The Vampire Diaries 2x15 Review

[iaria]

The Dinner Party

Excellent episode.

• Elena is so freaking awesome! I ♥ her so much. I seriously spent the last five minutes going XD and ♥ and *\o/* and just generally squeeing over how amazing Elena is. I honestly cannot understand how people can not like Elena or think she’s boring. After Alaric ‘killed’ Elijah I totally thought he was going to be the BAMF of the episode but then Elena went and one upped him in awesomeness and she was undisputedly gets the BAMF title.

- I love that she didn’t back down from her position – protecting her friends at the expense of her life – just because Stefan disagreed and was mad at her about it.

- “I’m renegotiating.” – Elena
“You have nothing else to negotiate with.” – Elijah

THIS. This is so Elena. She negotiates, she talks and discusses and doesn’t let up or accept failure when she has a goal in mind and when the other person thinks that they have her, that she has no options, she does. Because she is a fucking Petrova and Petrova’s kick ass.

- Elena stabbed herself with a knife! And then while she was bleeding to death she forced Elijah to agree to her terms! And when he agreed to her terms she staggered into his arms and then stabbed him in the heart! Fuck yeah!

- “You guys want me to fight, fine I’ll fight. But if we’re going to do this then you guys can’t keep anything from me anymore. From this moment on we’re doing it my way.” ♥ Hell yes, Elena is in charge. I so knew she would be the boss in their eventual eternal threesome. :D :D And then they respond with “seems fair” and “okay” and it seems they understand it as well.

- Was part of the reason why Elena drew things out and forced Elijah to promise to the new agreement before stabbing him because she knew that eventually they would have to, uh, revive him and she wanted that in place? I mean trying to lure him into not suspecting her, and thus getting him really worked up, is a valid reason in itself but I don’t think she had to draw it out like that to be successful. I love the idea that she was laying the groundwork for when they eventually would need to remove the knife. That’s totally going to be my fanon.

- “It’s the understatement of the century.” / “You would know” Hee. I like snarky Elena.

• I am so pleased that Katherine is out of the tomb. Yay! Things are so much more awesome with Katherine. Katherine nominally being on team Salvatore will certainly shake things up a bit. (Actually since Elena is so much the centre of things wouldn’t Team Gilbert make more sense? But then it doesn’t sound as good, hmm.) I love that Katherine’s fear and pleading and seeming misstep with Damon was all on purpose and yet again her playing him. That’s because Katherine is awesome.

• I was a bit surprised with how horrible Katherine looked. I mean hasn’t it only been a few days since we last saw her (when John visited)? How did she get so bad so fast? That seems like a mistake on the part of TPTB. Also I wondered why John hasn’t brought her any blood since they are working together. Katherine is not the type to forgive an ally letting her starve. But then I was thinking that if they want to keep their connection secret Katherine should probably be given no help from anyone (blood, clean clothes) and Katherine is so the type of person who would starve herself for her end game.

• I really like Elijah so both times he was killed I was left feeling both ‘OMG, awesome, Alaric/Elena is such a BAMF’ and ‘... but I don’t want him to be dead! D:’ So I’m really pleased that TPTB left Elijah returning in the future very likely.

• On the flashbacks:

- Damon having not flipped his switch at the beginning was strange. He was all sweet and caring and very much like he was as a human. He was the responsible one who worried about their safety and was appalled by Stefan eating the girls, and the one who compelled them to get them to safety. When did he change? What event caused him to turn off his emotions if the initial increase in the strength of his emotions after being turned didn’t do it? More importantly what happened to ‘an eternity of misery’?

- “I’ll do better, I promise.”- Stefan and then there was Damon’s “Help him. He needs it.” to Lexi. Oh, they love each other so much. We see it there but also it’s implicit in the fact that Stefan forgave Damon for killing her – and we get to see just how important she was to him here. I loved that little moment between them at the end over Lexie. The looks on their faces...

- It was so great to see Lexi again. I was surprised that she met Stefan before he had his epiphany and started trying to be a better vampire. Her being his vampire mentor is excellent, and I love how it mirrors Stefan's relationship with Caroline.

- I was really surprised by how short a time Stefan was a ‘bad’ vampire. It looks like it was only a couple of days or weeks at the most. I don’t like that at all. I mean Stefan’s all ‘I was worse than Damon’ but I’m not really seeing it from what we had in the flashbacks this episode.

