100 Reviews: 41
Sep. 13th, 2012 11:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jedi_of_urthHey everybody, it’s an episode where I have an excuse to talk about Elijah, let’s see how wordy it gets.
TVD: 3x08: Ordinary People
Actually, the interesting thing to me is how Elijah seems to be a bigger presence in the modern day stuff than the flashbacks. Although considering it seriously looks like they had DG for about a day so you can play “I’m totally in this episode” with him, it’s not very weird.
But there’s a lot of echoes of 2x19 here (you know, that episode that I rambled on about a LOT), and largely from Elena’s side. The last time she cornered an Original and got them to tell her a chunk of their backstory she was dealing with Elijah and his increasingly less subtle ~feelings for her (no I don’t think she knows what those feelings are but by the end it was really obvious he cared about her). And the fact that she never really seems to have held the whole not killing Klaus when he said he would thing against him she still puts that one down in the win column. I also feel like Rebekah’s over there cataloging every time Elena’s like “Elijah told me about...” as part of her later stance that Elena and Elijah are pathetic about each other.
However, Beks I like you but as I discussed here honor =/= morality so people need to stop saying Elijah is moral. Sure he is after a fashion, but as a defining characteristic it shouldn’t need to be “after a fashion” it should just be. I might almost believe Finn was moral, hell I’d be willing to hear someone have a headcanon that Kol was incredibly moral once upon a time and he couldn’t reconcile the different demands of morality especially with survival as a vampire so now he’s just a little shithead because he can handle that, and Elijah’s honor does muddy the waters of morality; but saying his strongest trait is his morality is just inaccurate even when the show does it. *I* remember the things he’s done, I expect the show to remember too.
It’s also too bad they hadn’t cast Finn and Kol yet, though it does leave some wiggle room on why Elijah isn’t in some scenes since the family wasn’t all together. I always thought it was a little ridiculous that the only new members of the family we met here were Henrick and Esther both of who I assumed we wouldn’t see again. And while we did end up with Esther showing up in modern times, the fact that the whole family is going to show up in just a few episodes kind of makes it a different sort of silly that we don’t get them here. It’s not like the show has shied away from introducing plot points in flashback before, or even this season.
And if I’m going to AU this I’d probably have Rebekah go off and undagger the others at this point because...why wouldn’t she? If I were Rebekah the first person I’d turn to with this new knowledge of events is Elijah. Yeah, maybe not emo Finn (who one assumes is off chasing Sage during Ether’s funeral) or shithead Kol, but Elijah would be only logical to turn to. While I didn’t necessarily put it in those terms the first time around I kind of felt like this was here to prepare us for brining Elijah back into the story, unfortunately we still had to wait a few more episodes.
You know, I don’t really have much to say about the plot outside of the Originals, which makes since this was really their episode. The Stefan and Damon plot is interesting, and I feel like I should have thoughts on it but I kind of don’t. I do love it when Alaric gets to slide into the Watcher role. I think Damon and Elena are incredibly sibling like here so the attempts to sexualize their very siblingy vibe is kind of disturbing (yes I recognize the irony that I ship Elena/Alaric).
But I guess I have a couple things to say about Elena, because I usually do. I think the last scene with Damon is very telling about her attitude to the Salvatore drama. Damon refuses to accept her not at all subtle signals to leave her alone so she just stops fighting; not accepts that she’s cool with it, just loses the energy to fight him for her own choice. Which is really...ug after she’d had so much agency in dealing with Rebekah all episode. And she out right says she out of energy to fight with him over Stefan, she’s just tired of it all. When she’s more engaged with Rebekah I really have a hard time seeing the appeal of her relationship with the Salvatores.
Plus her ability identify with Rebekah in the end is really very interesting. It’s very human to view Rebekah’s problems in how they’re like her own, and I’d argue that even more than the dead moms side it’s Rebekah’s stance that she’s not going to reject Klaus because she doesn’t want to be alone that really gets to Elena. But also interesting that while she does find the ability to identify with Rebekah, there’s never that moment where she just *gets* it like she does with Elijahbut that’s because she and Elijah are totally right for each other in *getting* it.
Oh yeah, one minor complaint in a review that’s been fairly positive even if I don’t have real strong feelings on this episode (besides the Elijah factor and just Original family feels). This episode sets up the idea that it’s going to be Stefan’s love for Damon that’s going to matter more than his love for Elena. And while that sort of plays into the next episode it ultimate doesn’t pan out in the greater saving Stefan from himself plot. Because in the end it is Elena that brings him back to (a more douchey version of) his old self. And at this point I was happy to see the show focusing on other types of love than romantic (Bonnie and Jeremy were broken up, Caroline and Tyler were on the outs, Elena was tired of dealing with the Salvatores, Alaric didn’t have a love interest, nor did Matt, they weren’t giving the Originals love interests at this point, unless you count Rebekah who wasn’t actually pursuing Stefan at this point), but unfortunately t cold stick with it and actually give us a plot that didn’t ultimately come own to romance.
And I say this as someone who I think we all know does enjoy shipping, but since I don’t have many ships I care about on this show I end up being the type wishing for less of it. Hypocritical? Maybe a touch, but if I own that can I still complain?
