The Vampire Diaries (s1ep15): A Few Good Men – ****

SPOILERS BELOW

Guess who’s back. Back again. It’s been six weeks since our beloved show went on hiatus. Which in tv years is a frickin’ long time. But now we’re back and will hopefully not have too many more interruptions.

Previously: Stefan has lived over a hundred years as a vampire and falls in love with this Elena girl in town. But wait, Elena also happens to look exactly like Katherine, a vampire who Stefan and his brother Damon loved in the past. Well, Damon is still in love with her. And it turns out Elena was adopted and her birth mother’s name was Isobel. But there’s also Alaric, a guy who’s come to town because Damon killed his wife. His wife’s name was also Isobel. Then there’s a tomb that Damon’s been obsessed with opening all season because Katherine is supposed to be trapped inside. It’s finally opened, but they learn Katherine was never there. Two other vampires, Anna and Pearl, tell Damon that Katherine escaped before being put in the tomb and didn’t even care to find Damon. Bummer. But now the tomb is open…

Let’s go: We start with a vamp named Harper who comes out of the tomb and says ‘sorry’ before biting and stealing the clothes off a poor hiker in the woods. It’s nice to know there are still deadly, but nice, vamps in the world.

Then, we get mucho progress from Aunt Jenna on Elena’s birth mother, ‘Isobel Peterson’. They ‘bing’ her. (Plug for Bing much?) And see a pic of Trudie Peterson and Isobel Flemming (Who looks pretty evil). Bing-o. (See, I can do it, too.) Jenna gives her Trudie’s address to follow up and lets her in on how Alaric’s Isobel may be one and the same. Not good. Elena stupidly goes to visit Trudie alone who doesn’t exactly invite her in for tea. Looks to me like she’s aware of vamps and the inviting process. We learn Trudie last saw Isobel 17 yrs ago, doesn’t know about Elena’s dad, and last heard Isobel moved to NC to go to Duke. Then as she goes and get the tea, she txts someone that, “She’s here.” Elena puts the the vervain tea and not being invited in together and asks Trudie what she knows. But she’s just ordered to leave. And an ‘effin creepy person stands outside watching in a pretty creepy out-of-focus shot as she drives away. Later, Trudie answers the door to the guy we saw standing outside. He thanks her for sending him the txt. Trudie says she kept her promise, but that Elena knew something. He says, “That won’t be any problem. She won’t get any closer to the truth.” Clearly not a vampire, he comes in and kills her.

Stefan finds Damon dealing with everything by drinking and having a biting orgy with some sorority girls. Damon says he’s fine. “It’s so liberating, not having a master plan.” But actions speak louder than words, he’s heartbroken. Stefan asks him about Isobel, but Damon doesn’t know or care. “I have to go exploit some women in the name of grief.”

Stefan has a meeting with Alaric on Isobel as Aunt Jenna told him about Elena’s birth mother being his wife. Alaric is getting frustrated and wants more info from Damon on what happened, but Stefan tells him not to push it as Damon is unstable right now. He’s also hot when he stands up for Elena:

Stefan: I’ll handle it, but for now I need you to let it go.
Alaric: Is that what you’ll tell Elena? Let it go?
Stefan steps right up to him: Leave Elena out of this.
Alaric: I need to know what happened. I think you would, too.

Alaric gives Stefan a picture to show Damon and flashes back to a late night when he awoke to find his wife on the computer. “Look, baby. I’m in a threeway here between you and your computer, the least you could do is let me know what you’re up to.”

She’s researching a little town, Mystic Falls, where she thinks there are vampires. We also get an amusing reference to The X-Files. (First a reference to Twilight and now X-Files? Be still my heart, show.)

Alaric: “This is why I love you. Because you believe in all of this stuff. So much so that you’re making a degree out of it. You’re like…Mulder. Except hotter, and a girl.”
Isobel vows to prove it and says: “And Mulder was right in the end.”

