Monsters of Television

Does anyone do the lovable prick better? Congrats, Uncle John, it's a girl.

There are a lot of sad people in Mystic Falls today. The only person who ended the day feeling satisfied and content, most likely, was Uncle John. Course, he spent most of his life being a shit, so the path from jerk to savior pretty much meant he had to do one selfless thing, you know, ever. I have never made a secret of my love for the actor portraying Uncle John. David Anders has developed a particular gift for being a lovable prick, something he exploited on both Alias and Heroes. His addition to The Vampire Diaires cast delighted me from day one, and each return of his character was met by my cheers. Seeing Uncle John fight to build a relationship with his daughter has been among the more touching developments this season. And Uncle John’s actions this week continued that trend in grand form (don’t worry, no explicit spoilers until after the jump). Uncle John became Elena’s father this week by doing the fundamental act of parenting—anyone can create a baby, but only a parent understands the sacrifice entailed in the day-to-day business of helping a child grow and thrive.

Some of you might be wondering why I have been giving so much attention to Uncle John when other characters demonstrated a similar willingness to sacrifice this week. From Jenna to Bonnie to Stefan, everyone was jumping on the bandwagon to sacrifice themselves for Elena. Heck Elena even was trying to save people, as per usual, fighting to save Jenna. The scenes between Jenna and Elena were particularly effective this week. Having been murdered and turned by Klaus, Jenna was reborn as a vampire in the episode’s earliest moments. Knowing nothing about her new life, Jenna depended on Elena to raise her as a new vampire. They both debated who let the other down more in life, but it became clear that neither woman was going to go out without a fight, hoping against hope to spare the other’s life.

People died. Honestly, it was kind of a bloodbath, complete with blood dripping into Greta’s witch’s potion. As often happens on TVD, characters surprised us and let us down. Everyone was fighting to survive this week, and the stakes have never been higher. Most shocking, it was Matt that delivered one of the night’s most honest moments. In a developing theme, TVD is finally answering for me the profound question, “why would anyone prefer to be a human when they could be a vampire?” The answer is complex, shifting for each character. As it becomes clearer, though, the tragedy that is Stefan and Damon’s afterlife becomes more poignant.

Let’s see—I’m going to try to sum up the night’s primary happenings, inserting a bit of dialogue and commentary as I go. As you may be able to see, I’m trying to develop a hybrid recap/review—what Noel calls my reviewcaps. Hope you like it.

I’ll start with Awesome Vampire Caroline, Matt, and Tyler for a number of reasons. First, I freakin’ love Awesome Vampire Caroline. Second, Tyler had his shirt off for the entire episode, and that was terrific. Third, they pretty much had their own story this week, remaining relatively separate from the bigger happenings elsewhere, so they are easy to separate out as a distinct narrative. Fourth, Matt is becoming a moral center for this show, and for me [who the fuck knew?]. After Elena’s moving confession last week that she had no desire to become a vampire, Matt’s own journey this week confirms some of the bitter pleasure of being just a regular guy.

We pick up where we left off last week, with Tyler as a wolf trying to attack Matt and Awesome Vampire Caroline, trapped in the Lockwood cellar. Caroline is brave, taking the lead in keeping the door from bursting with each push by WolfTyler, but Matt takes matters into his own hands and shoots TylerWolf with his wooden bullets. The wolf collapses, and Awesome Vampire Caroline proves how awesome she is by immediately reminding Matt that, duh, this is their mutual friend. With WolfTyler down for the count, AVC grabs Matt and races out of the cellar, taking refuge in what seems to be the Lockwood mansion.

