You’ve seen all the previews, you’ve picked apart the character portraits (click for Klaus’s, Elijah’s, Cami’s, Davina’s, Hayley’s, and Marcel’s), and now its time for the new season!!! (And, really, what is up with that naked cat?!)
Are you ready?!!
Buckle up, because HERE WE GO!!
There were funny moments (Al Capone reference), there were moments that were heartbreaking (Hayley and Elijah Part 1), and there were moments that were lacking in the drama that they were supposed to convey (Hayley and Elijah Part 2, and Hayley’s killing of . . . I’m getting ahead of myself), there were WTF moments (that new hot accented guy is really WHO?!), and there were the great twisty-turny moments that we’ve come to know and love.
Its great to have the Mikelsons back.
But, not-so-great to have to be reminded AT THE VERY START that we’ve lost one of THE BEST deliverers of one-liners in this show, Rebekah. Her telling Hope of the story unfolding in the Quarter was almost painful because I already miss her so very much. Auntie Becks tells Hope the story of what’s been going on in New Orleans to catch us up (as if we could have forgotten!), reminding us who the enemies are (The Guerrera Werewolves, The Witches).
The new stuff starts with Elijah talking to some of the werewolves about why they can’t tear down some dump of a building – something about a Preservation Society – but I wasn’t really paying attention because ELIJAH’S FACIAL HAIR!!! Like, seriously, Daniel Gillies with scruff (and I’m not a fan of scruff) is something to behold. AND IS ALSO WRONG CONSIDERING VAMPIRES DO NOT CHANGE, AND THEREFORE CANNOT SPROUT FACIAL HAIR!
But, I digress.
Mr Amazing Facial Hair is still talking about things like columns, and we get a flash of the ring that one of the wolves is wearing. This is information for later. Promise.
And next? Klaus temper tantrum. He’s tearing up canvases, complaining that he doesn’t have the color he needs (read: BLOOD). He and Elijah exchange a few brotherly barbs, and we’re (once again) reminded of the plot. Elijah tells Klaus he’s found the last two Klaus-zapping rings are (we just saw them in the abandoned building thing) and is worried about Hayley. She’s grieving alone.
FIRST SHOCKER ALERT!!! Cami and Marcel are knocking boots, baby!!! No strings. He may or may not be using her for information about Klaus, but they do seem to be enjoying each other’s company. Cami catches us up on the witches (Davina is back in High School, told the witches to “shove it”).
Davina is in a record store (they still exist? Don’t know what records are? Ask your parents!) buying “Ancient Icelandic Folk Music” which she insists is for someone else. Oliver bursts in, talking about how useful Cassie (with in the coven) has been, and demands the place close up. Turns out, shopkeep is a vampire, and Oliver’s been sent to destroy him. Davina puts the witchy kibosh on that. Then Francesa is bawling out Oliver, Cassie (head witch), and others for not actually killing the dude. Cassie tells her, like Cami did, that Davina is on her own now. Francesca is like a caged wolf (hahaha) because she’s been expecting a Klaus revenge attack that hasn’t come yet.
Cassie meets mysterious dude on the street, and they reveal what we already know . . . she’s Esther (the Originals’ mum) and something we weren’t sure of. He’s Finn! They’re impressed with Klaus and Elijah’s tactics, because they seem to be working. But will those tactics work against them? Dun dun dunnn!
Cami’s in the Quarter, being followed by two wolves sent by Francesa, and grows a set when she hands one of them their usual coffee order. She’s gone to the compound to check on Klaus, who does his best vampire whooshes to avoid her. She never sees him. Elijah pops out of the shadows to tell her that Klaus doesn’t want to see her. She counters with “Marcel ran these folks out without help, what’s your problem?” She challenges the Mikelsons to use Marcel as a weapon. The boys attend a mutual admiration society of Cami’s spirit.
Josh (YAY JOSH!!!) brings Marcel what he says is another group of prospective vampires. Marcel gives a long speech – frankly, I tuned out – and ends by compelling them to forget, but plants a seed that someone might find their way back later, not knowing really why. Once he’s sent them off, he tries to explain to Josh what he’s really looking for, and Klaus walks in and finishes for him.
Elijah has started packing things up in Hope’s room. Hayley walks in and is furious with him. She, apparently, hasn’t been spending much time at home of late. In keeping up appearances, he says that they should begin clearing things out and moving on. Hayley doesn’t think so. Says she can’t begin moving on until Francesca is dead. Elijah promises that she’ll have her vengeance, and she insists that the room isn’t to be messed with and storms out.
