100 Reviews: 49
Oct. 2nd, 2012 06:08 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jedi_of_urthOkay guys, it’s finally come to this.
TVD: 3x15: All My Children
Let’s state this up front:
1) I LOVE this episode, flaws and all (I definitely don’t deny that it has flaws).
2) This is the last episode of the season I have that reaction to.
Of course, maybe on rewatch without the pressing fear of my baby Elijah being killed I may like it better. On the other hand I know where it’s leading on the other plots too...
(Let’s also say this, yes I wrote most of this last night but I needed to sleep on it and make sure my rambling glee made some kind of sense. I think it makes...enough sense, if not perfect sense.)
This is my go-to episode when I’m trying to pester my muses awake. It doesn’t always work as I always have to be reminded that the parts I love boil down to about half a dozen scenes in the grand scheme of things but those scenes give me ALL THE FEELINGS. There are other scenes that give me lots of feelings too, but of the ‘the Salvatores are awful people’ sort, which are sometimes inspiring too if for some reason I need to be reminded why I feel the way I do about them.
Back in my initial reaction post to this episode I said that I was reserving judgment on a lot of the Stefan stuff because while it was just kind of iffy here it had the potential to get really sucky; and low and behold, it did. The show forgot all about how it started off the season with Stefan’s backstory about ‘yeah Lexi got him off human blood and then spent decades teaching him to smile again’ which was one of the most reasonable things the show had ever set up for Stefan. The show should basically have ignored the Triangle drama for the rest of the season and let Stefan focus on sorting himself out and give Elena a chance to try and get some distance from them so she could get some perspective, and could have told an interesting story with Damon figuring out whether he wanted to be a better man even if he didn’t win Elena with it. Make them still have to work together on the Alaric stuff and I suppose that kill all the Originals plan, but don’t make all of their stories ABOUT the Triangle.
Unfortunately, they will.
This, like so many of the coming episodes, convinces me that certainly the boys love each other but fails to convince me they love Elena. And yet from this point on the entire Triangle is going to be framed in the context of “who will Elena choose” when I don’t think she actually likes either of them anymore but she and everyone else think she MUST choose from those two.
Can I jump on that?
Not yet
This episode is just BAD for convincing me the boys love Elena. They utterly refuse to listen to her in the opening. Damon wants to tie her up to keep her from having an attack of conscience. They both know she’d rather die than let anything happen to Bonnie but they’re both perfectly willing ignore that fact. And do you need me to go on another rant about how Stefan letting Damon take the fall for him does *not* absolve him of responsibility? And just everything about the way they talk about her in the car scene (and almost as much in the last scene) is gross; it’s as if she’s a doll, push button combo X and she picks Damon, button combo Y and she goes for Stefan, which ties in with the thinking that how only choices are A or B and nothing else ever. I’m sorry but she’d be well within her rights to hate both of you for talking about her like this (and that you’re both to blame for what happens).
Now?
Got some more things to get to first.
This episode is more or less responsible for my crack ship of Finn/Bonnie even though they never actually speak to each other ever. I guess I just feel like they both have issues that would be interesting to see them discuss. Like Bonnie would kind of get Finn’s issues but tell him he can still find hope, and Finn would get Bonnie’s issues but tell her she can learn from her mistakes for a better future. I don’t know that they would actually work, and we never will, but the idea found me here and I found I liked it.
I still feel like the scene between Elena, Caroline and by extension Bonnie rubs me the wrong way. But I think the only person I’m mad at is Caroline. Bonnie is allowed to feel what she needs to feel, and Elena had the best of intentions, but the way Caroline intercedes doesn’t work for me. And a lot of it boils down to the thing about Bonnie always ending up the one that gets hurt. And...no, just no. If Bonnie herself said that it would be wrong but understandable given her state at the moment, but for Caroline to say it; NO. If we’re going to do a measure of how much shit these characters have in their lives, then compared to the other two Bonnie’s gotten off EASY.
