S01.E16: There's Always A Loophole

[paulvdb]

Quote

When a group of unwelcome visitors descends upon The Salvatore School, Hope leads the charge to keep her friends safe. Meanwhile, MG uncovers a secret about his mother and Josie finds herself in a dire situation.

Season finale. Airdate: March 28, 2019.

[ketose]

That made no sense.

Apparently, everyone's memory is wiped / changed when someone enters Malivore (except for Hope). But all the written records remain? How about electronic records / social media? Time doesn't change.

How did Alaric know "Landon" had the school cell phone?

Can't Siphons siphon from anti-magic spells? Kai did.

How did MG's mom tranquilize both a Gorgon and MG? You have to tranquilize a vampire with vervain.

An anti-magic spell wouldn't de-activate a daylight ring, it would kill a vampire from the original cause of death. For that matter, it would "cure" all the werewolves. I can let that one slide, however, because Triad used the spell and not the Travelers.

On the other hand, the hour went by pretty quickly and the story was okay until Hope sacrificed herself in a way which will be sure to lead to her return within 3 episodes. But Landon is alive and I'm cool with that.

[Lady Calypso]

Ok, show. Unless it takes at least an hour for people to forget about the person dragged into Malivore, no way can Alaric call maintenance, get Hope's room cleared out, AND get all her stuff burned that fast. Also, no surprise Landon rose from the dead very quickly.

Hope's sacrifice was noble. We all know it won't last very long and I only wonder who will remember Hope first, but it was a good sacrifice. Plus, it led to Clark's hilarious death. 

Landon's snark was fantastic. Ok, show. You got me fully invested in Landon now. His humour is on point. 

So, Josie almost dies, Josie/Lizzie make up, and they find Kai's Ascendant. Interesting turn of events there. I was convinced for a second that Hope's blood was going to turn her into a Heretic, but Hope's blood healing her makes sense.

MG took his turn as a leader, which was great. I also liked seeing his conversation with Kaleb. Both have come a long way since the pilot. Also, Gorgon Girl is surely coming back, which works for me. 

The finale was action packed and a lot was left up in the air. Alaric may not be Headmaster next season, but I wonder who would even take his place.

[UNOSEZ]

So.. Is Raf gonna be the whipping boy like Bonnie was on the mothership (TVD)  and Marcel was on the spinoff(Originals) 

[ursula]

2 hours ago, ketose said:

 Can't Siphons siphon from anti-magic spells? Kai did.

For the same reason why Hope's blood is the wolf-bite cure, when siphoners can neutralise a wolf bite. 

1 hour ago, Lady Calypso said:

they find Kai's Ascendant

Was that Kai? Ugh, so I guess Chris Wood is definitely coming back to the Plecverse. I really don't know what to think about that but my gut instinct is no. 

But I can't even be too mad at that because this episode was fricking awesome! Pedro! Headless Horseman! Landon cheering his Bad-Ass Bruiser Girlfriend! Pedro in combat! Kaleb and MG being awesome vamp-bros. Can I just say how awesome it was that an entire season of a Plecverse show and no black main characters died? I kept holding my breath throughout the entire episode for one of the boys to kick the bucket. When Kaleb said "point the gun at me" on the bus, I was certain this was it for him. Instead he got to be a hero over and over and over again. Also what awesome development for MG. He gets to be  part of a generational Legacy. Fine, an evil legacy, but still something huge and significant and he got to lead in this episode in a way that I don't remember Bonnie Bennett being allowed to in TVD. He even gets a beautiful, dark-skinned, powerful potential girlfriend at the end. 

Oh and lest I forget - Pedro!

I think Hope deciding to kill Landon's brother is going to bite her in the a$$. I'm speculating that if he hadn't fallen into the mud with her, she'd have killed Malivore definitely, but now Malivore is going to skin-jump into his son. He might "prefer" Landon's body but to survive, he will take Clark's.

I wonder now that Hope has been "erased", will people start "remembering" the Tribid as a legend/fairy story? The way they do for Headless, dragons, etc?

Edited March 29, 2019 by ursula

[RachelKM]

Bummer of a time for Hope to forget how to suspend the falling knife and prevent it from going into Malivore 5 minutes after she'd just done so.

But hey, it was going to find its way into the angry mud puddle eventually.  Might as well happen while Buffy...er.. Hope is right there throw herself in.  

Ah, ye old neck snap.  Welcome the TVDverse, Landon.  And.... Bye Clarke.  Ashes to Ashes, Mud to Mud. 

[ElectricBoogaloo]

I'm guessing that Julie Plec wanted me to feel all teary that Hope sacrificed herself, but this was a million times more moving when Buffy sacrificed herself in S5 or when she sacrificed Angel in S2.

Damn, I give Alaric credit for admitting to the entire school what he'd done. I just wish that instead of letting the honor council vote, he would have let all of the students at the school vote. I know that Kaleb, Josie, and Raf are supposed to represent their factions but this is a pretty big deal so it might be better to let all of the students have a voice, not just have four people decide the future leadership of their school (one of whom is related to Alaric and therefore might be slightly biased).

As soon as I saw that Jed had joined the Scooby gang, I was convinced he would be the one to die. I can count on one hand how many Asian characters we've seen in 13 combined seasons of TVD/TO and they all died pretty quickly, so I was kind of surprised that Jed managed to live through the entire season. I thought it was sweet that he finally said Landon is part of their pack because he is Raf's family though. Awwww!

