S03.E09: Do All Malivore Monsters Provide This Level of Emotional Insight?

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Quote

As tensions build between Hope and Lizzie, the latest monster's arrival forces them to set aside their differences in order to defeat it; Alaric comes up with an excuse to keep tabs on Josie at Mystic Falls High.

Promo:

Original air date: 4/8/21

[Kmr]

This was a good episode but not sure if that is because it was good or this season has set the bar low. 

Ric is dying soon. That speech with Josie screamed dead man walking. 

Usually love Kaleb but his whole attitude towards MG is confusing and annoying. 

Wow Elena's house. Ric really is dead.

Hope and Lizzie reconciliation was too soon and forced. 

 

[twoods]

If they kill Alaric off, who will be the adult on this show to supervise all the teens? I hope the writers don’t go there.

Hope is still annoying even if she’s not obsessed with Landon’s “death” anymore. At least she apologized to Lizzie for being a jerk and putting Josie in harm’s way.

I’m glad that MG didn’t compel Ethan. I enjoyed their scenes. Also liking Chloe and Kaleb, even though I do miss him with MG.

Im also convinced that this isn’t the real Landon, but he’s still the same adorable dork he has always been. Him giggling at the gremlin was hilarious.

 

 

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Ha, Landon's face when the gremlin first appeared was hilarious. Landon got another A+ for the look on his face when Lizzie referred to him as a muppet.

I was surprised that they were trying to figure out exactly what kind of monster it was, but later learning that Landon was the only one who had seen Gremlins made more sense (although I still wondered why Landon didn't realize what it was until it molted).

It was cute how proud Landon was of himself for figuring out how to weaken the gremlin. Seeing it shrink down to a tiny little gremlin, it reminded me of the BtVS episode Fear Itself when Buffy stomped on the tiny fear monster. I was cracking up at Landon giving Lizzie and Hope advice while running by with the jumper cables to rescue Cleo.

I love that now it's not a secret to anyone that Lizzie likes reading comic books. When she tried to pretend she didn't know what Kaleb was reading and he called her on it, I just laughed.

Ethan trying to pretend he had been compelled was slightly funny but it was made hilarious when Alaric finally realized that DUH, his mom had him on vervain. Remember the good old days when Sheriff Liz and the town council were just putting vervain in the Mystic Falls water supply?

I loved seeing Ethan and MG bond over their love of comic books. It was cute to see how genuinely excited Ethan was about MG being a vampire. I was worried that he was going to ask MG to turn him so that he could keep playing football, so I thought it was sweet that he just wanted MG to let him keep the memory of meeting him so they could stay friends.

Awww, the nostalgic part of me was happy to see Damon's car again and then double awwww at seeing the Gilbert house (even though it seems really odd to me that Alaric wouldn't visit his BFF Damon for a drink more often).

[Chris24601]

7 hours ago, ElectricBoogaloo said:

Awww, the nostalgic part of me was happy to see Damon's car again and then double awwww at seeing the Gilbert house (even though it seems really odd to me that Alaric wouldn't visit his BFF Damon for a drink more often).

Presumably he does... off-camera because actor availability is a thing.

Still, it’s a lot harder to do the drinking buddies thing when kids enter the picture. Given Elena’s career I wouldn’t be surprised if Damon is the one who does more of the day to day parental errands (i.e. get kids to after school practice, make sure homework is done, etc.) that make time for social drinking more of a special occasion than a Tuesday.

I dunno about “dead man walking” for Alaric, but I definitely get the sense of a transition coming.

His daughters are 17 and one has moved out of the house to live with family friends because of what amounts to a drug problem. Surrogate daughter Hope is 19 and, as the episode “Hope is Not the Goal” laid out... there’s layers of guilt involved in the whole “let already damaged Hope fight the monsters so others don’t have to” (which also explains why he lets her get away with way more than the other students too).