Next time:
I probably ought to round out the first act of s3 and do 3x09, but we’ll see.
You’re always welcome to suggest stuff
TVD: 3x08: Ordinary People
Actually, the interesting thing to me is how Elijah seems to be a bigger presence in the modern day stuff than the flashbacks. Although considering it seriously looks like they had DG for about a day so you can play “I’m totally in this episode” with him, it’s not very weird.
But there’s a lot of echoes of 2x19 here (you know, that episode that I rambled on about a LOT), and largely from Elena’s side. The last time she cornered an Original and got them to tell her a chunk of their backstory she was dealing with Elijah and his increasingly less subtle ~feelings for her (no I don’t think she knows what those feelings are but by the end it was really obvious he cared about her). And the fact that she never really seems to have held the whole not killing Klaus when he said he would thing against him she still puts that one down in the win column. I also feel like Rebekah’s over there cataloging every time Elena’s like “Elijah told me about...” as part of her later stance that Elena and Elijah are pathetic about each other.
However, Beks I like you but as I discussed here honor =/= morality so people need to stop saying Elijah is moral. Sure he is after a fashion, but as a defining characteristic it shouldn’t need to be “after a fashion” it should just be. I might almost believe Finn was moral, hell I’d be willing to hear someone have a headcanon that Kol was incredibly moral once upon a time and he couldn’t reconcile the different demands of morality especially with survival as a vampire so now he’s just a little shithead because he can handle that, and Elijah’s honor does muddy the waters of morality; but saying his strongest trait is his morality is just inaccurate even when the show does it. *I* remember the things he’s done, I expect the show to remember too.
It’s also too bad they hadn’t cast Finn and Kol yet, though it does leave some wiggle room on why Elijah isn’t in some scenes since the family wasn’t all together. I always thought it was a little ridiculous that the only new members of the family we met here were Henrick and Esther both of who I assumed we wouldn’t see again. And while we did end up with Esther showing up in modern times, the fact that the whole family is going to show up in just a few episodes kind of makes it a different sort of silly that we don’t get them here. It’s not like the show has shied away from introducing plot points in flashback before, or even this season.
And if I’m going to AU this I’d probably have Rebekah go off and undagger the others at this point because...why wouldn’t she? If I were Rebekah the first person I’d turn to with this new knowledge of events is Elijah. Yeah, maybe not emo Finn (who one assumes is off chasing Sage during Ether’s funeral) or shithead Kol, but Elijah would be only logical to turn to. While I didn’t necessarily put it in those terms the first time around I kind of felt like this was here to prepare us for brining Elijah back into the story, unfortunately we still had to wait a few more episodes.
You know, I don’t really have much to say about the plot outside of the Originals, which makes since this was really their episode. The Stefan and Damon plot is interesting, and I feel like I should have thoughts on it but I kind of don’t. I do love it when Alaric gets to slide into the Watcher role. I think Damon and Elena are incredibly sibling like here so the attempts to sexualize their very siblingy vibe is kind of disturbing (yes I recognize the irony that I ship Elena/Alaric).
But I guess I have a couple things to say about Elena, because I usually do. I think the last scene with Damon is very telling about her attitude to the Salvatore drama. Damon refuses to accept her not at all subtle signals to leave her alone so she just stops fighting; not accepts that she’s cool with it, just loses the energy to fight him for her own choice. Which is really...ug after she’d had so much agency in dealing with Rebekah all episode. And she out right says she out of energy to fight with him over Stefan, she’s just tired of it all. When she’s more engaged with Rebekah I really have a hard time seeing the appeal of her relationship with the Salvatores.
Plus her ability identify with Rebekah in the end is really very interesting. It’s very human to view Rebekah’s problems in how they’re like her own, and I’d argue that even more than the dead moms side it’s Rebekah’s stance that she’s not going to reject Klaus because she doesn’t want to be alone that really gets to Elena. But also interesting that while she does find the ability to identify with Rebekah, there’s never that moment where she just *gets* it like she does with Elijah
Oh yeah, one minor complaint in a review that’s been fairly positive even if I don’t have real strong feelings on this episode (besides the Elijah factor and just Original family feels). This episode sets up the idea that it’s going to be Stefan’s love for Damon that’s going to matter more than his love for Elena. And while that sort of plays into the next episode it ultimate doesn’t pan out in the greater saving Stefan from himself plot. Because in the end it is Elena that brings him back to (a more douchey version of) his old self. And at this point I was happy to see the show focusing on other types of love than romantic (Bonnie and Jeremy were broken up, Caroline and Tyler were on the outs, Elena was tired of dealing with the Salvatores, Alaric didn’t have a love interest, nor did Matt, they weren’t giving the Originals love interests at this point, unless you count Rebekah who wasn’t actually pursuing Stefan at this point), but unfortunately t cold stick with it and actually give us a plot that didn’t ultimately come own to romance.
And I say this as someone who I think we all know does enjoy shipping, but since I don’t have many ships I care about on this show I end up being the type wishing for less of it. Hypocritical? Maybe a touch, but if I own that can I still complain?
Next time:
I probably ought to round out the first act of s3 and do 3x09, but we’ll see.
You’re always welcome to suggest stuff
