you went on a murderous rampage. IT HAPPENS.
My interested ambivalence in Elena continues. Because OH MY GOD, ELENA. YOU DO NOT NEGOTIATE WITH TERRORISTS. Or at least, you don’t go out of your way to cave. It’d be admirable if it was just about her, but she’s also proposing they let the werewolves all off their leashes, which is not exactly a way to keep people safe. She really thinks that because she’s an integral part of the whole thing, she is the whole thing. She doesn’t think what happens to the people she loves after she sacrifices herself, because it’s at least in part about her wanting to die so she can stop dreading it. Even when she does snap out of it a bit - which I love! - she still can’t imagine herself being anywhere other than the center of it. If she’s going to be involved at all, which she has to be, then they all have to do things HER WAY, because she is clearly the center of the world, and also a strategic genius who is not in any way suicidally insane.
It’s also how she can still trivialize Caroline’s concerns the way she does when Caroline calls as they’re heading out to the lake house - because her problems are so intense, that Caroline’s must be small in comparison. I don’t blame her for wanting a break, you can only be a caretaker for so long. But that dismissive “it’s just Caroline” kind of grates.
However! She is fantastic against Elijah at the lake house, channeling that willingness to die into a weapon she can use toward a goal that will help them all, herself included. That is admirable. I really like seeing survival-mode Elena against Rose and Elijah, in particular the way she can fight back against and care for Rose in quick succession. Also, I approve of this new Bristol Palin hair situation, if only for the comedic value.
Caroline continues to be awesome. Love the way it plays with the girl and the monster during Tyler’s transformation - because she’s one too, and you’re still scared for her. God, it’s heartwrenching when the werewolves kidnap her - her yelling isn’t the NOOOOOOOOOOO OTT flailing it is with most characters, it’s played totally straight and CA does a fantastic job with it. It’s great to see that she’s developed some self-respect, enough that she can call Tyler out, even if: “I am not girly little Caroline anymore.” Honey, you can be girly and tough, in point of fact, you are. That scene where Bonnie and Elena just come in and hug Caroline moved me more emotionally than anything the show has done so far, and then the next morning when they all wake up together. Gorgeous, gorgeous female friendship.
I do understand why Stefan is trying to build up a vervain tolerance and it’s a choice they have to make. But he’s still the last one that should be screwing around self-medicating with deadly substances and I hope this leads to Crazy Stefan Hijinks. I like him now, btw, now that he has dropped the controlling bullshit for actually being a good friend and decent boyfriend. But I like him better when he’s crazy and/or threatening people. I very much like, too, how he was only awful for a few weeks after being turned. It makes his issues very much about his present struggle, rather than shoving it all into regret and boxing everything into the past. Good to see Lexi again, too, and I liked the parallels with his friendship with Caroline.
UGH MORE FRIDGING WHAT IS THIS IDEK. This gorgeous character, with this huge story and her odd mix of toughness and vulnerability, her amorality and lack of malice, the way she came into town offering nothing but real friendship and that was enough that she and Damon made each other happy for a little while. Rose’s death is excruciating. It’s disappointing. I liked Rose, but basically her arc was there to illustrate Katherine’s depravity, and to cause Damon to weep the Single Tear of Man Pain without smudging his manliner because he is the Champ King Moper of Moper Hill. Rose does get to be one of the characters who impartially tell us some
I do love that he still thinks to take Rose’s corpse to Liz, to keep his place on the Council and yeah, to give them a little peace of mind, and because Elena’s hubris and Alaric’s groundedness aside, Damon is the general here (MYSTIC FALLS IS TRULY DOOMED &c &c). We all know how much I love do-what-needs-doing guy.
Especially when he is also bugfuck-crazy guy. I feel, okay? And it sucks. It’s all been an act and not an act, because while he might feel, his feelings aren’t oriented in a normal human way. But he misses being human, and he wants to be able to channel his feelings that way, and that’s where the train wreck happens. You are my existential crisis! And though you know he’s going to kill her from the moment she stops, I really don’t think he knows it. I LOVE Damon’s breakdown. It’s one of those moments where Damon takes all that manic energy he usually puts into his performance of Damon Salvatore, Psychotic Vampire-At-Large and uses it to actually express his feelings. He has to work so hard at not caring because oh, he is utterly alive with emotion, violent and tempestuous when it rises, and empty and desperate for distraction when it ebbs. Once you can hurt, you can love. Of course he spent decades chasing Katherine, loving and hating and missing her fiercely, because he is so vulnerable, no matter how good he gets at hiding it.
