The Vampire Diaries Rewatch -- The Sun Also Rises

I know everyone was raving about this episode and declaring it should have been the season finale, but I hated it, and on rewatching I figured out why. Everyone got the shaft to prop-up the epic Stefan and Elena.

Alaric and Jenna fans pretty much got the finger. There was no reason Alaric couldn't have come with Damon and Bonnie where he would have discovered his dead girlfriend and could have shared an emotional goodbye with her. They didn't even have Jenna give a lost goodbye message to Ric when she knew she was about to die. Why? Because that would have taken the focus off of Stefan and Elena.

Jenna's real purpose in the whole ritual wasn't being the vampire sacrifice, but to use her supersonic hearing to tell Elena that Stefan had offered himself to replace her, so they both could look at him like he hung the moon. It was but one of many Stefan propping moments.

We had a Stefan propping moment from Elijah when Elijah told him how honorable he is, while Elijah being thought not-so honorable for wanting to kill his own brother. We had Damon muttering a line that deserved to be muttered on how Stefan was cleaning up his mess, as usual. Since when? Usually it's the other way around.

We also had the Stefan is wonderful crapola. Stefan was blowing his own horn, this time, as he declared he was going to offer Klaus something he wanted more than Jenna...himself. Hate to burst your bubble, Steffy, but if he wanted you so badly, he could have taken you when you had your eyes closed and used you for the vampire sacrifice. With you closing your eyes like that, all he had to do was bop you on your head.

And it wouldn't be a Vampire Diaries episode unless Stefan was getting a free pass. Remember, Klaus got Elena because Stefan closed his eyes. But who is getting the blame for not protecting Elena; Damon is. John's ragging on him for not keeping Elena safe. Hey, John boy, he's not her boyfriend. They when he learned Damon gave her vampire blood he's going on how Damon has ruined her life. Again, she doesn't want to be a vampire, she doesn't have to drink the blood. God knows, I'm not drinking this show's Stefan Kool-Aid. They keep pushing it on me and I keep grabbing a glass of milk, instead.

You know, sometimes I think I'm too logical to watch this show, because I keep bringing up stuff like shouldn't Elena be unfit for sacrifice because she's got vampire blood in her system? Another one is this whole spiel about John giving up his life by binding Elena's soul to her body so she doesn't die and became a vampire. Shouldn't she have died, anyway? Klaus drained her blood out of her. Shouldn't she have died from blood loss?

You know the real reason I think John died? So he couldn't tell anyone Stefan shoved vampire blood down his throat and threatened to kill him and turn him into a vampire unless he left town. What with Elena lamenting about the fact Damon shoved vampire blood down her throat, it was bound to come up that, "Hey, Elena, your boyfriend did the same thing to me, only he took a level further than Damon. He also threatened to kill me." Would have been a funny scene watching Elena try to justify that one so Damon bad and Stefan good.

Of course, as bad as Jenna and Alaric got it, Jeremy got it a bit worse. He lost his aunt and uncle, too, and yet he was the one having to comfort poor little Elena. Damon and Stefan were asking about poor little Elena and talking about all the people she's lost. Well, Jeremy lost the same people, along with two girlfriends to boot, so that makes it a little bit worse than poor little Elena. Jeremy got relegated to that back of the pack with all the rest of the mourners like an unwanted stepchild while Princess Elena got to put roses on everyone's graves. Even Alaric got a two second goodbye to Jenna and putting a rose on her grave, which was more than Jeremy got.

So here's a one paragraph recap: Jenna wakes up; Elena urges her not to drink the blood, when witch Greta opens a vein and holds it under Jenna's nose. Jenna drinks. Klaus arrives and sacrifices Jules. Stefan arrives to offer himself up, only Klaus impales him and says he has other plans for him. Klaus sacrifices Jenna and bleeds Elena dry. Damon and Bonnie arrive. Damon snaps witch Greta's neck, while Bonnie does her mojo on Klaus. Stefan tells Damon to get Elena out of there and wants to stay to watch Klaus die. Elijah betrays everyone when Klaus promises to reunite Elijah with his family and flies off with Klaus. End of story.

Probably the most hilarious moment has to be how quickly Stefan stopped being all about Elena. He saw Damon about to leave the cemetery early and he wanted Damon to stay because Elena needed everyone around her now, even the guy who vampire blood down her throat. It's at this point Damon reveals he's been bitten by a wolf and walks off into the sunset while Stefan all, "Elena who?" Gotta find your laughs where you can get them.