So I’ve been doing some research with Bonnie, Shane and the whole expression magic by rewatching some episodes of Season 4 problem being I have to endure everything else and I didn’t realize how taxing that would be until I watched episode 4 (which is where I started because I didn’t need anything before that). So within the first ten minutes of this episode I found myself so annoyed that I had to write it down just to calm myself down and get through it and within those first ten minutes there were just so many things wrong that I had to share it. 

So one of the first things that set me off is that Stefan learns that Damon and Elena are going to Whitmore to teach her control through Damon. Basic common curtesy is to tell your boyfriend when you’re going out of town before the day of and Elena not only didn’t do that, but also failed to tell him she was going out of town with Damon — the guy she’s had issues staying faithful to him with. That warrants a discussion where they both make a decision together on whether she should go and that semi happens when Stefan confronts her. This is where my second issue starts, not only is she dodging him with excuses, but he’s not allowed to be angry with her due to his guilt of her being turned — he’s not allowed to have valid feelings for respecting her wishes. That pretty much tainted the scene for me when they got all lovey dovey because they didn’t solve anything. This is one of the things I found worse than Elena sleeping with Damon (in his house no less) immediately after breaking up with him because she was essentially cheating on him well before that. 

 The next big issue I had was when Elena was making her excuses for why she needed Damon to help, she cites the flimsiest one for why Caroline can’t help her. She says she’s “too good” at control and has “never struggled” with control which is just plain inaccurate. Not only did Caroline have issues with control in season 2 that resulted in a death (which is a line Elena hadn’t crossed at that point), but she almost killed Matt too, so Caroline was in a position to understand her the most. Add on top of that the fact that Damon has never struggled with control so why the hell does she think he can help? I realize in retrospect that this is all the sire bond, that doesn’t make it any less annoying especially since Stefan, who knows all of this, doesn’t point out the holes her logic. Her head may not be screwed on correctly, but his is. 

So of course, on one of the first episodes I’ve watched in months it has to be an episode where Elena is unnecessarily added to story line she has no business in, and now with a side of Damon. The entire reason they’re at Whitmore is because Bonnie needs to get her Grams’ stuff back from Shane (a year later). Where in that is Elena, let alone Damon, relevant? I mean at this point Bonnie doesn’t even like Damon nor does she even approve of what they’re doing (victimizing people the same way Damon did Caroline). Why, if this was even necessary to begin with, didn’t they go somewhere else more relevant to their own story line? One that makes sense maybe? 

 One that note, Damon has had a creepy moments, but this one takes the cake for me when he’s describing how to choose a victim. Not only does he point out and describe a girl who looks like Caroline, but he describes exactly what he did to her to Elena as instructions as though he was PROUD of that. THANK GOD, Shane interrupted them because I was literally getting sick. And then there’s Elena who’s taking notes on it completely oblivious that that’s exactly what he did to her best friend. It makes when she shames Caroline for sleeping with Damon all the more inconsiderate since she knows the exact inner workings of that relationship. Ugh! 

And to top it all off just plain annoyance at Klaus and Rebekah’s presence because it was like “what are you still doing here?” “Don’t you have more important places to be?”

All that was literally in the first ten minutes (actually 8 but I rounded up). How can so many things be wrong when the episode has barely started and the season? 

Things just get worse from there everything involving Klaus and Rebekah. It was the same song and dance and they were both having temper tantrums however I did find myself on Rebekah’s side since he was being so hypocritical. And Stefan manipulating her and stabbing her in the back although I guess he felt vindicated about that. This entire episode basically was trying to convince me that hunters were the villains and vampire are anti-heroes, but they’re not, The Originals needed to do something heroic to earn such a title. 

 Then there’s the god awful blood and dancing scene with Damon and Elena. This episode highlight one of my fundamental issues with Elena being called compassionate when she’s too complacent for such a title. When they target the blonde girl Elena can’t do it because she sees the girl has a family that care, so she ends up feeding on a guy roofying people at the party. No issue with that, but she nor Damon actually do anything to stop the guy from roofying people. She feeds on him and then sends him on his way to go back to what he was doing. It’s like they were thinking “job done, saved some people” but NO! not only his he going to keep doing that in the future, but later that night. All she did was bruise his neck. It’s like in Season 1 when she finds out Damon is feeding on Caroline, she threatens him once and never does anything to stop him after that. She’s too short sighted to have the title of “most compassionate” that the writers so tried to convince us she was via words other people say. Something like that is a show not tell moment. 

 Anyways the only thing I like this episode that didn’t make me want roll my eyes was Bonnie and unfortunately she was barely in the episode, but had a few key scenes. I especially liked in the scene, before Damon goes full creeper, when they’re in the classroom Bonnie calls Shane cute and it reminded me so much of her in season 1 in the pilot. It was the first time she’d been bubbly in a while. I know Shane turns out to be a total creep in the end, but I appreciated him bringing out that in her.

Rewatching this episode made me remember just how much I despised Damon back then. I was actually perfectly fine with his season 1-3, a little whiny, but manageable, but season 4 turned my like for him into pure hate – he’s half the reason I gave up on season 5 midway through. When I heard the spoiler about him dying at the end of season 5, I couldn’t careless at the time because a) I knew the plot amour he had and b) his presence wasn’t missed by me. He only slightly redeemed himself to me in season 6, but it just went from me despising him to tolerable – I wouldn’t have been sad if he died, but I didn’t want to tear my eyes out everytime he was on my screen.

I honestly would just look at clips, but I need a refresher on the story line around it and reading about it just isn’t cutting it – the plot that season was just too convoluted. I continued on to episode 5 and it was mildly better. Had a lot less of Damon and Elena, but ugh! her whining. I usually don’t harp on female characters for whining because for the most part it a valid feeling to have, but what bothers me so much about it is how much perspective she lacks and the people around her. They’re acting like she’s the first person to go through this–that she’s the first one to have this feelings, and because she’s Elena and just that special, everyone coddles her, even Damon, instead teaching her how to deal with it like Caroline. Of course Caroline was given no such luxury when she was turned and instead had to worry about being killed if she got out of control. 

I think the horribleness of season 5 and the fact that I loved expression Bonnie in this season distracted me from how bad this season was. Anybody who says the first four season of TVD were great is either lying or just forgot the all kinds of awful this season spawned because it’s almost unwatchable. I think season 7 was even better than this.