Monsters of Television

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There are a bunch of reasons to celebrate this new episode of The Vampire Diaries, especially after last week’s (rare) disappointment.  It primarily features an extended conversation between Elena and Elijah during which many (many) secrets were revealed. Plots were twisted. Relationships started to come undone. Bodies were exchanged. And Damon seemed determined to play this his own way, which could make for some good drama in the last three episodes.

Let’s review the best parts of “Klaus” in a top 10 list, shall we? (spoiler alert—couldn’t avoid revealing major plot points in this list, so read at your own risk if you haven’t seen the episode).

Top 10 Reasons “Klaus” Ruled Me

10) Katherine got drunk and danced around! Also, Damon sort of helped her, which means she owes him. Not a bad marker to hold.

9) Bonnie was nowhere to be seen. (Of course, Awesome Vampire Caroline and Uncle John were also MIA, so there’s bad with the good).

8 ) Flashbacks are back! The costumes are the best parts of the flashback. Did you just love how they managed to put Klaus in a leather jacket that still seemed reasonably period-appropriate?

7) Ric is back—sort of. I think. Or rather, I’m hopeful. Looks like we’re getting more Damon/Ric bromance style banter next week, too. Love. It.

6) Klaus is back—in his own body. And he seems way hotter with shorter hair.

5) Elijah is back! Elijah has grown on me in a way that only Awesome Vampire Caroline rivals. He’s funny, smart, and super focused. Plus, dude doesn’t let anyone F with him.

4) Damon was super pissy all episode. He’s so sexy when all hot and bothered.

3) Jenna knows the truth! About damn time.

2) Damon and Stefan fought a lot. Much though I believe the real love story in this show is the relationship between Stefan and Damon, both characters come alive when in conflict. Makes for an exciting, tense episode.

And number 1? After the jump…

1) The Sun and Moon Curse is totally made up! I loved this twist. I never got the whole “we have to end this curse even though we all have secret rings and walk around in the daytime anyway but will pretend there’s urgency to this plot point” thing. The idea that Klaus and Elijah made the curse up to manipulate vampires and werewolves to do their dirty week is a riot. Of course, related to this big reveal is the secret that Elijah is Klaus’ brother and that Klaus is half vampire and half werewolf…sort of. More about that below.

After Elijah comes back to life (the effects makeup was pretty good here, gotta say), he finds he can’t breath. It took a moment for Elena (and me) to figure out the trouble—of course! He’s a vampire that hasn’t been invited in. [Clever—glad the writers’ acknowledged that.] Elijah, slowly coming back to form from the rather crispy embers of his tattered, dead self, races outside the Salvatore mansion. Elena does not invite him in, and they both ask each other, “can I trust you?”  Elena hands Elijah the ashy dagger.

The justification for all of this week’s flashbacks was Elijah’s effort to fill in Elena about his past, in particular his motivation to kill Klaus. All the flashbacks occur in 1492, and I gotta admit, I got a bit lost. I kept asking, is Katherine human in 1492? Why is Elijah such a dork? Why does Katherine have a British accent? Ah well, details. Basic gist—Klaus needed the doppleganger, Elijah helped him build a relationship with Katherine, even as Elijah began to feel a pitter-pat in his heart each time he looked as the (super girlie) Katerina.

Damon is saying goodbye to Andie at the door, begging for a little bit of breakfast: “How’s the shoulder? Any time for a bite, I am soo hungry”. She is super straight faced when she reminds him that if he bites her, it will get really messy, so he kisses her, and off she goes. Stefan is less than pleased when he views their exchange. “What are you doing?” he asks Damon, “she’s not a wind up toy.” They both get distracted from this discussion of vampire-human relationship ethics when they notice Elena is nowhere to be seen and the door to the basement is open. They dash downstairs to find Elijah’s body gone and the room empty. “No, she didn’t,” Damon quips.

Klaus/Ric sends his witch off to retrieve his body. Seems he has grown tired of Ric’s hot bod. Klaus messes with Katherine as he explains that he has to kill the doppleganger in her place of birth, hence his continued presence in town. Katherine is super pissy that Klaus is keeping her trapped, and it is funny to watch.

Elijah and Elena begin a gentle dance of negotiation. He reminds her, “your ability to make demands is long past.” But Elena notes that they need each other. Stefan calls Elena, rather distraught that she has returned Elijah to life, but she assures him, “Elijah is a noble man, Stefan. He lives by a code of honor, I can trust him.” [Gotta admit, I found this fascinating. If it is true, it makes Elijah a pretty cool vampire, akin to Godric on True Blood, a vampire that has lived long enough to know there is a better way to live than being an animal. That some rules are in place for a reason.] Trust still being in flux, Elijah opens his hand, reaching for Elena’s cell phone, which she gives to him.

Damon and Stefan fight about Elena’s plan. Stefan tells Damon they both need to trust her, but Damon will have none of it, thinking her way will get her killed. “I said, back off,” Stefan warns Damon with steely eyes. The tension between them only builds throughout the hour.