During their downtime, Awesome Vampire Caroline and Matt come to terms with her realization that he knows the truth and has known it for some time. Worse, she learns that her mom knows, too. “Where does this leave us? Awesome Vampire Caroline asks, cause she is apparently never afraid to ask the hardest questions of all (she’ll do this repeatedly throughout the episode…just like the following…). In the next scene, Awesome Vampire Caroline goes there with the mom issue, “do you think my mom wants to kill me?” Matt, trying to process his feelings, is brutally honest, “I don’t think your mom knows what to do with you.” Awesome Vampire Caroline demonstrates her classic coping mechanism, her tendency to discount herself to make others feel better, with the next line, “I don’t really know what to do with me, either,” she jokes, with a sad smile. Awesome Vampire Caroline knows her world is falling apart—that she is losing her two most important people in the world, yet she makes a joke to make Matt’s comment seem less harsh and her mother’s own prejudice less cruel.

They get interrupted by a sound outside the door. Awesome Vampire Caroline finds Tyler, in human form (totally naked, btw) lying unconscious outside the door. Being Awesome Vampire Caroline, she immediately tries to help him. After she gets Tyler settled, resting comfortably, Matt comments, “so this is your life now,” with a note of sadness and amazement. Again, Awesome Vampire Caroline deflects with humor, “never a dull moment,” she replies. [Gosh, this girl tries sooo hard. It is sweet and touching.] In their resulting conversation, it becomes clear that Matt can’t “get over the whole vampire thing.” He tells Caroline his position, quite plainly: “My life is an absentee mom, a bunch of bills to pay, school, and a job, and it sucks sometimes. But it’s my life, and I think that I just want to live it without all this.”

Here’s why I love this speech so gosh darn much. One of the great ironies within Buffy the Vampire Slayer [yes, I am about to compare TVD to this treasured and acknowledged genius series] is that Buffy, the blonde ditz, would rather be stuck studying sometimes, rather than have to make the really hard and tough choices of a slayer (example of said choices—um, kill my boyfriend or let the world end?). Matt gets the slightest glimpse of the chaos of Awesome Vampire Caroline’s world, and he chooses bills and his part-time job. I mean, isn’t that profound? For me, Matt is acknowledging that despite the romance of Awesome Vampire Caroline’s power and eternal beauty, his normal life is preferable for him.

The thematic links here to both Elena and Damon’s own yearning to be human are inescapable.  [And don’t worry, I will have much more about Damon below, including the impossible trap the show has set for itself with Damon’s half-hearted storyline this season.]   But keeping closely with Matt, I’d like to offer a pre-emptive defense for the possibility that some might read Matt’s rejection of Caroline as “easy” (for the writers, who clearly want the relationship with Tyler to move forward–as I do). Matt’s speech wasn’t elegant (again, TVD isn’t elegant, as Buffy often was), but it is super freakin’ real. Banal is the term a scholar would use. The most ordinary, mundane concerns in life—those are what Matt chooses here. Interestingly, they are what Uncle John chooses for Elena, too…. (more below).

When Tyler wakes up, he finds himself alone with Awesome Vampire Caroline. After she shows him his healing bullet wound, he sorta jokes, “you’re right. I shouldn’t have come home.” Awesome Vampire Caroline being super straight up, counters this, “no, you just shouldn’t have left. And you shouldn’t leave again.” Tyer takes the Awesome Vampire Caroline defense here, continuing his half-joking tone, “you’re kidding, right? This is the second time I’ve tried to kill you.” [Neither Tyler nor Caroline are good at being vulnerable. The fact that they both deflect means they are either perfect for each other or destined to a life of frustration as a couple]. Awesome Vampire Caroline echoes his tone, “well, no friendship is perfect.” Then without much of a beat, she admits, “Matt broke up with me.” Tyler now feels badly for her, but she quickly offers, “yeah, well, you know, instead of just bailing on me, you could just say, ‘thank you Caroline, for taking care of me. And I’m sorry that I tried to chow down on you again.’” [The use of “chow down” is particularly apt here, for with those words, Awesome Vampire Caroline removes the menace from WolfTyler’s attack. She always thinks of other’s feelings.]  Then Caroline breaks the facade, sobbing.  Tyler pulls Awesome Vampire Caroline towards him, and after she eases herself onto his chest away from his wound, he says, “thank you, Caroline, for taking care of me.” It is super cute, super sweet, and I may have unintentionally have let a sigh escape (though I’ll deny it if you bring it up).

