The first wish is that the cast gets less good looking so that my deflated ego could actually survive.
The fourth season of our favorite vampire drama is just a week away. We already sort of kind of maybe had a post like this, written by Heba. However, that was more about what Heba wants to see in the fourth season and this is more about…
…nothing different really, sorry about that. But a couple of people did ask me what it is I want to see in season 4 and so I’m determined to write it down. If you listened to the recent Mystic Harbor episode, then you might have a sense of what it is I want already. Hell, if you know me or read this site, you probably already have a sense.
I’ve really made it no secret that the third season of The Vampire Diaries wasn’t exactly my favorite. It started out really good and had so much promise, but somewhere around the middle it got stuck in lovesick drama over love triangle again and again. And once that began, there really was nothing else happening. Meanwhile, “villains” were upon us that weren’t really that villainous.
And if you just read that previous paragraph, then you can sort of guess what this wishlist is going to contain. But nevertheless, I wish to still list them. I’ll at least be reviewing the season premiere of The Vampire Diaries’s fourth season — and with lots of promise. I tend to be a more optimistic person when it comes to my favorite series. But I definitely don’t want to be that guy that just complains about the series not going my way. That’s not fair to anyone involved. And if in fact the show stays in a level where I’m just not, how can we say this?, connecting with it in any which way, then I may just need to not say those things anymore.
That said, my number one wish, regardless of what’s listed here, is that the show becomes as entertaining as it was in earlier seasons so that I may still call it one of my favorites and so that I may still continue reviewing it. But how can it achieve that for me specifically, well, without further adieu I present to you my wishlist for season 4. Keep in mind, I try to not read spoilers as much as possible, so this stuff may actually be happening and I have zero idea.
“Let’s give the audience an actual reason to dislike her other than saving all the main characters on a weekly basis!”
Otherwise known as throw the supporting characters some good writing. Here’s inherently the problem with the three of our pictured supporting characters here. Matt was once used just to be part of a love triangle, then he sulked for what seemed like forever, and then we were supposed to believe that he took down an Original Vampire. Jeremy was given the buddings of a great plot, which was seeing ghosts, but the show decided to push the breaks on that and ship him off to Denver. Bonnie, meanwhile, finally was given two things this season: a house and a mother. We saw the foyer to her house (and her pillow in another scene) and we got to see her mother, but that was only used to help fuel whatever the Originals were doing back in Mystic Falls. And the one scene in which Bonnie would have been able to tell her mother off for being, well, inept, the series decided that would be better fit for Caroline to do.
Okay…?
I don’t know where they’ll go with Jeremy and Matt in season four, but it seemed promising that Bonnie was finally going to stop being the show’s plot device, relegating to changing and ending storylines when the show has trapped itself in a corner. (The promo was a different story.) It appeared as if she may even veer off into “evil” territory. Obviously, Bonnie is one of the audience’s least-liked character; well I say, let’s give the audience an actual reason to dislike her other than saving all the main characters on a weekly basis!
This one is basically just self-indulgent because I’ve always wanted a full out war between vampires and witches on this show.
3. Make use of Elena’s vampirism
“I somewhat expected, maybe even yearned, that the whole Big Bad In Town For Elena was coming to a screeching halt”
This may seem like a given, but I honestly think it needs to be stated. Season three was mainly salvaged for me because of the entire Crazy Alaric and supernatural rings storyline. I will say that I actually, really liked that storyline and don’t think it was able to shine as brightly as it could because it was stuck in the muddled up mess that season three as a whole was.
When the third season ended, it promised that the entire fabric of this universe was about to change. Up until then, the series has been about several different people (some good, most bad) wanting to find Elena because she’s the doppelganger…and with that, it means she holds supernatural powers. Not directly, mind you. She more or less is the key to different things: she’s “the key to breaking the curse,” her blood can make hybrids, it can bind an entire family’s bloodline together, and so on.
But with Elena as a vampire, those things were bound to stop happening right? I mean, her blood is basically useless now.
