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butterflyNow that I'm all caught up on the show, I can start thinking about the bigger picture. I'm so excited about how into this show I am. I kinda went off tv as a whole for a while, so it's good to be drawn back into something. There are several aspects in particular that I want to start off thinking about.
Friendships and Family
One of the things that I like most about this show is that the romance, while definitely there, is only one part of the emotional puzzle. Family relationships (especially sibling relationships but not limited to them) are such a key element, and so is friendship.
One of the core friendships on the show is between Elena-Bonnie-Caroline. I adore the way that they've given this friendship so much care and screentime. All three women are built up and the relationships between them (and the way each friendship impacts the other ones) is fantastic. Whenever two of the girls are on the outs with each other, they still have the third one there to anchor them together. It's a fantastic friendship/set of friendships.
I also love the way that the Elena-Matt friendship has gone. It was set up with him still pining for her after she'd broken up with him and we get to see that, however, the friendship is more important to him and that they never stopped being friends. And we get to see him finally get over Elena and see that the friendship does remain intact through that, as well. Just... a really well-done friendship between exes and I don't see much of that on TV.
Family is also huge. Anna goes to great lengths to try to save her mother from the tomb. A lot of Matt's early character definition comes from being Vicky's brother. A lot of the fierceness in Elena's character gets shown through her relationship with (and her protectiveness of) her brother Jeremy.
And we have the brothers Salvatore. Wow, do we have the brothers. Seriously, if you are a fan of intense sibling relationships, you should be watching TVD. It's a beautiful thing. They have each other's backs, absolutely. Unconditionally. That's something that Elena twigged to that other characters had a harder time with - Stefan is not going to kill his brother. It doesn't matter how many people Damon might kill or what he does. Damon killed Stefan's best friend and Stefan couldn't kill him. Stab him in the stomach knowing that he would heal, yes. But he couldn't kill him. The reason that Damon is a vampire is because Stefan could not face eternity without his brother. It's a hugely important aspect of the show.
Female Agency
This show has a lot of women, all doing very different things. There's no one 'way' to be a woman on TVD.
And I kinda like that the lead female has no supernatural power of her own (though both of her close female friends eventually do - which I like, too). But she's got this fire and passion and she does not back down. She will stare a deadly vampire in the face and negotiate.
I love that Caroline, who started out basically as fluff and as a victim, has become so strong and awesome. Caroline's character arc is a thing of beauty.
The women have flaws, just like the guys. Sometimes they need to be rescued. But they act. And being a woman who listens to herself instead of 'authority' is something that is treated just like when the male characters do - sometimes it works out and sometimes it doesn't. And it's kinda hilarious (and awesome) how many times we get a set-up of a male character doing something... and it ends up that he's working for a more powerful female character.
We also have Katherine, the person who set everything in motion. And she did that by refusing to be a victim. She ran and she seduced and she did whatever the fuck was necessary to survive. She has a heart but it's hard out of necessity. She was a woman that didn't fit into the time she was born in and someone with a personal magnetism that captured many people. Katherine is a force to be reckoned with. I like her more than I like Darla (BtVS/AtS) and I adore Darla.
Women doing shit = awesome.
Vampires
I love TVD's take on vampires and now also werewolves.
Vampires:
a. have heartbeats (as long as they have enough blood in their system). I love this because it solves all the metaphysical problems like 'how do they have sex?' and 'why can't vampires tell humans and vampires apart quickly?' And it makes sense. They're taking in blood and it's being used as blood.
b. human blood makes them more powerful. Whether or not that blood is fresh doesn't seem to matter - Damon hasn't gotten weaker now that he's off the fresh stuff. They have a hunger and a hunting instinct that takes a lot of will-power to overcome. I like that they're still them just even more so than in life. Damon was always recklessly impulsive and a hopeless romantic.
c. keep all their human emotions and connections. And they don't get 'twisted' sadistically, as often happened in the Jossverse. But they do get all mushed together at first with the overwhelming hunger. Every strong emotion comes out as hunger in the beginning. I find the whole thing fascinating. They've really taken care to have us experience how overwhelming it is, especially at first.
As for the werewolves, they've done a great job showing how painful and horrific the transformation is.