Like I said, Bonnie’s allowed to be as angry if she wants at whoever she feels she needs to be angry at; but blaming Elena is blaming the victim here. She was the one whose life was threatened and what happened to Abby happened not because of something Elena did but because of the lengths the guys will go to to protect her.
Now, if the point had been that Elena HAD caused this by spilling the beans to Elijah that would have been a valid point to have (although still a few steps removed from her being to blame for what happened). I’m not entirely sure Elena could deny it if Bonnie/Caroline accused her of that because
Eh hem.
Sorry, I’m stepping on your turf without being ready to hand it off yet.
But, even if they had even accused her of getting what she wanted (saving Elijah) at the cost of Abby becoming a vampire it would have been *A* point, maybe not a very good one, but a point I didn’t feel as much need to call bullshit on as the idea presented here that Bonnie suffers the most. Because even if Elena *had* been okay with this trade off she’s still got one Original vowing revenge and another using her as a human blood bag, that leaves HER with a pretty high cost of saving the one who she happens to like.
Is it my turn now?
I probably could keep going about the Salvatores, and I have some other points I thought I’d hit...but I ought to let you out.
So yeah from here on out lots of Elijah and Elijah/Elena talk
The thing I love about this episode is that there is no good way out of the situation at hand, and at the heart of that is Elijah. Which is why we all think of this as an Elijah episode when, if one thinks about it objectively, he’s not actually in it that much. Not only is he the one driving a lot of what happens when he’s not around but he’s the most in touch with the complicated morality at work here.
Elijah and Elena are the only ones who truly act like they’re caught between a rock and a hard place with what’s happening. Bonnie for a few seconds there when she realizes it’s come down to her (she assumes) life or Elena’s but she barely even has time to ask the question before the solution has been doled out by the others. For the Salvatores there’s just no question, even when they talk about how they could choose to go through with the ritual and sacrifice Elena you know they won’t, and they don’t really even talk about whether killing Abby (or even Bonnie) is even a question beyond how it will upset Elena; that’s not morally complex, it’s just morally questionable that so few people on this show will ever actually question.
After THE scene between Elena and Elijah her stake in the moral questions kind of fades into the background, but up to that point you can see her struggling with it. After the fact she realized that she wasn’t really comfortable with the cost of Esther’s solution (and as far as she knows that’s just Elijah, she doesn’t know what it would do to everyone else) and she would very much like it if someone else would understand that; but everyone else finds Esther’s plan perfectly acceptable.
I actually do have to question why she goes off with Elijah when he shows up. Because given her attitude in the previous scenes there was no way she was going to be able to keep the lie up. Which is kind of why I feel she lets the others blame her in the end (aside from the fact that she’s pretty prone to blaming herself for things if they are even fractionally her fault), because she may not have sought him out to tell him what was happening (and there’s no way to know what she might have done if left on her own that afternoon) but she kind of knew even if she didn’t tell him he was going to guess. In fact she may have assumed from the point he showed up that he had guessed and gone with him because at that point why not? She might as well get some nice quiet time with Elijah before the shit hits the fan.
What really puts everything in question is that they made it all the way out to the woods before addressing that and then continued to have a pleasant time strolling down Elijah’s memory lane. For Elijah I have to guess he’s savoring these last few minutes before he has to do something he really doesn’t want to (along with the other side of the coin, that he’s keeping her from being suspicious that he’s driven her to the middle of the woods, a lot of his actions re double edged swords like that), but for Elena I really can’t get how she’s so zen about the fact that the man that she’s having this intimate moment with is going to be dead in twelve hours. Maybe in her mind she’s going to say goodbye since she’s been told there’s nothing she can do, but considering her attitude prior to that and soon after is one of “I wish there was something I could do” I find her attitude at that moment to be suspicious; that or it was done badly on a writing/acting/directing level but I’m a Watsonian at heart so I try and find reasons in text for this kind of behavior.
Can I butt back in a sec?
If you must.
It’s Elijah related.