Damon has now moved the drowning of sorrows to a bar where Alaric stupidly makes some mighty suspicious comments before leaving. Caroline’s mother sits down, long time no see, and amusingly still thinks Damon is helping them fight the vamps. She calls him a “hero” and asks him to help them by being raffled off as a bachelor. Oh god. Damon agrees and asks for a favor in return, info on Alaric.

Elena goes to meet Stefan and runs into Damon who drunkenly asks for help buttoning his shirt. She tries to be nice, even when she shouldn’t, and tells him about searching for her mom. He callously asks why she even cares. (I don’t know why she cares about him.) Stefan then shows up and Damon buttons his shirt just fine on his own. Elena is clearly annoyed at that fact. And so am I. Personally, maybe cause I’m not a Damon/Elena fan, I’m annoyed at how these irrelevant scenes between the two keep getting in. And Stefan needs to say something already when he keeps walking in on Damon trying to seduce Elena.

Elena tells Stefan about Trudie knowing about vampires. Stefan shows her the picture he got from Alaric and finally tells her Isobel was killed by a vampire, but not by who. Stefan asks Damon again using the picture if he remembers Isobel from NC. Again he refuses to answer and says he doesn’t know. At the raffle, Caroline’s mom shares with Damon the info about Alaric and his wife in NC. Damon hears the info, sees the picture, and puts it together that Alaric’s Isobel is the same as Stefan’s Isobel. During the raffle Damon teases Alaric by saying his wife was ‘delicious’. Elena finally realizes Damon was the vamp who killed Isobel. Elena later runs into Damon and tells him how the Isobel he joked about killing was also her mom. Damon is shocked. Now this is a Damon/Elena scene I’m ok with as it’s relevant to the plot. The guy who killed Trudie is outside waiting for Stefan and Elena. He tells Elena to stop looking. “She doesn’t want to know you.” Stefan realizes the guy is under compulsion right before he, OMG, steps in front of a truck. But thank goodness his phone survives and Elena pockets it before Stefan sees.

Alaric flashes back to remember how Isobel wanted more than just a normal life and goes to kill Damon who just throws him around a bit before admitting:

Damon: “I slept with her cause I liked her. I turned her cause she begged me, too. Guess she wasn’t happy at home. Wasn’t happy with life in general. Wasn’t happy with you.”

Damon stabs him in the chest, OMG, and leaves him to die on the rug as he chillingly says: “Sounds like I got a lung, which means I get to sit here and watch you die.” Damon is still obsessed with Katherine and goes on this crazy rant to Stefan. “Isobel is related to Elena. Elena is related to Katherine. Isobel is related to Katherine, and her seeking me out couldn’t have been a coincidence. Maybe Katherine sent her.” Makes me wonder if there’s any truth to his theory. He leaves an utterly defeated Stefan to dispose of the body. But then, Alaric’s fingers twitch. Turns out Isobel gave him a ring as a gift that he thinks saved him. I really thought he was a goner.

In other news, the always cute Matt and Caroline get hot and heavy before being interrupted by Matt’s mother Kelly who’s back in town. (Hello, Melinda Clarke!) Matt takes his mom home and we see how she’s exactly who you’d think bad girl Vicki’s mom (RIP Vicki) would be, but also how she could be sweet guy Matt’s mom. She’s spends the episode degrading Caroline, even to her face, that she’s not good enough for her son. And now drunkenly admits to Matt that she’s all alone and he’s all she has left. I think she’s just possessive of her baby boy.

Elena looks at the phone she retrieved and dails the last call. “Was there a problem? Did you find her?” When Elena replies, “Isobel?” The lady hangs up.

And Harper from earlier has been wandering around town and sees a lady he recognizes. At the end he arrives at a house and the lady from the park answers the door. Then we see that Anna and Pearl are also inside.

That was crazy good. I missed my show.

Addendum: What are Anna, Pearl, and Harper up to? What is Isobel up to? Where is Katherine? So, wait, Damon has slept with Elena’s mother and her distant relative who happens to look exactly like her? Did Isobel do something so Elena would look like Katherine? What the frack is going on?