It's not romanticized, any of it. Vampire bites are bloody and painful and obvious. It's not just a couple of pinpricks; it's a bite wound. And the trigger for both the final step into becoming a vampire and being a werewolf is blood and death. To be a vampire, you have to die (with vampire blood in your system) and then you have to drink human blood - that's what triggers the change. For werewolves, they have to 'cause death', any kind of death. And both of these things are urged along by instinct - the overwhelming hunger of the baby vampire, and the hard-to-leash temper that runs in families with the werewolf gene.
I love how the supernatural elements feel realistic and grounded. We've been getting that with the witchcraft, too, but there's still a lot that I feel like we don't know yet about how that works (except that, like werewolves, it runs in families).
Romance
When I was... more than half-way through the first season, I was wondering if I would actually ship anything in the show. I liked all the character and relationship permutations, but I wasn't really rooting for anything in particular.
I enjoyed the Stefan/Elena. I found the drama of Damon's Katherine obsession compelling. When Matt/Caroline started, I realized that I wanted that to work out and for Matt to get over his Elena issues. I think that my first real ship on the show was actually Jeremy/Anna. I was just heartbroken when Anna died.
And, all throughout the season, Elena and Damon were building up this fascinatingly tense friendship. And Damon obviously starts liking Elena as a person, her own person. He's having fun traveling with her in "Bloodlines", just enjoying teasing her and being around her, and he worries about her safety in that episode.
I don't think it was romantic for Damon at that point - he'd noticed that she looked like Katherine (and thus, was hot) and he enjoyed tweaking his brother over her - but his heart was with Katherine. But he's growing more and more fond of her and he trusts her and even after she betrays him once, she gets him to trust her again. Now, that is a huge thing in Damon-world. He's not generally big on forgiveness. And it's Elena, not Stefan, who gets Damon out of the tomb where he was searching for Katherine. Damon seemed content to argue with Stefan until the cows came home and the barrier went back up, but when Elena asked him to come, he came.
Once the reveal came that Katherine just... wasn't there in the tomb, Elena reached out to him and it's obvious that there is a friendship there, despite Elena knowing what horrible things that Damon has done to people (including her friend Caroline). Though, at this point, Elena is on her way to subconsciously embracing a more vampire-type of morality, which helps with that.
The moment when things changed for me was 1x19 - "Miss Mystic Falls". They're both so concerned over Stefan. It's all about Stefan. Except... they dance. And it's intimate and they both (not just Damon) get caught up in it. That dance is what got me to start shipping Damon and Elena.
(I think Damon started shipping it before then, though! The red rose that he gives her in 1x18; the way it's Elena that gets him out of the tomb in 1x14. 'Our girlfriend')
And Damon came to terms with his feelings for Elena in the following episodes (when he tells her that she looks prettier as herself than dressed up to look like Katherine... that was kinda huge for him and a sign that she'd eclipsed the memory of Katherine). The confession and the kiss (that was really Katherine) made me catch my breath the first time that I watched it (before I knew that it was Katherine).
Interestingly enough, I think Damon's complete crackdown snap at Elena's rejection of him, horrifying as it was, is one of the things that's made me even more invested. Because I wanted him to be able to overcome the damage that he'd caused by being willing to kill Jeremy. He was feeling so much (and "The Return" really showcased all the different emotions that he was letting himself feel) and it all turned negative and painful and he couldn't handle it, because he'd spent so many years completely suppressing that stuff. Much like Stefan going crazy over getting human blood again after so many years off it, Damon could not handle caring so much and not getting it in return. And he did something horrific and stupid and damn near unforgivable ("You don't admit you get hurt. You cover it up and get angry and do something stupid.").
I like everything on the show, pretty much, but Damon and Elena are riveting. I can't look away.
Elena and Stefan have a lot of things in common more... on the surface, but Damon and Elena have this connection. She understands Damon, even when it makes her hate him. She understands when he acts out of hurt, not malice (not that it makes his actions less horrifying). And he gets her, too - I remember, back in the third episode, Damon is the one to tell her that moving on from her parents' death doesn't have to mean trying to force herself to fit the old Elena box. Her parents' death changed her and she can't be the old Elena anymore. And Damon just seemed to get that.
When I first started shipping Elena and Damon, it was just basically about trying to add Damon to Elena/Stefan. Trying to go the OT3 route. But the more I watched the show, the more that I didn't think it would work. Stefan and Damon's respective insecurities would kill it.
