As the holidays draw near, Stefan and Damon's search for Julian leads them to a town outside Mystic Falls; Bonnie becomes friendly with Nora during a toy drive; Alaric fears that Caroline is struggling with her pregnancy.
AIRED: December 10, 2015
RATING: 5 ★★★★★ Extraordinary!
3 years from now in Chicago, Stefan is getting ready to go after Damon and Caroline, but Valerie is telling him that he can't go. He refuses to leave Damon and Caroline in the hunter's hands. When she offers to go with him, Stefan won't allow it. The hunter already has two people he cares about and he won't allow her to have a third. Valerie promises him that if anything happens to him, she'll reign down hell on anyone responsible. Before leaving, he kisses her and promises to be back before she knows it. Now we learn that Stefan is with Valerie. Like, with her-with her. These glimpses into the future are kind of driving me nuts. I want to know what happened to cause such dramatic changes in their relationships.
In this episode, Damon and Stefan lay Lily to rest. Caroline's pregnancy hormones go haywire. Stefan and Damon travel to Sunbury to track down Julian. Bonnie runs the Toys for Tots toy drive, with Nora's help. Mary Louise and Nora break up. And Julian gets his revenge on Damon and Stefan.
At Lily's graveside, I thought that it was really sweet that Valerie brought with her the flowers that Stefan used to place at his mother's grave when he was a boy. That was a really touching moment that was then off set by Damon's flippant eulogy that shows he still doesn't feel any remorse. Throughout this entire episode, people comment on Damon's apparent lack of remorse. He may not have any right now, but something does happen that changes things for him.
After a birthing class, Caroline overhears a couple talking about her and Ric. They recognize him as a professor and her as a student. They say some rude things and that makes Caroline angry. Her pregnancy hormones have made her control over her vampire nature almost non-existent. Luckily, Ric was there to stop her from doing something she'd regret. We learn what's really going through Caroline's head when she goes to visit her mother's grave. Caroline feels responsible for the babies, even if they aren't her own, and she just wants to make sure that she does right by them.
In Sunbury, a town that Bonnie found Julian in using a locator spell, Damon and Stefan follow a Santa Pub Crawl to a pub where they find everyone dead. They know that's where they'll find Julian. And they do, but he's not alone. Damon is able to get them out and wants Stefan to drop it for now and not to kick the hornet's nest. Stefan doesn't drop it though and that get him and Damon into a situation they can't get out of. Julian uses the X-shaped sword and stabs Damon in the heart, trapping his soul in the Phoenix Stone. It took this happening to Damon to snapped Stefan out of his fog of vengeance. Stefan tells Caroline that Damon won't be able make it in the Stone. With all the things that Damon has done, Stefan doesn't want to know what kind of hell the Stone has created for him. We are shown a scene where Damon wakes up, wounded, on a Civil War battlefield. I'm really curious about what Damon did back then, while still human mind you, to cause the Stone to use that in creating his punishment. Caroline promises that they'll find a way to save Damon and that Damon can survive this. Nora, who was cloaked, tells them that even if Damon survives, he'll be different, just like Stefan will be. She then stabs Stefan with the Sword in retaliation for what he did to Mary Louise. Things are going to get really interesting now that both Damon and Stefan are trapped in the Phoenix Stone. We know that Damon's done a lot of bad things, but we haven't seen much of what Stefan has done in his past, so it'll be interesting to see what his hell looks like.
Finally, now that Nora has separated from Mary Louise, she has gone out on her own. She enrolls in classes at the University, and she wants to be more involved in charity. She asks if she can help Bonnie with the Toys for Tots toy drive. But it's apparent that Nora is still hung up on Mary Louise. When Mary Louise visits Nora at the hospital where she's delivering gifts to the children, they end up fighting and Nora breaks it off completely. But that all changes when Julian tells her that Mary Louise has been taken. I was really liking the new side to Nora we were seeing. And I was really enjoying seeing her and Bonnie kind of bond. But it looks like there's just no way for the Heretics and Team Salvatore to be friends (with the exception of Valerie).
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