The Vampire Diaries: Catch Me If You Can

Posted by: Kyle Tetarenko  •  January 24, 2013 @ 8:54pm

Filed under: Recaps & Reviews

Klaus's patience is running thin. His plan to create his army of hybrids has been put on indefinite hold until Jeremy can complete his mark and give him the map to the cure. But ready or not, if Jeremy won't hunt the vampires, the vampires will hunt him.

Picking up on the heels of last week's episode, Jeremy and Matt are on the run from the people that Klaus just turned into vampires and even worse, they were compelled to hunt Matt. Damon is doing his part to keep Jeremy alive but when Elena shows up, the fun is over. After quickly retreating to the Gilbert cabin, they come up with a plan for Elena to get Matt home while Jeremy and Damon kill the vamps the next day. After heading back to the bar where they were turned, Jeremy and Damon find all of the vampires lying dead in the cooler and Kol would like to have a word. Elsewhere, Stefan and Rebekah are playing catch up since they don't have a witch or hunter but plan to steal Silas's headstone from Professor Shane and force him to join them. Speaking of the Professor Shane, he and Bonnie are having another session and everything is going well until he is arrested by Sheriff Forbes and taken into custody for the murder of the pastor and the council. Bonnie doesn't believe the story at first but when Shane finally confesses, their relationship may never be the same. Kol has his chat with Jeremy and Damon and tries to convince them that finding the cure means resurrecting Silas who will trigger the end of all things. Damon prevents Kol from ripping Jeremy's arms off but gets compelled in the process to hunt down Jeremy. Once again, Jeremy has become the prey to prey his friends may not be able to stop.

Plagued by difficult pacing and multiple storylines each vying for our attention, Catch Me If You Can was a mess. Last week is seemed as if the focus would solely be on Jeremy in a live or die situation that would give him both confidence and maturity. Instead, Kol returned and killed all of the vampires, effectively dulling the plot and destroying that hope. It comes across as though the show is afraid to put anyone in the spotlight except for the Stefan, Elena and Damon. Even as a hunter that wanted to kill all vampires not that long ago, Jeremy still needs to be saved by his sister's boyfriends, effectively falling back into the status quo.

Speaking of the series love triangle, the best moments were easily Stefan pushing Elena further away with each word. Elena has become one of the least likeable characters in the show over the years and I can only cheer Stefan on as he tells her he no longer loves her when she yet again, implies that he's hurt because of her actions. Though it's obviously true, she's so selfish it's impossible to ignore. Matt was right that she may not be sired but she would have never have left Damon with Jeremy alone before. Does she not remember that he once snapped Jeremy's neck just to blow off steam and killed Alaric on more than one occasion when he said something he didn't like? What I do question is why the show decided to hold back and not have Elena and Damon tell Stefan that she was no longer sired; it's not as if we haven't seen Stefan have a good cry and throw a book every now and then. When Stefan does eventually find out, I hope he is at the point where it doesn't break him like it would have before. He and Rebekah have more chemistry than he ever did with Elena and it would be great for that to develop further.

Finally, Bonnie's story with Professor Shane just isn't going anywhere. We have all known for quite some time that Shane can't be trusted (most likely because he worships Silas) and is using Bonnie to his own ends but it's taking forever to get to that point. It also makes everything worse that Kat Graham drags each scene down with her over the top delivery and exaggerated movements. The fact that she was allowed to question Shane was ridiculous to begin with but she almost stormed out like her dad said she couldn't go to the big party. In another situation it might have worked but not when your mentor just admitted to coercing a mass human sacrifice.

Catch Me If You Can could have been a tense thriller but the pieces just weren't in place. We'll see if that changes in next week's A View to Kill.

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

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