Normally we’d see a creature like this struggle to be good, but we’re watching him struggle to pick a side. I don’t think Aimee is a cover. I don’t excuse the abusive relationship, at all. I think what he is thinking is that this is how to resolve the torn impulses - because really, the compulsion is totally unnecessary to “Damon tries to have a stable relationship,” she came when he called. Neither did he compel her to forget about the vampire thing. He just craves the control that using the compulsion gives him. But it’s one of those things the show does so fearlessly with the character, which is generally to write his issues as large and melodramatic as possible. He creates a mockery of romance, in a way that his persona is a caricature of himself. Possibly the polar opposite of what he had with Rose, who did have her eyes wide open, and it was all about acceptance and companionship, not love.
I feel like Damon is in a similar narrative situation as Katherine. The show cannot let him be good, because if he started to actually improve, he would still be unstable, obsessive, and ruthless [OH OXFORD SERIAL COMMA, I WILL NEVER LEAVE YOU], but he would just be too awesome to justify the show being about anyone else. Clearly these writers have in fact watched Wesley Wyndam-Pryce Angel: the Series in its entirety. But what is ending up happening with him is even more interesting, as we’re seeing just how on the edge he’s always been, but as the stakes get more and more dire, as he can’t ignore his humanity any more, the pushback is chaotic. Chaotic by choice, to some extent, because Damon doesn’t want to try and fail even only in front of himself, so he goes to the extreme the way he always does, and it’s so awful. I’m not excusing it at all. But I’m so interested in how he works.
Also, Damon’s Crazy Eyes are possibly the best thing on television at the moment. There should be an Emmy category for Crazy Eyes, and Ian Somerhalder should win forever. There should be an Ian Somerhalder Crazy Eyes Education Fund, for young actors who aspire to have the craziest of eyes.
Awww, Tyler. Since being a colossal fuck-up is pretty much my #1 favorite quality in a character, I’m into him (lol shoving his middle finger into Stefan’s face, so perfectly adolescent), and by extension the werewolves, though that subplot seems to have dropped out of sight for a t least the next couple of episodes. I love how being a werewolf is basically like being in the Mafia. Maybe you’re family and maybe you’re not, but if you’re the right kind of family, you kill someone to get made. Do they have to rip a werewolf’s heart out to kill it? Or does it just look cool? (I am okay with them doing it because it looks cool, I’m just wondering.) And Tyler…signs on, at least for now, because he doesn’t think he can do it alone. Harsh. But I understand it. Not least because - I’m sympathetic to Caroline’s anger at him, I don’t think she’s overreacting. But at the same time, all Tyler knew when that happened was that Caroline and her secret mysterious associates she was lying about murdered his uncle for being like him.
DON’T FUCK WITH BONNIE BENNETT, BITCHES. I can’t believe she drugged that dude! But I kind of can. Because she is pretty ruthless and big-picture oriented even toward people who haven’t personally betrayed her, but those who have are really boned. (haha, honey, you should be a little less hard on Damon for being EXACTLY THAT WAY.) Luca isn’t just working with the vampires to kill Elena, he got under her skin and made her trust him when she’s usually so (justifiably) suspicious. She and Jeremy remain cute but not particularly compelling. I do like that they’re also teammates and both have each other’s backs when they get involved in stuff.
It’s terrifying to her to have to face the idea of life without her power, as she’s built her entire identity around being a witch. And other witches, so far, have been such a positive experience for her, to have her trust so cruelly betrayed by one she clearly wants so badly to trust - it’s a powerful metaphor, but a necessarily ugly one. (Too bad the whole thing results in the dead POC count going EVEN HIGHER, MY GOD.) And, though I know her opaqueness is an issue from time to time, I really do like that I don’t know what terrible thing she’s going to have to do Klaus, and I don’t know if she’s going to go through with it. Bonnie can surprise me.
KATHERINE my fabulous Machiavellian lady. Damon is so fucking easy to play, and she of all people knows just how to play him. I’m glad the show has found her a way to keep her around, at least temporarily, and in a way that doesn’t drag the plot down into spiraling of CAN WE KILL HER angst, but doesn’t hollow her out or, heavens forfend, reform her. Klaus is a threat to her, this is her chance to eliminate the threat, she’s going to take it. Also, I know Elena was snarking, but I actually do kind of want Katherine to go to their girls’ nights.
AND Katherine/Damon shipper watch. I mean, he clearly knew she didn’t care if he died, but was still hoping against hope, just a little, that she would at least lie to him. That scene in his room is really interesting. He looks - by Damon standards, anyway - pretty relaxed, he’s let the theatrical edge drop. Because why pretend with Katherine? He’s laid all his cards out in front of her, more than once. And he’s a little more aware of just how much he’s her plaything, and because of Elena, because of Rose, even because of his friends (and he really does have a few) he can’t go with either lie, that it’s more than it is, or that it’s enough for him because he shouldn’t expect anything at all. But he can’t go through with it, he can’t have her in his room, because she’s too big a part of who he is for sex not to be weighted with meaning, and because any tiny chance he has to lash out at her, he’s going to take it.