In flashback land, Elijah introduces a human Katherine to Klaus. Back then, he wanted to help his brother achieve….whatever nefarious plan he had in mind.

Elena and Elijah visit the Lockwood mansion cause Elijah needs some new clothes (coming back from the dead really wrecks a person’s signature look). Elijah had found a way to stop giving Carol Lockwood verveine [convenient, that], so he knows he can compel her to help him get a new suit. [Love that after being dead for a few weeks, Elijah’s first act is to get better clothes.]

Jenna calls Stefan because she’s noticed both Jeremy and Elena have not been home in a while [she’s a great guardian, that one]. She also mentions that she has plans to see Ric at the Grill. Stefan hates this idea, of course, and when he realizes Jenna is at the Gilbert house, he rushes off to save her from impending doom.

Damon and an increasingly amusing Andie, meanwhile, go to what I presume is Ric’s apartment to investigate. Or, in Damon speak, they’re “splitting off from the team, going rogue.”

Back to Elena and the newly undead undead, Elijah is a bit bummed his witch is dead. The flashback here reveals that Klaus and Elijah are brothers [I smell a parallel structure narrative coming on…Does this mean Damon = Klaus?]. With this reveal out there, Elijah taunts, “I’m a little behind on the times, but I believe the term you are searching for is ‘OMG’.” [Elijah and Awesome Vampire Caroline need to meet and have an Awesome vampire baby.]

Damon and Andie find Katherine at Ric’s. She’s awkwardly relieved to see Damon. Andie walks right in to the apartment as if she owns it.

Stefan arrives at the Gilbert home to find Klaus/Ric has already arrived. Not good.

Elijah tells Elena his family are the Original vampires, from them came all other vampires. He does not go into details about how that transformation happened, alas, but we do learn he had six siblings [so much hijinx with other Originals may be in our future, TVD fans.]  “Our origin as vampires is a very long story, Elena.  Just know, we’re the oldest vampires in the world.”

Damon gives Katherine a small vial of verveine, noting that as long as Klaus hasn’t compelled her to “do absolutely everything he says until the end of time,” she has a way to get around his orders. “You owe me, and I will collect,” he tells Katherine.

Klaus/Ric plays all kinds of mind games with Stefan as he slices some vegetables with a big ol’ chef’s knife. “Do you want to tell her, or shall I?” he asks calmly. When Stefan doesn’t reply, he asks Jenna if she believes in vampires: “I’m obsessed with vampires,” Klaus/Ric offers.

Elijah discusses the difficulty of killing an Original, nothing that “the witches won’t allow anything truly immortal to walk the earth. Every creature must have a weakness in order to maintain balance.” The flashback shows us Elijah and Klaus admiring “Aztec” scrolls describing the Sun and Moon curse. The brothers laugh over their various scroll drawings when the camera cuts back to the present.: “Easiest way to discover the existence of a doppleganger and to get your hands on some long lost moonstone is to have every single member of two warring species on the lookout…The curse of the Sun and Moon is fake. It doesn’t exist.”

Jenna gets annoyed by Klaus/Ric rambling on and on about vampires and werewolves, so she tells him to get out of her house. Her anger is pretty firm, giving me hope she can become a real character someday. Klaus/Ric isn’t quite ready to leave though, so Stefan shoves him to the wall with his vampire speed, turns to Jenna with his vampire vein-y eyes and orders Jenna, “I said go!” She does. Go, that is. Then Stefan starts kicking the crap out of poor Ric’s Klaus-infested body since killing Ric’s body would do Stefan little good.

After Elena recovers from her shock that the whole “Sun and Moon curse” thing was just a big ol’ lie, a hyped up PR campaign to advance Klaus’ goals, Elijah assures her that there is indeed a curse—just not that one. The curse is on Klaus alone, it seems. During the entirety of this speech, Elena’s phone is ringing in Klaus’ breast pocket—it is super distracting and annoying—to Elijah and the audience. He reluctantly hands Elena her phone. When she learns Jenna now “knows,” she says she must go to her. Elijah wants a reason to trust Elena that she’ll come back. She offers her word, but he explains, “that doesn’t mean anything to me until you live up to it.” [The Elijah/Elena relationship is getting more interesting—hope the show develops it.]

Another flashback shows Katherine pouting that Klaus never came home, leaving her to spend the day with boring ol’ Elijah. Katherine is confused—it is basically a faux Renaissance version of “he’s just not that into you.” Expressing naïve platitudes that only mean something to teenage girls, Katherine says to Elijah, “true love is not real when it is not returned.” He replies, “I do not believe in love,” like the toughened vampire that he is. Klaus arrives with his white tunic open and bloody (still wearing that leather jacket), and takes Katherine away from Elijah.

