though, probably, revenge would not be terrible.) If they follow pattern and she ends up evil and crazy, blaming him? That’s going to kill him. That’s going to shame spiral his ass from here to New Haven and back.
(Also, if you don’t think Ian Somerhalder can act, fuck you and get out of my journal. SOLD IT. LIKE IT WAS A HOUSE. You don’t want to be here when Lost comes back and I start crying because the fucking plane lands safely.)
Aaaaaaaaaaand then we get this week’s portion of the Stefan & Elena: I Want To, But I Can’t dance, which is one of my least favorite parts of the show. “I want to be with you! But I caaaaaaaaan’t! I’m leaving toooooooooown!” “But I looooooooooooove you!” OH MY GOD, JUST GET ON WITH IT ALREADY.
So then! Damon is being emo in the woods! Stefan is throwing a fit because they cannot be toooooooogetherrrrrrrrrr! Caroline and Matt are-no, they’re eating snacks and giggling, they’re fine. Elena and Bonnie are crying because OMG YOU’RE DATING A VAMPIRE! Jeremy is going through childhood mementos! Aaaaaaaaaaand Jenna opens the door and HOLY SHIT, JENNA, DON’T INVITE LOGAN IN, THAT NEVER ENDS WELL WHEN YOUR FAMILY INVITES PEOPLE IN YOUR HOUSE.
Next week: Logan is totes a vampire! Stefan and Elena are half-naked and on a bed! It’s still sweeps! I’m pretty sure Logan wasn’t made a vampire by Damon or Vicki, and it wasn’t Stefan, so it’s Unnamed Vampire In the Woods Who I Would Bet You Money Is Katherine (Or One of Her Gang)! I LOVE THIS SHOW SO GODDAMNED MUCH!
First: ALARIC GODDAMN SALTZMAN. In the books, Alaric is the replacement history teacher who “happens” to show up after Tanner is killed; he’s really a parapsychologist from Duke University who finds out that OMG VAMPIRES ARE REAL and promptly a) shits himself and b) tries to stop animals from attacking the winter dance via a remarkably ineffective Tibetan dispersal spell. He also ends up dating Meredith, who-let’s remember-is SEVENTEEN. (He gets engaged to her sometime before Dark Reunion, off-panel, and is in Tunguska researching psychics when Nightfall happens. I love him. He and Meredith have the healthiest relationship in any of the books.) On the show, they’re faking us out to think he’s a vampire. (Spoiler alert: I really think it’s a fake-out. Besides, we’ve done that before.)
In practical application, Alaric Saltzman is GODDAMN AWESOME. He’s self-deprecating about his name! His family is from Texas by way of Boston! His wife died in an open accident in North Carolina! Ten bucks says his wife’s name is Meredith and she’s a vampire he keeps in his basement! I LOVE THIS SHOW!
(That said, I would maybe be okay with Jenna/Alaric, mostly because I really like Jenna, for all that the interesting parts of the plot kind of drag when she’s around, and I really like Alaric, who has a big fuck-off Salvatore-esque ring and tells his students to call him Rick. For the record, I will not be calling him that. I don’t care how much easier it is to type.)
Show of hands: who here learned about “shadow reckoning” in school? Yeah, that’s what I thought.
As I mentioned earlier, Emily Bennett is played by Bianca Lawson, aka Kendra, the Vampire Slayer. This automatically makes the show seventy percent cooler.
So apparently at some point, the town was known as Fell’s Chuch-now “old Fell’s Church”-and its remains are mostly the Salvatore house. What kind of fire did you people fucking start back in the day? Jesus.
“This is where it started. And this is where it has to end.” I like that they tell us where the season finale fight is gonna happen.
Tanner had a jackass file. With a label. This does not even remotely surprise me.
Also! I am kind of pulling for Caroline/Matt! I kind of--I really want to like Caroline, okay? And Matt would be so much more fun if he was less emo! It’s a nice reminder that not everyone is a werewolf or a witch or a vampire. Sometimes you just have to worry about prom.
“I won’t be coming to school anymore.” Stefan! I’m not saying that you should in any way emulate Edward Cullen, but at least his family understands how to blend in. (To be fair, the giant piece of wall art made of graduation caps makes that a total lie.)
“Believe it or not, Bonnie, I want to help you.” Ahaha. Ahahahahahahahah.
Door open! No overt threats! I want to like you so much, Bonnie/Damon, but oh my God, this episode made that hard. I do love that even when Bonnie is clearly freaked right the fuck out by Damon, she doesn’t actually back down from him. That’s my girl! (Also, I will need wallpaper of that stat, because Ian Somerhalder + Katarina Graham = IT’S SWEEPS, WHY ARE NEITHER OF YOU TAKING CLOTHES OFF.)
“You’re sleeping at my place tonight.” ...where Damon’s allowed in. Oooookay, Elena. Right church, wrong pew.
The dueling Stefan-Damon impressions killed me. Stefan does a surprisingly good Damon (which makes me really want to see P. Wes do Damon), and Damon immediately goes to the forehead place. “You’re really hard to imitate, and then I end up going to a lesser place.” HA!
For the record, Stefan and Damon are splitting a bottle of Kentucky sippin’ whiskey.
