The Vampire Diaries – Love, sex and bromance welcome in the season

“I am every parent’s worst nightmare. I am the chaperone teacher from Hell.” – Alaric at Elena’s party, full of teenaged drinking and drugs

It’s interesting that I’m feeling the way I felt after I watched almost every season premiere of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. One of my favorite shows of all time … but I never ceased being slightly disappointed by the season openers. After such amazing season finales, followed by a summer of longing, the first episode of the season never quite lived up to expectations.

Maybe The Vampire Diaries and Buffy have more in common than I thought they did.

Like Buffy‘s, there was nothing wrong with this season premiere; in fact, it was quite good. I’m glad they skipped a couple of months so we didn’t have to watch everyone mourn Jenna for episodes, and watch Elena pine over Stefan (though the poor girl has had a bit of loss in her life; I guess she’s entitled to some pining). All in all, they did an excellent job of setting up what promises to be a pretty great season.

I love how the whole Stefan changing thing isn’t black and white. He’s evil, yeah, but he’s torn, he’s doing it for the right reasons but temptation is too much. Can Elena’s love bring him back, or keep him from getting worse? Will he be able to problem-solve his way out of Klaus’s clutches? How will the (heart-wrenching) phone call to Elena change things next week?

Can Damon save Stefan? Does he want to? I’m not sure how much Damon actually cared about Andi, but now that he has Elena all to himself and Stefan was less than brotherly, he may just write him off. Although his angst at the end of the episode may say otherwise. Damn if that Damon doesn’t have a heart. …

And with The Vampire Diaries, always a few surprises. Never a show to beat around the bush, Caroline and Tyler hopped in the sack far sooner than I thought they would. As Caroline was sneaking out, I figured the worst problem we’d get out of the hook-up was some teenaged angst over the morning after. I never expected Mrs. Lockwood to go all Buffy on Caroline!

This and that:

• May I just say that Jeremy looks hotter than ever with his glorious short haircut?
• Though Damon needs a trim, his naked torso covered with bubbles more than made up for that.
• I couldn’t tell if Elena was dressed or in underwear / jammies all episode — am i just getting old? Her shorts outfit looked the same as her pajamas at the end of the episode, and her party dress was clearly her slip or a nightgown. She may be 18, but she still needs a parent to tell her what’s appropriate garb.
• I liked that Alaric was camped out on Elena’s and Jeremy’s couch all summer. I was sad to see him move out.
• Ah, Matt and Jeremy and the drug-bonding … I guess the Vicki sightings were more than Matt could handle, seeing how his knowledge of the supernatural in Mystic Falls has him nearing the edge as it is. I hope they follow this up a bit, though, because the two make a nice pairing and they could do some fun sleuthing together to get to the bottom of Jeremy’s problem. In other words, I think we may have the making of a beautiful bromance.

Clacked by Debbie McDuffee
on Sep 15, 2011 @ 22:10 EST5EDT