The Vampire Diaries 4.03 - "The Rager" Review

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Previously on The Vampire Diaries... wait we don’t have that intro anymore we have this this is Mystic Falls recap.  Am I the only one who finds it annoying?  I digress.  This week on The Vampire Diaries we see that the new hunter in town means business, Everyone who wants to leave town can’t, and Matt almost dies...twice.

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Hooray for Klaus and Rebekah being back this week; they both were amazing in their own way.  Klaus was headed for Chicago (dammit Klaus you could have been in my neck of the woods), but he turned back to protect Tyler. I was surprised to see that there were other remaining hybrids because I’d assumed the Salvatore brothers ripped all their hearts out.  He’s not the only one who comes to see Tyler when a good “friend” we’d never heard of before a werewolf named Hayley (Phoebe Tonkin who was my favorite thing about The Secret Circle) shows up.  However, unlike most of the important people we’ve never met before it turns out there’s a pretty good reason we didn’t hear about Tyler’s sire bond-breaking helper, Tyler totally cheated on Caroline with her.  Which Klaus caught onto and knows about now, it’ll be interesting to see if he spills the secret in an effort to win favor with Caroline.

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The big twist of the episode comes when Klaus saves Connor from the trap Damon set for him, (fellow Beyond Fandom contributor Keysha pointed out that the mines Connor and Damon both used in the episode are Claymore mines so you’ve possibly now learned something, you’re welcome!) After Damon remarked on Connor’s invisible tattoo, which is a Hunters mark that apparently only Hunters and those who are capable of being one can see, Klaus recognized the mark on the stake.  Apparently he’s one of ‘the five’, whatever that means, and it’s something very important to Klaus.  Elena remains important to him as well in light of this information, perhaps she’s part of the recipe in breaking another curse?  It looks like Klaus is going to be guarding everyone and acting like he’s on everyone’s side until all the pieces come together.

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I’m also going to take a moment to talk about the scene with Klaus and Stefan this episode.  It’s no secret that we at Beyond Fandom love us some Klefan, in both the shipping sense and the complicated relationship these boys have with each other.  So Stefan called Klaus because Connor poisoned her with Werewolf venom, and honestly Stefan one voicemail is enough nine is fucking excessive.  And Klaus makes a smashing point here, what would they do if they’d succeeded in their plan to keep him out of the picture?  I imagine they’d have gotten him out of the coffin just for special snowflake Elena despite her protests to just let her die.  However, because Connor is packing that venom around in his arsenal it’s a lovely convenient excuse for why Klaus gets to stick around in Mystic Falls.  At least a reason he can use with the Salvatore brothers.

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Skipping over to my other favorite original Rebekah, she once again proved why I love her so.  Her very existence annoys Elena which yeah, she can be angry that she’s technically the one who did this to her. So why is it always okay for Elena to be vengeful when her family dies, but Rebekah can’t be pissed off that she thought her brother was dead?  I cheered when she turned the pencil around that Elena tried to swing at her and impaled it into her. Just a little lower next time Beks, aim for the heart.  I was giddy about the bathroom scene as well, her whole ‘deal with this’ attitude when she rubbed the blood in her face was fantastic.  Which seriously how many times this season are we going to have Elena washing blood off her hands and clothing in a public bathroom this season? Another fantastic moment was when she pulled some sleight of hand with the daylight ring right off Elena’s finger and tossed it down the drain before she turned the garbage disposal on.  Was I the only one who had a Heroes flashback when Elena reached in to get it?  But of course her fingers don’t come out as mangled as Claire Bennet’s did.  This pisses Elena off so much that she hunts down the White Oak stake and prepares to murder Rebekah with it. Luckily, Stefan is far more level-headed than she is about it and he points out how killing her will end several thousand vampire lives as well.  Just no one we know as it’s a Klaus bloodline party up in here.

What bummed me out was Rebekah’s whole desire to impress everyone and outdo Elena. I understand the whole mean girl thing, but honestly she’s a thousand years old and doesn’t need to impress high schoolers by having a keg party.  Which was one of the two glaring things this episode that go in the ‘reasons why The Vampire Diaries has been getting on my nerves’ pile.  There are always parties and they’re never in school.  But wait, they were in school this episode!  For a grand five minutes where they sat in a teacher-less classroom.  Where for the fourth season and two school years in a row they’re still learning about the Civil War.  What Mystic Falls can’t afford a substitute at least with a different lesson plan?  I thought for sure Connor was going to roll in and be the substitute, but clearly that didn’t happen as heaven forbid we’re in a school when we could be out partying.

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It was kinda cool that April stuck around and helped her clean up long after the others had gone.  Am I sensing a new friendship or perhaps even something slightly more than that? They certainly have better chemistry than she and Matt do. I was disappointed that the scene where she ripped his heart out after he was an asshole was just a fever vision. But lets be honest this is TVD and they’re the kings of No Homo (see: how the show handled Klefan existing in the fandom) so let’s not speak of this possible ship in the making too loudly or they’ll go out of their way to have April betray Rebekah in some horrible fashion.

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There was a bunch of other stuff this episode I’m not going into detail as it mostly all dealt with the trials and tribulations of Elena being a baby vampire.  I get the whole ‘oh look being a vampire can be fun’ thing they’re trying to pull with the keg stand and motorcycle surfing, but it’s coming off as way cheeseball and they’re spending way too much time on it.  I am glad however that the question of who should be the one teaching Elena how to behave as a vampire came up again.  Stefan is doing his best, but as he admitted to Caroline later in the episode, it’s hard because if he relaxes just a bit and enjoys it the ripper might come back out to play.  It also appears that Damon is going to be taking over as Stefan’s vampire enjoyment lessons almost ended in Elena killing Matt. (So close...)

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Next week it looks like we’re headed for more partying (shocker) when they go off to visit Bonnie wherever she was this past episode.  Hopefully we’ll also learn more about ‘the five’ that has Klaus so interested and maybe Matt will die.  Well probably not the later, because Matt’s apparently immortal, we just don’t know it yet.