Mikael tries to remind Davina that he’s an all-powerful baddy, but she holds all the keys there. He is bound to her, and will be until she sorts out how to untangle her friends from Klaus’s bloodline/sire line. To demonstrate this, she commands him to drink from her and when to stop.
Marcel and Klaus begin to plot to separate rings from wolves’ hands, or hands from bodies whatever, and Klaus finally admits why he’s been stalling. He’s concerned that the Guerreras have the White Oak Stake, because it went missing the night Hope “died.” After asking Marcel if he has it, they decide that the wolves haven’t attacked again because they don’t have it either. Wolf hunting ensues.
A lot of flashing back and forth starts to happen now, as plot points fall into place. Klaus relays his conversation with Marcel to Elijah, who is much more unsure of the whole idea. The rings have begun to take power from Klaus as the moon rises. Joe goes back to his record shop to retrieve his stuff, only to fall (on purpose) into the hands of Oliver. Elijah goes over the finer points of the hunt with Hayley and Klaus, insisting that they have to work together to make this work, as Joe gets questioned by Francesa, some other wolves, and Cassie. Joe tells them he thinks he knows where the White Oak Stake ended up – Francesca demands that Cassie do a spell to find it. Elijah insists again that Hayley and Klaus work together, and when they agree, Hayley demands Frencesca’s head.
Cassie’s spell attempts don’t work, and Francesa leans on Joe to tell her what he knows. He tells her that he’s heard that the stake ended up with “the priest.” Wolves begin to throw things around in Cami’s home until she gives up the address and Father K’s key. Once they leave she and Elijah (hiding on the porch) exchange the most epic of head nods! She’s setting them up!
Francesca plots with the wolves, thinking she’s about to get her hands on the stake, and sends the wolves out to attack while Klaus is weak. She tells them that whoever kills Hayley gets a bonus, that Klaus will be weak enough to kill, and Elijah can be weakened with enough bites. Oliver protests because she’s staying home while they go out to fight. Saying she’s the “top dog” (hahahaha) she says she’s safe because no vampires have ever been invited into her home.
A pack of wolves end up in the building from the first few scenes. Josh locks the door behind them, and Marcel starts the wolfsbane laden sprinklers spraying them & begins removing rings one way or another. With each one removed, Klaus regains some strength. Wolves being to invade the compound and Hayley starts taking them out. Klaus gets a little stronger. Guards outside Francesca’s house get attacked and the rukus leads Francesca to the window. Elijah removes the ring from the guards he’s just killed, and Klaus begins to paint. At the compound, Hayley fights Oliver, lecturing him on breaking up their pack as she takes his ring. Two wolves get close to Klaus, and he takes them out with paintbrushes!
Francesca’s front door flies open. A head rolls across the carpet into the foyer. Elijah stands just outside, cleaning his hands off with a hankerchief. Francesca clearly believes she is safe. Mr Amazing Scruff brings up how Al Capone was caught – tax evasion – and starts explaining how he talked with the city leaders and they decided that “immenint domain” should be evoked on all historical homes, like her own, meaning that they are now public property . . . *drum roll* . . . that anyone can enter. Francesca’s smile fades quickly. (And Twitter EXPLODED. It was GREAT!)
Klaus, still not at full strength, asks Elijah which ring didn’t get retrieved – Francesca’s – but once Klaus realizes she didn’t escape because Elijah set her up to be found by Hayley, he’s pleased. Francesca is speeding out of town, looking in her rearview so much she almost misses Hayley standing in the road. She slams on her breaks, and Hayley has disappeared. Next thing Francesca knows, she’s being ripped through her car window by one, very angry, Little Wolf.
Josh comes in and reports to Marcel that Joe has been killed. Josh wonders if death is the reward that all warriors end up with. Marcel tries to explain why they are fighting for what Josh calls “a few blocks of real estate.” Marcel preaches yet again about why he’s fighting this battle, the battle for the soul of the city, the soul of his home. One of the humans from the group Josh brought him earlier wanders in, looking confused as to why she’s there.