The scene with the Original siblings is seriously a hoot. I do love the Original family as immortal annoying teenagers. But I always get a big kick out of the later bit when Elijah comes in and Rebekah is so upset that he’s going to start in on her about her sex choices and Elijah’s like “This concerns Mother and MY inappropriate crush on a high schooler thank you.” Or at least that’s how I hear it.
Okay, continue.
You didn’t say you were making a shippy joke, those are my area.
But yeah, THE scene (and as far as I’m concerned THE scene of the episode, possibly the season) out in the forest, once Elena realizes that, yeah, this conversation has moved to the point of no return when Elijah mentions his mother and the balance of nature and all that. That’s her cue and she knows it, but she falters. She’s stuck between wanting to tell him and what it means if she does (if there’s a way out he’ll find it, but he’s not going to care about the cost and she knows it). She doesn’t want him to die but she can’t see her way out of this.
But if my heart hurts for Elena at that point it BREAKS for Elijah. He’s just so...*raw* here. He’s hurt and scared and angry and sad; in an Elijah mostly-restrained way but it’s all there. His mother and the girl he’s just realizing he’s falling for are conspiring to kill his entire family; his friend and ally lied to his face about it (even if she did do it badly); and he’s caught between a rock and a hard place because to save what he values most he’s going to have to do something he really doesn’t want to do.
I still always question whether Elijah would have gone through with killing Elena if it came to that. Do I think he *could* have? Yeah, I don’t doubt he has it in him to be that ruthless (it’s pretty obvious he can be) but *would* he have? I always end up thinking he wouldn’t be willing to have his and Rebekah’s last act on this earth be Elena’s death. Now, if he knew 100% that Elena’s death would save his family...you know at the time I’d have questioned it a little but ended up on ‘yeah probably if he absolutely had to’ but I think the finale puts a lot more doubt on even that hypothetical (and there was already some).
He’s pretty convincing in his threats, but we don’t see him outside of those moments until they show up for Esther’s speech. And there’s some points even in his threats where his composure cracks just a bit. This is what he has to do, now if the Salvatores would kindly do what he knows they feel they have to do everybody but one of the witches will live to see another day. But that’s his big scary Original face that gets lesser people to do whatever he wants them to do, and he’s very good at that. But we don’t know what Elijah actually *feels* about what he’s set in motion (and it’s a complicated pile of plots, using Rebekah to threaten Elena to motivate the Salvatores to kill the witches to stop his mother; clearly Elijah is the sibling who plots these complex plans).
What we do know is that in the end, he definitely hears what Esther accuses him of; and we know he acknowledges guilt and regret to the two people in that chain of people that he actually feels responsibility to. Rebekah for using her the way he usually only uses people outside the family; and Elena for basically everything he did that day. We don’t know for sure if the letter writing came before or after Esther’s speech but I’m not sure how much it matters. The reason her speech affected him as much as it did was because he already regretted what he’d done, she made sure that he knew that the part of him he regretted today was hardly a new thing to him.
Thelove letter apology letter...no I meant love letter, is kind of strange in the larger context of where the show goes from here. Because while it’s the perfect cap to the Elena/Elijah tone of this episode, and is exactly right for Elijah’s story (here and going on), but for Elena’s story considering the kill all the Originals plot in a couple eps...it’s a little awkward. *Because* it’s such a fitting note for this episode, one is left with the feeling that while estranged they still understand each other and would eventually find their way back to being allies again (which is what happens, but only after she goes in for another plot to kill them all), because at their heart they GET each other and don’t want to fight each other (again, it does happen, but only after Finn got killed, which one would think would make it more difficult to repair things coughcough).
I also love the final scene between Elijah and Rebekah (and the fact that they happily have less incesty chemistry than most of the other siblings) and if we HAD to have Elijah off the show the rest of the season it was a nice note to send him off on; confronting his own moral complexity and not really sure what he’ll find/decide once he does. He had changed a lot since we first met him back in “Rose,” and not just because we’ve gotten to know him better; his entire world has been knocked askew so many times (several in just the last couple days) that no wonder he’s reeling and needs time to think.