Not according to the promo. It appears that Elena will still be in high demand to random people entering Mystic Falls. In some ways, that’s pretty much a given. It’s not like Elena is going to announce to the world she’s a vampire. She’s not going to tweet out: “LOL I be a vampz nao dont take mah blood kthx.” There’s no reason for people to not be after her, if in fact they still believe she’s the doppelganger (in human form anyway) and that’s who they’re after. But I somewhat expected, maybe even yearned, that the whole Big Bad In Town For Elena was coming to a screeching halt.
I can understand how that new territory may be way too different for the series, however. So if the show can’t make use of Elena becoming a vampire that way, I at least hope that it will add more depth to Elena’s character. We know for a fact that Elena never wanted to become a vampire, and I personally believe that seeing her struggle with her newfound immortality could be quite entertaining. I know this show is more about getting to point B in the plot, but don’t be afraid to explore the internal dilemmas of your characters, Vampire Diaries. You’ll find they can be plot points all on their own; no need for Big Bads even, sometimes.
2. Choose a tone
Being that The Vampire Diaries is on The CW, you can’t expect it to not be a teenage gothic soap opera, and for a while I was very much okay with that. But I don’t think it’s out of the ordinary to want it to veer off into absolute darkness. I’m a weird individual that way.
Some of the most interesting parts of season three were Stefan’s dive into “ripper” status or Alaric becoming…well, insane. The not-so-great moments consisted of characters not truly being aware of their surroundings or not suffering consequences that matched up to their actions. The example that comes to mind is Caroline and Alaric’s first talk after it was confirmed that he, well, killed her father. Of course, it technically wasn’t him him, it was his crazy alter ego, but even then a simple conversation that just cushioned the blow seemed a bit too…easy, wouldn’t you say? Caroline also killed someone, and she shared sympathy for knowing that it was out of his control, but Caroline hardly suffered from that indiscretion either (all the way back in season 2). The same goes for Stefan killing people by chopping their heads off and just being greeted with a sympathizing Elena. Let’s get gritty here: that’s absolutely, one hundred percent not okay. But somewhere along the line the show decided that murder is sort of justified as long as you’re “disturbed.”
We get it, Stefan’s cold turkey approach to deling with the demons within causes him to go on killing sprees. But should his effort to stay “good” really justify his ability to be completely villainous as to murdering people in cold blood? The series never seems to want to ever go there or answer any of these questions. The same happened to Klaus (which we’ll get to in a second…or a first, get it?). It’s happened to Damon. It’s happened to everyone, so much so that witches, who are supposed to keep the balance of nature intact, are seen as The Bad Ones on this series.
In fact, a new vampire hunter will be introduced, according to spoilers I couldn’t avoid, and is already being touted as the Big Bad. How is someone who slays evil bad again?
Let’s take, for instance, Caroline and Klaus in Tyler’s body. There are rumblings of this being the antithesis of romantic and the very description of appalling (if to be used as a love storyline). And that’s absolutely true. But that’s not what’s wrong. If The Vampire Diaries wants to be gross and appalling, let it be. I’m completely okay with that; I just urge that the characters treat that situation as such, that this storyline which could be considered rape even is treated with the weight it deserves to be treated with.
1. Deal with the Klaus situation
“His hybrids were a complete joke, easily killed by the weakest of humans”
The number one thing I want in season four of The Vampire Diaries is Klaus’s story dealt with in some way. Klaus was introduced as this huge evil character that wanted to begin a war against the entire world, but his hybrids were a complete joke, easily killed by the weakest of humans. Once he realized Elena was the key to making these hybrids, however, he became absolutely non-threatening — soon he was falling in love with Caroline and drawing pictures of animals. It was almost laughable.
Look, I like Klaus and I like Joseph Morgan as Klaus and I don’t want him to be out of a job, but for the sake of the story here, what is the point of keeping Klaus around any longer? Meanwhile, everyone’s always talking about what a huge threat he is. Klaus has harmed maybe about…uh…zero people we care about since Jenna, but the characters continue to reiterate that he’s a huge danger. He’s just not a believable threat. This became a problem for the series, since it always likes to introduce villains and then introduce people who are even more dangerous than them. But once the show killed Mikael and then revealed the bloodline aspect of its mythology, it’s as if they backed themselves up into a corner. They decided they could sink Klaus in the ocean, but then that wasn’t enough! Where do we go from here? My wish is that it doesn’t go back to him dillydallying around Mystic Falls with his siblings, crowding up the town. I hope we move on from that.