So now poor Raf is going to be stuck as a werewolf until Hope magically becomes undead!

And Lizzie's wish finally came true - a world without Hope Mikaelson!

Edited March 29, 2019 by ElectricBoogaloo

[UNOSEZ]

Raf still being a wolf may be the key to saving Hope .. Or at least it makes sense that it  could.. His human mind is like locked away inside his wolf or its half and half or some other supernatural mumbo jumbo.. And when she jumped in the pit he howled as if really hurt.. Probably on account of his strong feelings for her...  While everyone else kinda just looked puzzled and kept it moving... Of course how he would explain to everyone who she is..and what happened in his current form is a challenge... And who knows if these executives and writers will go there...  I agree with the sentiments of @ursula and @ElectricBoogaloo that we saw better cases of representation  than we've ever seen before in the Plecverse.. But the trials and tribulations.. The nerfing of powers.. The half-assed storylines or the storylines that really were just in service of Elena or Klaus or Damon or Elijah etc.. The straight up Torture of characters Bonnie.. Marcel.. Keelin... Matter fact every witch apparently in the Bennett line as there was an ancestor with Esther.. And I feel like they're may have been one with Silas and the original dopplegangers... Bianca Lawson  Kelly Hu and Malese Jow as just ornaments in the K. Pierce saga.... Cade.. Basically being the devil.. The mute heretic.. The light skin dude Caroline liked who Elena killed.. Because of reasons... The mother of that mixed Salvatore girl.. Like half the witches from the first season of The originals.. The wolf girl from the last season of the originals... I could keep going... Hell even Tyler Lockwood never really got to shine and he was fully white on the show..  So safe to say I'll have to see this team do more before I believe they've changed

[AnimeMania]

1 minute ago, UNOSEZ said:

Raf still being a wolf may be the key to saving Hope .. Or at least it makes sense that it  could.. His human mind is like locked away inside his wolf or its half and half or some other supernatural mumbo jumbo.. And when she jumped in the pit he howled as if really hurt.. Probably on account of his strong feelings for her... 

Raf probably also heard Alaric say where Hope was, maybe he can go there in his wolf form to find her.

[Chris24601]

Gotta say,  it’s nice to see that they actually appear to have a plan for going into Season Two.

My hunch is that Raf will be an element of Hope’s life they forgot to remove and/or his being a wolf at the time let him keep memories of Hope.

Meanwhile I’m all but certain the twins finding Kai’s Ascendent in the finale also tells us where Hope has gone (with a snarky villain as her only companion no less) and how she’ll return.

I’m 99% sure Malivore will turn out to be just the portal to an extradimensional prison realm (the Gemini Coven had to learn the means of creating them from somewhere) and all Hope blew up was the portal itself. So now she and Clarke will find themselves stuck in said dimension along with a whole load of monsters the world has forgotten about and be forced to cooperate to survive until Raf and the twins realize there’s a Hope-shaped hole in the world and get her out (and I would be shocked if a number of monsters didn’t come with her).

We also have some potential for drama if, in coming back, people don’t automatically re-remember Hope. Say it’s only Raf who remembers and convinces the twins to get Hope out. Hope then tries to start again with Landon, but because the timing is different now, she fails to connect like they did before...

There’s your instant love triangle where Raf loves and remembers Hope, but Hope loves Landon and remembers their old relationship, but he doesn’t remember her and has since developed feelings for say, Lizzie because she and Josie helped Raf become human again.

There’s also the potential for a larger time jump than I’d expect too (say an entire year) and that could bring with it changed dynamics. Imagine if, due to the Hope-shaped hole, Hope came back to find that Landon is Alaric’s sidekick/favorite (not being able to die definitely makes it safer to take him into risky situations).

Then there’s our Gorgon girl and the potential for other monsters to find a place at the school now that Malivore is off the table (sidebar: the Triad guys on the school raid are the lucky ones... per Landon everyone at the Malivore facility is dead).

In short, there’s a lot of stuff set up here that could go a lot of directions for next season, but I’m pretty sure Act I will be Hope’s adventures in Malivore while everyone else realizes something’s wrong (ex. where did the werewolf bite curing blood they have come from? Surely not being able to remember where you get it from if it runs low would set off some type alarm bells that your memories have been messed with).

[Artsda]

That was a good season finale, left it on a note to see what will happen next season.

[ursula]

3 minutes ago, Chris24601 said:

the portal to an extradimensional prison realm (the Gemini Coven had to learn the means of creating them from somewhere)

That's already established. They were cheap knock-offs of the Other Side Purgatory that Questiyah/The Bennett Coven already made.

Spoiler

Same way the Phoneix Hell that was distilled from the Hunters's Magic (also created/invented by a Bennett witch) is another wannabe-purgatory.

That's also why the Prison Worlds need Bennett blood to travel through.

3 hours ago, UNOSEZ said:

I agree with the sentiments of @ursula and @ElectricBoogaloo that we saw better cases of representation  than we've ever seen before in the Plecverse.. But

[...]

safe to say I'll have to see this team do more before I believe they've changed

Hey I get you. I am the last person to retroactively forgive the subconscious or conscious (and frankly after being told a hundred times, it's hard to keep claiming it was the former) racist, misogynistic, and generally offensive writing that was TVD and most of TO.

