The end where I begin

The Vampire Diaries

Season 3 episode 22 - "The Departed"

Dear Diary,

What would you do if you knew this was your last day as a human?

Spend it with loved ones, give up, fight to hold onto your humanity, run wild in fields of vervain, walk into places you've never been invited in.

Unfortunately for Elena Gilbert her last day as a human was filled with heartache, despair, terror, loss and the occasional kidnapping, though to the anointed that’s typically just a day in Mystic Falls.

One of the strongest character traits Elena has had was her resolve to never become a vampire. Katherine turned herself to avoid being sacrifice, Isobel used Damon to turn her for undisclosed reasons, but Elena had chosen to never go down that path, a choice that was respected to the point her birth father (Uncle John the Jerk) gave up his life so she would remain human.

Unfortunately life doesn't always respect your choices.

Holding on and Letting Go

The Departed deals with the life that Elena no longer gets to have. She'll never have the normalcy she had with her parents post-vampires and she desperately clung to and craved. But if Damon is to be believed she never really meant to or at one point wanted a normal life.

But that's easy enough to understand. When you're in high school, I imagine particularly in a very small town like Mystic Falls, you want nothing more for something exciting, an adventure. But her passion for life and thrills changed once her parents died and reality sunk in.

It doesn't matter what she wanted before that point, because since then she has to try and survive in the darkness that followed and never fully recovered. It's that pain and stark reality, vampires aren't sparkly and people get hurt and die sinks in and you just want things back the way they were. Unfortunately for Elena that's never going to happen.

It is my opinion that the Vampire Diaries is one of the best written television shows on at the moment. Yes they have been high and low points (which really the lows are only low compared to the extremely high standard of this show) If you look back and take in Elena's arc for this season it’s been more than love triangles and Originals, it's been the lead up to this game changing moment. (Plus how many shows would have the guts to kill off one of its leads and bring them back as a vampire.)

We started Season 3 with Elena's birthday, the starting point for the next stage of someone’s life and we ended it with Elena's death, mirroring the point when her normal life ended ad signalling the next stage, her afterlife.
　
Most people think that their problems are the worst or that something is the most horrible thing that they could possible go through until it’s not. For Elena once upon a time her biggest problem was that she didn’t know if she could break Matt's heart or not, than her parents died. That caused a series of events more frightening and difficult than she could have possibly imagined. They were highs (Hello Salvatore brothers) but there were definitely lows, but it came back to that one horrible instant when her parents died. That’s when a new Elena Gilbert was born. Matt and Elena discussed this on the bridge in "Our Town" (again kudos to the writing team A pluses all around) Elena was a new person because of that event and it is that new person that fell in love with Stefan Salvatore.

Elena off handling mentions that if she met Damon first maybe she would have chosen him and I think that is true. The Elena that Damon met, before that accident would have chosen Damon. He was exciting, dangerous, the kind of excitement that you wouldn't normally get living in mystic falls. The Damon that Elena met that night would have welcomed and love the adventure and challenge that being with Damon brought, but that Elena hadn't met reality yet and felt the excoriating pain of losing someone.

This is why her choice to be with Stefan makes sense. The brutality of losing her parents changed her, she wants security, safely, a love she can always be sure of and Damon can't provide that for her (yet?)

Stefan is the love of her human life and that's ok. She's allowed to feel that. The same way its ok for to her have feelings for Damon but not choose him.

Things look all sparkly and new

That being said Vampire Elena is a whole other story. Now all the cards are off the table and the table has been blown to hell, stomped on, had the ashes, set on fire, scooped up and thrown to the wind than eaten by a pterodactyl.

Having Elena become a vampire resets everything, the love triangle is fresh again with anyone now a chance at being endgame, Klaus has lost his way to produce his hybrids friends, Matt will have to deal with the guilt of being the one to survive, Jeremy who has lost so much to vampires will face the last member of his family becoming one after trying so hard to save her, Alaric is gone to the ghostly world of vampire diaries cast casualties, and Bonnie and Caroline will have to deal with the fallout of the new transition to their best friend.

Some people may be concerned about how Vampire Elena won't be any different from Katherine, but I have faith that Nina Doberv who has handled and excelled any part that they've thrown at her will be nothing short of fantastic.

(Besides who thought that the romantic lead of this show would spend half the season trying to tear everyone's throats out and excel about convincing us that the old Stefan was gone as well as being awesomely evil and sympathetic at the same time- these guys know what there're doing, it's cool)

So many emotions

Other stuff that happened that I should probably talk about:

- The whole episode completely slayed me. From the look at life for Elena before, seeing her parents and Jenna, footballer Matt and psychic Bonnie to the finally heartbreaking ten minutes, the juxtaposition between Elena's father giving up his life for Elena as Elena was doing for Matt, was really emotional for me ok, and it was ok that I was crying no matter what my brother says. Stefan sitting there in the morgue watching over Elena's body, ok now I'm crying again.

- I thought I was done mourning Alaric after "Do not go gentle" but damn it if I didn't literally feel my heart being ripped from my chest as the real Alaric, ghost style said goodbye to Jeremy. From Jeremy facing having lost another loved one to realising what it meant for his sister. So many emotions during this hour people, I honestly don't think I've quite recovered from it. 

- UbervampRic stabbed Klaus in the Chest. HE STABBED HIM AND HE CAUGHT FIRE. I don't even, what, how, noooooo. Pretty much sums up my reaction to that experience. I'm pleased to say that news of his death was greatly exaggerated because Bonnie swapped his handsome English self into the body of his former protégée Tyler, the beau of the girl that Klaus currently fancies. I see what they did there.

- So evil Bonnie's happening right? RIGHT. 

-People need to stop trying to kill Jeremy and Matt. There are plenty of other people in town. Just leave them alone. Sincerely, Hanniebee.

-So much happened I didn't even get to the fact that Elijah back, Elijah was back, Elijah was back. Ok I’m done. 

-If I was Rebekah I'd just leave town, no dance is worth going to for what she's about to face. 

- I'm excited to know what is going to happen to Meredith after this. She was one of my favourite characters in the books as I might have mentioned and BOOK SPOILER: Alaric was her primary love interest there and how she was connected to the gang in the television series: OK DONE- so it will be interesting how she is integrated further into the story, now that the council knows her secret and she is responsible for helping Elena to transition. I’ve heard that a position for a day drinker just opened up in the Gilbert residence.

Well, that's it for this season, thank you so much for reading, I've really enjoyed writing about and hope to continue to do so next season (which is Wednesday the 17^th October on Fox8 6:30pm non-daylight savings, 7:30pm daylight saving for you Australian viewers playing along at home)

Wahoooooooo!

Ok, back to maturity now. That was one hell of an episode to close off one fantastic season.
　
Until next time, if you hit your head really hard than drink tequila make sure you check first what the doctors trying to give you.

Always and forever,

Hannie Bee