"The House Guest" has more beats than a Bonham solo, and my respiration rate keeps trying to sync up with it. Where to begin? Pant. Pant. Panta-pant-pant. Okay. How about here? Junior and Senior Manwitch pretend to make a deal with Stefan and Bonnie, which includes protecting Elena, finding a way to kill Satan Klaus, and freeing Girl Manwitch. Senior Manwitch is a double-dealer, though, and tries to resurrect Elijah, by sending Junior on the astral plane (or what have you) to Mossy Manse, to pull the knife out of Elijah's heart. Damon has to torch the invisible, astral Junior Manwitch to death, to keep Elijah dead.
Once Junior's physical body burns up in Senior's presence, Senior goes off the reservation and decides to take Elena. During his magical temper tantrum, he intentionally and mortally wounds my Pudding Pop Matt, who has just reunited with Caroline, after she compels the live band at the Bronze Grill to let her sing "Eternal Flame" to him. Die, Senior Manwitch. Die. Die.
Caroline does what any vamp in love would do and opens a vein to save Matt's life. Later when he comes to, he remembers the incident and she explains she fed him her blood to save his life, because she's a vampire, silly. Matt doesn't take this news as well as she expects, because he remembers Vicki talking about vampires and figures Caroline killed her and we've got to wait weeks to see how this shakes out. Grrr argh.
Katherine is up to something, because she's Katherine, but she works with the Fellowship of the Falls to protect Elena, and even imitates Elena to Elena's benefit this time, rather than her detriment. Katherine also kills Senior Manwitch, so I love her -- at least for the nonce. Jeremy knows the Manwitches deserved to die and says so, even if Bonnie's not sure about that. I say she's just feeling soft because in his death throes, Senior Manwitch gives her back her powers. He also gives her the charge to kill Satan Klaus and a way to do it, but we won't learn about that 'til this Hellish hiatus ends, either.
And that's not all. Elena is pleased as punch to give Bonnie her blessing to date Jeremy. Hooray! Jenna and Alaric remain on the outs, but he saves her from Senior's temper tantrum, takes her home to Gilbert Gables, and tells her that he loves her.
Since Jenna's out of tequila, she breaks out the ice cream. Elena joins her in the kitchen, and when the doorbell rings, Jenna goes to answer it. I yell at Elena that she and the Germ should NEVER let Jenna answer the door, since they're keeping her in the dark about vampires and I think she kind of listens, because she chases after Jenna -- meaning I have achieved control of the pretty people in this shiny box with all the lights. Hurrah!
When Jenna opens the door, there is indeed a vampire waiting on the other side. She introduces herself to Jenna as "Elena's mother." That's right, babies. Isobel is BACK! Jenna's jaw hits the porch. Elena hisses her bio-mom's name, and then the stupid CW tells me I can't have my show back until April 7th. My daughter, who is sleeping over at my mother's, calls me up and screams about it. I scream back. My husband rolls his eyes and pours me a glass of wine. The end!
I'll be back with the weecap ASAP. In the meantime, please grade the episode at the top of the page and then join us on the boards, to ride out the long, cold, lonely hiatus.
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Want more? The full recap starts right below!
Well gang, since The Vampire Diaries moves at such a breakneck pace, but is going on hiatus until April 7th, this seems like a good place to stop, take a deep breath and figure out what the heck has happened so far this season.
We open with Stefan and Elena in his room at Mossy Manse. Elena hangs a lantern on the fact that they hardly ever go to school. You know, Elena, if you ever doubt Stefan's love for you, remind yourself that he's a hundred and mumble years old, and yet he willingly enrolled himself in high school, just to get to know you, and then once he got you, he kept going to school (mostly) just to be with you. There's not a person in the world for whom I would do that. I mean, I'd do it to save a life, but just to hang? No way. Getting ready for school turns into making out on Stefan's bed, which seems like a better plan to me. These two are so adorable together.
After the cut, Elena wanders downstairs and finds Damon with his morning paper and coffee. But wait, is that Elena? Damon doesn't think so. He Stealth Salvatores over to her, pushes her up against the wall with The Vampire Diaries stock-throttle and accuses her of being Katherine. Stefan stumbles upon the scene, as "Elena" is asking Damon why he thinks she's Katherine, since Katherine is still compelled to be in ye olde tomb. He Stealth Salvatores up the stairs, into his room and finds Elena, assumes she's Katherine, throttles her, pushes her against the wall. When Elena cries that he's hurting her, Stefan screams, "Stop it, Katherine." Katherine slithers up to his doorway and says, "Stop what?" Oopsy doopsy. As Stefan releases his hold on the real Elena's neck, Katherine smirks at her. "It's getting really easy being you."
After the title card, Elena has a come to Jesus meeting with Katherine and the boys. Once Elena is all caught up on how Elijah's compulsion of Katherine died with him, Elena gets stompy footed. She wants Katherine out of there. Katherine states her case: they're going to need her if they want a chance at defeating Klaus. What is her angle, here? I mean, of course she wants Klaus dead, but as Katherine has shown us time and again, she only cares about number one. How is hanging in Mystic Falls, with the doppelganger to her benefit at all? I guess she can try to throw Elena at Klaus when the time is right, but I still think there's more to it.
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