I almost didn't touch Legacies for that very reason. Which is why I'm so impressed by what I'm seeing. 

And you know what you said about Raf being the whipping boy ---- this is where diverse, multi-faceted representation works. If Raf were the only black kid or black main character on this show, that storyline would be disturbing. But bad things happen to Raf... and Kaleb gets to be heroic and snarky... MG gets to be a leader with a cool back-story... Dorian gets to have his feelings respected - and as much as I disliked the whole faux-love-triangle arc, the storyline didn't make him look irrational or have him grovel back, but instead it put the burden of apology on Alaric, and reconciled them as friends. Every character got their personal hero moment - to quote MG, it was really a SuperFriends episode. 

The more I think about it... the more I wonder if this isn't a side-effect of the fact that - there are no White boys on this show. Alaric is the only white male main character, isn't he? Every other main character is either WF or MOC. The "pull focus on the white male" effect is almost non-existent. I mean Alaric does pull focus, but it's appropriate because he's the Headteacher and he's our continuity from the previous shows. But it's not inappropriately so. It's still unmistakably Hope's story. Plus her friends get independent story arcs that have nothing to do with propping or supporting her. 

[memememe76]

My favourite scene was the when the three women were holding hands. Yay, Girl Power! It was actually quite moving. 

I wonder if Alaric will really step down. Does that mean Caroline is coming to the show? Or maybe Jeremy or Bonnie? I don't want an Original. 

I have quite the fondness for this silly show. I look forward to next season. 

[tennisgurl]

I put off watching this for awhile, mainly because its looked rather cheesy and I am not super familiar with the TVD verse, but I am glad that I decided to give it a try. Yeah, it really is still pretty cheesy, but I think it found its stride in the second half of the season, and I have really grown to enjoy it and its characters a lot. I am actually really looking forward to seeing what happens next, a LOT of balls are in the air, and I am interested to see where they all land. 

Alaric being able to destroy all evidence of Hope existing is pretty ridiculous, but her sacrifice, and admitting that she has people at the school she cares about now, was very sweet and heroic and showed good character growth. I am really glad that Hope made peace with Josie and Lizzie, and her last few scenes with Landon were really good, and I did actually see some chemistry there. I know she will come back soon though, so its not super high key drama, more like a new plot for next season, which I am alright with. 

Speaking of growth, Kaleb has come such a long way from the jerky bad influence friend he was at the start of the season, to one of my favorite characters.. He is still the same guy, but a more mature, responsible, empathetic version of him, which is great to see. I was actually nervous he would die in a heroic sacrifice to save the younger kids on the bus, but he made it out to be awesome another day! Him putting his hand on MGs shoulder when Alaric mentioned his mom was a really nice touch. 

The Headless Horseman was not who I expected to show up, but it was pretty awesome, even if it did send me to some weird Sleepy Hallow holes I did NOT want to get sucked down again. "How can you even find me without your...seeing eye horse? Emotional support horse?" Landon had another good episode, his snark was on point (especially the Tim Burton cracks!) and I love how he was so excited to see Hope kicking ass. And Hope was so impressed when Landon snapped his evil brothers neck! Ah, young love.

MGs mom sucks. I mean, bold of her to announce how she and her people are totally the good guys as she stands there in front of a fountain of blood and skulls while her people point guns at children to steal their stuff! Poor MG, but at least he got a nice hero moment, and the Gorgon girl is still around, and is totally into him! I hope she comes back, I like her, and it would be fun seeing the school getting used to having more or more supernatural species around.

[Terrafamilia]

Hey, it's a dullahan. Bye, dullahan!

Am I the only one who is fine with Alaric having an anti-supernatural contingency plan?

Unanswered question for the season - who has been going around creating all these teenaged vampires? Not just creating vampires but vampires who are going to be teenagers, For. Ever.

[UNOSEZ]

10 minutes ago, Terrafamilia said:

Hey, it's a dullahan. Bye, dullahan!

Am I the only one who is fine with Alaric having an anti-supernatural contingency plan?

Unanswered question for the season - who has been going around creating all these teenaged vampires? Not just creating vampires but vampires who are going to be teenagers, For. Ever.

I really hope they explain what psycho sired them.. Now o get the kids may be from all over.. But still

[ketose]

6 hours ago, Terrafamilia said:

Hey, it's a dullahan. Bye, dullahan!

Am I the only one who is fine with Alaric having an anti-supernatural contingency plan?

Unanswered question for the season - who has been going around creating all these teenaged vampires? Not just creating vampires but vampires who are going to be teenagers, For. Ever.

Since they don't age, those teen vampires could be older than they look and sired at different times along the way. It also explains why Caroline isn't around, since she's supposed to be forever, ahem, 17.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

10 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

MGs mom sucks. I mean, bold of her to announce how she and her people are totally the good guys as she stands there in front of a fountain of blood and skulls while her people point guns at children to steal their stuff! 

Ha, hilariously accurate!

[Aeryn13]

Kaleb got great heroic scenes but why does a human dude with a gun on the bus pose a problem for him? He could easily vamp-speed over before that guy fired. The powers of the teenage vamps seem all over the place, sometimes they appear level with the vamps from the mother shows and sometimes way below. Is it the diet? In that case compulsion should be weak, too, and that, they are perfect at.  Werewolves are wonky, too. Only the witch students seem quite powerful.