In sum, the path has been cleared for a wolf-vampire romance. Unfortunately, that path was cleared in part by the death of another wolf.

Each person that dies this week is going to get a sort of reviewcap eulogy from me. First up is Jules. She apparently suffered from world’s worst choice in boyfriends (she picked that dumbshit who tortured Awesome Vampire Caroline over Uncle Mason?), but it is unfortunate that her attempt to help Tyler lead to her brutal death here. And I mean, brutal. In the moments before Klaus dispatched her, she suffered not only the torture of her body trying to shift into wolf-mode in slo-mo, delayed by a spell (must have felt like bones breaking very, very slowly), but also the torture of regret. She said to Elena that she only wanted to help Tyler, so he wouldn’t be alone. Elena’s dumb ass response? “You must be Jules.” [Um, yeah, lady is about die, Elena, could you muster maybe a word of comfort?] Klaus rips Jules heart from her body, then juices it like a lemon for his moonstone brew. Jules got pretty short shrift in this series—as far as I am concerned, the fact that boring ol’ Rose got way more screen time (and got to bang Damon) than Jules is a huge mistake on the part of the casting agents and writers. We knew her only briefly, but Jules was a tough gal, and I’ll admit that I’ll miss having the chance to know her better.

Let’s move to the evening’s most affecting death. [Well, most affecting for most people (more on my favorite death below).] Once Jenna was turned, the entire episode’s focus shifted to saving her. Elena tried to convince Jenna to run. Stefan offered himself in exchange (Klaus denied him, wanting to save Stefan for some other unstated purpose, that I’m sure may become a larger storyline later). But Jenna got the most interesting storyline of her entire TVD career with this episode. She became a real parent, protecting her ward. I just wish the writers’ had allowed her a more heroic end.

When Jenna comes back to life at the start of the episode, she is (naturally) confused. Elena talks her through the eventual realization, “oh, god. He killed me,” Jenna whispers.  [It is well acted by Sara Canning, btw.] “I’m a vampire,” she says, aghast. [A more elegant show would have taken the time to show how Elena, also facing the future as a vampire, might respond to watching her guardian face the same fate, only sooner, but TVD moves right by this option.] The damn witch, Greta, arrives and offers Jenna her blood to drink. Jenna, being hungry, drinks the blood from Greta’s offered wrist, as Elena watches in horror.

Now that Jenna is a real, confirmed vampire, Elena takes it upon herself to teach Jenna that she has power.  Elena tells Jenna she can overhear Stefan’s conversation with Klaus, when Stefan offers himself in exchange for Jenna. She can be strong and fast, able to escape, should an opportunity arise. She can fight. Jenna learns all these lessons quickly. But the biggest lesson she learns is that her greatest job has been the care entrusted to her by the Gilbert parents—as guardian of Elena and Jeremy. She breaks down momentarily, thinking of her initial fear of taking this responsibility, and Elena quickly reminds her that she’ll feel guilt more strongly as a vampire. She offers Jenna the more persuasive inducement to survive, “we can’t leave Jeremy without a family.”

After Stefan has a brief aside with Klaus, during which Klaus comments, “quite the hero, aren’t you? I’ve heard that about you,” Klaus asks Elena to choose between Jenna and Stefan as his vampire sacrifice. He doesn’t torture her long, admitting “there’s actually no choice.” He stabs Stefan with a stake and knocks him unconscious, saying he has future plans for Stefan. Jenna grows strong and confident, saying to Elena, “It’s all right, Elena. I know what I have to do.” Instead of running, though, Jenna attacks Greta, the witch, biting into her flesh. I had hoped Greta was dead, but it seems Jenna left only a flesh wound. With Klaus on top of her, Jenna is frightened, so Elena begs her to turn off her feelings, saying “you won’t be scared anymore.” Klaus stakes Jenna. All the acting is strong here. The death is meaningful. I just wish Jenna would have more of an opportunity to be a bad ass before she died (twice in one day). Klaus adds her blood to his stew, and the ritual continues.