Jenna is distraught and having trouble processing the truth about vampires when Elena arrives. “I should have told you, “ she admits to Jenna. [BIG FREAKIN’ “DUH,” Elena.] When Jenna learns that Jeremy and even awful Uncle John knew the truth before her, Elena feebly explains, “we were just trying to protect you.” At this point, Jenna shows that there is a character somewhere hiding in there, bemoaning, “I should be protecting you!” Then she gets real honest, “I’m scared.” Stefan is listening outside the door, looking sad. [It is a good scene. There really is nothing Elena can say to explain, and there is no way to make it better for Jenna. But I would have loved to see more of this scene—of Elena trying to explain Isabelle, Ric, John, Stefan, even that old reporter beau of Jenna’s. But as Elena later says, she only scratched the surface of the present moment’s complexity with Jenna. I hope they let this reveal go on for a bit—let’s see how someone deals with their world being changes for a less good reason. Both Elena and Jeremy were kinda in love with vampires when they found out, so they were automatically disposed to love them. Jenna has no such stake, and it would be neat to see how her world being overturned plays out.]

Damon is unhappy to see Elena leaving Jenna to return to Elijah. Stefan steps in, telling Damon to let her go. As she leaves, Damon turns to Stefan, “that’s twice today you stood in my way. I wouldn’t try a third.”

Klaus/Ric returns from the ass whooping he got from Stefan super eager to get the hell out of the history teacher’s body. Another random African American witch notes that Ric does have a nice body, though. [True that.]

Elena returns to Elijah and gets right down to business: “tell me, what is Klaus’ curse?” Elijah explains that after they became vampires (again, no word on how that happened), they learned why their dad had never been really nice to Klaus. Turns out, Klaus is only Elijah’s half brother—mom had an affair with a dude that carried the werewolf gene. So Klaus has the potential to be both a vampire AND a werewolf [at this point, my partner jokes, “didn’t they make a whole series of movies about this called Underworld?] Alas, “nature would not stand for such an imbalance of power,” Elijah notes, so the witches made Klaus’ werewolf side dormant. [At this point, my curiosity about witches is exploding. These witches seem to have a shit ton of power, so whey are they all serving as bitch to random vampires? They really need a union.] Klaus wants to lift the curse that would free his werewolf side. Oh, and that ashy dagger won’t work on Klaus cause even though he can’t turn into a werewolf, his genes allow him to heal from penetration by a steel blade [again, convenient mythology]. So, Klaus is in town to get his wolfie mojo on. He needs a moonstone, a doppleganger, and a full moon. Yet during his transition, he will be weak, and Elijah believes a witch can take him down.

Oh! And bonus! In a flashback we learn that Elijah got the witches to figure out a way to spare the doppleganger even while lifting Klaus’ curse. Klaus is not interested to hear this: “she is human. Her life means nothing.” Discovering that his brother feels for Katherine, Klaus suggests, “love is a vampire’s greatest weakness.” As if the point wasn’t already clear enough, Elena comments gently to Elijah, “you cared about her, didn’t you?” Saving the moment from being super dumb, Elijah replies, “It is a common mistake, I’m told—it’s one I won’t make again.” In other words, the Salvatore brothers may be suckers for a doppleganger, but Elijah won’t fall prey to that lure.

Stefan again lectures Damon on his treatment of Andie. “She’s a person, you’re victimizing her.” Damon is tired of being lectured to, so he goes there. Yes, there. “She keeps me from going for what I really want.” Stefan is rather nonplussed: “You can be in love with Elena all you want, if it means that you will protect her.” Then he hits Damon with the awful truth, “But I have the one thing you never will…. her respect.” A big fight erupts between the brothers as Elena and Elijah walk in.

Flashback: Klaus runs into the room, upset, telling Elijah that Katherine has disappeared: “what have you done? What did you tell her?” Klaus is super upset. He threatens to kill Elijah [unclear if this is the moment that Elijah stops ‘shipping for Klaus.]

Elijah tells Stefan and Damon he’s happy to help, on one condition—he wants an apology. Stefan complies, saying he is sorry for the role he played in Klaus’ death [man, that was a good episode, wasn’t it?], but he explains that he would do anything to protect Elena. Elena is pleased—Bonnie will be able to kill Klaus without hurting herself [really? Did we learn how?] or Elena. “Told you I’d find another way,” she informs the brothers. Damon is not so eager. “You’re trusting him,” pointing to Elijah. “I am,” Elena replies with confidence. “You can all go to hell,” Damon shouts, and leaves the room.

Andie is in Damon’s room, wearing only her underwear, ‘natch. He is not in the mood. “I’m upset, you know what happens when I’m upset,” he cries to Andie, but she holds firm. She explains that Damon did not compel her to leave, so she is here to show him that someone cares about him. This sends Damon over the edge, so he takes a big bite out of Andie. “Get out of here before I kill you,” he mutters, blood running from his lips. [My notes indicate here, “aw, let him kill her.” Not because I don’t like Andie, but because I need to see Damon sell that soul he keeps on the market at a bargain price. If we’re going to see the extension of that reveal, that Damon wants to be human (an impossible dream), then I want to see him just give up and become evil (like Klaus, his spiritual doppleganger in this episode)]

Back at Ric’s apartment, the witches have done their spell, the candles’ flames grow brighter, and Ric’s eyes open. “Elena?” he says weakly, staring at Katherine. Then he falls to the floor. The witches open a big box, and out walks Klaus, back in his real body.