Hayley is tearing apart the crib she earlier fussed at Elijah for starting to dissemble. Elijah stops her from destroying it completely, but she remains upset. Elijah tries to explain that Hayley’s emotions are heightened because she’s a hybrid now, that its only natural that Francesa’s death wasn’t satisfying. Hayley says that there is nothing that is natural about her now. She says that while she was staying in the Bayou, she learned what it was to be part of a pack, and that, tonight, before she killed Francesca, she killed *8* of her own kind. She is horrified by that, and starts to compare herself with something else . . . . a vampire, Elijah finishes for her. She tells him that even he doesn’t even look at her the same way. Before he saw her as a mother, now he sees her as a monster. Everything has changed. And, with that, she storms away, with Elijah’s MOST FEEBLE ATTEMPT EVER to stop her.
This entire thing seemed sooooooooooooooo contrived to me. Like these two actors, who have so much chemistry were acting like they were fighting. Now, maybe that’s the plan. Maybe that was for Klaus’s benefit. I don’t know. But, it didn’t work for me. Maybe because I expected Hayley to have problems being a hybrid before she went on a wolf-killing spree. I just don’t know, but there was just an element of emotion there – that usually is there between these two – that just was not there. (So sayeth the Haylijah-shipper!!!)
But anyway.
After the last commercial break of the night, you’d think the show has done with its twists and turns, but nooooooooooooo there’s two more good ones to come!
Back in the Quarter, Davina’s outside Joe’s closed record shop, when the cutie that made eyes at her earlier walks up. They exchange small talk, and he teases her about her Icelandic Folk Music fetish – which she again insists isn’t for her – and introduces himself as Caleb, complimenting Davina on her “cool name.” There’s just a little something wicked in Caleb’e eyes (TO BE EXPLAINED LATER!!!!).
The stones from all the moonlight rings removed from the “gauche” settings (Elijah’s word), Klaus is ready to destroy them. But taking a sledgehammer to them won’t do the trick. Nope. Just a little fire and water and a gigantic mortar and pestle! But not before Klaus beats himself up over “playing King” and allowing a weapon that could kill not just him, but Elijah too to be out in the open again. Klaus laments that Elijah has always tried to find hiw own redemption, and likens it to an uphill battle. With a smirk, Elijah says that the mountain isn’t endless, some are just “steeper than others.” Love that line.
Klaus is upset because Hayley is so upset, but doesn’t know what to say to her. And, in an act that I will never understand, Elijah encourages Klaus to go and comfort her, tell her “whatever she needs to hear.” Maybe his feelings for her really have changed?
After another romp in the sack, Cami and Marcel discuss whether or not things will be better in the Quarter, ending with Cami breaking it off with him. She wants to “help humans with their human problems,” and I don’t think anyone was really upset by that. Klaus tells Hayley that things will get better, but she argues that she doesn’t see how when she’s immortal. He explains to her that, as time goes by, memories fade, but the real moments are more vibrant (likening everything to a painting) and shine through. She says that she won’t be happy until she has her baby back in her arms. Klaus tells her that, one day, they will get Hope back, but they have to reunite the wolves again, under their Queen. Hayley worries about the witches that “don’t stop plotting even after they’re dead” and Klaus believed he defeated his mother by standing united. He wants to face all their enemies . . . together, as a family (because that’s worked SO WELL in the past!!!).
At a table in the Quarter, our mysterious African American man (seen earlier with Cassie/Esther, WHO IS FINN) is sitting with his paper. Cami walks up and greets him as “Mr Griffith” and her residency supervisor!!! “Vincent,” as he wants to be called, smiles at Cami and she already seems enamored with him. (THAT WAS THE SECOND-TO-LAST TWIST, in case you missed it. The next one is coming in 3 . . . 2 . . . 1 . . .
Cassie and Vincent are discussing whether or not Cami bought his little act, and he complains about feeling vulnerable in this human form. She complains about being stuck as a teenager when . . . . Caleb comes in. He says that he likes his new body, thinks that Davina does, too. And Cassie agrees that while Elijah and Klaus killing Francesca has helped them, there is still work to be done. She plans to take over the witches and the werewovles, since the vampires are still in exile. She’s ready to make New Orleans their new home. It is then, and only then, that she drops the LAST bomb of the night on us . . . by calling Caleb by his real name . . . KOL!! (Kinda figured when he first appeared, but it was nice not to have to wait too long for it to be comfirmed!!)
They have a family reunion to plan.
Wonder if they know Daddy Dearest is in town, too?
Can’t wait to see how this all plans out! Join us next week to see what little twisty-turny things Ms Plec et al have for us next!!!