In the interim, Bonnie and Jeremy have been holed up in their secret layaway. They are researching spells, having learned (somehow) that Elena has Damon’s blood in her. To be honest, I thought their scenes lacked urgency. I mean, they were flirting while a whole bunch of people were dying. Ah, well.

Uncle John arrives at Damon’s house to offer his expertise. Damon, being awesome, comments, “great, I was just thinking about getting a bite to eat.” When Damon admits that Elena is “safe” from death because of Damon’s blood in her system, John is furious. “I know, John, I took her choice, destroyed her future. Trust me, I get it. It actually gets worse,” Damon replies. He is referencing Jenna’s transformation, but we don’t get to see Uncle John’s reaction to that (which I am sure was brilliant).

Uncle John brings the Gilbert journals to Bonnie and Jeremy, who are researching a possible “resuscitation spell.” John knows all about it—a mother with a sick child saved the child by asking Emily to bind the mother’s life force with the child through a spell.  According to the Gilbert journal, the mother’s life force restored the sick child.  So the theory here is that if Bonnie can bind Elena’s life force with her father, her soul will remain intact during her death.

At this moment, I knew the end of this story. I knew Uncle John would die. And I thought it was marvelous.  Because, as a father, Uncle John gave life to Elena as a sort of bystander. He was there for her birth, but it was Isobel that pushed Elena from her body. In this episode, Uncle John gave Elena life a second time—from his own body’s effort. It is a glorious and somewhat daring move—to let a father embrace his life-giving potential as does a woman. In essence, he gave Elena live twice.  Despite having missed much of Elena’s life and upbringing, he became an authentic parent by giving his life force to her’s. (it gets better, just wait…)

Now I suppose I must discuss the ritual. Having killed both Jules (his werewolf) and Jenna (his vampire), Klaus is ready to sacrifice Elena. Stefan has regained consciousness, but is still bound by the stake in his body, unable to rise, despite his most valiant efforts. Elana has watched her guardian die and her lover be incapacitated. She is done. She is ready to become a vampire, if only to avenge herself on Klaus [no dialogue confirms this, btw, this is my interpretation.]

Klaus approaches Elena, thanking her for her sacrifice. She responds, “go to hell.” He bites and drains her, which Stefan watches in agony. While Klaus is in transition, his bones breaking as he transitions to become a werewolf hybrid, Bonnie enters with all of nature’s energy at her disposal. Finally, Bonnie’s efforts seem truly great—she blows Klaus off his feet, charging him with all the pain that she can muster. Damon, meanwhile, snaps Greta’s neck as a kind of afterthought. [Brief aside—Greta’s eulogy. Do we have any reason to understand why Greta is willing to go so far to serve Klaus? Why she left her loving father and brother? Why she is willing to kill humans? Why she is rejecting her witchly service to nature and balance? Nope. Nada. Nothing. She’s a device, little more. Boooo.] Damon picks up Elena, and lays her next to an incapacitated Stefan [a super kind move, I must say.] He removes the stake from Stefan’s back, and Stefan begs Damon to take Elena far away, since Stefan won’t leave until Klaus is dead.

This seems the right time to comment on Elijah’s role in this episode. I have become an Elijah fan. Somewhat unexpectedly. He seemed a huge dork at first (I mean, his hair?). Then he threw that coin through a window, and I realized he had power. When he pulled his first heart out of a chest, I fell in love. Since then, I have hoped the writers would find a way to keep him around. They seem to have found it, but I am not sure I like it.