Why didn’t they compel Jenna not to let strangers in? Or, novel thought: tell her the truth. And I adore Alaric for struggling with that in the way he does. AND OH HI THERE ISOBEL WHO I LOVE TO PIECES. And Uncle John back as well, making ill-advised alliances with Katherine and being all jealous over Alaric. Sorry to see Elijah gone, though he was played out and far too much of a threat to be contained without dragging down the plot.
It’s also how she can still trivialize Caroline’s concerns the way she does when Caroline calls as they’re heading out to the lake house - because her problems are so intense, that Caroline’s must be small in comparison. I don’t blame her for wanting a break, you can only be a caretaker for so long. But that dismissive “it’s just Caroline” kind of grates.
However! She is fantastic against Elijah at the lake house, channeling that willingness to die into a weapon she can use toward a goal that will help them all, herself included. That is admirable. I really like seeing survival-mode Elena against Rose and Elijah, in particular the way she can fight back against and care for Rose in quick succession. Also, I approve of this new Bristol Palin hair situation, if only for the comedic value.
Caroline continues to be awesome. Love the way it plays with the girl and the monster during Tyler’s transformation - because she’s one too, and you’re still scared for her. God, it’s heartwrenching when the werewolves kidnap her - her yelling isn’t the NOOOOOOOOOOO OTT flailing it is with most characters, it’s played totally straight and CA does a fantastic job with it. It’s great to see that she’s developed some self-respect, enough that she can call Tyler out, even if: “I am not girly little Caroline anymore.” Honey, you can be girly and tough, in point of fact, you are. That scene where Bonnie and Elena just come in and hug Caroline moved me more emotionally than anything the show has done so far, and then the next morning when they all wake up together. Gorgeous, gorgeous female friendship.
I do understand why Stefan is trying to build up a vervain tolerance and it’s a choice they have to make. But he’s still the last one that should be screwing around self-medicating with deadly substances and I hope this leads to Crazy Stefan Hijinks. I like him now, btw, now that he has dropped the controlling bullshit for actually being a good friend and decent boyfriend. But I like him better when he’s crazy and/or threatening people. I very much like, too, how he was only awful for a few weeks after being turned. It makes his issues very much about his present struggle, rather than shoving it all into regret and boxing everything into the past. Good to see Lexi again, too, and I liked the parallels with his friendship with Caroline.
UGH MORE FRIDGING WHAT IS THIS IDEK. This gorgeous character, with this huge story and her odd mix of toughness and vulnerability, her amorality and lack of malice, the way she came into town offering nothing but real friendship and that was enough that she and Damon made each other happy for a little while. Rose’s death is excruciating. It’s disappointing. I liked Rose, but basically her arc was there to illustrate Katherine’s depravity, and to cause Damon to weep the Single Tear of Man Pain without smudging his manliner because he is the Champ King Moper of Moper Hill. Rose does get to be one of the characters who impartially tell us some
I do love that he still thinks to take Rose’s corpse to Liz, to keep his place on the Council and yeah, to give them a little peace of mind, and because Elena’s hubris and Alaric’s groundedness aside, Damon is the general here (MYSTIC FALLS IS TRULY DOOMED &c &c). We all know how much I love do-what-needs-doing guy.
Especially when he is also bugfuck-crazy guy. I feel, okay? And it sucks. It’s all been an act and not an act, because while he might feel, his feelings aren’t oriented in a normal human way. But he misses being human, and he wants to be able to channel his feelings that way, and that’s where the train wreck happens. You are my existential crisis! And though you know he’s going to kill her from the moment she stops, I really don’t think he knows it. I LOVE Damon’s breakdown. It’s one of those moments where Damon takes all that manic energy he usually puts into his performance of Damon Salvatore, Psychotic Vampire-At-Large and uses it to actually express his feelings. He has to work so hard at not caring because oh, he is utterly alive with emotion, violent and tempestuous when it rises, and empty and desperate for distraction when it ebbs. Once you can hurt, you can love. Of course he spent decades chasing Katherine, loving and hating and missing her fiercely, because he is so vulnerable, no matter how good he gets at hiding it.
Normally we’d see a creature like this struggle to be good, but we’re watching him struggle to pick a side. I don’t think Aimee is a cover. I don’t excuse the abusive relationship, at all. I think what he is thinking is that this is how to resolve the torn impulses - because really, the compulsion is totally unnecessary to “Damon tries to have a stable relationship,” she came when he called. Neither did he compel her to forget about the vampire thing. He just craves the control that using the compulsion gives him. But it’s one of those things the show does so fearlessly with the character, which is generally to write his issues as large and melodramatic as possible. He creates a mockery of romance, in a way that his persona is a caricature of himself. Possibly the polar opposite of what he had with Rose, who did have her eyes wide open, and it was all about acceptance and companionship, not love.