I still think we should have gotten some indication that he warned his siblings off Elena aside from a fanwankable “My brother said you’re off limits” from Kol in a couple eps who almost certainly meant Klaus but gave us the inspiration for Elijah giving his siblings a powerpoint show of staying away from Elena. But in a way I suppose that actually would have been out of step for the way their relationship is portrayed (not OOC mind you, but contrary to the presentation of their relationship), because we don’t really see him serving as protector or trying to change things for her behind the scenes, it’s just what they are it seems.
Okay, this has gone on WAY too long and I know I never even touched on Klaus/Caroline or the Alaric plot or what if any impact Esther’s speech may have had on the others; but if I keep going it’s going to be even more thoughts on Elijah and my ship and I’m pretty sure I’ve gotten incoherent enough on them already.
Next time:
Well, if I’m going to round out the season by the premier I better keep going but it’s going to get so much harder after this because I get so angry at everything.
Suggestion box here
TVD: 3x15: All My Children
Let’s state this up front:
1) I LOVE this episode, flaws and all (I definitely don’t deny that it has flaws).
2) This is the last episode of the season I have that reaction to.
Of course, maybe on rewatch without the pressing fear of my baby Elijah being killed I may like it better. On the other hand I know where it’s leading on the other plots too...
(Let’s also say this, yes I wrote most of this last night but I needed to sleep on it and make sure my rambling glee made some kind of sense. I think it makes...enough sense, if not perfect sense.)
This is my go-to episode when I’m trying to pester my muses awake. It doesn’t always work as I always have to be reminded that the parts I love boil down to about half a dozen scenes in the grand scheme of things but those scenes give me ALL THE FEELINGS. There are other scenes that give me lots of feelings too, but of the ‘the Salvatores are awful people’ sort, which are sometimes inspiring too if for some reason I need to be reminded why I feel the way I do about them.
Back in my initial reaction post to this episode I said that I was reserving judgment on a lot of the Stefan stuff because while it was just kind of iffy here it had the potential to get really sucky; and low and behold, it did. The show forgot all about how it started off the season with Stefan’s backstory about ‘yeah Lexi got him off human blood and then spent decades teaching him to smile again’ which was one of the most reasonable things the show had ever set up for Stefan. The show should basically have ignored the Triangle drama for the rest of the season and let Stefan focus on sorting himself out and give Elena a chance to try and get some distance from them so she could get some perspective, and could have told an interesting story with Damon figuring out whether he wanted to be a better man even if he didn’t win Elena with it. Make them still have to work together on the Alaric stuff and I suppose that kill all the Originals plan, but don’t make all of their stories ABOUT the Triangle.
Unfortunately, they will.
This, like so many of the coming episodes, convinces me that certainly the boys love each other but fails to convince me they love Elena. And yet from this point on the entire Triangle is going to be framed in the context of “who will Elena choose” when I don’t think she actually likes either of them anymore but she and everyone else think she MUST choose from those two.
Can I jump on that?
Not yet
This episode is just BAD for convincing me the boys love Elena. They utterly refuse to listen to her in the opening. Damon wants to tie her up to keep her from having an attack of conscience. They both know she’d rather die than let anything happen to Bonnie but they’re both perfectly willing ignore that fact. And do you need me to go on another rant about how Stefan letting Damon take the fall for him does *not* absolve him of responsibility? And just everything about the way they talk about her in the car scene (and almost as much in the last scene) is gross; it’s as if she’s a doll, push button combo X and she picks Damon, button combo Y and she goes for Stefan, which ties in with the thinking that how only choices are A or B and nothing else ever. I’m sorry but she’d be well within her rights to hate both of you for talking about her like this (and that you’re both to blame for what happens).
Now?
Got some more things to get to first.
This episode is more or less responsible for my crack ship of Finn/Bonnie even though they never actually speak to each other ever. I guess I just feel like they both have issues that would be interesting to see them discuss. Like Bonnie would kind of get Finn’s issues but tell him he can still find hope, and Finn would get Bonnie’s issues but tell her she can learn from her mistakes for a better future. I don’t know that they would actually work, and we never will, but the idea found me here and I found I liked it.