Loopholes for loopholes upon loopholes is kind of funny. Nature must have patiently waited for witch-born vamp/wolf Hybrid Klaus to finally bang a wolf and procreate.

[AngelKitty]

I have to say that this show exceeded my expectations. I was leery that it would be too many teenagers and their angst but they've done a pretty good job mixing up all aspects of teen romance, sibling rivalry, and rebellion with the supernatural elements.

13 hours ago, Terrafamilia said:

Unanswered question for the season - who has been going around creating all these teenaged vampires? Not just creating vampires but vampires who are going to be teenagers, For. Ever.

This has been something I have wondered too because they do seem like teens, not hundred year old vampires in teen bodies. Really it only makes sense that the younger kids are witches.

This episode was a good season finale with a lot of action, twists, and turns. Characters grew as people, learned things, and forgot things.  Plus I like that nobody we know died.

[ursula]

3 hours ago, Aeryn13 said:

but why does a human dude with a gun on the bus pose a problem for him?

I think in this specific case he was worried about the children. He could vamp speed and grab the gun but not before he fired a shot and the bullet in this case wasn't something he could just block with his own body.

But you're right the the vamps in this show seem so weak compared to how superhuman they were in TVD. I remember newborn Caroline easily taking down Mason an older wolf, etc.

[ursula]

42 minutes ago, AngelKitty said:

Plus I like that nobody we know died.

Tell me about it. There were 4 black boys/men in the main/recurring cast and none of them died. I'm still reeling. 

[UNOSEZ]

21 minutes ago, ursula said:

Tell me about it. There were 4 black boys/men in the main/recurring cast and none of them died. I'm still reeling. 

And don't forget about the young (witch?)  I wanna say pedro

[ketose]

3 hours ago, Aeryn13 said:

Kaleb got great heroic scenes but why does a human dude with a gun on the bus pose a problem for him? He could easily vamp-speed over before that guy fired. The powers of the teenage vamps seem all over the place, sometimes they appear level with the vamps from the mother shows and sometimes way below. Is it the diet? In that case compulsion should be weak, too, and that, they are perfect at.  Werewolves are wonky, too. Only the witch students seem quite powerful.

Loopholes for loopholes upon loopholes is kind of funny. Nature must have patiently waited for witch-born vamp/wolf Hybrid Klaus to finally bang a wolf and procreate.

Even though vampires can't procreate, Klaus was apparently able to do it because his werewolf side was unbound. And, for some reason, only Klaus could only turn werewolves into hybrids, maybe because wolf blood would kill a vampire?

This all leads to the question of what is a tribrid? Klaus is a werewolf / vampire with a witch bloodline, but he's not a tribrid. It seems you have to have vampire blood, but not be dead. Even though Hope triggered her werewolf curse by killing someone, she can still do magic because she has vampire "DNA" but has not actually been killed yet.

This also relies on the assumption that werewolves can't do magic, because all the werewolves come from witch bloodlines. All werewolves came from 7 witches who were cursed by the Hollow. In fact, it seems like the only supernatural creatures who have access to magic are the Heretics, who are siphons who became vampires and essentially use the vampire magic within them to do magic. I guess they would be hybrids as well.

I just wanted to put all that out there instead of screaming it at my TV in bits and pieces.

[Diapason Untuned]

On 3/30/2019 at 7:05 AM, Aeryn13 said:

Loopholes for loopholes upon loopholes is kind of funny. Nature must have patiently waited for witch-born vamp/wolf Hybrid Klaus to finally bang a wolf and procreate.

Another poster pointed out that Hope is younger than Landon, so she may have been born as a counter to him being Malivore's host, so rather than waiting it's more like Nature made stuff happen...

On 3/29/2019 at 11:34 AM, ursula said:

And you know what you said about Raf being the whipping boy ---- this is where diverse, multi-faceted representation works. If Raf were the only black kid or black main character on this show, that storyline would be disturbing. But bad things happen to Raf... and Kaleb gets to be heroic and snarky... MG gets to be a leader with a cool back-story... Dorian gets to have his feelings respected - and as much as I disliked the whole faux-love-triangle arc, the storyline didn't make him look irrational or have him grovel back, but instead it put the burden of apology on Alaric, and reconciled them as friends. Every character got their personal hero moment - to quote MG, it was really a SuperFriends episode. 

The more I think about it... the more I wonder if this isn't a side-effect of the fact that - there are no White boys on this show. Alaric is the only white male main character, isn't he? Every other main character is either WF or MOC. The "pull focus on the white male" effect is almost non-existent. I mean Alaric does pull focus, but it's appropriate because he's the Headteacher and he's our continuity from the previous shows. But it's not inappropriately so. It's still unmistakably Hope's story. Plus her friends get independent story arcs that have nothing to do with propping or supporting her. 

Maybe next season we can even get great scenes with that Gorgon girl as well!

On 3/29/2019 at 6:53 PM, tennisgurl said:

Speaking of growth, Kaleb has come such a long way from the jerky bad influence friend he was at the start of the season, to one of my favorite characters.. He is still the same guy, but a more mature, responsible, empathetic version of him, which is great to see. I was actually nervous he would die in a heroic sacrifice to save the younger kids on the bus, but he made it out to be awesome another day! Him putting his hand on MGs shoulder when Alaric mentioned his mom was a really nice touch. 