He’s single and his last love interest packed up and left town after learning about the supernatural. His best compadre, Dorian, left the school for a safer occupation and roughly two-thirds of the student body got pulled out by their parents after the big battle with the Necromancer. They’ve also made a recurring point that he’s past his prime when it comes to confronting monsters directly.

Kids on the verge of adulthood, career prospects looking iffy, lousy love life... basically, Alaric is staring at a midlife crisis.

Given the specific references to the main cast as the “Super Squad” and that next season not just Hope, but all the other main characters should be out of high school, my hunch is the end result is going to be some sort of restructuring of the Salvatore School... perhaps a more overtly “X-Men-ish” direction where “we fight monsters” becomes an actual part of the mission statement vs. trying to pretend that “we educate supernaturals to be a part of ordinary society” is still viable in a world where all the monsters have returned.

And really, what other organization on the planet has the sheer variety of supernaturals working together? The present “Super Squad” isn’t just vampires (Kaleb), werewolves (Jed), and witches (Chloe), but a siphoner (Lizzie), fairy (Wade), phoenix (Landon) and a tribrid (Hope).

So my expectation isn’t “dead man walking” for Alaric, but rather that he’ll end up getting his groove back by realizing he still has a lot to contribute in mentoring this new generation of monster hunters.

[foxfreakinmulder]

On 4/9/2021 at 2:01 AM, ElectricBoogaloo said:

Awww, the nostalgic part of me was happy to see Damon's car again and then double awwww at seeing the Gilbert house (even though it seems really odd to me that Alaric wouldn't visit his BFF Damon for a drink more often).

Yeah, I love that car. Didn't Elena burn that house to the ground? I guess you could rebuild but it looked exactly the same.

I wish this show would do something other than monsters. We never saw monsters on VD or The Originals and VD started with high schools kids.

That scene with Ethan was funny and I'm glad MG didn't compel him.

I also laughed at Josie and MG looking/talking about Alaric's coaching attire.

The problem with shows like this is the kids grow and once they are out of high school then what?

This show really put themselves in a corner with Hope and Landon. I want to see Hope become a vampire to see how she will handle that or something, anything other than Landon, Landon, Landon.

Why isn't Landon going to school with Josie and MG he's not supernatural anymore is he?

[Chris24601]

4 hours ago, foxfreakinmulder said:

Yeah, I love that car. Didn't Elena burn that house to the ground? I guess you could rebuild but it looked exactly the same.

The problem with shows like this is the kids grow and once they are out of high school then what?

This show really put themselves in a corner with Hope and Landon. I want to see Hope become a vampire to see how she will handle that or something, anything other than Landon, Landon, Landon.

Why isn't Landon going to school with Josie and MG he's not supernatural anymore is he?

Alaric mentions in the episode “Wow, they really did spare no expense restoring this place. It looks exactly like it did... well, maybe the shades are different.” So as ridiculous as it might seem, that is the explanation for why it looked identical.

Regarding the kids aging out of school. Honestly, it’s been my contention since season one that the setup would have worked just as well if they’d timeskipped a couple years further and just made Hope, Lizzie, Jo and MG (Kaleb wasn’t a regular at the start of s1) into junior faculty at the school (sorta like Cyclops, Jean, et all were for the X-Men) as it would make almost no functional difference in the stories (instead of class responsibilities from the student side they’d be from the teacher side) and there’d be zero “what do we do when they graduate” issues.

That said, my hunch is that’s probably what they’ll end up transitioning to going forward anyway. It’d just be a little easier if they’d started from there.

I, for one, don’t want to see Hope as a vampire... because the inevitable next step for “the dramas” will be “let’s have her flip her humanity switch” and instead of the clearly heroic story we’ve been getting we’ll be back to the wretched “protagonist-centered morality” that was used to justify all the atrocities Damon, Stephan, Elena, Klaus, etc. visited upon random innocents.