I still feel like the scene between Elena, Caroline and by extension Bonnie rubs me the wrong way. But I think the only person I’m mad at is Caroline. Bonnie is allowed to feel what she needs to feel, and Elena had the best of intentions, but the way Caroline intercedes doesn’t work for me. And a lot of it boils down to the thing about Bonnie always ending up the one that gets hurt. And...no, just no. If Bonnie herself said that it would be wrong but understandable given her state at the moment, but for Caroline to say it; NO. If we’re going to do a measure of how much shit these characters have in their lives, then compared to the other two Bonnie’s gotten off EASY.
Like I said, Bonnie’s allowed to be as angry if she wants at whoever she feels she needs to be angry at; but blaming Elena is blaming the victim here. She was the one whose life was threatened and what happened to Abby happened not because of something Elena did but because of the lengths the guys will go to to protect her.
Now, if the point had been that Elena HAD caused this by spilling the beans to Elijah that would have been a valid point to have (although still a few steps removed from her being to blame for what happened). I’m not entirely sure Elena could deny it if Bonnie/Caroline accused her of that because
Eh hem.
Sorry, I’m stepping on your turf without being ready to hand it off yet.
But, even if they had even accused her of getting what she wanted (saving Elijah) at the cost of Abby becoming a vampire it would have been *A* point, maybe not a very good one, but a point I didn’t feel as much need to call bullshit on as the idea presented here that Bonnie suffers the most. Because even if Elena *had* been okay with this trade off she’s still got one Original vowing revenge and another using her as a human blood bag, that leaves HER with a pretty high cost of saving the one who she happens to like.
Is it my turn now?
I probably could keep going about the Salvatores, and I have some other points I thought I’d hit...but I ought to let you out.
So yeah from here on out lots of Elijah and Elijah/Elena talk
The thing I love about this episode is that there is no good way out of the situation at hand, and at the heart of that is Elijah. Which is why we all think of this as an Elijah episode when, if one thinks about it objectively, he’s not actually in it that much. Not only is he the one driving a lot of what happens when he’s not around but he’s the most in touch with the complicated morality at work here.
Elijah and Elena are the only ones who truly act like they’re caught between a rock and a hard place with what’s happening. Bonnie for a few seconds there when she realizes it’s come down to her (she assumes) life or Elena’s but she barely even has time to ask the question before the solution has been doled out by the others. For the Salvatores there’s just no question, even when they talk about how they could choose to go through with the ritual and sacrifice Elena you know they won’t, and they don’t really even talk about whether killing Abby (or even Bonnie) is even a question beyond how it will upset Elena; that’s not morally complex, it’s just morally questionable that so few people on this show will ever actually question.
After THE scene between Elena and Elijah her stake in the moral questions kind of fades into the background, but up to that point you can see her struggling with it. After the fact she realized that she wasn’t really comfortable with the cost of Esther’s solution (and as far as she knows that’s just Elijah, she doesn’t know what it would do to everyone else) and she would very much like it if someone else would understand that; but everyone else finds Esther’s plan perfectly acceptable.
I actually do have to question why she goes off with Elijah when he shows up. Because given her attitude in the previous scenes there was no way she was going to be able to keep the lie up. Which is kind of why I feel she lets the others blame her in the end (aside from the fact that she’s pretty prone to blaming herself for things if they are even fractionally her fault), because she may not have sought him out to tell him what was happening (and there’s no way to know what she might have done if left on her own that afternoon) but she kind of knew even if she didn’t tell him he was going to guess. In fact she may have assumed from the point he showed up that he had guessed and gone with him because at that point why not? She might as well get some nice quiet time with Elijah before the shit hits the fan.
