The Vampire Diaries: Bring it On

Posted by: Kyle Tetarenko  •  March 14, 2013 @ 9:26pm

Filed under: Recaps & Reviews

With Jeremy gone and Elena's emotions off, Stefan and Damon need to accept their new friend or get out of her way.

Without any ties to her humanity, Stefan is worried they will lose Elena entirely if she goes too far into the deep end. Damon isn't concerned but how do they get her to turn it back on when grief awaits her on the other side? Elsewhere, Klaus saves Hailey from a vampire but wants Katherine's location so he can take the cure from her. Back at the Salvatore mansion, Sheriff Forbes shows up with some bad news about the hospital blood supply. Stefan offers to help while Damon tracks down the lead on Katherine leaving Caroline taking Elena to school to rejoin the cheer team just in time for a competition. Needless to say, that doesn't go as well as planned when Elena feeds on a rival cheer girl and drops Caroline during their routine. Noticing that Elena is out of control, Stefan takes her back to the house; which works until the kids start showing up for the party she just threw. Klaus has been entertaining Hailey at his estate and when confronted by Damon to give her up, he insists that she is under his protection. When Damon's adventure to find Katherine fails, he returns home to the party only to find that Elena has gotten out of control and may no longer be the same person he fell in love with.

As its first episode back from the short break, Bring it On was a disaster for The Vampire Diaries. The hour felt scattered as a meaningful plot struggled to form amidst the constant babysitting for Elena. Each story's tone felt drastically different from the others and made for strange pacing and an unusual composition. Though Silas is still out there, no one can stop focusing on Elena long enough to pay any attention to all of the missing blood in the area. The question is, if the characters don't care about Silas, why should we?

While Elena may have flipped the switch on her emotions, her transformation was drastically overplayed. Looking back at when Klaus compelled Stefan to turn it off, he lost emotions but his actions were never thoughtless or reckless. If he attacked someone, it was for a purpose and logical. On the other hand, Elena has lost all inhibitions she may have had (especially those for clothes) and indulged her baser instincts. Though it makes sense for her to not feel the emotional impact of her actions, there was no logic to her motives. She was hungry so she fed, she felt threatened so she dropped Caroline and then later almost killed her. Ultimately, this has all been done before with Stefan and it was a lot better. If Elisabeth R. Finch and Michael Narducci continue to write for the show, they need to pull away from the hedonistic Elena and distance themselves poor characterization. Based on next week's preview, this doesn't appear to be in the cards.

Unfortunately, the other storylines were not any stronger. Klaus's time with Hailey was a meaningless distraction that failed to bring any excitement as her affections for Tyler and need to find her family don't fit with the present story. While their chemistry is usually great, Damon and Rebekah's scenes fell flat since they were not any closer to finding Katherine and bringing another attachment into Damon's life so late in the season, probably isn't the best idea with so little time left. The worst part about Damon and Elena's relationship now that her emotions are off is how she said that he liked her better this way. While he does like her more as a vampire, that simply can't be true. If it was, he would be dating Katherine who is at least more fun and has a lot less baggage.

Lastly, is Tyler taking off again? How can one of the most interesting characters not have a place on the show but Matt is still around?

After a short break, I was expecting a lot more from Bring it On. We know that The Vampire Diaries is capable of so much more and hopefully we get that in next week's Because of the Night.

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

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