Friday, December 6, 2013

The Vampire Diaries 5.09 Review: Living in Hell


All those that have yet to watch tonight’s episode of The Vampire Diaries, entitled ‘The Cell’, now would be a good time to do so before proceeding ahead. For this is not a spoiler free blog. THIS REVIEW MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS! You’ve been warned.
Well, this week we were given the backstory behind Damon’s time as an Augustine vampire, as well as some backstory on the experiments and who Aaron is. Now, while I am happy that Damon is finally getting a substantial story of his own, I’m finding it a little hard to believe that any of this ever happened to him. That amount of trauma, surely there would have been some hints towards it, and yet I can recall none from the previous four seasons. This is the problem for some writers and actors, as characters grow they’re growth tends to reflect in any flashbacks, not more who the characters were in the beginning, but more who they are now. I’m a little disappointed in this series for not really being able to do that.
Also, I’m disappointed in this series because of how this whole Augustine thing feels thrown in here. After the originals left, it feels like they needed something to throw in and just came up with this to take over once Silas was taken care of. The way it’s been written in has just been sloppily done, particularly with including all the Mystic Falls bigwigs as being part of this society that hadn’t managed to pop up on this series until just now. There have been no clues hinting at this at all, and yet it has managed to be written in. That’s just terrible in my opinion.
Just a few other comments regarding this episode. One is that I absolutely adored the use of fifties music for the flashback sequences; perfectly fitting for those scenes, I just wish there had been more. Another thing was how much I absolutely loved Katherine’s shirt, and now how very badly I want something like it. Finally, there were absolutely no doubts that Enzo wasn’t going to pop up and be alive near the end of the episode. His character definitely has so much more to him than that, and I am glad he’ll be around next episode. Hopefully we’ll have some interactions between him and Damon, and get to see just how the effects of being captive for a good seventy years or so has taken its toll on him.
Overall, while there are certain things I am excited to watch on this series, it isn’t anywhere near as good as it was two seasons ago. Let’s be honest, as soon as Elena became a vampire, and especially after she made her decision when it came to choosing between Stefan and Damon, there wasn’t much more they could do with this series. Unfortunately, as this series runs on The CW, there’s no doubt there will be another season after this one, I just don’t know if I’ll be around to watch it. That’s the trouble with TV these days; no one ever knows when is a good time to end their series.
My rating: 6.5 out of 10.

Best Lines:
“Deep thoughts, mortal coil, blah blah blah.” – Katherine writes down.
“And so on, and so on, and so on.” – Damon states.


Alright, folks, I’m off to review Once Upon A Time in Wonderland now, so check back soon for that. Afterwards we have Grey’s Anatomy and The Crazy Ones.

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