The Vampire Diaries - S8E4 - An Eternity of Misery

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Previously on The Vampire Diaries, “You Decided That I Was Worth Saving”

The Vampire Diaries – S8E4 – “An Eternity of Misery” | Starring: Kat Graham, Ian Somerhalder, Paul Wesley, Candice King, Matthew Davis, Michael Malarkey, Zach Roerig

“An eternity of misery” is yet another Damon quote from the series’ pilot. It’s what Damon promised to give Stefan after forcing him to become a vampire. It’s also what I think The Vampire Diaries has officially promised to all of its fans. Luckily for us, in this case, eternity will only last another 12 episodes.

The Good

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The Bad

Matt is back. OK, this isn’t necessarily bad, but I just don’t really know what he’s going to offer the story at this point. His character has been useless for a long, long time, so his comeback is likely just so the show can wrap up all its loose ends. (See: Tyler.) Or, it could be possible that reconnecting with his father will have some bigger impact on the overall story, but I doubt it. I will say his return was a genuine surprise. Perhaps if I were paying as much attention to the show as I used to, Matt’s reappearance would have been obvious. So, I suppose that’s a win for TVD? Get your audience to feel so indifferent to the material that they don’t see an obvious plot twist coming; well done, I guess.

The origin stories. I’m so torn. There are only so many episodes left and while I’d like the show to spend as much time with characters we know and love, I also understand the necessity in fleshing out new faces so that we may actually develop an interest in them. In the past, I’ve given TVD a hard time for not doing this very thing, or for trying too hard with someone’s backstory only to have it fall flat. So, I’ll reluctantly give some small credit to the show, for at least trying to give Sybil and Seline more dimension. Unfortunately, it just didn’t work. At best it was boring, and at worst it was a giant waste of time because I actually care less about these women than I did before. The one small, teeny, tiny, good thing that came from these origin stories was the revelation that Sybil will not be the final Big Bad of TVD. I’m not necessarily holding my breath that this “Devil” character, Cade, or Seline, are going to be any better, though.

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Seline is Sybil’s sister. Sure, okay, we can whistle past that weirdness, but it does call into question an event from the premiere. On the one hand, I understand why Seline wouldn’t defend herself when Virginia attacked; it throws the scent off of her, and builds trust with Caroline and Ric. On the other, I feel like this was cheap storytelling on TVD’s part. Why not have Caroline show up just in time to protect Seline? This would have accomplished the same results for Seline’s character, and it wouldn’t feel as though the show had played us dirty by making us believe Seline wasn’t supernatural. To be honest, I might be less annoyed if the show had a better track record with things like this, but here we are. However, I do like how this brings the twins back into the picture. They did open that vault, after all. And Seline being the sister is decidedly better than it being Georgie, which would have felt way too obvious after all her shady behavior and the story about her time in “hell.” RIP Georgie, we hardly knew ye; thank goodness.

Even Worse

The blatantly obvious parallels between Sybil and Stefan, which were blatantly obvious, even without Sybil repeatedly making them so. As soon as we learned about Sybil’s past and what happened with her sister, it was transparently clear there were similarities to the Salvatore brothers’ story. Though it still would have been a little on the nose, “An Eternity of Misery” could have been a little less annoying had the episode just let this idea play out in a more organic nature. Maybe allow the audience to come to their own conclusions, all the while building the tension for Stefan’s ultimate response. But no, Sybil had to shove the idea down the audience’s collective throat for the entire hour instead – why must she talk SO much? Now, had the parallels drawn something deeper than what we already knew from watching this show for 7 years, maybe it would have been worthwhile, but that’s just not the case. And because of this little bonding session between Stefan and Sybil, it feels as though she’s leaning towards helping him save Damon. I could be wrong, but because we know SO LITTLE about where this storyline is heading, anything is possible at this point.

“Which siren is your Spirit Animal?” This dialogue was both offensive and cringe worthy as fuck. It’s bad enough they sideline characters of color, now they throw in a little cultural appropriation? Ugh. Not. Okay.

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Final Thoughts

• Did anyone else notice how when Georgie died, her spirit was dragged away in the exact same manner as Katherine’s was? If we’re about to get to know the Devil, could we be making a trip to hell? If so, Katherine better be there. Here’s hoping it’s through that character that Nina Dobrev makes her comeback.
• Why did they drag out Tyler’s death? Was it just so we could feel awful for Michael Trevino again? This dude must have whiplash from TVD. His character was written on and off the show several times, and has died at least once before only to come back again, and then they toyed us around with his actual death. Talk about an unstable gig! Tyler as a character has been through it, but I feel way worse for Trevino.
• Poor Ric. He was the only one with the guts to do what we were all thinking – destroy his hearing so he wouldn’t have to listen to this fiery trash anymore. But seriously, he took some pretty badass steps to get himself out of that vault. It would have been pretty cool if it hadn’t happened in such a horrible episode. I hope he didn’t have to go too far for some vampire blood healing.