Plus, the Elena and Stefan relationship got less interesting to me as S2 went on. I still really like the actors together but that relationship as a romance... it started feeling immature (the 'fake break-up' arc in particular pointed this out in a way that ended bloody). Maybe they're going to have it 'grow up' in the second half of season two. We'll see. But, meanwhile, we have Damon going through this painful and fascinating character arc. He's in love! He has friends! He's willing to be selfless! He's so fucking over Katherine that it's pretty much the best thing ever.
I don't pretend to have any clue what direction the actual show is going to go in. But my heart kinda wants it to go down the rocky, rough road that would lead to Damon and Elena.
On other relationship notes:
a. Caroline/Stefan would actually be awesome. I guess they were trying to go for a platonic, sexless friendship like Stefan had with Lexi, but I love the Caroline/Stefan chemistry. On the other hand...
b. Caroline/Tyler became viable for me in the most recent episode. Caroline got shit done by securing Tyler and being there for him, and Tyler was just so vulnerable.
c. Bonnie/Jeremy - surprisingly cute. I was not expecting how cute that would be.
d. Matt's love for Caroline is not, at this point, anything close to the love that he had for Elena. Which makes me sad. But Caroline was acting off in the wake of, you know, a near-death experience, and he had no patience with her. So, I don't know what's going to happen with that. I was so hopeful for them in S1, but with S2, I don't know.
e. Alaric and Jenna: sort of cute. It's kinda meaningless to me as long as he keeps her in the dark, though. Someone, tell Jenna the truth! That way, she can stop being polite and inviting everyone inside.
One of the things that I like most about this show is that the romance, while definitely there, is only one part of the emotional puzzle. Family relationships (especially sibling relationships but not limited to them) are such a key element, and so is friendship.
One of the core friendships on the show is between Elena-Bonnie-Caroline. I adore the way that they've given this friendship so much care and screentime. All three women are built up and the relationships between them (and the way each friendship impacts the other ones) is fantastic. Whenever two of the girls are on the outs with each other, they still have the third one there to anchor them together. It's a fantastic friendship/set of friendships.
I also love the way that the Elena-Matt friendship has gone. It was set up with him still pining for her after she'd broken up with him and we get to see that, however, the friendship is more important to him and that they never stopped being friends. And we get to see him finally get over Elena and see that the friendship does remain intact through that, as well. Just... a really well-done friendship between exes and I don't see much of that on TV.
Family is also huge. Anna goes to great lengths to try to save her mother from the tomb. A lot of Matt's early character definition comes from being Vicky's brother. A lot of the fierceness in Elena's character gets shown through her relationship with (and her protectiveness of) her brother Jeremy.
And we have the brothers Salvatore. Wow, do we have the brothers. Seriously, if you are a fan of intense sibling relationships, you should be watching TVD. It's a beautiful thing. They have each other's backs, absolutely. Unconditionally. That's something that Elena twigged to that other characters had a harder time with - Stefan is not going to kill his brother. It doesn't matter how many people Damon might kill or what he does. Damon killed Stefan's best friend and Stefan couldn't kill him. Stab him in the stomach knowing that he would heal, yes. But he couldn't kill him. The reason that Damon is a vampire is because Stefan could not face eternity without his brother. It's a hugely important aspect of the show.
This show has a lot of women, all doing very different things. There's no one 'way' to be a woman on TVD.
And I kinda like that the lead female has no supernatural power of her own (though both of her close female friends eventually do - which I like, too). But she's got this fire and passion and she does not back down. She will stare a deadly vampire in the face and negotiate.
I love that Caroline, who started out basically as fluff and as a victim, has become so strong and awesome. Caroline's character arc is a thing of beauty.
The women have flaws, just like the guys. Sometimes they need to be rescued. But they act. And being a woman who listens to herself instead of 'authority' is something that is treated just like when the male characters do - sometimes it works out and sometimes it doesn't. And it's kinda hilarious (and awesome) how many times we get a set-up of a male character doing something... and it ends up that he's working for a more powerful female character.
We also have Katherine, the person who set everything in motion. And she did that by refusing to be a victim. She ran and she seduced and she did whatever the fuck was necessary to survive. She has a heart but it's hard out of necessity. She was a woman that didn't fit into the time she was born in and someone with a personal magnetism that captured many people. Katherine is a force to be reckoned with. I like her more than I like Darla (BtVS/AtS) and I adore Darla.