Because let’s be honest here; If a vampire like Damon or Klaus did actually turn up on this show and pulled one of those two’s trademark “woe is me” massacres... act four of the same episode would end with Hope standing over their staked/decapitated/incinerated corpse.

Frankly, I think the THREAT of becoming a vampire if she ever does die is a far more interesting dramatic element to play with than another round of “how will they adapt to life as a vampire/when will they flip the switch and be a monster” we’ve already seen on two different series now.

And to be fair... even Landon is calling out Hope for her “Landon, Landon, Landon” thing; so we should see a bit of a shift away from that going forward; at least for a bit.

Lastly, as to why Landon is attending the Salvatore School? A) Alaric already decided he could attend back before he or Landon were even sure he was supernatural (the end of the ep where his mom jumped back into Malivore).

B) They were at exactly the minimum (30)needed to stay a school before Landon returned and then MG left... if Landon left they’d have to either scrounge a replacement or shut the school down (i.e. 30+1-1=30).

Related to Alaric’s midlife crisis; actually the above highlights how this season is about throwing everyone out of their comfort zones and forcing them to deal with changes.... Lizzie to life without her twin always around, Josie to life without magic, Hope to life without Landon (and now to needing to NOT make Landon her sole focus), MG is now making new friends at a new school, Kaleb is adapting to not having MG under his wing... and we’ve already discussed Alaric.

Basically, this is the same thing as Puck’s deal... first you break everything apart (all those changes for all the leads) and then, presumably, the writers will put it all back together.

[nilyank]

Rather than Hope becoming a vampire, isn't it possible that she will turn out to be a werewolf. I cannot remember the mythlogy in this universe but she has to kill a human to activate that power right?

[ElectricBoogaloo]

1 hour ago, nilyank said:

Rather than Hope becoming a vampire, isn't it possible that she will turn out to be a werewolf. I cannot remember the mythlogy in this universe but she has to kill a human to activate that power right?

Yup. So far, so good at only killing monsters!

[Chris24601]

10 hours ago, nilyank said:

Rather than Hope becoming a vampire, isn't it possible that she will turn out to be a werewolf. I cannot remember the mythlogy in this universe but she has to kill a human to activate that power right?

I know it’s easy to forget since the last time she switched forms was early season two (and I think the Pilot was the only prior time), but Hope is ALREADY a werewolf (of the improved Crescent Moon variety which is why she can control her transformations).

Her activated werewolf side is why she’s already got super strength and agility and the vampire blood in her system gives her fast healing (and is why she’d automatically turn into a vampire-werewolf hybrid if killed).

Normally the activated werewolf curse would keep Hope from being able to do magic (all the werewolves are witch bloodlines cursed by the Hollow), but between being the Hollow’s host for a bit (not to mention being a blood descendant) and being Nature’s anti-Malivore loophole, Hope still has her magic.

So, basically Hope is already a “were-witch” with magic healing blood (heals like vampire blood, counters werewolf venom, creates hybrid vampire-werewolves). Other than immortality (not actually that great), vampire speed and compulsion and the thirst for blood, Hope’s already got most of the benefits of being a vampire and, as indicated by Lizzie’s first genie wish, if she did transition to a vampire she’d probably lose her magic so it’d probably be a net downgrade to her abilities.

There’s a reason I call Hope the Buffy Summers of The Vampire Diaries universe (and by extension Alaric is Giles, Josie is Willow, Lizzie is Cordelia, Landon is basically Xander, and Kaleb is Oz).

[Kymmi]

This season has just dragged a bit, or maybe because I binged the first two seasons it seems slow? Landon/ Hope is just weird now. Her constant need to protect him is nearly their whole relationship. I like that he can point out her blind spots, but I need to see more here. They’re fine, just not very root-able at the moment. 
 

MG and Josie together make the MVHS storyline a bit more interesting (although, where is Finch, not that I miss her). Either way, I found it more interesting when Hope was there because nobody remembered her, rather than Josie because she didn’t want to remember herself. MG seems to have chemistry with everyone, and props for wardrobe for dressing him so chic. 
 