I feel like Damon is in a similar narrative situation as Katherine. The show cannot let him be good, because if he started to actually improve, he would still be unstable, obsessive, and ruthless [OH OXFORD SERIAL COMMA, I WILL NEVER LEAVE YOU], but he would just be too awesome to justify the show being about anyone else. Clearly these writers have in fact watched Wesley Wyndam-Pryce Angel: the Series in its entirety. But what is ending up happening with him is even more interesting, as we’re seeing just how on the edge he’s always been, but as the stakes get more and more dire, as he can’t ignore his humanity any more, the pushback is chaotic. Chaotic by choice, to some extent, because Damon doesn’t want to try and fail even only in front of himself, so he goes to the extreme the way he always does, and it’s so awful. I’m not excusing it at all. But I’m so interested in how he works.
Also, Damon’s Crazy Eyes are possibly the best thing on television at the moment. There should be an Emmy category for Crazy Eyes, and Ian Somerhalder should win forever. There should be an Ian Somerhalder Crazy Eyes Education Fund, for young actors who aspire to have the craziest of eyes.
Awww, Tyler. Since being a colossal fuck-up is pretty much my #1 favorite quality in a character, I’m into him (lol shoving his middle finger into Stefan’s face, so perfectly adolescent), and by extension the werewolves, though that subplot seems to have dropped out of sight for a t least the next couple of episodes. I love how being a werewolf is basically like being in the Mafia. Maybe you’re family and maybe you’re not, but if you’re the right kind of family, you kill someone to get made. Do they have to rip a werewolf’s heart out to kill it? Or does it just look cool? (I am okay with them doing it because it looks cool, I’m just wondering.) And Tyler…signs on, at least for now, because he doesn’t think he can do it alone. Harsh. But I understand it. Not least because - I’m sympathetic to Caroline’s anger at him, I don’t think she’s overreacting. But at the same time, all Tyler knew when that happened was that Caroline and her secret mysterious associates she was lying about murdered his uncle for being like him.
DON’T FUCK WITH BONNIE BENNETT, BITCHES. I can’t believe she drugged that dude! But I kind of can. Because she is pretty ruthless and big-picture oriented even toward people who haven’t personally betrayed her, but those who have are really boned. (haha, honey, you should be a little less hard on Damon for being EXACTLY THAT WAY.) Luca isn’t just working with the vampires to kill Elena, he got under her skin and made her trust him when she’s usually so (justifiably) suspicious. She and Jeremy remain cute but not particularly compelling. I do like that they’re also teammates and both have each other’s backs when they get involved in stuff.
It’s terrifying to her to have to face the idea of life without her power, as she’s built her entire identity around being a witch. And other witches, so far, have been such a positive experience for her, to have her trust so cruelly betrayed by one she clearly wants so badly to trust - it’s a powerful metaphor, but a necessarily ugly one. (Too bad the whole thing results in the dead POC count going EVEN HIGHER, MY GOD.) And, though I know her opaqueness is an issue from time to time, I really do like that I don’t know what terrible thing she’s going to have to do Klaus, and I don’t know if she’s going to go through with it. Bonnie can surprise me.
KATHERINE my fabulous Machiavellian lady. Damon is so fucking easy to play, and she of all people knows just how to play him. I’m glad the show has found her a way to keep her around, at least temporarily, and in a way that doesn’t drag the plot down into spiraling of CAN WE KILL HER angst, but doesn’t hollow her out or, heavens forfend, reform her. Klaus is a threat to her, this is her chance to eliminate the threat, she’s going to take it. Also, I know Elena was snarking, but I actually do kind of want Katherine to go to their girls’ nights.
AND Katherine/Damon shipper watch. I mean, he clearly knew she didn’t care if he died, but was still hoping against hope, just a little, that she would at least lie to him. That scene in his room is really interesting. He looks - by Damon standards, anyway - pretty relaxed, he’s let the theatrical edge drop. Because why pretend with Katherine? He’s laid all his cards out in front of her, more than once. And he’s a little more aware of just how much he’s her plaything, and because of Elena, because of Rose, even because of his friends (and he really does have a few) he can’t go with either lie, that it’s more than it is, or that it’s enough for him because he shouldn’t expect anything at all. But he can’t go through with it, he can’t have her in his room, because she’s too big a part of who he is for sex not to be weighted with meaning, and because any tiny chance he has to lash out at her, he’s going to take it.
Why didn’t they compel Jenna not to let strangers in? Or, novel thought: tell her the truth. And I adore Alaric for struggling with that in the way he does. AND OH HI THERE ISOBEL WHO I LOVE TO PIECES. And Uncle John back as well, making ill-advised alliances with Katherine and being all jealous over Alaric. Sorry to see Elijah gone, though he was played out and far too much of a threat to be contained without dragging down the plot.