‘Vampire Diaries’ Recap: Damon Takes Out The One Person He Loves Most

After the way Damon took out everyone last week, it wasn’t surprising (even for him) that he was chained up within the first two minutes of this week. Oh yeah, and it wasn’t exactly just a week.

First things first: The Vampire Diaries started with Damon (Ian Somerhalder) realizing he took out everyone and trying to fix it — before being informed that he wasn’t actually out for a weekend — but actually for multiple weeks, and during that time, Mystic Falls took a turn for the worst, yet again. Thanks a bunch, Julian.

Right away, Tyler (Michael Trevino) returned to Mystic Falls for Caroline’s baby shower (because that’s not weird at all), and Stefan (Paul Wesley), attempted to fill him and Damon in on what he had missed. Damon convinced him to unchain him even though he definitely was not okay and still hallucinating (a “hell world hangover”). That was proven when he killed an innocent heretic in the process. But he wasn’t the only one hallucinating. Stefan had been trying to move forward from his hell too, but revealed to him that Damon was haunting him non-stop, so much that he almost burned Damon’s body to stop it. Luckily, Caroline stopped him.

After Stefan’s confession, Damon ran away and enlisted Tyler’s help, and begged him to let him see Elena (Nina Dobrev). When Tyler does, he opens the casket to find Henry (Evan Gamble) instead. With that, Tyler started shooting at him but of course, Damon won. He couldn’t stop arguing with Henry, so he burnt him. But it wasn’t him — he burnt Elena’s body. (Side note: does this officially put the nail in the coffin for the chance of Nina Dobrev to return?)

So, why was the stone still haunting Stefan? Well, apparently what woke him up from his virtual hell, was a vision of he and Damon drowning; he let Damon go to survive. It was the only way to find his “true self,” to let Damon go. So, it continued to haunt Stefan. Until he finally told Damon. Damon wasn’t surprised — he said that Stefan is better off without Damon, because he’s too dark. But let’s be honest — Stefan’s the good guy, and he wasn’t about to give up on his brother anytime soon. And Damon’s the bad guy, and he wasn’t about to tell Stefan about Elena’s body.

A Vampire Baby Shower

For some reason, Matt (Zach Roerig) and Bonnie (Kat Graham) — you know the two non-vampires who could actually die, are set on border control because that’s safe; so they’re informed to take out any heretic that tries to come through. Also, Matonnie — my ship name for them — are also both involved in the same dating app and were matched. (Sidebar: Bonnie’s handle is “Mystic Queen,” and Matt has his gun in his photo.) We actually learned a lot about Matt this week — he can’t text and drive, and he can’t put a diaper on a baby. During the shower, Tyler, Matt and Alaric play a who-can-diaper-the-baby fastest game, and well, it’s good that Alaric is the father. Matt actually popped the head off the doll.

Following the shower, Matt was reading a text while driving (take note kids) and got pulled over. Even though he was a cop, he still was questioned about being “drunk” and got put behind bars. The police found his bag of vampire weapons, so well, there’s that. Caroline had an issue of her own following the shower — she found out that Alaric planned on leaving town to get away from the vampires. Obviously, that sucked for Caroline to hear.

At the end of the episode, we saw a new three years later flash forward, featuring Matt, who saved Caroline under “her” orders, to get closer to Stefan — we can assume she is the cop that found his weapons. “Your problems don’t mean anything to me anymore. Now go, get out of sight and stay out of sight until huntress gets what she wants.”

So, do you think Elena is gone for good now?