S02.E10: This Is Why We Don't Entrust Plans to Muppet Babies

[ElectricBoogaloo]

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As the witches of the Salvatore School come together to celebrate Coven Day, the latest monster to infiltrate the school targets Alyssa Chang and the other students by spreading discord and creating chaos among the covens. Elsewhere, Alaric, Lizzie, and Josie search for a solution that keeps Josie protected from the dark magic brewing inside the mora miserium. Fed up with feeling powerless alongside Hope, Landon asks her to give him self-defense training. Finally, Alaric's past comes back to haunt him.

Promo:

Original air date: 1/23/20

[ybrik]

Okay still processing this episode. I was really questioning all the focus on Alyssa but the pay off kind of works for me. Though I kept wondering if she was really this powerful witch why nothing before hand. Glad she ended up being bad because those flashbacks were annoying me as she was getting more development than most of the cast. 

The Wade/faery storyline I just don't know. Yeah for him being a hero for him but in the most after school special sort of way. So I guess making him the butt of all those jokes previously is okay now that he got his hero moment. 

Speaking of hero, if Landon wanting to train and be a hero is what it takes to break him and Hope up I'll take it. Seriously I want to like them but their just like vanilla ice cream. Perfectly good but just plain. 

Okay so how did Ric get Sebastian in the hell world? Does Bonnie give like a monthly pint of blood for the school to have on hand? 

So Alyssa is mad that she got her  mind wiped even though she gave them permission to wipe her mind instead of being kicked out of the school and possibly sent to the hell world? Please show don't try to redeem her just let her be bad. 

As much as I want to be alarmed with Ric possibly sending other bad students to the hell world, I kind of see the point. Unless there is a way to strip the person's powers you can't let someone as destructive like Alyssa out in the public. Maybe I am a terrible person but this seems like a good option except for the whole now being sent to hell world yourself part.

[Lady Calypso]

Wow. A whole lot happened in this episode. I'm still processing that ending. 

I mean...I figured Alaric didn't kill Sebastian. But knowing what he actually did to him, and it sounds like he did it to countless others for...some reason? I'm stunned. That is definitely not a good look on Alaric's end. I don't know what kind of explanation he would have to explain to Lizzie and Josie what he's been doing. 

Alyssa has a lot more layers to her now, knowing what Alaric covered up. I can't blame Alyssa for being pissed. Being sent to the Prison World, especially knowing who's there, is definitely extreme. I'll wait for the explanation, but it doesn't look good for Alaric. I get WHY he might have, but it doesn't mean that his choice was right.

I didn't mind the Wade as a Fairy plot. I kind of liked seeing Wade get the win, and I loved seeing Landon so supportive. Go Landon! He continues to impress me; I like Landon a lot.

 

[Diapason Untuned]

38 minutes ago, Lady Calypso said:

I mean...I figured Alaric didn't kill Sebastian. But knowing what he actually did to him, and it sounds like he did it to countless others for...some reason? I'm stunned. That is definitely not a good look on Alaric's end. I don't know what kind of explanation he would have to explain to Lizzie and Josie what he's been doing. 

It seems like Alaric has been using the prison world to lock up all the Salvatore School students he deems as being to dangerous for the outside world.

Not all that different from what he was doing with the bone fountain last season. What surprises me is that Dorian seemed totally unaware of it.

 

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I didn't mind the Wade as a Fairy plot. I kind of liked seeing Wade get the win, and I loved seeing Landon so supportive. Go Landon! He continues to impress me; I like Landon a lot.

Yeah, really liked seeing Landon stand up for Wade. He knows what it's like to be the bullied kid.

[twoods]

I am also wondering why Alyssa is so pissed because she agreed to this plan so she wouldn’t have to leave. She’s supposed to be someone who can get away with tourmenting other students (and burning Lizzie) without any consequences? I can’t wait for Hope to take her stupid ass down.

I hope Lizzie realizes why Alaric put Sebastian away instead of immediately side with him. Guy was killing humans to feed off of them. I get why Alaric thought this was the best option because the other two options (letting him keep killing or staking him) were not good ones.

It was nice seeing Emma again. I hope she doesn’t go back to Japan because I always liked her and Dorian.

Landon supporting Wade was cute. I wish shows didn’t make light of bullying because it’s never okay, but at least he got his hero moment. 

[Chris24601]

5 hours ago, Diapason Untuned said:

It seems like Alaric has been using the prison world to lock up all the Salvatore School students he deems as being to dangerous for the outside world.

Not all that different from what he was doing with the bone fountain last season. What surprises me is that Dorian seemed totally unaware of it.

