The Vampire Diaries - Memory Lane review/recap

During this episode of The Vampire Diaries, Damon was still confirming what he and everyone else knows: The Lockwoods are cursed with lycanthropy. Damon had Alaric suggest that Jenna have a barbeque and invite Mason. Alaric invited Damon, much to Jenna’s chagrin, because she caught Damon kissing fake Elena (Katherine) at the end of season one, and she doesn’t want Damon skeeving on her niece. At the barbeque, Mason was trying to be nice to Damon, but Damon kept being Damon. He kept dropping hints that Mason Lockwood was a werewolf. When they first met, Mason cordially said, “I’ve heard great things about you.” Damon’s hilarious reply? “Really, that’s weird, ‘cause I’m a dick.” And he delivered that line perfectly. Mason confronted Damon, saying that they didn’t need to let an ancient rivalry get in the way of their potential friendship. Damon actually won Aunt Jenna over a little bit, but after the party, he stabbed Mason with silver and walked away. Unfortunately for Damon, silver doesn’t really kill a vampire (on this show, anyway). Mason told Damon that they were enemies now and walked away. If this show were realistic, Mason would have transformed and attacked Damon right away. What, does he have some master plan? If he just transforms later and fights him, one of us is going to be annoyed. The other thinks that, based on last week's episode, werewolves in this universe don't get to choose when they transform, so his lack of werewolf-ing out makes sense. Mason got home and told Tyler that in order to activate the werewolf curse, you have to kill someone.

Katherine threatened Caroline into keeping Elena occupied so Katherine could spend the day with Stefan. She also got Caroline to tell Elena things like, “Your vampire/human relationship will never work because when you are old he will still be smoking hot.” This was pretty obvious, so Elena figured out that she was in league with Katherine.

Stefan woke up cuddled next to Katherine, which he didn’t like. He stuck her with vervain and chained her up so he could question her about the Lockwoods and why she was back in town. Katherine threatened Elena and everyone Elena loves, and Stefan held a stick up to her neck. But he couldn’t do it. For heaven’s sake, Stefan! Do you really have feelings for Kat, deep down? Because Katherine was sipping vervain daily for 145 years, she was immune to it, and the second she felt ready, she freed herself. This reveal, while predictable, was awesome. One of us is firmly Team Katherine. She wanted to spend more time with Stefan, so during her fake captivity, she informed him of a few things. Turns out, Katherine had a deal with a Lockwood ancestor to burn and entomb her vampire friends so that she could fake her own death and escape…or something. “Everyone has a past, Stefan,” she said, referring to what she was fleeing. She told Stefan that other werewolves exist, but they are rare and mostly in bad movies. Ok, she should have specified bad MODERN movies. Some of the old werewolf classics are watchable. So was Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. After telling her story and ripping off her chains, Katherine stabbed Stefan in the leg and confronted Elena, who had just arrived. They looked at each other intensely, and then Katherine took off.

Stefan and Elena went to the Grill to fake a break-up for Caroline’s benefit. They knew Caroline would tell Katherine what she heard. Damon also heard the fake break-up. Cruelly, Stefan and Elena decided not to clue Damon into the fact that they were still together. Are they stupid? Damon is just as much of a wild card as Katherine. If he thinks Elena is single, that gives him license to pounce. Sure, this is going to open up some great storylines for us viewers, but what are Stefan and Elena thinking? They said that it would be more convincing if everyone believed they were broken up. But how is Damon going to react when he finds out they tricked him and didn’t let him in on the secret?

Also, turns out Katherine really does love Stefan and came back for him. We aren’t surprised. Katherine is the new Damon, and here’s why: We don’t completely hate her now. Sure, she has killed and manipulated people, but so has Damon. In fact, he’s probably worse than Katharine. Maybe she is just trying to come back to town for her true love? After all, she came to Mystic Falls in the 1800s to live with Stefan’s family and fell in love. This is just like Stefan. Just trying to live in Mystic Falls and fall in love. She CAN be a bit cold, especially when she backstabs and sells out all her friends. But maybe if we knew her whole story, we could sympathize like we do with Damon.

We are starting to get tired of the flashbacks to the 1800s. We hope that’s over for a while. Also, the love speech Stefan gave to Katherine back then was really lame. That’s why his love with Elena is better. He must have gotten some taste for what is really romantic over the decades.

The show keeps making a big deal out of Elena wondering why she looks so much like Katherine. Way out there theory that is probably not true: Wouldn’t it be awesome if Elena ended up accidently going back in time (maybe Bonnie could freak out and send her), turned into Katherine, and has been waiting all these years to take her old boyfriend back. But then why would she be trying to steal Stefan from HERSELF…maybe she remembers Elena/herself doing something bad to Stefan? And it would explain why she won’t kill Elena. We know…it’s way out there. And the writers of this awesome show will probably come up with something much better anyway.

Episode grade: B