“I can’t talk to you! You don’t listen!” Which...is kind of Caroline’s whole thing? I’m starting to actually like her, but you get the feeling a lot of what she hears comes out like Charlie Brown’s teacher until she hears a name or word she recognizes.
Stefan wants to bond! Not that this is a transparent attempt to weasel out Damon’s diabolical plan! CERTAINLY NOT. (Hilariously, Damon knows it is, but still plays along. You guys, he misses his brother! It’s really kind of sad if you think about it!)
“I have an idea! Let’s have a séance.” Caroline, you are formally no longer invited to have ideas anymore, JESUS CHRIST.
I’m taking vampire football as a hilari-terrible shoutout to Twilight’s vampire baseball.
“Downside of my diet: getting hit actually hurts a little.” Stefan! Why can’t you be entertaining every week? Look at your brother: sure, he’s evil, but he’s amusing. I give you a lot of leeway for that.
Okay, so: DAMON’S DIABOLICAL MASTER PLAN FOR WHY HE IS IN MYSTIC FALLS: [deep breath]
At some point, there were a lot of vampires in Fell’s Church. (I suspect this was Katherine’s fault. Maybe she just wanted a good place to raise kids. IDK.) The town, not loving this, banded together to get rid of the vampires; I’m reasonably sure it was the Forbes, Gilbert, Lockwood and Fell families, and maybe even the other Salvatores. 27 vampires ended up dead; Katherine and a number of others were presumed dead when trapped inside a church and lit on fire.
HOWEVER: Damon had already made a deal with Emily, Katherine’s handmaid and a witch, to save her. In exchange for saving Emily’s line-which he did; Damon saved her children-Damon made Emily trap Katherine safely in the tomb beneath the church. Emily couldn’t really discriminate, so she had to take the other vampires in there with her. So for 140+ years, there’s been a number of starving vampires trapped beneath Mystic Falls, waiting to come out and feed.
I repeat: Underneath Mystic Falls are any number of starving vampires, just waiting. Including Damon and Stefan’s ex-girlfriend. WHAT.
Okay, so: supposedly without the crystal, there’s no way for Katherine and the others to get out, but if you believe that, I have some delightful land to sell you. It’s in a swamp.
(Seriously, I’m mostly convinced that Katherine’s already out, or someone is, because if Damon had eaten Brooke and Darren from the pilot, or that idiot couple that went camping, they would have shown it. They haven’t had any problem showing it so far.)
Emily flung Damon’s ASS around those woods, didn’t he? I think I love her, for all that I don’t love that she possessed Bonnie.
I would pay real money for official wallpaper of Damon and Emily/Bonnie in the woods, in the pentacle of fire. The lighting! The wind! The misery on her face contrasting with the total calm on hers! GAAAAAAAAAAAAAH.
...and then, just when I felt for him, DAMON GOES AND BITES BONNIE, WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK. NOT COOL, OLDEST LIVING SALVATORE.
(Then Stefan rips open his wrist and gives Bonnie blood, so she’ll be fine, and Damon’s half-broken right now so it’s not like he’s really gonna try to finish the job, but still, that shit broke my heart. Dear Kevlie: you know that redemption arc you keep teasing us with? Fucking get on that.)
So Vicki’s gone, I’m pretty sure Mr. Donovan is dead, and Mrs. Donovan is off with her boyfriend Pete. Uh, who the fuck is raising Matt? No, really. Does he have a job or something?
So Damon knew everything the whole time-or so he claims-and never got whammied; he always loved Katherine for exactly who she was. I have doubts about that, but not as many as you’d think; his quiet, broken “I’ll leave now” sold it like it was a house.
He loves Katherine, the bone-deep, scary kind. All he wants is her back. (Though, probably, revenge would not be terrible.) If they follow pattern and she ends up evil and crazy, blaming him? That’s going to kill him. That’s going to shame spiral his ass from here to New Haven and back.
(Also, if you don’t think Ian Somerhalder can act, fuck you and get out of my journal. SOLD IT. LIKE IT WAS A HOUSE. You don’t want to be here when Lost comes back and I start crying because the fucking plane lands safely.)
Aaaaaaaaaaand then we get this week’s portion of the Stefan & Elena: I Want To, But I Can’t dance, which is one of my least favorite parts of the show. “I want to be with you! But I caaaaaaaaan’t! I’m leaving toooooooooown!” “But I looooooooooooove you!” OH MY GOD, JUST GET ON WITH IT ALREADY.
So then! Damon is being emo in the woods! Stefan is throwing a fit because they cannot be toooooooogetherrrrrrrrrr! Caroline and Matt are-no, they’re eating snacks and giggling, they’re fine. Elena and Bonnie are crying because OMG YOU’RE DATING A VAMPIRE! Jeremy is going through childhood mementos! Aaaaaaaaaaand Jenna opens the door and HOLY SHIT, JENNA, DON’T INVITE LOGAN IN, THAT NEVER ENDS WELL WHEN YOUR FAMILY INVITES PEOPLE IN YOUR HOUSE.
Next week: Logan is totes a vampire! Stefan and Elena are half-naked and on a bed! It’s still sweeps! I’m pretty sure Logan wasn’t made a vampire by Damon or Vicki, and it wasn’t Stefan, so it’s Unnamed Vampire In the Woods Who I Would Bet You Money Is Katherine (Or One of Her Gang)! I LOVE THIS SHOW SO GODDAMNED MUCH!