SGRoA: Vampire Diaries, S2 E17: Know Thy Enemy

Before we get started, let me share this little tidbit I found on Reddit today. Titties out and hair down, just like Katharine would want.

Y’all, I can’t believe I’m gonna say this, but I might be too stoned to do a recap today. (Yadda yadda, chronic pain, blah blah blah.) And when I say “too stoned”, what I really mean is “these jokes are gonna be hilarious right now, and super unintelligible tomorrow when I go to edit”. I’m still gonna make ‘em, tho. Don’t worry.

Our “Last Time on the Vampire Diaries” thingie is all moonstone curse, all the time, so I hope there’s a lot of plot today. I don’t wish hard, or anything, but I do wish.

We pick up right where we left off last time, Isobel in the doorway telling Jenna she’s Elena’s mother. Elena says it’s lovely to see Isobel again, and Jenna looks at her: AGAIN? Isobel of course takes this opportunity to say, “So you’re the one who’s dating my husband,” like a BITCH, and Jenna is now incapable of rational thought.

Isobel says she must speak with Elena, can she come in? Elena practically screams “No, don’t invite her in!” and shuts the door in Isobel’s face.

Jenna asks if Elena knew that Isobel - Ric’s WIFE - was still alive. Elena begs to explain. “Ric? John? Did they know?” Jenna runs upstairs, Elena at her heels, begging to explain, but Jenna locks herself in her room and we get our opening sting.

Elena calls Stefan, who tells Damon and Katharine about Isobel. Stefan’s heading over to deal with Jenna, and he tells Damon to call Ric and tell him that his wife just showed up on his girlfriend’s doorstep. Katharine convinces them both not to tell Isobel that she’s here, on the strength of her wanting to help them kill Klaus, and that they might need her to impersonate Elena again, so the fewer people know she’s still there, the better.

Also, Isobel and Uncle John might be… not thrilled that she stuck around after getting out of the tomb.

Ric shows up at Jenna’s, and she comes downstairs with a couple of bags. She’s going to stay on campus to write her thesis! Finally, after almost two full seasons, I know what Jenna does all day. She tells Elena to go to the Lockwoods’ to pick up the check for her mother’s foundation, tells them both she doesn’t want to hear any more lies, and skedaddles.

Uncle John oozes from the shadows to say it’s best if Jenna isn’t around, what with, you know, everything. Or, you know, we could TELL HER. John even says that Ric should have been “more honest” with her, and Ric punches him right in the face and then leaves. Elena looks contemptibly at his bloody nose and tells him it’s his own fault before disappearing upstairs.

pictured: me talking to John

Caroline, meanwhile, has been looking for Matt since he bolted from her place. He’s not at home, he’s not at work, not at school or any of his friends’. He’s not answering his phone. She calls Stefan to tell him, and to let him know that Matt thinks she’s responsible for Vicki. Also, all the vervain she’s been slipping him is out of his system.

Stefan tells her she has to find him and calm him, but he can’t deal with it right now, will she be okay for a while? Sure, of course, and….

Stefan tells Elena about Matt, and she adds it to her disaster tally. Uncle John requests they come downstairs to talk, so they do, possibly because John acted like a normal human being and actually asked this time.

Too bad he only wanted to show them Isobel, whom he invited into the house!

She says she’s asked John for “a do-over”, and, like, girl, what? Why on earth do you think John is the correct Gilbert to ask these things of? Everyone hates him, for starters, and also, like, everyone hates you? Maybe start with a round of apologies? Some improved behavior?

John says she has info on Klaus.

we’re going with this. every time.

She does not, in fact, have info about Klaus. But she says that rumors of a doppleganger are going around, so all the vampires who want to get in good with Klaus will be lining up to kidnap Elena. Isobel bought a house, put it in Elena’s name, so no vampires can get in. A safe house. “Let me help you,” she says, and Elena says she can help by getting the fuck out of her house.

Damon, Jeremy, and Bonnie go to the Martins’ place to clean up. Damon will bury Luka, Bonnie and Jeremy start packing up grimoires. When Doc gave Bonnie back her powers, he also gave her a message: if she can find the site of the witches’ massacre, she can use the power of it whenever she needs it. Damon puts it on the to-do list: “harness ancient dead witches’ power.”

Because it turns out Damon knows where that is. Katharine had accused him of knowing, sure, but this is confirmation. Bonnie does a spell to find the grimoire that has the dead witch spell in it, she grabs it, and Jer’s gonna pack up the rest.