What really puts everything in question is that they made it all the way out to the woods before addressing that and then continued to have a pleasant time strolling down Elijah’s memory lane. For Elijah I have to guess he’s savoring these last few minutes before he has to do something he really doesn’t want to (along with the other side of the coin, that he’s keeping her from being suspicious that he’s driven her to the middle of the woods, a lot of his actions re double edged swords like that), but for Elena I really can’t get how she’s so zen about the fact that the man that she’s having this intimate moment with is going to be dead in twelve hours. Maybe in her mind she’s going to say goodbye since she’s been told there’s nothing she can do, but considering her attitude prior to that and soon after is one of “I wish there was something I could do” I find her attitude at that moment to be suspicious; that or it was done badly on a writing/acting/directing level but I’m a Watsonian at heart so I try and find reasons in text for this kind of behavior.
Can I butt back in a sec?
If you must.
It’s Elijah related.
The scene with the Original siblings is seriously a hoot. I do love the Original family as immortal annoying teenagers. But I always get a big kick out of the later bit when Elijah comes in and Rebekah is so upset that he’s going to start in on her about her sex choices and Elijah’s like “This concerns Mother and MY inappropriate crush on a high schooler thank you.” Or at least that’s how I hear it.
Okay, continue.
You didn’t say you were making a shippy joke, those are my area.
But yeah, THE scene (and as far as I’m concerned THE scene of the episode, possibly the season) out in the forest, once Elena realizes that, yeah, this conversation has moved to the point of no return when Elijah mentions his mother and the balance of nature and all that. That’s her cue and she knows it, but she falters. She’s stuck between wanting to tell him and what it means if she does (if there’s a way out he’ll find it, but he’s not going to care about the cost and she knows it). She doesn’t want him to die but she can’t see her way out of this.
But if my heart hurts for Elena at that point it BREAKS for Elijah. He’s just so...*raw* here. He’s hurt and scared and angry and sad; in an Elijah mostly-restrained way but it’s all there. His mother and the girl he’s just realizing he’s falling for are conspiring to kill his entire family; his friend and ally lied to his face about it (even if she did do it badly); and he’s caught between a rock and a hard place because to save what he values most he’s going to have to do something he really doesn’t want to do.
I still always question whether Elijah would have gone through with killing Elena if it came to that. Do I think he *could* have? Yeah, I don’t doubt he has it in him to be that ruthless (it’s pretty obvious he can be) but *would* he have? I always end up thinking he wouldn’t be willing to have his and Rebekah’s last act on this earth be Elena’s death. Now, if he knew 100% that Elena’s death would save his family...you know at the time I’d have questioned it a little but ended up on ‘yeah probably if he absolutely had to’ but I think the finale puts a lot more doubt on even that hypothetical (and there was already some).
He’s pretty convincing in his threats, but we don’t see him outside of those moments until they show up for Esther’s speech. And there’s some points even in his threats where his composure cracks just a bit. This is what he has to do, now if the Salvatores would kindly do what he knows they feel they have to do everybody but one of the witches will live to see another day. But that’s his big scary Original face that gets lesser people to do whatever he wants them to do, and he’s very good at that. But we don’t know what Elijah actually *feels* about what he’s set in motion (and it’s a complicated pile of plots, using Rebekah to threaten Elena to motivate the Salvatores to kill the witches to stop his mother; clearly Elijah is the sibling who plots these complex plans).
What we do know is that in the end, he definitely hears what Esther accuses him of; and we know he acknowledges guilt and regret to the two people in that chain of people that he actually feels responsibility to. Rebekah for using her the way he usually only uses people outside the family; and Elena for basically everything he did that day. We don’t know for sure if the letter writing came before or after Esther’s speech but I’m not sure how much it matters. The reason her speech affected him as much as it did was because he already regretted what he’d done, she made sure that he knew that the part of him he regretted today was hardly a new thing to him.
The
I also love the final scene between Elijah and Rebekah (and the fact that they happily have less incesty chemistry than most of the other siblings) and if we HAD to have Elijah off the show the rest of the season it was a nice note to send him off on; confronting his own moral complexity and not really sure what he’ll find/decide once he does. He had changed a lot since we first met him back in “Rose,” and not just because we’ve gotten to know him better; his entire world has been knocked askew so many times (several in just the last couple days) that no wonder he’s reeling and needs time to think.