However, there is an alternative. Klaus could become a villain again! He could be a threat! He could kill people! And the gang could be trying to get rid of him for reasons that make sense! If this happens, then I will totally be fine with Klaus staying and murdering everyone. That’s cool with me.
And those are four of my wishes for the upcoming season of The Vampire Diaries. Of course, I have my more “ridiculous” ones, like a Phoebe Tonkin and Claire Holt falling down as an homage to H20: Just Add Water, or having Matt and Rebekah hook up even though it makes no sense, no more love triangles please lord, or… just bring Katherine back please for all that is good and pure! But the aforementioned ones are flaws that need a bit of fixing, in my humble opinion. I won’t fault the show for not changing anything; I just may be coming to with it not exactly developing into what I wish it could be. And that’s fine. There’s nothing wrong with The Vampire Diaries fixating on being a show about love triangles that just so happens to have vampires. It’s just that, if that’s the case, it’s not the show for me anymore.
But I stay ever so optimistic and look forward to Thursday at 8pm. Time to catch VD.
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I at least hope that it will add more depth to Elena’s character.
They called S3 the "Season of character development where we slow down the pace for the sake of characters". Did that happen? nope.
They touted S3 finale as "big episode to develop elena's character"....and then nothing of that sort happened. Instead the show completely retconned Elena's past making the past contradict what already was said in the show.
Kevin Williamson called Season Two "elena's soul-searching journey"....and in result Elena lost the main traits that made her even remotely interesting in S1.
Even all the Plec interviews and sneak peeks seem to point that Elena-vampire story will be all "let's show how Damon and Stefan feel and how they have different points of view on the subject, while ignoring Elena herself".
Hell, the only thing Plec even said about Elena in all the interviews where she gushed about Damon, Klaus, etc is that "elena will care even more"....
I think its pretty safe to say that Elena is mystic falls resident bella swan by now, doomed to be merely "an object of affection who says she cares about all the living things in the world"
But should his effort to stay “good” really justify his ability to be
completely villainous as to murdering people in cold blood?
what is hilarious is that writers actually gave EVEN MORE excuses for Steffie as a way to NOT deal with any sort of consequences.
- He is bloodaholic addict. (this one, mind you, is still bearable since it still implies that its all part of Steffie, steffie's fault, etc)
- He has this whole ripper-illness stuff that causes him do things he does not want!
- He got compelled to turn off emotions~
The amount of plot devices introduced to EXCUSE characters for what they did are no longer amusing.
Even Rick's plotline....it would have been fascinating for it to be just SIDE-EFFECT to a friggin rings of plot armor(that should have never been in the show), the side-effect being that it makes you crazy. But no, the show HAD to make sure rings stay consequence-less and HAD to make sure that its not Ric being crazy but this evil alter-ego that allows Ric to stay consequence-less.
But hey, at least in their cases, the show bothers to introduce badly written plot excuses....Damon and Klaus on other hand apparantly are excused from EVERYTHING by ....being misunderstood?
I just urge that the characters treat that situation as such, that this
storyline which could be considered rape even is treated with the
weight it deserves to be treated with.
Damon and Andie.
Damon and Caroline.
I am pretty sure that this show is oblivious to what word "rape" means, nor what word "consequences" means.
However, there is an alternative. Klaus could become a villain again!
or Katherine could become villain again~!...yep....sadly I really really doubt writers would even go there.
Julie Plec seems to have a tendency of making characters she fangirls about overstay their welcome pointlessly. Come second half of Season four and Klaus will be hanging in some house, waiting to appear as useful plot device, just like Katherine spent her season three.
Hell, even now Plec is all "oh the new big bad is a threat to both klaus and mystic falls!", already grouping him with them as if nothing happened.
The problem is not that Elena cares about people.The problem is that even though she says she cares,she does nothing to help the people she loves;when Esther tried to kill Matt and Jeremy,what did Elena do?Nothing!She just screamed ''Esther,stop it!".When Rebekah took Damon hostage,what did she do?Nothing.When she said she wanted to save Elijah's life,what did she do?She went home and watched T.V.!Elena is a passive character-she never acts!