Isobel goes home to her boy-toy and her weird mansion. Katharine comes flying down the stairs and seems to attack her - but no, of course. Isobel’s made a deal with Klaus to save Katharine’s life.

Isobel couldn’t get directly to Klaus, of course. But she found one of his witches, who said Katharine is off the hook if they deliver the moonstone and the doppleganger. The moonstone, no problem. Elena, however…. Katharine assures Isobel it’s no problem. The Salvatores are flailing: their witch lost her powers and they used their only weapon to kill Elijah, of all people. Thank god Isobel is here. Now Katharine has a team she really can root for!

Damon and Stefan are going to stick to Elena like glue - no more thinking she’s safe anywhere. Fine, she says, but someone has to come to the BCE this week - the Lockwood Luncheon. Stefan says he will; Damon says he has witch business to attend to with Bonnie. Elena starts to ask if he found the massacre site, but he shushes her - Katharine is coming down the stairs and into the room, demanding they share their plan with her.

They don’t.

Carol and Sheriff Liz are talking about something - a fire started, no bodies found, only blood - and Carol says, “Do you think it’s vampires?”

Did I miss something? Has weed truly ruined my memory, or is it all the collective trauma we keep going through in this country? WHEN TF DID CAROL FIND OUT ABOUT VAMPIRES.

Anyway, Liz says they should always assume it’s vamps, and then Caroline bursts in. She asks Carol if she’s seen Matt, sees her mother, and tries to tamp down her panic. Carol says she hasn’t, but can Caro ask if he’s heard from Tyler? She hasn’t had any word.

Back in full panic sail, Caro meets Stefan and Elena at the door. Elena says they will help her find Matt, but she has to accept this thing for Jenna. Caro extracts a promise to call as soon as they’re done.

On the way to the massacre site, Bonnie asks for backstory. Damon tried to save Emily: that’s why he knows where he’s going. Emily was his ticket to Katharine - before he knew how awful Katharine was. They roll up on an abandoned mansion - the Salvatores’? - and walk right in.

Well, they walk through the main hall to a back room, and then Damon tries to turn around, but is stuck fast. In a beam of sunlight. And his ring is suddenly inoperable. He tells Bonnie to do something, and she looks constipated for a second, and then Damon’s free. She tells him she doesn’t think the witches are too keen on his being here, and he says he’ll wait outside.

Katharine searches the Salvatores’ current house, taking cash as she goes. Looking for the moonstone? Probably. No dice, because doesn’t Damon or someone always have it on him? Oh, shit, nope!

He left it in the soap dish in his bathroom.

(Ew, I just got an ad for that terrible new Snow White movie. Gross.)

Look, I get what he was going for. He had a big-ass bowl full of soap next to the sink, and yeah, it should have gone unnoticed. But still. STILL.

Isobel rolls up on Ric as he’s … leaving school, maybe? It’s outside his car. She tries to say she loved him, but c’mon.

And of course, as he’s looking at her dumb moony eyes, her lackey takes him out.

Damon gets shut out of the house, and leaves Bonnie and Jeremy to spellwork on their own. Seems unwise, but how else do you make a plot go brrr?

Bonnie takes the grimoire and the witches start whispering. She moves deeper into the house, finding the actual room where they were killed. She tells Jeremy to set up the candles, and the witches light them - and all the leftovers already in the room, and the hearth. “They’re ready.”

While Elena is giving her speech about the scholarship donation and the historical society, Isobel is biting Uncle John. Well, she did say, when he asked, that she was there to create a distraction. John’s hopefully dead body would do that quite well, but I won’t be lucky enough for that to stick.

Isobel shoves him down the front stairs and as everyone goes to help, Katharine, now dressed identically to Elena, snatches her. Moonstone? Check. Doppleganger? Check. Evil plans going nicely? Double check.

Liz sees the bite and pretends like John is drunk so everyone will disperse. Stefan finds Katharine and seems fooled, at least till they get to the car. Too bad Katharine has anticipated that and stakes him in the gut. Can’t have him following.

Y’all, we are only halfway through and this episode has been wall-to-wall sensical plot development. I’m impressed, ngl.

Back at the massacre site, Bonnie looks like she’s struggling, and the witches’ whispers are no more distinct, but very much louder. Bonnie screams as Jeremy is kept from her; she must complete the spell and take in the power. She slumps against him as soon as it’s done, exhausted.