I still think we should have gotten some indication that he warned his siblings off Elena aside from a fanwankable “My brother said you’re off limits” from Kol in a couple eps who almost certainly meant Klaus but gave us the inspiration for Elijah giving his siblings a powerpoint show of staying away from Elena. But in a way I suppose that actually would have been out of step for the way their relationship is portrayed (not OOC mind you, but contrary to the presentation of their relationship), because we don’t really see him serving as protector or trying to change things for her behind the scenes, it’s just what they are it seems.
Okay, this has gone on WAY too long and I know I never even touched on Klaus/Caroline or the Alaric plot or what if any impact Esther’s speech may have had on the others; but if I keep going it’s going to be even more thoughts on Elijah and my ship and I’m pretty sure I’ve gotten incoherent enough on them already.
Next time:
Well, if I’m going to round out the season by the premier I better keep going but it’s going to get so much harder after this because I get so angry at everything.
Suggestion box here
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no subject
Date: 2012-10-11 09:55 pm (UTC)Haha, I know how you feel. If only Klaus/Caroline and the triangle drama was excised from this episode, it would be so much better.
But yes, let's talk about the good stuff, namely Elijah/Elena:
Which is why we all think of this as an Elijah episode when, if one thinks about it objectively, he’s not actually in it that much.
It's definitely an Elijah episode though. He does the "previously" voiceover!
I love your point about Elijah and Elena being morally complex because that's exactly right and it's what makes them much more interesting than anything else in the episode. (I also enjoy Rebekah deciding to kill Matt and then not going through it when he's kind to her; that's a nice bit of layered characterisation.)
I actually do have to question why she goes off with Elijah when he shows up.
I think subconsciously she wanted to tell him. Maybe she rationalised it as a chance to say goodbye, but it really seemed like she wanted to tell him the truth.
Elijah mentions his mother and the balance of nature and all that. That’s her cue and she knows it, but she falters.
Oh yes, I love that moment. She knows, you can tell that she knows he's trying to get her to talk about his mother. But that's when she says she should probably go home (not exactly certain, that "probably", which again shows she's still torn), and of course that only confirms to Elijah that she's hiding something.
I completely agree with your dislike of the episodes that follow, by the way. It really went downhill after this point.
no subject
Date: 2012-10-11 11:27 pm (UTC)Rebekah does get some nicely layered characterization (and not in a random flip-floppy way like Klaus does), though I wouldn't call her morally complex either. I do at least think it's consistently dynamic.
I think subconsciously she wanted to tell him. Maybe she rationalised it as a chance to say goodbye, but it really seemed like she wanted to tell him the truth.
Oh I agree with that. I think...she wanted him to know the truth and not to lie to him anymore, but wasn't sure about telling him exactly. I just have a hard time getting my head around how awkward their car ride must have been with all the subtext going on.
She knows, you can tell that she knows he's trying to get her to talk about his mother. But that's when she says she should probably go home (not exactly certain, that "probably", which again shows she's still torn), and of course that only confirms to Elijah that she's hiding something.
Exactly. She knows once the conversation turns to Esther that she's going to have to make the choice all over again whether or not to keep lying to him or tell the truth. And she's so conflicted about that that she should probably just get out of the situation entirely, which is kind of ridiculous once you've wandered into the middle of the woods with someone. But it's weird to me that she DOES try to keep the lie going after that when it's pretty clear that it's the last thing she wants to do.
But Elijah really didn't need to go to a "I can hear your heartbeat" place to know she was lying. Her words, voice, body language, all shift almost instantly once the topic shifts to Esther making it pretty clear that she's nervous and probably lying about what's going on. And yeah, he sees all of that, which confirms his suspicions pretty damn quickly.
But yeah, after this the season got a lot worse. While there were still okay moments they got a lot fewer and farther between and even the highs weren't this high again, and the lows were REALLY low.