I agree so much with everything you wrote about Stefan,Ric,Damon,Caroline,Klaus and Andie!
Oh believe me I could write thousands of pages of text about what a failure in terms of character development, Elena Gilbert has been.
The main principle of good writing is always Show, Don't Tell, which never ever ever happens with Elena.
We are TOLD she cares, we are TOLD she used to be fun, we are TOLD she is this awesome person everyone is ready to throw their lives away for. But we never SEE it.
Elena for most of part is the typical damsel in distress, without any sort of personality or relevance. She is there for two things:
1. So villains could have something to go after.
2. So the brothers salvatore could fight over a girl.
That's all. Thats the ENTIRE purpose and description of Elena Gilbert.
The start set -up of her character was actually intriguing - someone who lost her parents, feels guilty about that and suffers from ptsd, enhanced by survivor's guilt. good baseline and all...
But what did the show do with that? did it expand it? did it show us her developing? NO. What's worse - the show completely destroyed those character foundations Elena started with, during the horrible writing of her "character" in Season two and three.
Suddenly she does not feel guilty about her parents deaths because the whole death was retconed(notice how what Elena says about the accident in S1 and what Plec shows in S3 finale contradict each other), her supposed psychological problems from that trauma got whitewashed into "oh she is REALLY just that nice and caring and great and always have been!~" and her character got completely neutered into this messiah who always knows best.
She is never challenged by others.
She never fails.
If she fails she never gets any consequences over it
Her actions and decisions never get consequences.
She never reacts to ANYTHING that is happening around her.
She never actually DOES ANYTHING.
The show does not even bother to show us her having nor WANTING any sort of normal life. so most of her plotlines about not being supernatural fall flat on their face and every time viewers is supposed to root for her or care for her fate, it just does not work.
And yet despite all of that every character instantly goes along with anything she wants or decides as if universe revolved around her.
She does not feel like a realistic teenager person. She does not feel like realistic person. She does not fee like a person, period. She is just this object everyone cares about, object around which the plot just happens.
Elena Gilbert is a textbook mary sue, even bigger one than Bella Swan.
I know what you mean about Elena becoming a different person in season 2.I didn't like Elena in season 1 but she had her moments.She staked a vampire at the '50s dance.How did the girl that felt good b/c she had fought back turn into this suicidal,passive girl in season 2??And it's not that no one calls Elena on her stupid decisions;Bonnie told her it was wrong that she had Damon compel Jeremy,Jeremy told her she was not the right person to tell him who he could or could not be seeing,Evilaric said that Elena couldn't tell right from wrong anymore.But as usual,Elena pouts afterwards and everyone is sorry they hurt her feelings.As for Julie Plec constantly contradicting herself...don't even get me started!
She never actually DOES ANYTHING.
you're so wrong kitty, her life revolves around steffy and dayday lul
Didn't you say you would stop watching the show for good after season 3 for like a hundred times?
For that you're a little too interested in season 4 ;)
be quiet kitty
I don't need Bonnie to get a backbone necessarily, I just want her on my damn screen. I'll settle for anything at this point, I get so happy when she has more than 3 minutes of screen time. I'd be excited about her darker turn, but I wouldn't be surprised if they say she went away for the summer and she returns five episodes in all better and ready to help the vamps. So, I'm not expecting much but if she does stay evil for a while I hope she kicks everyone asses without mercy for all the times she's saved the town without getting a thank you.
Just give some Jeremy/Matt relationship already.Williamson needs to bring some LGBT stuff to mystic falls
its hilarious that Kevin Williamson, someone who IS openly gay, only managed to add ONE gay character(Caroline's Father) whose sexuality was only mentioned once as passing mention and who might as well been bisexual from the way he is portrayed and who also got portrayed in EXTREMELY negative light AND ended up dying...
I expected better from someone like him.
The only real potential romantic story was Jyler, something Kevin was aware of but he didn't want to go there because he already did a coming out story on Dawson's Creek which I can understand not wanting to repeat storylines but let's be honest Jack pretty much hated himself after coming out and seem more into Jen than any man, and I only recall him getting with someone in the very last episode. The problem with that is I know Trevino and Steven were down for Jyler being more than friends while Kerr Smith was never a fan of Jack being a gay characters.