Earlier in the episode, Stefan had a talk with Elijah about his plan to sacrifice himself to save Jenna. Elijah comments, “you’re very honorable.” And Stefan replies, quickly, “are you? Because this whole plan is contingent on your honor, Elijah.” [True that, Stefan.] When Stefan admits that he, too, has wanted to kill his own brother on countless occasions, but has never been able to do so, Elijah reveals more about why he wants Klaus dead. It seems Klaus killed Elijah’s entire family, scattering their bodies “across the seas” where Elijah could not find them. Elijah affirms his commitment to the plan, saying, “sometimes there’s honor in revenge, Stefan. I won’t fail you.” Stefan begs him, “please end this.”

Bonnie exacts her own type of vengeance upon Klaus, but stops when Elijah steps up to his brother. “In the name of our family,” Elijah says as he forces his fist into Klaus’ chest. A desperate Klaus reveals, “I didn’t bury them at sea…if you kill me, you’ll never find [our family].” Stefan is terrified, worried Elijah will renig. Bonnie, hyped up, promises to kill both of them even if it means her own death. But Elijah grabs Klaus and escapes.  I’m all for keeping Elijah around, but this last minute reveal is a bit weak as far as development goes.  Does Elijah want to find his family to bring them back to life?  Why in the world would he even believe Klaus?  What happened to all of Elijah’s honor?  Sometimes TVD moves the plot at the expense of character integrity.

Jeremy has read further in the Gilbert journals, realizing that Uncle John has sacrificed his own life to save Elena. Uncle John hands Jeremy a letter and his own ring, asking Jeremy to give them to Elena.

Damon brings an unconscious Elena to his home, promising to stake her if she returns as a vampire because “I can’t stand the idea of you hating me forever.” Jeremy and Ric arrive, and Damon has to deliver the bad news about Jenna: “I’m sorry, Jeremy,” he offers stoically. Uncle John sees the unconscious Elena and makes his way to the door of the house. As he walks outside, Elena awakens, revealing that she feels fine. John has a curious look on his face—not quite a smile but seemingly content. He falls to the ground, dead.

Now things get interesting, at least according to the mythology of TVD.

After Elena offers Jeremy a sincere and moving apology for all the people he has lost, he reminds her that he still has Elena.  Elena then reads Uncle John’s letter as she prepares for the burial of John and Jenna. I’ll transcribe the entire thing so I can comment upon its importance below.

“It is no easy task to be an ordinary parent to an extraordinary child. I failed in that task, and because of my prejudices, I failed you. I’m haunted by how things might have played out differently, if I’d been more willing to hear your side of things. For me, it is the end. For you, a chance to grow old and someday do better with your own child than I did with mine. It’s for that child that I give you my ring. I don’t ask for your forgiveness or for you to forget. I ask only that you believe this—whether you are now reading this as a human or as a vampire, I love you all the same, as I’ve always loved you and always will.”

Wow!

Elena can now die knowing that all her parents—her adopted and birth parents—loved her truly. Uncle John has become noble in death. But he has also planted a seed. A dangerous seed for Elena/Stefan fans. He gave her a ring for her human child. This child, something Elena mentioned last week as one reason she didn’t want to die—is now a partial presence, embodied by the ring. Elena’s father has offered her the prospect that she, too, will produce a child that must be protected, and the ring will help achieve that.

I couldn’t help but think of Twilight again (as I did last week). The only happy solution to this problem is to give Elena a half vampire, half human child. But as we saw in Twilight, that likely kills the mother. I’m not sure TVD can go that gothic. And John’s letter, whatever its other effects, will remind Elena that like Matt, she has a stake in remaining human.  The future her father envisions for her in his goodbye letter is one that does not provide a space for Stefan.

Would you believe this episode is not yet over?

Damon walks away from the funeral of John and Jenna, trying to escape. Stefan stops him, saying, “she needs us right now, all of us.” Damon, who has remained silent about his wolf bite with everyone but Katherine, replies, “the curse is broken. How does one go about killing an all-powerful wolf-vampire, and his two-faced older brother?” Stefan replies honestly, “I have no idea.” Damon won’t accept this answer, “Well, you need to get an idea. Fast.” Stefan assures Damon, “I’m not going to let Elena lose anybody else.” Damon, knowingly, says, “I wouldn’t make any promises, brother.” Showing his festering wound, Damon says simply, “Tyler Lockwood bit me.”