Kaleb was definitely the biggest surprise of the season. They really did a great job with him, and moved him away from being a one-note character.

Edited April 2, 2019 by Diapason Untuned

[AsiagoSauce]

Great finale! I'm definitely more excited to watch Legacies than I ever was for TVD or TO. I hope MG's gorgon girlfriend gets more screen time next season. I'm a little bummed that the writers had to "import" a dark-skinned female character who is, of course, an antagonist. This show has plenty of MOC and I'm looking forward to seeing more WOC that aren't going to be "Bonnie-fied". The writers have shown that they can "flesh out" the male characters.

[Chris24601]

On 4/6/2019 at 6:55 PM, AsiagoSauce said:

Great finale! I'm definitely more excited to watch Legacies than I ever was for TVD or TO.

I think a big part of the greater appeal is that we’re dealing with actual protagonists and not villain protagonists.

All the kids are actually kids, not hundreds of years old with monstrous acts in their histories. They are struggling with control over themselves and the very first episode helped establish that the school is there to teach them how to not become monsters and that they don’t take in those who are already well down that road (hence the question about who Raf killed).

TVD started out with that premise; Elena, Bonnie, Caroline, Matt, etc. were kids, Stephan was the saint and Damon the devil. Then they went and really darkened up Stephan and tried to make Damon more sympathetic (and only tried because it’s really hard to sympathize with someone who’s answer to personal setbacks is indiscriminate murder).

The Originals didn’t even try, the leads were villain protagonists from the start and the premise was that Hope was a chance at redemption, but other than love for his daughter (and to a lesser extent the rest of his family), Klaus was a monster to the end and dragged a lot of people down with him.

Legacies isn’t taking that road. They’re acknowledging that the previous shows didn’t feature saints; Stephan is explicitly called out by Ric as the person who murdered his family. Klaus was a bad guy. The school takes a hard line on their student vamps even non-lethally feeding on humans.

Then, despite their screw-ups, the kids got to be genuine heroes in the end; Hope going so far as to sacrifice herself to “save the world.”

It’s always more fun to watch a show where the people you’re rooting for aren’t just the designated so-called heroes, but are genuinely good (or conflicted) people struggling to figure out and then do the right thing.

[AsiagoSauce]

As much as I liked the finale I kind of feel like they pulled the "sacrifice thyself to save the world" plot a little too soon. I mean, once you've saved the world, any future storylines may pale in comparison. Even Buffy did this close to the end of the series.

[Chris24601]

To be fair; Malivore wouldn’t be the end of the world.

He was an immediate threat to Landon (i.e. Malivore’s intended meatsuit) and to non-witch/wolf/vamp supernaturals (i.e. Malivore’s food source), but only proximate to the Salvitore School (Triad was trying to evolve the pit to eat Vamps, Wolves and Witches, but he couldn’t do it currently and arguably wouldn’t gain that ability if free of Triad’s experiments) and only indirectly to mundanes (i.e. those he planned to breed with to create a species... maybe they eventually supplant humans, but that would take many many generations).

My sense is Hope was primarily sacrificing herself for Landon’s sake and because she’s been thinking of herself as a cosmic mistake for so long that a situation that gave her existence a purpose and meaning was an easy one for her to latch on to.

Especially since throwing herself into Malivore wrapped everything up with a neat bow; none of her friends or family would have to grieve for her and she could go be with her mother in the afterlife and let her father be at peace.

Of course I’m almost certain Hope was dead wrong precisely because it was so clean and “easy.”

At most this is just her at the “Crossing the First Threshold” stage of the hero’s journey (i.e. the division between the normal world and the special world).

Heck, the finale setup is even complete with the threshold guardian (i.e. Malivore) and the helper figure past the threshold (i.e. Clarke).

If they keep to that formula, Hope will next find some type of Mentor figure in Malivore who will provide the information needed to prep her for a series of temptations and tests that she will fail because she didn’t heed or understand the mentor’s advice. This culminates with a huge revelation* at their lowest point and a metaphysical death and rebirth.

Armed with the new knowledge they undergo a new series of challenges (which they overcome now) that returns them to normal world armed with their new understanding that allows them to change the world in some way.

While you could potentially spread that across an entire season, my hunch is we’ll get one episode where we see the Hope-less world that ends with establishing Hope’s starting point wherever she ended up and then a second really Hope-centric episode that ends with her return, but also sets up whatever complications come with that (ex. a bunch of Malivore monsters escape, Malivore returns too in Clarke’s body, or returning doesn’t restore anyone’s memories of Hope; mix-and-match as appropriate).

Given the first season, I’d expect monsters to be released as a given (since MotW seems to be their default and Malivore setting them loose would no longer be an option), Malivore returns as likely and people still not remembering Hope to be temporary at best (i.e. good for an episode’s drama, but too much is undercut if they never remember and have to start all her relationships from scratch).

[AsiagoSauce]

Yeah, I'd give it about half of season 2's premiere before Hope magically/mysteriously ends up on school's doorstep. What would really be ballsy is if Hope only popped up halfway through the season after thoroughly exploring what a "Hope-less" world would be like.