I’m not surprised Dorian was aware of it and even okay with it; It’s sometimes easy to forget his father and sister were murdered by “Saint Stephan the perpetually forgiven” during one of his Ripper-sprees.

I’m actually pretty okay with it too. It’s good to see that at least in this corner of the TVD-universe we’re not getting villain-protagonists who excuse casual murder of non-supernaturals because they’re friends.

I like being able to genuinely root for my protagonists.

If Superman can have a Phantom Zone projector to put away powerful villains without killing them, I’m okay with Alaric having a prison dimension for locking up supernaturals too dangerous for society, but that he doesn’t want to outright kill.

[Kmr]

Yeah not really getting some responses I've seen feeling sorry for Alyssa. What the flashbacks showed me was that anytime someone upset her she would use magic to hurt them. We don't know exactly what happened to her family and their home. Also before getting her memories taken she actually researching magical spells to hurt people. Then in the group meeting she shot a fireball at Lizzie. Yes I know she was infected but her natural reactions seem to always hurt people.

I'm on Alaric's side and his mistake was letting Emma talk him into the mind wipe. 

Do like we saw that there was more to those therapy sessions we saw in season one and also why Emma was in charge of the younger students. I assume that Emma and Ric are monitoring these kids as they grow up to see which ones could be dangerous if they are allowed to leave the school and into the public. 

I do wonder why Emma spared Alyssa. Was she younger than the other students they may have sent before or was it something else?

[foxfreakinmulder]

So these witches are like Samantha from Bewitched now, a snap of the fingers and they can turn someone purple or switch shoes with them and with the turn of a wrist catch a falling hour glass and have it fly to you? No spells needed. I don't remember Bonnie having powers like that, it seems like she always had to do spells, same with the powerful Mikaelson witch Freya. Or maybe I just don't remember them doing magic like that.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Awwww, I love that Lizzie and Josie refer to Bonnie as their Aunt Bonnie! Related anecdote: like Lizzie and Josie, I had family friends who I was told to address as "aunt" or "uncle" so I just assumed that we were blood related. It wasn't until I got older and started asking exactly how we were related that I found out that I really only had three aunts and one uncle. Everyone else was just a family friend.

Anyway, first the mention of Aunt Bonnie and then Alaric was talking to someone about the black magic container so when the camera cut over to who he was talking about, for a split second I thought OMG ARE WE GOING TO SEE BONNIE?!!! Nope. Damn you for getting my hopes up, show.

One of the things I hate about characters in the TVD universe is how they're always deciding for other people who can and can't make their own decisions/participate in missions and then lying or deceiving each other to keep them from having their own agency. How many times did we see that on TVD? "No, Elena, I won't let you do XYZ!" And how many times did Damon and Stefan snap each other's necks so that they could keep the other one from coming with them?

If Landon wants to learn how to fight, he should. Isn't it a better option to train him how to fight so that he has more of a chance of surviving given the ridiculous amount of dangerous things that happen at school? What does Hope expect him to do every time something weird happens? Lock himself in his room and hope that the latest demon or spell doesn't find him there?

I was cracking up that Alaric was framing his bomb research as "I'm writing a novel." Ha! And his gas leak cover story for what happened to Alyssa's house reminded me of excuses they had on BtVS for anything weird happening in Sunnydale.

Alaric said that he, Lizzie, and Josie (and Sebastian) are in the prison world that the girls made when they were little (not the new one where they sent the black magic jar) so does that mean it's just a matter of time before Kai  shows up and tries to kill them? Maybe Sebastian will try to intervene and die saving Lizzie, thus proving himself to be like woobie Damon and Stefan the Ripper with a heart of gold and then Lizzie can go back to being angry at Alaric and blame him for everything (having them create the prison world, sending Kai and Sebastian there, getting Sebastian killed, etc.).

On 1/24/2020 at 2:28 AM, Chris24601 said:

If Superman can have a Phantom Zone projector to put away powerful villains without killing them, I’m okay with Alaric having a prison dimension for locking up supernaturals too dangerous for society, but that he doesn’t want to outright kill.

Or those (toilet-less) prison pods they had on The Flash!

[Chris24601]

6 hours ago, ElectricBoogaloo said:

Or those (toilet-less) prison pods they had on The Flash!

I’ll give Alaric props; compared to disembodied ghost (Phantom Zone) and Flash’s pods; the prison dimension is actually pretty posh. Plenty of food, bathrooms and beds galore... it’s really just the lack of people that’s a drag.

[Terrafamilia]

Either due to an excess of snow interfering with the reception or a problem with the transmission I was only able to view the second half of the show so I understandably have questions, namely, what's the deal with Wade being a fairy? Did Malavore fail in swallowing them, or at least a few of them, or did some escaped at some point, or what?

