The Vampire Diaries: Disturbing Behaviour

Posted by: Kyle Tetarenko  •  October 6, 2011 @ 9:59pm

Filed under: Recaps & Reviews

After living for an eternity, Klaus is will never stop trying to create his hybrid army. Now that his sister Rebecca is back in the picture, Stefan may not be able to stop him.

While still in the magical windy city, Klaus and Rebecca are hoping that Gloria can locate Rebecca's necklace which Elena is now in Elena's possession (Another piece of enchanted jewellery! First the rings, then the moonstone and now a necklace! What`s next, an enchanted watch that can reverse time?). When Gloria's first attempt ends with mixed results, Stefan sees this as his chance to remove Gloria from the equation permanently but this only ends with Stefan being tied to a table and tortured. After he is saved by an old love, Stefan is still determined to turn the tables on the hybrid but this Salvatore may not be enough to stop two Originals. Meanwhile, Damon is still adjusting to his new role now that Stefan is no longer in Mystic Falls and is beginning to feel the pressure around him. It's only when he attempts to kill Caroline's father, Bill, when the others realize he isn't quite the hero his brother is. Jeremy is also still reeling from his brush with death but finally decides to tell Bonnie that he sees dead people; just the thing you want to tell your girlfriend of three months.

Disturbing Behaviour has definitely left me with a number of mixed feelings. The first being that Stefan's storyline with Klaus and Rebecca has been fantastic; it is rich with a believable history and the line that Stephen toes is wrought with pitfalls should he make a single misstep. Unfortunately there was the portions of the episode with Elena that were quintessential heartbroken teenager moments. The Vampire Diaries caters to a very wide audience but when the show bounces from one extreme to the other it feels like two separate shows altogether rather than a well rounded episode.

Ian Somerhalder continues to impress with his weekly portrayal of Damon Salvatore. Damon continually tries to do the right thing but his course of action isn't always pretty and rarely involves saving lives. His confrontation with Elena leading to his admission that he isn't Stefan was great. Somerhalder makes the scenes with Elena watchable just to see Damon reach his breaking point.

Since the first season of the show The Vampire Diaries has emphasized that the older a vampire is, the more powerful they become but Disturbing Behaviour was another instance when the show broke its own rule. While it was a good idea to keep Caroline's father Bill alive, the fact that Caroline was able to overpower Damon for the second time was a lazy fix for problem. Damon is roughly one hundred and fifty years old and we watched him get tossed around by someone who has been a vampire slightly over a year (This happened just after she was immediately turned into a vampire in the high school hallway during a dance last season).To put this into perspective, Katherine is roughly five hundred years old and the combined strength of Stefan and Damon was barely enough to stop her in last season's Masquerade. Damon could barely mount an attack on Pearl (played by Kelly Hu), another five hundred year old vampire. It`s ridiculous to think that an audience would just forget the show`s own rules after so much time was spent establishing them. Maybe the show wants us to like Caroline more but that will never happen because the character is a cliché.

Weaving Katherine back into the story was a bold move now that more characters have joined the show and while others have returned but she is the original wildcard of The Vampire Diaries. Katherine is such a likeable character she oozes charisma in way that you have to like her. Dobrev's range in is especially impressive when she gets the opportunity to turn loose as Katherine and it also comes across that she has more fun as that character as well. Whatever happens, this season of the show will only be better off for Katherine being there.

All in all, Disturbing Behaviour is a good episode, not great but good. By this time in season two the show was off to an amazing start but also heavily focused on Katherine alone. Now that the Klaus and Stefan are back in Mystic Falls, I think The Vampire Diaries will definitely get the excitement back starting in next week's The Reckoning.

Tags: The Vampire Diaries, Stefan Salvatore, Damon Salvatore, Elena Gilbert, Paul Wesley, Ian Somerhalder, Nina Dobrev

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