The Vampire Diaries 3x13: Bringing Out the Dead

Original Air Date: 2 February 2012

Storyline: Sheriff Forbes delivers some disturbing news to Alaric and Elena about the weapon used in a recent murder. In the Salvatore brothers' escalating quest to kill Klaus, Stefan turns to Bonnie and Abby, while Damon reaches out to an old acquaintance for help in setting up an elaborate plan. Intent on a plan of his own, Klaus hosts a strange dinner party, where he reveals another story from his family's violent past until an unexpected guest brings the party to an end. Meanwhile, Caroline is heartbroken when she is unable to stop a tragedy from unfolding.

Best Quote:

Stefan: Nothing smart about trusting Elijah, Damon. He screwed us over the last time he promised to help us kill Klaus.
Damon: Yeah, the way you've been acting, I'd trust him about as much as I trust you.
Stefan: Hmm.  Well... Guess that goes both ways, doesn't it?
Damon: Oh, yes. This is about me kissing Elena. Just remember, if it wasn't for Klaus, you wouldn't have become such a dick and that kiss would never have happened. So get ready and get happy. We're going to negotiate a fake truce, and I don't want your attitude screwing it up.

Damon's Best: I thought we agreed that we would leave the grumpy Stefan at home.Review: Wow, what a ride! This show may not be BtVS, in terms of becoming a classic, but it almost never fails to deliver great action. What am I talking about, at the rate it's going, I'm actually pretty sure it is going to become a classic!

So this week we said goodbye to another useless character, one of those who turn up dead every season to keep Mystic Falls' population in line, but we saw a bunch of others coming back to life. And, except for the lame and completely predictable ending, which is the only complaint in my book, I loved every minute of this suspenseful installment.
The episode followed three storylines and I will start with the most interesting one - Damon and Stefan's plans to kill Klaus. So was bringing Elijah back a good move or a bad move from Damon's part? For a while there, watching Elijah and Klaus talk about family made me think it was going to be a bad move, but nothing is ever the way it appears in this show and Elijah's desire to be with his family and free himself from under Klaus' influence was what made him keep his word to Damon. Plus, why wait for your brother to undagger your siblings when you can simply do it yourself? And that's how, at the end of the hour, we met the two remaining Originals, Kol and Finn. And can I say eye candy alert?
But, as much as the turn of events kept me glued to my couch and barely breathing, two things will remain with me after this episode: one, I loved the interactions between Damon and Stefan. Damon put on a great show in trying to be he mature half of the family and take charge of the operation against Klaus. Also, their talk in the woods, right before entering the tomb, was great. They both needed to say to each other that they loved Elena. Two, the dinner was amazing. Not only because of the constant bantering between the two parties, with Stefan acting out and almost getting himself killed, but mainly because of Tatia's story. For a while now I've been wondering how come the Petrova line is so important to Klaus and now we know: it was Tatia's blood - the girl both Klaus and Elijah loved (didn't see that coming, did you?) - that mama original gave to her children to drink in order to turn them into vampires. These pieces of mythology are always worth waiting for.
So now we have every Original left in the world wide awake and with their own plan. Which is leave Klaus alone and go live their lives together, as a family, but not before killing Elena, so that Klaus can't make more hybrids. That was going to be their punishment. That is, until Bonnie and Abby managed to free the only thing capable if killing Klaus out of the fourth coffin. For a show known for delivering surprises, this one was fairly obvious and now we have not only the five siblings, but also their Original witchy mother hanging around Mystic Falls and talking about wanting to be a family again. And with this, Damon and Stefan's challenge to keep Elena alive is still very much going on.
But both Salvatore brothers need to seriously meditate on Klaus' words: "The worst thing for Elena Gilbert is... the two of you." Not completely wrong, even though I'm still wishing for Damon and Elena to be together at some point. Of course, wanting Elena to be with a human and have children is in Klaus' best interest, to keep the Petrova line going, but Elena herself wants to live her life as a human and she won't be able to do this properly while the Salvatores are hanging around her.
But I've talked enough about this arc and I don't want to keep you reading an entire novel. As I said in the beginning, this episode saw the death of the first major character of the season, I believe. And it's part of a bigger issue Mystic Falls has - someone hunting down council members. It started with the medical examiner, thus putting Alaric's new girlfriend in the position of being a suspect, and continued with Bill Forbes, whose recovery due to Damon's blood did not last long. But he was killed with vampire blood in his system, thus giving him the chance to decide whether he wanted to live his life as the creature he most hated or die as a human. His choice was not a surprise and Caroline signed her name on the list of Mystic Falls kids who have lost someone in their family. The entire thing was highly emotional and well played from both Candice Accola and Jack Coleman, whom I won't particularly miss, but who managed to give a great performance as Bill Forbes told his daughter how she grew up to be exactly who he had hoped she'd become.
But Bill was not the only one to die - at least for a while - at the hands of this serial killer who turns this show in some kind of crime procedural. Alaric was the other person attacked and I was on the verge of getting angry at the showrunners for making us live without one of the most engaging characters of this series. Fortunately, he was still alive when Elena found him and conscious enough to ask Elena to kill him, so that he can be revived by his ring. That was a big chance they took, since the ring has been losing its power, but it all turned up well, thank heavens, since I'm not ready - or will I ever be - to lose Alaric.
There are a lot of questions still unanswered and more that popped up in this episode and I, for one, cannot wait for next week to see what are mommy dearest's plans for her newly reunited family.