[ybrik]

Hey those Flash prison pods had toilets. Sure it took five seasons for them to  show those toilets but I am assuming they were always there and not just the writers trying to cover a plot hole that fans have been pointing out for years. 

I don't think the faeries were in Malavore. Even though Wade thought his parents may have been swallowed by Malavore since he was an orphan and didn't have memories of them. 

Since Bonnie was mentioned in the episode and in the thread, it does make me wonder if she knows about Ric sending really bad kids to the prison world. They had Bennett blood to do the spell later in the episode so I would assume they have it on hand at the school which would mean that Bonnie would have given them blood at some point unless there are other Bennetts that we may see later on the series. I would have to think to get her blood she would have to know why and how many spells specifically require Bennett blood?

The show is getting a bit loose with the witches magic. Alyssa does say an incantation before she turns the twins purple but then just flicks her hand and shoots a fireball. 

Watched the episode again and one thing I forgot to mention before was how much I am loving Lizzie this season. Her comments about whether her mean remarks were because of the monster or not were great. 

[jewel21]

1 hour ago, ybrik said:

Watched the episode again and one thing I forgot to mention before was how much I am loving Lizzie this season. Her comments about whether her mean remarks were because of the monster or not were great. 

Same. I wasn't a Lizzie fan before this season but I'm seriously loving her these days. She's hilarious and I kept laughing when she would clarify if it was her or the monster affecting her that were causing her mean comments. She's starting to remind me a little bit of Cordelia from BtVS and Angel. 

[ElectricBoogaloo]

1 hour ago, ybrik said:

Hey those Flash prison pods had toilets. Sure it took five seasons for them to  show those toilets but I am assuming they were always there and not just the writers trying to cover a plot hole that fans have been pointing out for years. 

I quit watching after S3 so I missed the big toilet reveal! I just remember everyone used to be obsessed with the pods not having toilets.

15 minutes ago, jewel21 said:

Same. I wasn't a Lizzie fan before this season but I'm seriously loving her these days. She's hilarious and I kept laughing when she would clarify if it was her or the monster affecting her that were causing her mean comments. She's starting to remind me a little bit of Cordelia from BtVS and Angel. 

Me three! I could barely stand Lizzie in S1 but they've adjusted her characterization this year and I've been enjoying her so much this season!

[UNOSEZ]

Well the prison world thing is cool.. And I’m glad wade wasn’t a running joke again.. That was getting tiresome… More tiresome is that once again No Raf…. Wth is going on?

As it stands for how Landon and Hope are together.. They seem to trade grand speeches about how much they love each other.. But most of their interactions don’t show that… But even if he isn’t brought back as a romantic option the show has done the actor and character a real disservice… He was a wolf for the beginning of the season and then wakes up to save Landon.. Almost immediately gets possessed.. Consistently has his mind messed with.. Had a flicker of hope ( no pun intended) when he was gonna ask hope out but then his memories returned and he couldn’t be around here and now he’s dissapeared off with his bio dad… Wouldn’t be surprised if the actor left to ” pursue a substantial role” elsewhere.. Which is what I’ve seen used to explain why some other black folks on these Genre shows dip after not being written for and pushed into the background... I read on another forum that they may be foreshadowing that the sheriffs son may be a wolf...  Here is that excerpt " His name is Ethan and I have a feeling he could be supernatural. With the way the Shunka Warakin from episode 3 of this season seemed to be watching him as he stood up to that jock bully and then mistakenly tried to eat the bully (but Shunka Warakin only eat werewolves) and now hearing about him getting into fights, reminds me a bit of how Tyler acted before he triggered his transformation, all that misplaced aggression. So he’s potentially an un-triggered werewolf and he definitely has an alpha wolf vibe, with the way he got those other jocks to stop vandalizing the Salvatore School. And with the way things seem to be going between Landon and Hope, if he accidentally triggers it and Hope is definitely the type of person who would want to help him through it that could be what leads to a romance between them"... 

To that I say... sounds plausible and reasonable… But if this show brings in a white dude to be not only a love interest for hope but an (Alpha) wolf.. While never giving Rafael anything to do.. I’m quitting the show.. Which would really piss me off cuz I really like the show.. But that scenario would be such a slap in the face… 

[tennisgurl]

This week we learn to believe in fairies! 

I am really going to need some more information about this hell dimension that Alaric and Emma are apparently expelling students/other supernaturals to when they become to dangerous to really function without being a danger to others. I can understand the logic here, that you dont want to just let violent people with super powers run around killing and hurting people, but you also dont want to kill them, so this seems like the best option to keep the body count low. On the other hand, I need to know exactly why people get sent here, if they can ever get out for good behavior, how old kids are when they get sent here, what life is like in their hell dimension, etc. 

