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Previously: Bonnie is still stuck in 90’s Alterna-Portland, Damon and Elena finally get their smooch on, Liz asks Stefan to take care of Caroline when she’s gone (WAIL), Luke merges with Kai in order to save his sisters, resulting in MegaKai.
HELLO! Yes, you heard correctly, I roughed myself up a couple of weeks back and have been recovering on lots of pain meds. This recap is coming to you LIVE from the rented hospital bed that is currently in my living room. Lesson learned – never try to put your socks on standing up or you just might fracture your shin. Also, a big shout-out to Kandis for covering for me these past two weeks! I know she took good care of y’all.
It’s Bonnie! I’ve been wondering when we were going to get back to our favorite displaced witch. It’s her birthday and while her friends are busy getting ready to celebrate in her honor, Bonnie is hitting rock bottom, more hopeless than ever that she will get to return home. At least the Salvatore Mansion has an endless supply of booze, Bon-Bon.
Elena is giving a Big Sister talk to Jeremy, trying to convince him to apply to art school and move on with his life, but he wants to stay in Mystic Falls until he knows that Bonnie is safely home. Cut to Damon wishing his long lost pal a Happy Birthday and OH MY GOD DID HE BAKE HER CUPCAKES? Ok, he probably bought them but in my mind Damon Salvatore has just added Red Velvet cupcakes to his culinary repertoire.
Caroline is, of course, totally on board with celebrating Bonnie’s birthday. Anything to distract her from her dying mom who she seems to be pseudo-stalking with constant phonecalls. Liz is going to start sending her ass straight to voicemail, you watch. Bonnie’s teddy bear, Ms. Cuddles, is front and center at the birthday table and Caroline confesses to Stefan that the REAL Ms. Cuddles is actually buried somewhere in the woods; turns out she stole her from Bonnie when they were kids and got into a fight and then sent her to a shallow grove marked with M&M’s. (As someone who had her favorite stuffed unicorn stolen from her as a kid all I can say is that Bonnie has a heart of gold for forgiving Caroline for crossing this most sacred of lines.)
Caroline decides there’s no time like the present to start looking for the Original Ms. Cuddles (hey, grief does crazy things to people), loads up a shovel and traipses off to the woods. Stefan follows her and pokes fun at her until she finally lashes out. It’s a good friend who will push you to scream at them because they know it’s what you really need. When they actually DO find Ms. Cuddles her head comes off. Well, she’s HAS been buried for twelve years. It’s a really great moment that starts in laughter and ends in tears and for JUST a moment you think that Stefan and Caroline will FINALLY kiss. BUT NO. Dammit show!
Speaking of crazy, it’s Kai! Although now he’s merged with poor Luke (RIP) who has seemingly transmitted his ability to empathize to Kai and it’s really quite hilarious. Kai the Sociopath Learns to Feel – this is a character I can get behind, especially when he’s writing out apology letters to siblings he tried to kill. Damon and Elena agree to deliver his letter to Jo (who’s managed to hide herself away from Kai) IF he does something for them in return – send a message to Bonnie.
In what is surely the most annoying and redundant of this week’s plotlines, Matt and Enzo go to Duke because Enzo wants to corrupt Sarah Salvatore in his Neverending Plot for Vengeance Against Stefan. DUDE. LET IT GO. This is such a waste of your charm and charisma, plus you’re not going to stay anyone’s favorite by kidnapping and threatening Matt Donovan.
Liv is mourning the death of her twin and it’s clouding her judgment just a smidge. Even though it will kill every member of the Gemini Coven, INCLUDING herself, she’s determined to murder Kai. She uses a spell to see through Luke’s/Kai’s eyes in order to locate him at Chez Salvatore. Tyler tries to stop her but she spells him to sleep.