I was watching "The Hybrid" again a few days ago.I remember Ric zip his pants only after he had seen it was Elena at the door and not Damon...Ric and Damon were totally having sex...It's a shame the writers never actually showed us that... ;)
I don't see the witches as the bad guys,Michael.In fact,I want a witches vs vampires showdown!However,I think some witches,like Esther or the 100 dead witches, are evil or at the very least big fat hypocrites;Esther tried to kill Elena ,Matt, Jeremy and she turned Alaric evil,therefore, she is responsible for the murder of 2 people.Moreover,she and her witchy friends took advantage of a mentally ill person and two teenage girls and turned him into the thing they despised in order for him to kill the things they despised!The characters have no moral compass anymore;they believe the end is justifying the means!Matt killed Finn (who was relatively innocent) just because the gang wanted Klaus dead.The whole plan was called "see an Original,kill an Original";Kol ,aside from breaking Matt's arm or attacking Damon b/c D had killed his brother,was not a threat to anyone.Elijah and Rebekah were targets also.Not because the gang wanted revenge on them (a reason I would have understood),but because they were linked to Klaus!One thing I liked about True Blood's earlier seasons was that whenever a person killed or harmed another (whether that person was human or supernatural),there were consequences!Not only that,but the characters explained how that was immoral in the supernatural world and the human world;Bill killed the bartender to save Sookie and when he had to go to trial for that,he explained it by saying:"if 1 of you killed another one of you to protect 1 of us,wouldn't there be a trial?''.
I want the African Americans to stop being slaves to the white people!Yeah,there I said it!When is someone on the show going to say things as they really are??(outside of the show,there is a wonderful article about the racial matters on TVD ,if someone wants the link).Again ,in True Blood,Tara (an African American vampire) said to Pam (a white vampire) "I'm not your slave!" to which Pam answered "Yeah you are".Of course I was appalled by Pam's answer and the way she treated Tara,but I thought "well,at least the writers acknowledged what kind of relationship Tara and Pam had and they were not trying to mask it as something else! (African Americans=witches,white people=vampires ,slaves=servants)".And it's not just that:Andy was also treated like a slave and as Damon's sex doll and no one has called him on that yet!In True Blood's 3rd season Tara was raped and the show didn't forget it.In season 5 Tara said :"The Authority can keep the laws off of my body".Go Tara!
I don't care about the show like I used to.I don't even consider it a favorite show anymore.But one thing that can make the 4th season bearable (especially if it's gonna be s3 2.0)is Katherine!Bring Katherine back!!
I liked your wishlist, because it simply outlines everything that makes me feel like I dont recognize the show I started watching during its second season. I actually did a little experiment and decided to watch s1 of TVD to see how things have changed since then. Now, given the fact that I only read reviews and opinions on the first season, I had this understanding that people mainly liked season two because of how it introduced characters like Elijah and Klaus and how TVD became better because it became more bloodier. Now even tho I at first thought of TVD as a shitty rip-off Twilight, once I actually got to seeing it, I understood that even tho it had some things that needed fixing, s1 still holds over s2 and s3 mainly because a) they had a main plot story, b) all the characters were a part of that story and c) all of that just worked so brilliantly - everything was connected and I didn't feel like "God, why did we need to know this or see this?". Everything linked and the show maintained a good balance between the normal and supernatural. Now I know s2 gave us awesome Caroline, likable Tyler, awesome squared Elijah and a real villain in the face of Klaus, but it does not make me close my eyes on things like Bonnie becoming a plot device after swearing in s1 that she would take out bth Salvatore brothers if blood was spilled, or Elena degrading so much that instead of being the girl to whom everything was connected, she became the center of the universe other characters'lives were revolved around.
I don't really have a clue what made the writers of TVD make such awful decisions in s3 and make a lot fans hate the show, but I my wishlist is that the show would take care ofthe following:
- The show takes on too much and ends up telling us too little to actually care about.
