THE VAMPIRE DIARIES: What Comes Next?

[Spoiler Alert: If you haven’t seen tonight’s episode of THE VAMPIRE DIARIES, please stop reading and go watch it. Trust me. You won’t want to read this post until after you’ve viewed “The Last Day” because it will spoil the hour.]

THE VAMPIRE DIARIES fans, have you picked your jaws up off the floor? A lot of things went down in “The Last Day,” and Give Me My Remote has some answers for you about what went down and what’s coming up straight from a press event the cast and crew attended earlier this week…

Tyler is a changed man: If you got the feeling that Tyler was a bit different upon his return, it was intentional. “I spoke with Julie and I was like, ‘Is it kind of like he went through the army and now he’s like an army ranger? Did he go through boot camp?'” Michael Trevino (Tyler) told reporters. “I wanted to switch up something different in him. But subtle and not overdo it. With this episode, especially with dealing with the shock of his mother and then running into Caroline and finding out who Klaus is and what’s going on and that he’s going to die, yeah, it does come off in this episode that he’s very subdued, very introverted about everything. There’s two more episodes in the season and I don’t know where we’re going to go with Tyler in season three, but I think there’s still going to be changes. There has to be changes and hopefully we can get into explaining what was he doing when he was gone? Who he was involved with?”

The only downside to his plan? “It’s actually been like four days [in the show’s timeline since Tyler left],” executive producer Julie Plec noted. While he might have experienced some things, he wasn’t away as long as it felt for fans.

Aunt Jenna is a vampire!: As if Elena didn’t have enough vampire drama in her life, Klaus went and turned her beloved aunt. So what’s next for Jenna? “You’re seeing the next episode take place over the rest of the night,” Plec said. “And it is Klaus’ attempt at executing the sacrifice ritual to break the curse and the part that Jenna is meant to play in that and then what everybody else has to do to try to keep her from being the vampire that Klaus sacrifices.”

Damon did a bad, bad thing: The thought of Elena sacrificing herself was apparently too much for Damon. He didn’t trust that Elijah’s elixir would keep her safe, so he force-fed her his blood, guaranteeing that if she died, she’d be revived as a vampire. Considering the rather icky nature of Damon essentially forcing this major decision on Elena without her input, are the writers ever concerned that they’ll be taking Damon too far?

“I think the interesting thing about Damon — which is complicated for us as writers — is the lengths at which people will forgive him,” Plec explained. “That was never more clear than at the beginning of the season when he snapped Jeremy’s neck. Everybody was like, ‘He was upset, he’s sad, he deserves…’ and yes, of course Damon deserves to be loved and of course, Damon deserves a lot of things, but Damon’s still got issues. And for this thing he did to Elena, this is sort of his biggest lesson to learn in that you can love someone with all the power in your soul, but you still have to remember who they are and what they want. We talked about it like turning off the life support on a loved one — what was their instructions in brain death? Do you keep them on life support because you can’t say goodbye or do you give them their wish? That’s the difference right now between Stefan and Damon is that Stefan sees those things and sees that [in] love, you have to take the other person’s wishes into consideration and Damon, because he’s been so screwed in the head by love, it’s his Achilles heel. This episode was about him learning that lesson.”

The one positive about Damon forcing Elena to drink vampire blood was the teen having to confront the idea of becoming a vampire and giving her the chance to declare her feelings about it.

“I loved this between Stefan and Elena because when we started this show, the similarities to TWILIGHT were so extreme and this was our way of closing our book on that chapter of similarities,” Plec said. “Because for Elena to say, ‘I’ve never even wanted this for a minute, because I’m still a kid and I still have choices to make in my life. Choices that I wanted to make.’ And I love that about Elena and I just think that that is so beautiful and was happy to be able to let her have this introspection when the choice has already been made for her.”

Damon was bitten by Tyler…is he headed for death?: “You know, anyone can die,” Plec joked. “I’ve said it before, we’ve got these two beautiful men on either end of me [Daniel Gillies (Elijah) and Joseph Morgan (Klaus)]. Who needs Ian Somerhalder (Damon)?” (Before anyone panics, she was completely, 100% joking.)

However, Damon is working under the assumption that he’s dying, so he will be seeking out Elena to try and make peace with her. “It’s been released in the synopsis for the final episode that he needs to seek [Elena’s] forgiveness for what he did [in “The Last Day”] and he does try to seek her forgiveness,” said Plec. “And he desperately wants it. As we’ve seen, he’s now got the extra reason with the werewolf bite. ‘I can’t die with you hating me.’ That’s his point. But how does that play out? And that’s really what the finale is all about.”

When I asked Plec if she could expand on what else the finale would be about, she was game to tease the hour. “The synopsis that’s been released prior to you guys seeing this episode, of course, was very vague because the end of [“The Last Day”] is a big turn,” she said. “But the finale is basically the end of the road of Damon’s journey for the year, his character journey. We could have ended with the sacrifice ritual and just gone out — it’s a really big, powerful [hour]. Next week’s episode is enormous and very emotional — and that could have just been it, we could have waited and that could have been the end of the season. But for us, we started the season and Stefan said to Damon, ‘For the first time, I see you starting to feel something. Starting to care. Do not let this ruin you. Do not let Katherine ruin you. Do not let any of this come between us. Do not take a step backwards.’ And here we are, we’ve come full-circle, [Damon]’s done so many things and made so many choices that have been so screwed up. And now he’s at the end of his life — so he believes — and he needs to come to terms with all the decisions he’s made in the year. And not just in the year — since Katherine seduced him 145 years ago. And so reliving those mistakes that he made with Katherine, trying to get Elena’s forgiveness, and what Stefan has to do — determined to do anything he can possible to save his brother.”

And what with the other Salvatore brother be up to? “Stefan’s whole cross to bear is, ‘Wait a second, my brother is finally showing his humanity — the humanity I took away from him 145 years ago — I can’t let him die now!'” Plec continued. “But there’s no cure [to save Damon], so what the hell is he going to do? So that’s the finale.”

Jeremy might be out of his league: With everyone he knows and loves in danger, Jeremy isn’t going to have an easy time the rest of the season. “He knows, he’s aware of everything around him,” Steven R. McQueen (Jeremy) said. “He’s trying to do everything he can to protect them, but he’s just on a different level of strength and there’s not much he can do. But he will constantly keep moving forward to try and protect everyone he loves — but he can only take it so far.”

Bonnie’s about to get “fierce”: “Having just locked picture on episode 21, which is the next episode, I can say that Ms. Kat Graham is at her most fierce,” Plec teased. “Badass fierce. It’s cool.”

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Are you excited about the rest of THE VAMPIRE DIARIES season two?

Related:

THE VAMPIRE DIARIES: ‘The Last Day’ Teases and Preview

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