As much as I like Hope's character, I feel like the writers are going to slowly turn her into a Mary Sue. An edgy Mary Sue, but a Sue nonetheless. For example, Buffy was a realistic superhero because she was still human and could still get hurt. Hope, on the other hand, is kinda overpowered. She has werewolf strength, reflexes, and healing that help with hand to hand combat and she also has witch abilities which should theoretically be the most powerful magic possible since she comes from the original bloodline. 

[ursula]

1 hour ago, AsiagoSauce said:

She has werewolf strength, reflexes, and healing that help with hand to hand combat and she also has witch abilities which should theoretically be the most powerful magic possible since she comes from the original bloodline. 

Esther was the Original Witch because she was literally the Original's Witch. She was their mother and she turned them into vampires. But technically she was imperfectly copying a spell that Questiyah had invented a millennium ago. And even after that she always drew her magic, parasitically, from other witch bloodlines - from the Bennetts then from the NOLA ancestors. There's nothing inherently powerful or skillful about being a Mikaelson witch besides being opportunistic and unusually comfortable doing dark magic.

IMO Hope is already a Mary Sue. The circumstances of her birth were already logically defying and it's only been worse since then. There are certain attributes of hers that make no sense - she's Klaus's daughter but they are technically a different species so there's no reason why her blood like his should be a cure to wolf venom. Especially when it's already established canon that the twins like their uncle Kai, can siphon wolf bites. If the Maligoo bullets were designed to destroy witches/vamps/wolves then Hope should be triply vulnerable to them, not immune. etc. 

[Chris24601]

6 hours ago, ursula said:

IMO Hope is already a Mary Sue. The circumstances of her birth were already logically defying and it's only been worse since then. There are certain attributes of hers that make no sense - she's Klaus's daughter but they are technically a different species so there's no reason why her blood like his should be a cure to wolf venom. Especially when it's already established canon that the twins like their uncle Kai, can siphon wolf bites. If the Maligoo bullets were designed to destroy witches/vamps/wolves then Hope should be triply vulnerable to them, not immune. etc. 

Except the show set up pretty well as early as Hope remembering events that everyone else forgot that she was the loophole Nature put in place to destroy Malivore. That's why she was also immune to the bullets and that immunity critical in the plot to her own realization that she was the loophole created to destroy Malivore.

Per the established rules NOTHING is immortal. There is always a loophole; always something that can kill them. Its been that way since the Originals first turned up in TVD. Their weakness was the White Oak Stake. Sylas had "The Cure." When Esther turned Alaric into an upgraded Original, she bound the magic to Elena's life.

The people that could have originally destroyed Malivore were all killed, but Malivore got reduced to a puddle so nature basically let it sit. But then Malivore created Landon as a means of returning and that's when nature said "NOPE!" and Hope, the combination of the three things needed to undo Malivore, was conceived and born shortly thereafter.

And to be fair on the blood healing thing; Hope's fast healing (which exceeds even a typical werewolf's) is actually because she's perpetually got vampire blood in her system (which goes all the way back to season one of the Originals when having Hope's blood in her system allowed Haley to heal quickly while pregnant and to transition into a hybrid after she got killed right after giving birth) and it was Klaus' mix of vampire blood while also being a werewolf that allowed his blood to be used as an antitoxin, just as it was also required to make a vampire/werewolf hybrid. Hope's blood has always had the hybrid creation ability, so it makes sense by extension that she'd also have the ability to cure normal werewolf bites with it.

One reason I expect that the school relies more on Hope's blood than siphoning is because Hope's blood can be stored and is easily transportable. What happens when a vamp gets bitten by a werewolf and Josie and Lizzie are on holiday with their mom in Europe or Asia? Hope doesn't even have to be in the school at the time for them to use her blood.

The other reason is that they established that there's at least some skill involved in selective siphoning. Caroline almost died carrying the twins because they were siphoning her vampirism to the point of draining it completely. In other words, it takes skill to siphon off just the werewolf toxin and not the vampirism and Josie and Lizzie are 15-ish, not 150-ish like the Heretics were.

Finally, the primary reasons Hope doesn't qualify as a Mary Sue is because A) she's not a fan insert character (which is the number one requirement) and B) all her actual abilities, relationships, etc. were developed over the course of The Originals while the audience watched. You can say she's overpowered, but that's not the same as a Mary Sue.

Also, so what if she is overpowered? Marcel gets to be a super Original+ vampire and no one bats an eye. Same with Klaus becoming a hybrid. Crossing the streams a bit, but Luke Skywalker in the old novels was basically a Force God who pulls Star Destroyers out the sky and no one complained... Rey uses standard level Jedi abilities without much training (the novelization claims she basically downloaded the skills from Kylo during their mind meld) and she's too OP.

Also, overpowered is relative. Is she overpowered compared to vampires, werewolves and witches? Sure. Is she overpowered compared to dragons? mummies? spider-demon thingies? headless horsemen? Malivore? Not so much.

How about whatever new monsters she finds in Malivore's belly or escape when she does?

Edited April 9, 2019 by Chris24601

[UNOSEZ]

2 hours ago, Chris24601 said:

Also, so what if she is overpowered? Marcel gets to be a super Original+ vampire and no one bats an eye. Same with Klaus becoming a hybrid. Crossing the streams a bit, but Luke Skywalker in the old novels was basically a Force God who pulls Star Destroyers out the sky and no one complained...

