Well, hello there. SB, our illustrious OCTV leader and TVD recapper-extraordinaire, is off seeing The Hunger Games tonight, and has temporarily handed the TVD reigns to me. For those of you whom I have not had the chance to meet, I’m Bethany (*waves*) and I typically recap New Girl and Revenge for OCTV, as well as the occasional Glee hate-cap. But TONIGHT The Vampire Diaries is mine.

This episode, “Break On Through,” felt very transitional to me. Which is basically because it is a very transitional episode. But because we’re dealing with Julie Plec and Kevin Williamson here, transition still has some bells and whistles for us—most notably the descent into a straight-up horror movie for a couple of scenes. There were also some really nice moments with Stefan and Elena, and of course, with our beloved Caroline Forbes. Bonnie was also around, but, y’know, didn’t really offer much more than “Looky! I did a spell that saved your asses. Again. Also, I forgive you. Again.”

So the big question was, “What the frickity-frack is going on with Alaric?” And the episode actually opened with him getting a CT scan at the hospital so that Meredith could definitively rule out that whatever was making him a crazy psycho-killer wasn’t, like, a tumor or something. But the interesting thing about this scene was that while in the CT, there’s a mirror where Alaric could see the reflection of his face. And while he’s staring at himself, all of a sudden his face changes and it’s clear that someone or something or some other part of him is staring back. And it is CREEPY, y’all. Alaric freaks out for a second, and when Meredith asks if everything is ok, his face totally changes and he says that he’s fine.

Then of course we learn that there is nothing medically wrong with Alaric, so Elena wonders aloud if Bonnie could maybe do a spell that reverses the damage. Then Elena and Damon have a little tete-a-tete in which Elena obviously chews him out for letting Stefan be a vampire and drink from a human in an alley. Damon tells Elena that she is deluded to think that after his Ripper Stefan craze back at the beginning of the season with Klaus that Stefan can just quit cold turkey. Which is true. He goes on to tell her that he’s trying to help Stefan regain some self-control when it comes to drinking human blood. Which makes sense. But Elena is all self-righteous about it and throws an insult about how it’s so hilarious that Damon is teaching Stefan self-control before slamming her door and driving away. Elena really, really annoys me sometimes. Because. HELLO, THEY ARE VAMPIRES. They drink blood. It’s their sustenance. And you’re the one who chose to fall madly in love with one at basically first sight, so stop being so morally superior and accept what you’ve chosen to be involved with. DO IT, ALREADY ELENA.

So after she drives away from Damon, she heads over the La Casa Salvatore to look for a book or diary or something that belonged to Samantha Gilbert. When she gets there, Stefan is sitting in the living room about to drink some bagged blood. Elena is startled to see him and mumbles something about not knowing he’d be there and needing the book. Stefan tells her she can look for it or he can just tell her what happened, which is that dearest Samantha ended up in an insane asylum where she attempted to give herself a lobotomy and died in her cell. Wah wah. Then he adds that if what is happening to Alaric is the same as what was going on with Samantha, there’s nothing they can do about it.

But because Elena has a hero complex (I’m really hating on her today. I don’t hate Elena, I just get annoyed with her sometimes. Which is apparently today.), she gives Caroline, who is hanging out with Bonnie and Abby and Jaime at Abby’s place to help her transition into a vampire, a call to see if maybe Bonnie would consider coming to Mystic Falls to help out. Bonnie says she’ll do it, but she’s all business on the phone. And you know, as meh as Bonnie’s character is the majority of the time, I feel bad for her character. She’s constantly having people taken away from her, but she’s the one who has to step in and help out and save the day and understand and forgive. I sure as shit wouldn’t be doing that. So, basically, Bonnie is a good person even though she is SO COMPLETELY blah on the show. Anyway, Bonnie tells Elena that she’ll need something personal of Alaric’s that he had before he acquired the Ring-that-Saves-His-Life-A-Lot-and-Also-Turns-Him-Into-a-Psycho-Killer. Alaric, who is under 24-hour Meredith surveillance, complete with tranquilizers, tells Elena that his wedding ring is at his old loft. So Elena goes to get it. While at the loft, she runs into Stefan because he’s come to find her. Because he has more info on Miss Samantha Crazy-pants Gilbert. Turns out she killed two people whilst institutionalized and had no personal effects with her. Which means that even if the person isn’t wearing the ring, they can have the Psycho Killer Moments.