Women doing shit = awesome.
I love TVD's take on vampires and now also werewolves.
Vampires:
a. have heartbeats (as long as they have enough blood in their system). I love this because it solves all the metaphysical problems like 'how do they have sex?' and 'why can't vampires tell humans and vampires apart quickly?' And it makes sense. They're taking in blood and it's being used as blood.
b. human blood makes them more powerful. Whether or not that blood is fresh doesn't seem to matter - Damon hasn't gotten weaker now that he's off the fresh stuff. They have a hunger and a hunting instinct that takes a lot of will-power to overcome. I like that they're still them just even more so than in life. Damon was always recklessly impulsive and a hopeless romantic.
c. keep all their human emotions and connections. And they don't get 'twisted' sadistically, as often happened in the Jossverse. But they do get all mushed together at first with the overwhelming hunger. Every strong emotion comes out as hunger in the beginning. I find the whole thing fascinating. They've really taken care to have us experience how overwhelming it is, especially at first.
As for the werewolves, they've done a great job showing how painful and horrific the transformation is.
It's not romanticized, any of it. Vampire bites are bloody and painful and obvious. It's not just a couple of pinpricks; it's a bite wound. And the trigger for both the final step into becoming a vampire and being a werewolf is blood and death. To be a vampire, you have to die (with vampire blood in your system) and then you have to drink human blood - that's what triggers the change. For werewolves, they have to 'cause death', any kind of death. And both of these things are urged along by instinct - the overwhelming hunger of the baby vampire, and the hard-to-leash temper that runs in families with the werewolf gene.
I love how the supernatural elements feel realistic and grounded. We've been getting that with the witchcraft, too, but there's still a lot that I feel like we don't know yet about how that works (except that, like werewolves, it runs in families).
When I was... more than half-way through the first season, I was wondering if I would actually ship anything in the show. I liked all the character and relationship permutations, but I wasn't really rooting for anything in particular.
I enjoyed the Stefan/Elena. I found the drama of Damon's Katherine obsession compelling. When Matt/Caroline started, I realized that I wanted that to work out and for Matt to get over his Elena issues. I think that my first real ship on the show was actually Jeremy/Anna. I was just heartbroken when Anna died.
And, all throughout the season, Elena and Damon were building up this fascinatingly tense friendship. And Damon obviously starts liking Elena as a person, her own person. He's having fun traveling with her in "Bloodlines", just enjoying teasing her and being around her, and he worries about her safety in that episode.
I don't think it was romantic for Damon at that point - he'd noticed that she looked like Katherine (and thus, was hot) and he enjoyed tweaking his brother over her - but his heart was with Katherine. But he's growing more and more fond of her and he trusts her and even after she betrays him once, she gets him to trust her again. Now, that is a huge thing in Damon-world. He's not generally big on forgiveness. And it's Elena, not Stefan, who gets Damon out of the tomb where he was searching for Katherine. Damon seemed content to argue with Stefan until the cows came home and the barrier went back up, but when Elena asked him to come, he came.
Once the reveal came that Katherine just... wasn't there in the tomb, Elena reached out to him and it's obvious that there is a friendship there, despite Elena knowing what horrible things that Damon has done to people (including her friend Caroline). Though, at this point, Elena is on her way to subconsciously embracing a more vampire-type of morality, which helps with that.
The moment when things changed for me was 1x19 - "Miss Mystic Falls". They're both so concerned over Stefan. It's all about Stefan. Except... they dance. And it's intimate and they both (not just Damon) get caught up in it. That dance is what got me to start shipping Damon and Elena.
(I think Damon started shipping it before then, though! The red rose that he gives her in 1x18; the way it's Elena that gets him out of the tomb in 1x14. 'Our girlfriend')
And Damon came to terms with his feelings for Elena in the following episodes (when he tells her that she looks prettier as herself than dressed up to look like Katherine... that was kinda huge for him and a sign that she'd eclipsed the memory of Katherine). The confession and the kiss (that was really Katherine) made me catch my breath the first time that I watched it (before I knew that it was Katherine).