Lizzie needs someone, I think she suffers the most from having a cut down cast, no Josie, no Sebastian, no MG (although I am not 100% on those two). 
 

I love Khaleb, but I’m not convinced with Cleo. We will see. 

[tennisgurl]

The monsters really do always provide this level of emotional insight, they have a very "metaphorical monster of the week" early seasons of Buffy vibe. I was so sure that Landon wasn't really Landon by the end of last week, but this week he really was acting just like himself, so maybe I was wrong. I am still pretty sure it was too easy to get him back to this plane of existence, but maybe its just budget cuts. 

This was a lot more fun than a lot of this season has been, even though I am still not thrilled with the cast being broken up. I know why they are doing it and I understand, but it just makes the show feel cluttered jumping from everyone in their different subplots in different places. I am still not a huge fan of Landon/Hope, but they were alright this week, maybe because it was also focused on other aspects of both of them. Landon got to spend most of his time being a lovable dork getting all excited about cute gremlins, and they mostly focused on Hope repairing her relationship with Lizzie, a relationship I always enjoy. The monster of the week was pretty fun as well, even if it was super on the nose even by this shows standards. The cutest monster ever, even when he was creepy and then a tiny shrunken monster at the end. Don't taunt the gremlin Hope. Its tacky...

I like Cleo, but I am still not sure I trust her. 

Its really funny to me that they rebuilt the whole ass house from TVD, right down to the curtains. So freaking extra. And that tons of TVD characters all seem to be around all of the time, just off screen. Like if you moved the camera slightly to the right, Damon would be driving his car into the driveway. 

I really hope that Alaric is just having a midlife crisis and his whole talk with Josie wasn't foreshadowing his upcoming death or something. He is really in a weird place right now in his life, maybe he gets his monster fighter mojo back? 

This is probably the only time I've liked Ethan, his interaction with MG actually made him feel like a real character and not just a boring possible love interest. Its interesting that MG and Ethan bonded over Identity Crisis and Batman getting his memory wiped by Zatana, in the comics that was portrayed as a really bad thing that the Justice League did and it had horrible ramifications that led to a lot of really bad stuff, much of which was tied back into what a terrible violation a mindwipe was. Considering how blasé this franchise normally is about mind control and memory wipes, its an interesting story to bring up so specifically in this context. 

[AnimeMania]

On 4/10/2021 at 6:20 PM, Chris24601 said:

Regarding the kids aging out of school. Honestly, it’s been my contention since season one that the setup would have worked just as well if they’d timeskipped a couple years further and just made Hope, Lizzie, Jo and MG (Kaleb wasn’t a regular at the start of s1) into junior faculty at the school (sorta like Cyclops, Jean, et all were for the X-Men) as it would make almost no functional difference in the stories (instead of class responsibilities from the student side they’d be from the teacher side) and there’d be zero “what do we do when they graduate” issues.

The cast couldn't do their school singing/performance episodes, teachers don't usually steal the spotlight from their students at the talent show.

[Chris24601]

5 hours ago, AnimeMania said:

The cast couldn't do their school singing/performance episodes, teachers don't usually steal the spotlight from their students at the talent show.

True. But too be fair, all the musical talent was more a happy accident than something pre-planned for the series (if I recall it was mostly a result of one of the showrunners hearing then still a guest star Kaleb’s actor singing that gave them the idea of actually adding some serious musical numbers).

Sitting back in the original planning meeting when probably the only for certain actors being the ones for Hope and Alaric (Jo and Lizzie needing to be re-cast from the definitely still kids from The Originals episode and Dorian and Landon being possible, but not required) I can’t see “easier to have high school musical numbers with the leads” being a key feature of the discussions.

And regardless, my point was more about where the show is going now than where it could have gone... and with the present ages either shifting focus to the leads as junior faculty or dropping the pretense of school for full time monster hunting are pretty much your two choices.