So Elena and Stefan search Alaric’s apartment and find a) a locked drawer that Stefan uses his vampire strength to pull open that is full of murder victim photos, and b) the wedding ring, and c) a thick folder addressed to Jeremy (JEREMY!!!!!!!!) full of information about the Council Members and complete with a cryptic message about finishing the work. Elena swears Alaric didn’t write it. BUT. While all of this is happening at Alaric’s loft, Alaric is, you know, trying to murder Meredith. And y’all, I was SO COMPLETELY TERRIFIED during that scene. It was soooo well done. And Meredith ends up getting slashed with a knife and runs up the stairs and locks herself in the bathroom so she can, you know, bleed to death in private, but stabs Alaric in the hand with some scissors in addition to burning him with hot coffee on the way there. So, yay for fighting back, Meredith!

After all of that, Elena shows up as Alaric is coming down stairs, bandaging his hand. She asks what happened and he says that Meredith got called back to the hospital and that he sliced his hand on a broken coffee cup. When he asks about the ring, Elena says she couldn’t find it because she can tell something is way wrong. She looks down and sees the knife with the blood on it. When Alaric sees that Elena has seen the knife, he gets CRAZY FACE, which he is real good at, and then Stefan (STEFAN!!!) grabs him from behind and knocks him out. Elena looks relieved, but Stefan knows something else is wrong because, you know, vampire senses, so he can smell Meredith’s blood. He tells Elena he needs her to come upstairs with him. Stefan gets the bathroom door open and Meredith is mostly dead and there is blood effing everywhere. Stefan  starts to vamp out (because Paul Wesley obviously wants to drink his wife’s blood. That’s normal, right?) But then he stops vamping out, bites his wrist, and feeds Meredith his super-magic-healing blood. After she drinks for a bit, he gets up and stumbles away. But you guys! He has some control! STEFAN! (Which is sort of sad-making, because I really, really, REALLY like Ripper Stefan. Because I’m a creep.)

The next morning, Alaric wakes up and finds Damon sitting beside his bed. Apparently Bonnie did the spell to block Psycho Killer Alaric from taking over Alcoholaric’s consciousness. Damon informs Alaric that he has an alter-ego hellbent on killing council members. Then Alaric asks where Meredith is. Damon gives him a look and says, “She’ll be fine, Ric.” And y’all. I love their bromance. It makes so much sense. Especially now that Alaric has been a serial killer because, let’s face it, Damon can completely relate. So, yay for that!

Bonnie gives Elena some herbs for Alaric to take twice a day to bind the spell. Then Bonnie tells her she’s going to go back to Abby to help her tend her freaking garden. Elena tearfully apologizes and Bonnie hugs her and forgives her. Because Bonnie is a good friend who is also such a wet blanket. But whatever. What Bonnie doesn’t know is that after Abby bit Jamie (he’s fine.), which Bonnie was there for and used her witchy powers to fling her mother away from the lumberjack dude Bonnie obviously has a thing for, Abby decided to high-tail it out of there even after Caroline gave her a super great lecture on how she needs to learn to be a parent and not run away from Bonnie AGAIN. Poor Bonnie. I really do feel bad for her because she just can’t catch a break.

So the other major story of the night dealt with Damon and Rebekah and SAGE, Y’ALL. The event of the week in Mystic Falls is the restoration of Wickery Bridge, which, like everything else in the town is old and preserved. There’s much ado about the fact that Alaric forgot to bring the sign the historical society was supposed to give him. But then Damon sees Sage. They banter for a bit and then Rebekah comes over. Rebekah doesn’t like Sage, but this isn’t really a surprise. It turns out that Sage has been in love with Finn for a thousand years or something, and has been waiting for him to be undaggered. However, she can’t stand Rebekah or Klaus and is more than happy to conspire with Damon on how to possibly murder them dead. Sage says that she could probably get into Rebekah’s head, but Damon says that Rebekah is too strong for that shit, since she’s, you know, an Original. But Sage is all, “Silly boy. Rebekah is a girl, so you just need to make her feel all sexy and then I can get into her head.”