The main story was pretty fun, it was nice seeing Wade, who is usually the resident reoccurring buttmonkey, getting to be the hero and it turns out that he is actually a fairy, which is certainly a fun talking point. They are collecting all kinds of kids here! It was also nice seeing Landon being supportive of him and trying to pump him up, even before he realized that his happy feelings were the key to saving the day. He really is a very sweet well meaning sort of kid, even if he cant throw much of a punch. 

Really, Landon should learn at least some basic self defense if nothing else. Its not like he is running around trying to start fights with monsters, they keep trying to kill him! And while he will inevitably come back, getting killed cant be fun even if he just pops back again, and its really rather sad that so many of his plans seem to revolve around him casting himself as cannon fodder. 

"We are three badass witches...and a semi competent bird." Lizzie has been on fire lately with the one liners! I especially enjoy her snark with Landon, its become increasingly less mean spirited and more banter-y and friendly. 

So were they implying that Alyssa accidentally blew up her house and killed her parents, and that messed her up and made her act out? She didnt need a memory wipe, she clearly needed therapy! Her sudden presence seemed pretty random, but I thought it had a good pay off, and I can see how all that would mess you up. Of course, she did agree to the mindwipe, so her being all pissed seems like she is looking to blame the wrong people. 

I cracked up at Jed awkwardly apologizing to Hope after she walked in on him and Alyssa making out on her bed. 

[ElectricBoogaloo]

1 hour ago, tennisgurl said:

I am really going to need some more information about this hell dimension that Alaric and Emma are apparently expelling students/other supernaturals to when they become to dangerous to really function without being a danger to others. I can understand the logic here, that you dont want to just let violent people with super powers run around killing and hurting people, but you also dont want to kill them, so this seems like the best option to keep the body count low. On the other hand, I need to know exactly why people get sent here, if they can ever get out for good behavior, how old kids are when they get sent here, what life is like in their hell dimension, etc. 

They went into more detail about the prison worlds on TVD. Technically it's not a hell dimension. It just feels like hell because you will want to die from the sheer boredom. It's an exact replica of the day/year when the witches create that particular prison world (minus any people).

Lilian (Stefan and Damon's mother) and the heretics were in a 1903 prison world. Kai (Lizzie and Josie's bio uncle) was in a 1994 prison world (which is where Damon and Bonnie ended up). Both of those prison worlds were destroyed when Kai died on TVD.

Bonnie, Lizzie, and Josie created a new 2018 prison world and banished Kai there after he came back from hell. This is the prison world where Alaric has been sending kids from the Salvatore School (including Sebastian) and where Alaric, Josie, and Lizzie currently are.

The prison world isn't just Mystic Falls. It's the entire world so anyone in the prison world can travel if they're willing to walk or if they can find a car to drive. It sounds like Alaric has sent more than one student there, but they might have left Mystic Falls. It will be interesting to find out if any of them became friends and are hanging out together (as Bonnie and Damon did) or if they each got the hell out of MF as soon as they were sent to the prison world. But I have no doubt that Alaric is going to be confronted by some angry/resentful students in addition to Sebastian. And I'm waiting for the inevitable confrontation with Kai. He already tried to kill Josie and Lizzie when they're kids so I'm sure he will relish the opportunity to try again. Ooh, I wonder if Kai rallied all of the kids that Alaric sent there and formed a new Gemini Coven.

[UNOSEZ]

3 hours ago, ElectricBoogaloo said:

if Kai rallied all of the kids that Alaric sent there and formed a new Gemini Coven.

I hope Kai somehow magically has a child now... Even better if its kind of Bonnie and Kai is now a different kind of psycho

[yourmomiseasy]

On 1/25/2020 at 8:30 AM, ElectricBoogaloo said:

I was cracking up that Alaric was framing his bomb research as "I'm writing a novel." Ha! And his gas leak cover story for what happened to Alyssa's house reminded me of excuses they had on BtVS for anything weird happening in Sunnydale.

 

A "gas leak" is classic Vampire Diaries.  

[ElectricBoogaloo]

17 hours ago, yourmomiseasy said:

A "gas leak" is classic Vampire Diaries.  

It was one of the many excuses used on BtVS whenever something weird or supernatural happened in Sunnydale. Gangs on PCP was my favorite.

[yourmomiseasy]

Yes, but I think it was more in world continuity than a nod to Buffy.  I wasn't a TVD fan, but have watched and it was pretty much a running joke that "gas leak" was their go to excuse.  They literally evacuated all of Mystic Falls with a "gas leak", maybe more than once.