SUMMARY
Unable to break into the house containing the vault, Damon tells Stefan and Caroline the only two options are to find Valerie or use the Gemini twins to siphon the barrier spell. Unable to find Valerie, Caroline eventually convinces Alaric to bring the children to the house. Narrowly avoiding being caught by Bonnie, Stefan and Caroline return to the house with Matt injured and stuck in his police car and Bonnie on the move. Enzo convinces Bonnie to chase him back to the cabin as the twins successfully siphon the barrier spell. Damon and Stefan enter the house but Damon implores Stefan to return to Caroline and let him face the danger alone. Bonnie finds Enzo and overpowers him. Unable to keep Bonnie from killing him, Enzo accepts his fate just as Damon finds the last tribal body and burns it, erasing the spell on Bonnie and saving Enzo. Alaric, realizing Caroline is still in love with Stefan, tells her to go to him while he takes the kids back home. As Damon is about to leave, he hears Elena’s voice and is consumed by the everlasting. Bonnie and Enzo arrive with Enzo locking himself in the vault. He finds Damon and is too taken over by the everlasting. Somehow they escape the vault and after months of searching, Caroline, Bonnie, and Stefan discover Enzo and Damon have been on a murder spree somewhere in the west coast. Damon and Enzo are seen hanging human bodies in a warehouse acting as though their emotions are turned off.
INITIAL THOUGHTS
Clearly someone on the writing team loves the idea of Enzo staying on as a main character, but what a moment it would have been had Bonnie actually killed him. Tonight’s episode of TVD cliffhangers us with the everlasting possessing or changing our two renegade vampires into something we’re all too familiar with. Never thought provoking, and often cheap in the thrills department, I found this finale doesn’t really know what to do with itself and had to make sure all the current plot threads were at least wrapped up before moving on to the next big bad. The second main death they escaped was Matt, who at this point is leaving the show, odds are to return in some new capacity, or maybe he’s done with the show entirely, I don’t know. What we do know is this next foray will be the last for these vampires as season 8 will be their final adventure in bloodletting and loud musical cues before the kissy-face scenes. Let’s go over our sticking points on “Gods and Monsters.”
THE GOOD
The tension between Bonnie and Enzo made for probably the best moment as it had so much potential had it been able to follow through, but what we had here is Enzo trying his best to distract Bonnie and in the event succumbing to her strength and resilient focus. They shared a very tender moment while she tried to stab his heart and for the most part, I was sold on this being a defining moment for Bonnie because her grief could have shot into the next level had she succeeded in killing him. What came of it wasn’t very risk worthy, but at least we had the tension and build up which I felt had been lacking for quite a while. These characters need to be in real life-threatening situations more often so we can really understand their natures. As it turns out, Enzo maintains a class act and isn’t punishing Bonnie for what she was compelled to do. He gets a few bonus points for that effort.
It’s small, but the car chase was another segment that I think was handled well given the nature of situation. Stefan owned the road and for a moment it could have gone horribly wrong with both cars smashing into each other. Matt made the save and crushed his leg in the process, but it was a fun moment to watch as car chases are far and few between on this show.
THE BAD
This goes back to risks. The show decided it needed everyone alive in a time where main characters are threatened to be killed off to lure in a higher rating, Returning Damon and Enzo to their evil roots was probably one of the bigger cop-outs this show has produced and felt very akin to season two’s finale when Klaus returned Stefan back to his ripper persona. We don’t know if Damon and Enzo are truly being controlled or if they’re just living in some contact high and are willingly participating in this everlasting’s influence. We’re given no new history on the entity except that Enzo may know more based on his conversation with Alex’s sister earlier. If they’re smart, they’ll play this creature off as a very old and ancient power that predates anything they’ve encountered thus far, but as an ending goes, it was one of the worst ones, certainly more diminished than last year’s crazy finale with Mystic Falls under chaos and Damon looking off of the clock tower.
FAVORITE MOMENT
The episode started with a good riff and a classy Damon trying to blow up the door with canisters of either helium or oxygen, not sure which. He fails and admits he can’t get the job done. That right there was a perfect metaphor for his entire run on this show. In just one minute they summed up his hair-brained schemes thinking they’ll work or have some impact and they don’t and he admits to failing and then brings up worse but inevitably better options that put him in the bad-guy’s seat because he’s willing to put people in danger to get people out of danger. Funny little moment and started the finale off right.
CHARACTER MVP
It’s ironic that both Damon and Enzo put themselves on the line and they’re the ones who suffered at the hands of this new evil. Since Damon has had these talks to Stefan about realizing what he’s done and who he is, it was a bit contrived and bordering on same ol same ol. Enzo actually managed to give himself up in a way that would have been a fitting end to his character and actually made all the crap we had to put up with when he was still a snarky goofball second-rate evil vampire worth it. Still, his moment with Bonnie in the cabin stood out more than almost any scene he’d been in previously. Good on him.
ENDING THOUGHTS
Those were clearly lines pulled form previous seasons when Elena called out to Damon. What’s unfortunate is how easy it was for Damon to get pulled in by just a few whispers of suffering as logic doesn’t tend to be Damon’s focus even when people are telling him on the phone what isn’t possible. As far as I know though wasn’t that door locked from the outside trapping him anyway? What was the point of using Elena as a lure at all if Damon was stuck to begin with?
And what the point of Enzo going into the vault alone knowing what he knew from Alex’s sister? They did a very typical scene avoiding the topic on the everlasting simply since it wasn’t going to do Damon any good to hear. That was cheap and somewhat misleading since Enzo willingly went inside the vault probably knowing it was going to lock itself behind him.
And they’re just going to write off that the two escaped the cave without explaining how. Was it more magical wind nonsense? Did they find some river and descended through it or did they just burrow through the dirt until they found an exit? Logistics can play an important role when storylines demand certain characters make it from point A to point B and here, it was like everyone shrugged and just accepted that these two influenced vampires figured it out.
The last shots of Enzo and Damon hanging more dead bodies and bloodletting them was also a bit random. They’re not drinking the blood so that’s something to think about. Maybe the everlasting needs bodies to stay strong or become corporeal or something, but at the same time, Enzo and Damon are back to enjoying what they’re doing, so I can’t say their emotions are turned off if they’re enjoying it. They seem cognizant of their actions which will make it interesting when Stefan, Caroline, and Bonnie attempt to persuade them out of their supposed trance next season. It just didn’t quite had the impact as other cliffhangers in the past.
Still feel nothing for Stefan and Caroline getting back together. In fact, I feel bad for Alaric having to push Caroline in that state of mind as he didn’t want to really deal with the “lie” anymore. Does this mean they won’t stay together for the kids or will she even be a part of their lives like she was?
OVERALL SCORE
7 out of 10. TVD brought us wicked tale starting with the heretics, pushing us into a realm of flashback and flashforwards that worked surprisingly well until Rayna became part of the plot. From there, we crossed over with the Originals which was paramount and great and then we ended with this armory plot that saw Damon and Enzo return to their evil ways, two snarky goofballs who enjoy killing and are on drugs it seems like. I felt the finale did little with the risks it placed everyone in and saved everyone for another season that is intended to be its last. While I’m not convinced this show has another season left to tell something truly interesting, there’s always the case that they’ll surprise us. Whether Elena returns at all or even in the middle of the season remains to be seen, but I’d hate to think the show will end with her still in the coffin. Some good tense moments, but nothing truly standing out, TVD holds onto their core cast for yet another season in the hopes they can put the Salvatore’s on one more vampiric ride into the sunset before calling it quits for good. Thanks for reading.
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