- I didn't really like how Lexie just kind of ignored Damon. How could things have been different if she had mentored him as well? She certainly couldn't have forced him to stay with them but she could have tried or at least offered him more advice/knowledge about being a vampire. I suppose she saw Damon keeping it together and decided to concentrate on the brother who needed her help the most. When she first met Stefan she was pretty horrified that he was 'a ripper'. I hope we get to learn more about what that term means to vampires.

• “I don’t really pursue younger women. (pause) It’s a joke, Ric, lighten up.” LOL.

• I think we really saw Elijah’s priorities this episode when after waking from being killed he immediately went to get Elena instead of killing everyone in the house first.

• “Gentlemen there are probably a few things we should get clear right now. I allow you to live solely to keep an eye on Elena. I allow Elena to remain in her house, living her life with her friends, as she does as a courtesy. If you become a liability I’ll take her away from you and you’ll never see her again.” ...I actually kind of want to see this. I think the Elena/Elijah interactions would be fascinating. Maybe when he comes back to life.

• Alaric killing Elijah, temporarily, was a pretty awesome moment. It shocked me and I loved how casual and ‘get rid of the body before it ruins desert’ he was about it.

• “Originals believed in truth and honour.” This is actually interesting and I wonder if it will come more into play. We’ve seen that Elijah does seem to hold very tightly to keeping his promises to the letter. I wonder if it’s not just age/custom but that Original vampires are forced to keep their word? Of course the book also says that ‘it is forbidden for a vampire to kill another vampire’ and Elijah certainly hasn’t been keeping to that rule so...

• “There’s no such thing as a bad idea. Just... poorly executed awesome ones.” – Damon. Hee. God that is so Damon.

• I actually enjoyed Bonnie/Jeremy a fair amount this episode. I’m still not really shipping it but Bonnie seems happy, and they have a nice friendship building and Jeremy’s so awkward and they are kind of cute. A couple thoughts:

- Jeremy playing the white knight for Bonnie is still making me role my eyes every time. I’m just like: a) Bonnie is a powerful witch and just because she’s also female doesn’t mean she needs your help, b) you may have a ring to protect you but you’re still human and thus pretty damn helpless. It just rubs me the wrong way. I’m always very much ‘whatever, littlest Gilbert’. So when Jonas Martin came storming into the Gilbert house – and he certainly knows how to make an entrance and exit – and threw Jeremy into a wall and held him pinned there helplessly I laughed. I mean – seriously, Jeremy.

- “Oh, god. (laughs) This is a date.” – Bonnie OMG, that was adorable! I love how she said that. She has this little awkward laugh right after ‘oh, god’ and it was just delightful.

- “Jeremy, I have to make sure Elena’s cool with us before anything happens.” I really liked this. I was worried a bit that we wouldn’t get it. “She’s my best friend. I tell her everything.” Aw. I have to shake my head at Jeremy again though because he seriously thought dating his sister’s best friend wouldn’t change things?

• Jonas taking Bonnie’s power (‘for her own goo’ whatever Jonas) – how the hell does that work? We know Bonnie is a powerful witch and removing someone’s power really doesn’t seem like something that you could do. Perhaps it’s just that he’s blocked her power or her ability to use it?

• “I am your friend, damn it. And you don’t have many friends. So no more lying.” – Alaric. I really liked this moment.

• Poor Jenna and Jenna/Alaric. But seriously they all need to tell her the freaking truth already! I understand why Alaric didn’t say anything, he should bring up telling her the truth with Elena and Jeremy first, and I can’t blame either of them for their reactions but I felt bad for both of them. I found it interesting that Jenna introduced Alaric as “my friend” instead of boyfriend. I mean she has serious feelings for him, he sleeps over... why not ‘boyfriend’? Because of her new John induced confusion and distrust? I wonder if John is going to stick to his word and try to smooth things over between them now that he has his ring?

• “You’re not a gentleman make yourself useful.” – Jenna to John Heh. That just really amused me. I want more of them. I want to know their background.

• John’s plan actually was a really good one. If Elena and Stefan hadn’t gone to the cabin for that weekend, if she hadn’t decided to read through the journals right then... well, then his plan would have worked. Elijah and Damon, two huge threats to him, would be dead and his ally Katherine would have been freed. And he could have played things like he didn’t know the truth about the dagger and it would have even been somewhat believable even.