- The show seems to think that there is one formula for every villain that appears in MF - First he/she is really evil, then semi-evil, then we find out he/she had family problems, then the villain shows a soft side - and voila! The audience is tired of that! So I have to agree that as much as I love JoMo as Klaus and Klaus is general, unless there is really more to his story, maybe we should just let him go. I don't need to see him painting horsies.
- The show definitively needs to choose a tone - it had one back in s1, it had a bit of that in s2, but s3 was a roller-coaster ride of tones - first I am evil then I am soft. Maybe the show should rewind back to the quote made by Isobel in s1 = Don't look for something redeemable in me, there is nothing. And keep to that.
Finally, the show has lost that mystical element about it, right now TVD is just one of those shows where anything can happen just because. I mean, back in s1 Damon and Stefan were actually concerned about keeping a low profile so that the council would not suspect them as vampires......forward to s3 and NO ONE is even concerned a little bit about some random guy throwing things at a house, with unnatural strength and ...nothing. Hello?! See my point?
Oh, I see your point but you forgot to mention sth about the villains;they always run from someone!In Katherine's case,that made sense!They had to explain why she wasn't trapped in the tomb and why she had to fake her death.But why do the same thing to Klaus,too??And there are too many inconsistencies;I mean in season 2 we saw Klaus throwing big parties and be refered to as 'Lord Klaus'.When you run from someone,you keep a low profile,you don't throw parties!
I always noticed majority of the flashbacks are inconsistent. How the brothers were turned/Katherine getting taken gets contradicted in Blood Brothers compare to when both the brothers talk about it in earlier episodes.
You're right about the flashbacks in season 1.I've noticed significant differencies,too!But this season the inconsistencies were more frequent and more obvious.The writers not only contradicted everything they had written in season 2 (especially as far as the Originals are concerned) but they also contradicted what they wrote in episodes in the same season!
I can't even talk about that, I mean s1 Elena tells Stefan: "The night my parents died, I blew of family night to go to some party, GOT DRUNK and they had to come and get me"...and then we see s3's finale, where Elena not only did not even look like the girl before the accident (she was way different and interesting in the pilot) and SHE WAS NOT DRUNK! She talked on the phone with Jenna about her Matt problems...and then her parents came to pick her up..for some reason...
That season 4 flashback made no sense at all it came off as a nina and ian than Damon and Elena both ooc for the time period they were in. Am I really suppose to believe Damon who was totally obsessed with Katherine would just accept nor freak out about seeing Katherine's look alike or even say remotely anything nice to her. Come on writers have you really forgotten how Damon behaved towards Elena in the first season. I called BS on all the flashbacks in the finale as Elena contradicted herself.
I agree about elena being too ooc for the time, why waste the opportunity to show us how interesting and "fun" elena used to be, and instead keep her as the all-the-time-worried-about-someting-elena! I dont buy that the funny aspect of her personality used to be woke up dancing at 6am!! please!
With the Damon part, I have my doubts, one part of me thinks he was also ooc cause he used to be a crazy, fun, not caring about nobady vampire, but at the same time, even though he teased elena a lot, he was shown caring for her, even in the beggining, remember that moment, in episode 3 I think, when he is caresing her cheek?? It was cause she reminded him of katherine but still...
Oh yeah, thats right the awful theme of someone running away from someone...in Klaus's case that was just lame. Although I still believe he needed that army of hybrids to be stronger against someone....But yeah, why the parties if you ar trying to keep a low profile...LOL, its JP running this gig remember?
A big yes to all of this, especially the part about making use of Elena's vampirism. I stopped watching the show halfway through season 3 because it was driving me insane (like it does basically every other viewer, I know). Elena's been my favorite since basically the pilot and I hate to see all her screentime be devoted to the godforsaken love triangle. Someone should tell the writers that screentime does not equal character development, because I think the memo got lost in translation to them at some point.
Agreed on the other points as well. Bonnie needs an actual storyline that doesn't revolve around saving/worrying about Elena, they need to decide what the hell they want to do with Klaus and the problematic storylines (such as rape) need to be addressed already, instead of being brushed aside with a "oh, but he's a vampire" or "she said yes once before finding out he intended to use her as a blood bag".