Also, overpowered is relative. Is she overpowered compared to vampires, werewolves and witches? Sure. Is she overpowered compared to dragons? mummies? spider-demon thingies? headless horsemen? Malivore? Not so much.

How about whatever new monsters she finds in Malivore's belly or escape when she does?

I agree on the "Mary sue" situation male characters who possess almost too many powers with little weaknesses don't even rate a name.. Yet its thrown out for all sorts of powerful female characters... That said I wouldn't use Marcel in this explanation the show went out of its way again and again to sideline him although not only was he physically sired by Klaus ( who then raised him)  but then he got turned into whatever it is that he became.. And though he was able to make all the originals go away he constantly got knocked out or had his neck snapped during big moments

[ursula]

2 hours ago, Chris24601 said:

Except the show set up pretty well as early as Hope remembering events that everyone else forgot that she was the loophole Nature put in place to destroy Malivore. That's why she was also immune to the bullets and that immunity critical in the plot to her own realization that she was the loophole created to destroy Malivore.

All this happened an entire series after Hope was introduced into the narrative canon of the TVDverse. Plec et al retroactively justifying Hope's existence isn't setting her up. It's retconning. 

Hope is a self-insert in the sense that she's a character whose existence was inserted into the TVDverse in defiance of all its established rules. Badly, as a matter of fact. Which is why Plec needed an entire new show to justify her existence. It also doesn't explain why she's super-powered in everything. She's the bestest witch from the most powerful Witch Family. (Another retcon.) And most magical Wolf Family. (Another Mary Sue-like upgrade. The Crescent Wolves couldn't just be a random wolf pack. No, they had to be the Wolf Pack of the Creator of Wolves). She's like a video game character whom the narrative keeps giving power upgrades. All this, is before she becomes a Full/Enhanced/Super Tribid and becomes the first non-siphoner witch to become a vampire and keep her magic. 

2 hours ago, Chris24601 said:

Hope's blood has always had the hybrid creation ability, so it makes sense by extension that she'd also have the ability to cure normal werewolf bites with it.

Actually Hope's hybrid creation is different from Klaus's. Unlike Klaus, she didn't need the doppelganger blood element (another super-power by the way) so it's clear that her blood isn't identical to Klaus's. She's also not a hybrid. She's a tribid. Which makes her something else. There's no narrative reason why she should be able to cure wolf venom except to give her more super-powers than she already has.

It won't have made any difference if this ability (cure wolf venom bites) was introduced in The Originals but it actually wasn't. So this claim is false.

2 hours ago, Chris24601 said:

Hope doesn't even have to be in the school at the time for them to use her blood.

First of all, Hope's blood wasn't in storage. In the episode in question, her proximity to the victim was necessary to cure said victim. Which makes the whole Watsonian advantage argument a moot point.

Secondly, making wolf bites hard to cure ---- is a good thing, Doylistically. It makes it a grievous event with narrative weight. 

2 hours ago, Chris24601 said:

In other words, it takes skill to siphon off just the werewolf toxin and not the vampirism and Josie and Lizzie are 15-ish, not 150-ish like the Heretics were.

Kai Parker, the first siphon to do this basically did it because he realized he could. It didn't take any special training. So again, this is an invalid argument.

Which again - Mary Sueism. We take a narratively established super-power for one character/creature type ---- and turn it into a super-power that was not narratively established for another character.

2 hours ago, Chris24601 said:

Marcel gets to be a super Original+ vampire and no one bats an eye. Same with Klaus becoming a hybrid. Crossing the streams a bit, but Luke Skywalker in the old novels was basically a Force God who pulls Star Destroyers out the sky and no one complained...

Klaus was introduced as a villain. A super-powered villain makes sense for the narrative. There's a reason why the moment the show decided to make him an anti-hero and give him his own series, he gets powered down narratively. Marcel's Original+ status lasts as long as he is an antagonist to the Mikaelsons... then he also gets "powered down" when he returns to the fold. Luke, who is a hero/protagonist, didn't have those Force Godlike abilities in the movies for a reason - we won't have needed 3 movies to start with. (Rey/TLJ is harming your own argument, by the way).

Which is all the reasons why Hope having All the Powers and All The Importance weakens her as a hero protagonist. Heck, it weakens her as an interesting character. If you want to compare hero protagonists, look at the make-up of the original Scooby Team: Buffy had Willow and Xander. Willow was a powerful witch. Xander was mostly... the Load. lol. But he had his moments. Harry Potter had Ron and Hermione. Harry was a powerful wizard but he wasn't book-smart or as technically skilled as Hermione, and he didn't have the advantages of Ron being raised as a wizard in a wizard family from birth. Luke Skywalker needed Han to give him an opening to blow up the Death Star, and he needed Leia to save him in ESB, and he needed the entire Rebellion to blow up Death Star II.

The show is making the fanfiction-like mistake of over-powering their protagonist and making her conflicts have no narrative weight because there are no stakes. 

Edited April 9, 2019 by ursula

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Since some of the more recent discussion in this thread isn’t specific to the season finale, I created some new threads:

Unspoilered Speculation

Spoilers & Speculation

All Episodes Discussion

[beeemkcl]

* Buffy did make a sacrificial dive until the season finale of BtVS S5. The TVD’verse copies the Buffyverse a little too much.