So Damon invites Rebekah over to La Casa Salvatore for a drink/party situation. She says no. But Damon touches her waist and does his eyebrow thing and MY GOD HE IS PRETTY HOW COULD YOU SAY NO TO HIM? But Sage is positive that Rebekah can’t resist him and his man-pretty, so they have a piano player who doubles as food at wait. And indeed the doorbell rings and Rebekah comes in with a bottle of wine. She’s disappointed that it’s only Damon and Sage. So she sits by the piano player and pouts as she watches Damon and Sage awkwardly dance around (The only thing I can ever think about in these moments is how weird it must be to shoot scenes like this.) Eventually Rebekah bites the piano player, and Damon joins her in feeding on him. Which, I guess is an activity vampires find super sexy. After they’re done, Damon goes all seductive on Rebekah again. Rebekah asks, “What about her?” motioning over to Sage, and Damon says, “I don’t want her. I want you.” And then they make out while Sage watches from the couch. And y’all. I really kind of like Damon and Rebekah together. They are a) HOT and b) HOT and c) HOT. Any questions?

So then after Rebekah and Damon have fucked like bunnies, Rebekah is sleeping, and Sage slips in to get into Rebekah’s mind. After a bit, she motions Damon toward the bathroom and takes her shirt off. She gets in the [awesome] shower and Damon joins her. Then he and Sage make out so that Damon can see all of the things Sage saw in Rebekah’s mind—which are about the goddamn white oak tree. So after the sexy shower times, Damon searches through his family’s old milling records to find out where the white oak is, while Sage goes upstairs to keep Rebekah distracted. Turns out the white oak is what the Wickery Bridge is made out of, which is information that Damon shares with Sage before he burns the records. But, Sage doesn’t want Finn harmed, so Damon promises not to stake him. (Oh, Damon. You think you are soooo clever.) But when he realizes that Sage is gone a little while later, he goes straight to the bridge. Which is burning. And Rebekah is there being all haughty and rage-filled. Damon confronts Sage, and she is pissed that Damon didn’t tell her about the whole linkage business between the Originals. Damon then tells Sage that Finn is the one who volunteered to die when Mama Original linked them all together and that he obviously never truly loved Sage the way that Sage loved him since he is so willing to die. And just to make it that much worse, he tells her that he’ll start with Finn when he figures out how to kill the Originals. Which doesn’t take him very long to do because, TA DA, the Wickery Bridge sign Alaric has is made out of white oak.

BUT THERE IS SOMETHING ELSE THAT HAPPENED Y’ALL, OMG. Elena calls JEREMY, whom I have mad, crazy love for. He’s all hot and McQueen-y over in Denver. Elena asks if he’s talked to Alaric lately andJeremy says no and asks if everything is fine. It didn’t go unnoticed that Jeremy is wearing his I-Can-Beat-Death ring. Elena says that thinks are fine, she just misses him. Jeremy says he misses her too, but asks if he can call her later because he’s going to go out with some friends. Elena says sure and sits there all misty-eyed as they get off the phone. AND YOU GUYS. JEREMY. WE SAW HIM. HE IS PERFECT. AND HAS A RING. WHICH MAKES HIM SO MUCH MORE INTERESTING AS A CHARACTER ALL OF A SUDDEN NOW THAT WE KNOW THIS STUFF ABOUT PSYCHO KILLER ALARIC. Mostly, I just want Jeremy back and I will take ANY storyline that brings him back to my TV every week.

Favorite Moments

“I tried once. He killed me.”—Alaric to Meredith when she asks why he hasn’t killed Damon.

“Take him out for chicken soup, get him a martini, make sure he doesn’t kill anybody.”—Damon to Elena

Rebekah has the best hair. It’s so shiny. And probably soft. I want her hair. (Good Lord, I’m a creep.)

“Ahhhhh you’re stress eating. Sublimating.”—Damon to Stefan as he chugs bagged blood.

“You know, she used to beat men for sport.”—Damon to Rebekah, about Sage. “She always was quite common.”—Rebekah

“God, I hate that elitist Original bitch.”—Sage

So what did y’all think of this episode? Love it? Hate it? Bored to tears? Tell me all of your EVERYTHING in comments.