Kai believes that they can all “become the collective Patrick Swayze” to Bonnie’s Demi Moore and Ghost themselves over to her. It’s successful, although Bonnie can’t see or hear them and they aren’t corporeal. When Damon sees Bonnie sipping on the best bottle of bourbon in the house he realizes that she’s going through their suicide pact. They are all yanked back to reality as Kai’s power runs out. They need to get back so that they can point her to where she can find a magical receptacle to get her home – it’s full of Katsia’s blood and it’s in Nova Scotia! Thank God the Salvatores are like me and still keep a road atlas around (hey, you never know when your GPS is going to crap out!) and Damon is able to scribble instructions on the map. Since it’s harder to send everyone back Jeremy volunteers to go alone.
Liv shows up to Chez Salvatore and “locks” Elena and Damon upstairs while she and Kai get into a FULL ON CUTLERY THROWDOWN in front of Sleeping Jeremy. Knives and forks are thrown with abandon! Did anyone catch whether or not the cake slicer was part of the action? Kai corners Liv and is about to set her on fire but finds that he can’t..! I guess he really has absorbed Luke’s empathy and it wasn’t just a ploy. Liv stabs Kai, Jeremy stabs Liv and manages to get Kai to send him over to Bonnie, who is sobbing into her final glass of bourbon. In a moment of sheer genius, Damon figures out that Liv is directly beneath them and sends a bottle of booze down the chimney which explodes into a firebomb below. It knocks her out long enough so that her spell lapses and they can get out of the bedroom.
Bonnie is in the garage with the engine running, recording her final goodbyes on a video camera. Choking down carbon monoxide, she realizes that she’s NOT trying to go out like this and tries to get into the car to turn off the engine. Jeremy is doing his best to let her know that he’s there and finally succeeds by opening the garage door. I almost want this to be the final Bonnie/Jeremy moment because it was immensely sweet seeing him be there for her like that. He returns to tell Damon and Elena that Bonnie will be ok.
Liv wakes up in her dorm room to a very calm but very angry Tyler. He managed to convince Elena to heal her and then he took her home. But Tyler Lockwood is done. He has no time for someone that would rather die than be with him, and I guess that’s fair enough (although I seem to remember a time when he would rather live seeking vengeance than be with Caroline but then again, I can hold a grudge like it’s my damn job.)
We end with all of our Mystic Falls pals moving forward the best they can; Elena and Damon engage in much smooching. She’s realized that no matter what she always finds her way back to him and that it’s time to stop living in the past. Jeremy fills out his application to art school, Caroline spends time with Stefan, boozing and stitching up poor Ms. Cuddles, and Bonnie finally sees the road atlas on the floor, complete with Damon’s instructions, loads up the convertible and hits the road to Nova Scotia!
Thoughts:
- How frustrating is it that Enzo now has the worst storyline on the show? Is it because of Kai? Too many smartasses for one show to carry?
- I never want to hear Cypress Hill again in my life. It was like a PTSD flashback of flannel and Boone’s Farm.
- ”Happy Birthday, Bon-Bon.” Damon and his birthday cupcakes for Bonnie..! LOVE.
- “So I Googled how to process emotional pain and they said to write everything down in a letter and burn it.” This new Kai can stay.
- I honestly don’t remember anything about a rock in Nova Scotia covered in Katsia’s blood. Wait – who’s Katsia again? (Thanks, painkillers!)
- “You truly have an epic lack of game. Grunting at her would have been more effective.” Enzo still gets great lines, even if he’s being an epic douche who should really get himself a hobby.
- “Why don’t I re-animate your dead parents for a tea party while I’m at it?” LOLZ.
- “I would’ve done anything for you and you chose death over me.” Tyler Lockwood, getting a taste of his own medicine.
So what did y’all think? Do we all want MegaKai to stick around for a while? Anyone else relieved that Jeremy is finally leaving for art school? Will the Steroline kiss finally happen next week??
About the Contributor:
Amanda Reid is an East Coast girl living in California who will never stop missing a true autumn. She’s a bookseller who specializes in kid and teen lit, and she bakes a damn fine pie.