JOHN GILBERT IS DEAD?! Oh, bitch, he’s wearing his ring. Liz and Carol called Damon to help. He explains about the ring and tells them to come up with a cover story: epileptic fit, alcohol poisoning, whatever. John will be fine in a couple of hours.

Liz runs into Matt on the way out. He’s frantic and angry, demanding Vicki’s file from Liz, working himself up until he gets physical with Liz. She handles it easily - she’s a trained Sheriff and he’s a kid, still - and tells him they’ll talk when he’s calmer.

Damon brings John to his place, then goes to wash John’s blood off his hands. Who knew the plot would revolve so much around good hand hygiene? Stefan calls and tells him about Elena and Katharine, and he dumps out the bowl to reveal a missing moonstone.

Katharine shows up to Isobel’s, on the phone asking when Isobel is going to show up so they can go. Isobel, in an SUV with Elena in the back, says she’s sorry, but “He wanted the moonstone and he wanted you.”

Katharine is absconded with by Klaus’s man.

Caroline goes home to find Matt in her house. Liz brought him home to cool off, but she got called away. Matt didn’t say anything about Caroline to Liz, and though he’s scared and angry, he needs to know what happened to Vicki. Caroline says she’ll tell him everything he wants to know.

Jeremy and Bonnie head back into town. Jer asks what the witches were saying, and Bonnie says it’s “just” a warning. It doesn’t matter. Jeremy insists, and Bonnie just says it’s a lot of power, she needs to be careful with it. “How much?” and she brings on a storm entirely localized to the yard they’re standing in. “A lot,” she says.

Damon and Stefan show up at Isobel’s, but of course no one’s there.

Isobel takes Elena to Isobel’s grave. There’s a lot of maudlin nonsense about the “human” part of her, who wanted to know her daughter, blah blah blah. DON’T TRUST HER, ELENA.

While there, she gets a call from the lackey, who says that she can let Elena go. Klaus has the moonstone and Katharine: he has all he needs, and Isobel has done everything she was compelled to do. Isobel says she’s sorry she was such a disappointment to Elena, and then rips off her sun-protection necklace and immolates.

What’s the over-under on Isobel really being dead? Like, I have my suspicions, but the sun! the fire! Elena standing there and watching it! That was horrifying. I’m shook.

Caroline tells Matt everything, and in the end, Matt can only say: “I’m alone. My mother doesn’t care, my sister’s dead, and all my friends are liars.”

He asks Caroline to make him forget. “I don’t want to know this!” With tears in her eyes, she does.

Elena is having complicated feelings about her mother dying, so we move on. “Why did they let me go?” They talk it out - Klaus knows she’s not going to run. She’s stuck here, where he can find her whenever.

So Damon says they have to take some precautions. They have the deed to their house, which is in Zach’s name - remember Cousin Zach, who died like, immediately? Ah, more innocent days. Anyway, it’s in Zach’s name, and they want to turn it over to Elena, so she can control who’s invited in.

Before we get any more detail on the rest of Damon’s plans, Uncle John springs back to life. He tells them he had no idea what Isobel was planning, and he apologizes. Elena says they have a lot to talk about.

Jeremy’s been looking through grimoires and discovered that if Bonnie channels too much power, it could kill her. How much will she need to kill Klaus? “All of it,” she admits, but tells Jeremy that she was born a witch for a purpose - even if it kills her. Good thing this is prime time TV in the 21st century, Bonnie: No main character is ever allowed to die! Even when it makes stories better and is true to character! Especially if sacrificing oneself for the good of others is involved! It’s fuckin’ socialism or some shit, right, America?

Matt gets into a car with Sheriff Liz. He says he “did it”: he drank vervain, had Caro tell him everything, and asked to take it away. Liz thanks him, and tells him to repeat everything she said. He hesitates; he says it feels like she died. Liz says, through tears, that she did.

John says he had no idea that Isobel and Katharine were working together against him. Why did he ever trust Isobel, then? Because she seemed broken up about giving up Elena, and because he loved her. Blergh. Lame.

He also says he’ll do whatever Elena decrees at his point, and she doesn’t banish him, because she’s better than I am. She says she’ll try to learn not to hate him, given he’s the last parent she has. Babe. No parents is a great way to be, trust me. You’ll never miss him.

Stefan and Damon figure out that no one on the opposite side knows where the massacre site is, what spell unlocks it, or that Bonnie ever got her powers back. Bonnie is literally a secret weapon.

Lackey (apparently his name is Maddox) is chanting over someone who’s hooked up to a bunch of blood - Katharine’s blood? OMG, it’s Ric!

They put Klaus in him!