School, unfortunately that is what the mid-season premiere of The Vampire Diaries felt like. Monotonous and contrived “After School Special” was just another routine day in Mystic Falls. The Vampire Diaries is generally rife with shockers, each episode bringing more unbelievable circumstances to the gang of Mystic Falls, but “After School Special” was just a set up for better things to come. The best part of the night, Kol is back AND he wears pea coats!
The unsung hero of “After School Special”, music supervisor Chris Mollere. In an episode lacking much action Mollere pulled out a soundtrack that overshadowed the lackluster plot. Here’s the full track list courtesy of Mollere’s twitter @cmollere. Follow him for weekly song lists.
“Shooting the Moon” by Mona
“Go Right Ahead” by The Hives
“Female Robbery” by The Neighbourhood
“New York” by Snow Patrol
“Nothing Will Ever Change (This Love of Mine)” by Jimmy Jules
Ok, let’s tackle this episode. There were redeeming qualities (3 words, 8 letters) but over all the episode fell flat. First off, aren’t Tyler and Caroline “broken up”. Since Klaus killed Tyler’s mom the audience is meant to assume Klaus realizes he sent Caroline back to Tyler, but we never got to see this. Tyler is mopey and for good reason. The town is deeming his mother’s murder an accident and with his mother and father dead and his hybrid peeps slain Tyler has really got nothing left. This could be depressing if Tyler wasn’t such a blasé character. Now that his rehab program is null not only does he have no family he has no purpose. Matt is the more interesting sideline male despite the fact that he has done basically nothing the past few episodes. There isn’t room on this show for Matt and Tyler to have no purpose and if we’re choosing, we choose Matt Donovan.
As Tyler’s plot weakens to nothing Bonnie’s is unfortunately becoming more prevalent. Not only is she the key to everything according to Professor Shadypants, but her absentee father is now the mayor. Bonnie delved further into this “expression” stuff last night and almost killed Professor Shadypants and April in one fell swoop. That would have been so nice. Just when we thought we were rid of the two most annoying characters ever to grace Mystic Falls they pop back up. Sorry guys, they’re not dead. While Kol (OMG Kol in a pea coat) is torturing Shadypants, Shady lets slip that what he’s really looking for is this random Silas dude who allegedly can raise the dead. Kol and Rebekah can have the cure for all he cares. Turns out Kol knows about Silas and Shady’s interest in Silas scares the living pea coat out of him. They’ve mentioned this Silas guy enough times that one can only assume he is the next big bad. Do we care? Not really. Come on TVD hopefully there is more to this Silas, a connection to Elena perhaps or something that makes him a tad more interesting.
Plot aside, the fan inside of us squeed at the love triangle developments of “After School Special”. Elena FINALLY admits that she is in love with Damon first to herself then to Stefan, then she calls Damon and says those three little words. We could almost forgive the rest of this episode for that last shot of Damon’s blue bulging eyes as he sire bonds Elena to come and see him. Really though, she would have come of her own accord. Couldn’t Damon adjust his syntax to allow for free thought on Elena’s part. Does “would you like to come out to see me” invoke the sire bond? Perhaps if Damon learned some manners all of his problems would be solved.
The ripper is nearly back. After Elena’s confession Stefan goes nuts and tells Rebekah to remove all of his memories of Elena. Rebekah refuses as that would be the easy way out. Maybe Stefan isn’t about to go full on ripper, it would actually be more interesting if he was now good not because of his love for Elena, but because he is actually a good person. Let him stand on his own two feet a little. It’s much more likely that his new alliance with Rebekah will lead to blood and sexy times. We’re ok with that too. The calculated feel of this episode was most apparent in the final scene with Stefan and Rebekah. Stefan laid out the various alliances and their assets (Jeremy, the sword, Bonnie, Professor Shadypants) as pieces of a game. A longwinded amazing race that ends with the cure. Let’s hope it is over with soon and this Silas guy turns out to be really freakin cool. Because apart from Damon and Elena being the most adorable vamps on the planet (hopefully next week we’ll get some additional sexy times), The Vampire Diaries this season has been lacking in oomph.
What did you think of last night’s episode? Did you find it more intriguing than we did? Would it have been better if April and Professor Shadypants died (coughyescough)? Let us know what you thought in the comments.
The Vampire Diaries airs Thursday at 8/7c on the CW.