* I disagree with not killing the ‘worse’ bad guy unless that guy remains stone forever.

* The ‘magic nullifying’ makes sense if MG’s mother could specify how the ‘magic nullifying’ would affect the students. She wouldn’t want the vampires actually dead and she wouldn’t want to kill any of MG’s friends. In any case, Alaric wouldn’t want such things either if such ‘magic nullifying’ couldn’t be changed after Alaric’s initial ‘instructions’.

* Hope didn’t mention her family not knowing about her. I assume she assumes the Mikaelsons would bring her back. She simply assumes the Salvatore School people aren’t powerful enough—or she doesn’t want to unnecessarily risk them—to bring her back. The Mikaelsons very likely have evidence of Hope.

* The Salvatore School was/is still funded by the Mikaelsons. Alaric will wonder why Klaus gave so much money to the school.

RESPONSES TO THE THREAD:

* Hope’s sacrifice is more noble and ‘moving’ than Buffy’s ‘sacrificing’ Angel in “Becoming Part II” (B 2.22) simply because Buffy’s choice was simply (1) Angel alone, (2) Angel and Buffy, or (3) Angel and however much of the rest of the world.

* Stefan Salvatore was sired at 17 years old and he got along just fine. Caroline Forbes not being in the series more is likely simply due to budget constraints and/or time constraints for the actor.

* Caroline Forbes was sired by either Damon Salvatore or Katerina Petrova/Katherine Pierce. I forget. It was also implied that Caroline was a possible Ripper (back when that meant Stefan was more powerful than Damon when Stefan simply drank human blood).

Bloodlines and such matter. It’s greatly implied that Haley Marshall was so powerful because she was sired by Hope Mikaelson’s blood. Haley was essentially Klaus Junior.

* If anything, Hope Mikaelson is relatively not powerful in Legacies.

* Legacies isn’t as good at TVD S1-S2 (maybe even S3) and isn’t as good as TO. It’s enjoyable to watch but it seems very odd that there aren’t more protections for Hope Mikaelson. She essentially funds the entire school and yet she’s constantly in danger.

* It’s “Stefan” not “Stephan”. Ever since Buffy learns Angel is a vampire, she and the rest of the Scoobies are compromised. Legacies features Alaric Saltzman, who was heavily compromised in TVD. Caroline Forbes is a murderer and she’s beloved by essentially the entire school. The Salvatore School is named after the evil Salvatore brothers (Stefan specifically) and its mainly funded by the very evil Mikaelson family.

So, no, the school isn’t full of ‘good people’. It’s full of a much lesser version of the Scooby Gang of BtVS.

* Power doesn’t make a character a Mary Sue. Hope in this season finale doesn’t even tell Langdon that his best buddy might be in wolf-form forever now. Hope doesn’t even leave Langdon with Freya’s phone number and instructions.

Edited April 16, 2019 by beeemkcl

[ketose]

I don't know that Hope was assuming that her family could bring her back. Freya may be powerful, (and off Roswell) but she's not as powerful as old magic.

Alaric might think that Klaus donated because of Caroline.

Caroline was sired by Catherine. She was the original sacrifice for the moonstone ceremony until Jenna was used instead.

There was some implication in the djinn episode that when the school is relatively full, it doesn't need that much financial support.

So far, the Julie Plec-verse has had great first seasons with subsequent seasons declining in quality. I think Legacies had a slow start and a strong finish.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

18 hours ago, beeemkcl said:

Hope’s sacrifice is more noble and ‘moving’ than Buffy’s ‘sacrificing’ Angel in “Becoming Part II” (B 2.22) simply because Buffy’s choice was simply (1) Angel alone, (2) Angel and Buffy, or (3) Angel and however much of the rest of the world.

I don't want to get into an involved Hope vs. Buffy/Legacies vs. BtVS debate, but for me, Hope's sacrifice was not moving at all. I cried when Buffy killed Angel. I still do every time I see that episode again. Hope's "sacrifice" did not move me in the slightest. Hell, Buffy dying in S1 moved me more than Hope did (and Hope had way more episodes for us to get to know her and care about her).

Obviously this is a YMMV situation, but Hope splatting into the mud pit did absolutely nothing for me (which is even weirder because I cry at tv deaths all the time, even guest star patients on Grey's Anatomy who appear in only one episode).

18 hours ago, beeemkcl said:

Hope in this season finale doesn’t even tell Langdon that his best buddy might be in wolf-form forever now. Hope doesn’t even leave Langdon with Freya’s phone number and instructions.

It's Landon, not Langdon 🙂

[emcmac87]

On 4/17/2019 at 12:27 AM, ketose said:

Caroline was sired by Catherine. She was the original sacrifice for the moonstone ceremony until Jenna was used instead.

Way late on this but Caroline was actually sired by Damon. She was in the car accident and in the hospital and they weren’t sure if she would make it. Bonnie felt guilty, because her lie about not deactivating the Gilbert device indirectly caused the accident. Damon offered his blood, Elena said no, but Bonnie told him to do it, so he did. Then Katherine smothered her with a pillow, killing her. 

So Damon sired her, but Katherine killed her. 

[Happywatcher]

Why are the bad guys always smarter in this?