Interestingly enough, I think Damon's complete crackdown snap at Elena's rejection of him, horrifying as it was, is one of the things that's made me even more invested. Because I wanted him to be able to overcome the damage that he'd caused by being willing to kill Jeremy. He was feeling so much (and "The Return" really showcased all the different emotions that he was letting himself feel) and it all turned negative and painful and he couldn't handle it, because he'd spent so many years completely suppressing that stuff. Much like Stefan going crazy over getting human blood again after so many years off it, Damon could not handle caring so much and not getting it in return. And he did something horrific and stupid and damn near unforgivable ("You don't admit you get hurt. You cover it up and get angry and do something stupid.").
I like everything on the show, pretty much, but Damon and Elena are riveting. I can't look away.
Elena and Stefan have a lot of things in common more... on the surface, but Damon and Elena have this connection. She understands Damon, even when it makes her hate him. She understands when he acts out of hurt, not malice (not that it makes his actions less horrifying). And he gets her, too - I remember, back in the third episode, Damon is the one to tell her that moving on from her parents' death doesn't have to mean trying to force herself to fit the old Elena box. Her parents' death changed her and she can't be the old Elena anymore. And Damon just seemed to get that.
When I first started shipping Elena and Damon, it was just basically about trying to add Damon to Elena/Stefan. Trying to go the OT3 route. But the more I watched the show, the more that I didn't think it would work. Stefan and Damon's respective insecurities would kill it.
Plus, the Elena and Stefan relationship got less interesting to me as S2 went on. I still really like the actors together but that relationship as a romance... it started feeling immature (the 'fake break-up' arc in particular pointed this out in a way that ended bloody). Maybe they're going to have it 'grow up' in the second half of season two. We'll see. But, meanwhile, we have Damon going through this painful and fascinating character arc. He's in love! He has friends! He's willing to be selfless! He's so fucking over Katherine that it's pretty much the best thing ever.
I don't pretend to have any clue what direction the actual show is going to go in. But my heart kinda wants it to go down the rocky, rough road that would lead to Damon and Elena.
On other relationship notes:
a. Caroline/Stefan would actually be awesome. I guess they were trying to go for a platonic, sexless friendship like Stefan had with Lexi, but I love the Caroline/Stefan chemistry. On the other hand...
b. Caroline/Tyler became viable for me in the most recent episode. Caroline got shit done by securing Tyler and being there for him, and Tyler was just so vulnerable.
c. Bonnie/Jeremy - surprisingly cute. I was not expecting how cute that would be.
d. Matt's love for Caroline is not, at this point, anything close to the love that he had for Elena. Which makes me sad. But Caroline was acting off in the wake of, you know, a near-death experience, and he had no patience with her. So, I don't know what's going to happen with that. I was so hopeful for them in S1, but with S2, I don't know.
e. Alaric and Jenna: sort of cute. It's kinda meaningless to me as long as he keeps her in the dark, though. Someone, tell Jenna the truth! That way, she can stop being polite and inviting everyone inside.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-12-31 11:35 pm (UTC)SHOW.
LADIES DOING STUFF.
I think I sold someone on the show by describing the scene where the 'blonde girl takes on the monster' - the bit where Caroline handily dispatches Mason in the woods, and then FIXES HER HAIR AND SHE AND ELENA GO OFF TO RESCUE THE BOY.
<3s
Interesting and layered characters who are never what they seem at first because they are real, even in their supernatural dealings.
It's just wonderfully thought out and developed and I am delighted that you have found this show too.
Elena and Damon are incredibly intense and you mentioned, they *get* each other, from very early on. Yes, they may not always get ALONG, but they understand one another in ways that aren't easy for others to explain or deal with at times.
Oh, Elena - how much do I love her not having a POWER, and yet when she is confronted with a vampire trying to kill her she stabs him with a pencil and then tries to stake him. She does not break down or give up, she FIGHTS for herself and for the people she loves.
(no subject)
Date: 2011-01-01 08:54 pm (UTC)Yes. Caroline kicked so much ass in that episode. She's been spectacular this season.
Elena and Damon are incredibly intense and you mentioned, they *get* each other, from very early on. Yes, they may not always get ALONG, but they understand one another in ways that aren't easy for others to explain or deal with at times.
Exactly.
Oh, Elena - how much do I love her not having a POWER, and yet when she is confronted with a vampire trying to kill her she stabs him with a pencil and then tries to stake him. She does not break down or give up, she FIGHTS for herself and for the people she loves.
Yes, I love how much of a fighter that she is.