Because, to review... Jo and Lizzie turn 18 this season and Hope will turn 20. Landon is supposedly just slightly older than Hope (nature let her be conceived because Malivore conceived Landon as a way to break loose). MG is probably the same age as Jo and Lizzie and just based on behavior (and his ability to legally drive in s2) Kaleb is at least MG’s age and probably a year or two older. Jed is also probably 18+ at this stage and Wade doesn’t feel particularly younger than the rest... which leaves Cleo as perhaps the only one who might be younger than 17 at this point (presuming she’s not some millennia old monster in disguise).

And a related point to this is... Alaric and Caroline started this school for their girls who are now nearly grown and the new class for the present year consisted of just two students. So is the school even really something Alaric wants to continue for its own sake?

Which again is probably why Alaric is staring at a midlife crisis.

My hunch is that towards the end of this season they all come together and decide to continue the school. Kaleb has grown into someone with an EXTREMELY healthy perspective being a vampire, making him an ideal mentor for younger vamps. Hope, Josie and/or Lizzie would be fantastic magic instructors and, frankly, the school should have always had an adult member of the faculty as the school pack’s alpha which Jed might mature into. Landon, MG and Wade could teach more traditional classes.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Alaric has been pushing Kaleb into a supervisory role all season, which originally made me think that they were going to have him take Dorian's place as Alaric's new second in command/confidante/adult friend at the school sooner rather than later.

But with Alaric's recent discussion with Josie, it feels like they may be finding a way to write him off the show and have the main characters take over as the new teachers/administration of the Salvatore School. It's an inevitable thing for any show about high school students that eventually they will no longer be high school students so unless all the main characters decide to go to an as yet unheard of college for supernatural students together, the only way to keep the show going is to find a reason to keep them together. Since many of them aren't from Mystic Falls, it feels like the logical choice is to have them become instructors/counselors at the school.

It would be natural for Lizzie and Josie to stay since they have spent their entire lives in Mystic Falls. Hope has said the school is her home and she's been there almost as long as the twins so it would make sense for her to stay. Landon has lived in Mystic Falls for a while (it seems like a million years ago, but he used to attend Mystic Falls High back on The Originals) and he loves Hope so he would stay too. Alaric seems to be grooming Kaleb to step into a leadership role so I would buy him staying. Now that MG is attending Mystic Falls High with Josie, it feels like they've having him put down additional roots in MF to have him stay as well. The only other person I could see them trying to keep around is Jed (if they're going to keep characters at school, it would be nice to have one werewolf). I don't know if they would bother to keep Wade and Cleo around (that's assuming they both survive until graduation).

[Chris24601]

I lean more towards Alaric getting his mojo back by the end of the season simply because the midlife crisis elements are coming mid-season-ish vs. the last episode or two (where resolving the crisis with a final blaze of glory might fit).

Ultimately though, I lean against death for Alaric because Legacies just isn’t the same type of show that The Originals or Vampire Diaries was. It just doesn’t kill off its leads or even supporting cast, even when writing them out.

Triad attacks and not a student is lost. If this were TVD or TO, Wade would have never survived Sebastian’s wake up feeding. Dorian would have died taking the arrow for Landon (particularly since it was his last appearance until turning up as MFHS’s new principal), Alyssa Chang and Raf would have died as they exited the series. The real Professor Vartimus wouldn’t have been found alive in a locker.

This show just doesn’t rely on shocking deaths of the main/supporting cast for drama the way it’s predecessor did (he says just hours before the episode with a Banshee drops) so even if they were writing Alaric out it is unlikely they’d do it via death... particularly when they’d need even wilder excuses than before for why Caroline isn’t turning up to check on her girls after their father has died.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

I do appreciate that Legacies doesn't rely on shocking twists and deaths (which were often only temporary on TVD/TO). That's a definite improvement from the other two shows. It got to the point on TVD where seeing a main character die meant nothing because ehh, they'll find a way to bring them back.