Stefan is shocked by Damon’s reveal. And he is destroyed by it. “We kept Elena human, right? We found a way when there was no way—hey, I will do this,” Stefan says, promising to find a cure for Damon. Damon has no hope to spare, so he suggests, “wanna do something for me? Keep this from Elena. The last thing she needs is another grave to mourn.”

And thus we end the episode with the season finale being all about Damon.

Here’s the thing. We have gotten great possibilities for character development for Damon this season. He had that emotional session with Elena, where he admitted his love and then compelled it away. He had the anguished scene where he admitted to a stranger that he missed being human, then he killed that poor stranger. He’s been snacking on and traumatizing the reporter for the entirety of their relationship. And he’s been hiding his own mortality here.  These are all links in a chain that have not been fully connected by this season.  Apparently, it all comes down to the final episode.

I haven’t yet commented on Damon’s conversation with Katherine at the beginning of the episode. But perhaps it is appropriate here. Damon, knowing he is going to die, remarks to Katherine, with no small degree of amazement, “somehow you’re the only one that wins. How’d that happen?” She answers, “I didn’t let love get in the way.” Damon leaves her, “enjoy eternity alone, Katherine,” but Damon is somewhat alone right now, too, isn’t he?  Has love led him to a better place?

Here’s the rub. This was a TERRIFIC episode of TVD. We got serious action, moving sacrifice/death, powerful character choices. Yet the second season seems to be coming down to saving Damon. So, here’s what I need, as a faithful viewer and Damon lover.

Somehow, in one episode, The Vampire Diaries has to find a way to reconcile the following:

Damon’s yearning to be human.
Damon’s decision mid-season to return to killing/feeding on humans.
Damon’s decision to end Elena’s human life.
Damon’s eternal battle with Stefan for the love of a woman.
Damon’s passion for Katherine (who remains, it seems, trapped in Alaric’s apartment)

That is a lot to achieve in the last episode. I suppose they could find a way to save Damon so that season 3 becomes a real battle for Damon’s goodness (i.e. Katherine finds a way to save him from dying of a the wolf bite, but only at great expense to Damon’s humanity), which would work. But I’m not sure they’ve handled this storyline effectively. Damon’s personal battle has gotten short shrift of late, and it is a shame. When you have an actor like Ian Somerhalder, you give him great material, people. I’m hopeful for the finale. Based on this week, it seems, they want to leave certain issues (like the Klaus/Elijah alliance) for next season, but that means Damon needs to form a new relationship with Elena in the finale for the last episode to be dramatic. I hope they go there.

Random Thoughts:

*Does anyone in Mystic Falls have a parent?  They better never show us Bonnie’s Dad, or we’ll know his days are numbered.

*Presume Katherine is still hanging out in that apartment, trapped?  Eventually, lady is gonna run out of liquor, and then there will be no more dancing.

*Sheriff Forbes is a plot point left hanging…for next season perhaps?

*Did Stefan’s heroic attempt to sacrifice himself lose some of its luster since we saw Damon attempt the exact same thing last week?  Course, Damon has been trying to kill Bonnie for weeks, so there’s little noble in his efforts.

*Ric isn’t dead!  I’m so relieved.  Course, he’s going to be pretty sad for a while, but I’m glad both Bonnie and Damon recognized that Ric is too important to lose.

*As far as points in the “Con” category for being a vampire, we now have boredom, being stuck with particular aholes forever, not being able to procreate (well, vampires create other vampires, but in this mythology, they can be pretty far removed form the process), feeling bad thoughts deeply, knowing your girlfriend will have to break up with you at some point if she ever wants a human life.