Along with happy family scenes (that also feature now-dead Aunt Jenna!), the episode includes the accident in which the family car veered off a bridge, killing Mr. and Mrs. Gilbert (played by James MacDonald and Erin Beute). Remember, says Plec, "Elena almost died with them but Stefan saved her."
"It's something I hopefully will never have to experience in real life — trying to survive underwater while trying to save other people," says Nina Dobrev, who got her scuba diving certification in Bora Bora before shooting these scenes 12 feet underwater in Atlanta. "It was quite intense and a little scary. I'm used to being underwater with a tank, but having to act without the tank is completely different. We were in the water two days for eight hours a day. By the end, I was exhausted and slept like a baby."
Source: TV Guide
The parents!! Great pics!!!
ReplyDeleteElena is soooo anoying this season...
ReplyDeleteToo little. Too late.
ReplyDeleteThis sort of stuff should have been shown all the way through first season. By now I doubt there's even a person in the audience who would care about Elena as it seems that the fanbase either barely tolerates her because of the ships the fanbase ships or OUTRIGHT despises her
(rightly so)
for her bland under-developed "flawless"personality of a classic mary sue and fake over-importance imposed by the writers.
I personally could not care less about her. She has been grating on my nerves for two seasons already and I am sorry, show writing staff, but you certainly failed at making me care for the supposed "lead heroine" and protagonist.
I'm sure there are some who hate her, but I hear of quite a lot who think she's pretty awesome. I love this show & everything about it!
ReplyDeleteShow writers, keep it up!
I'm super excited for this, actually. It's a great photo, and I'm looking forward to seeing Jenna again.
ReplyDeleteI think they are trying to bring Elena back to her humanity. She is so caught up in the vampire/witchy world and is so accepting of it that lots of horrible things have become commonplace and we all accept them. Except there aren't any more family members to kill, we've come to forgive killers because they have chemistry with Caroline, and nobody even pretends to go be in high school anymore, etc. They have to bring it all back a step, and taking Elena back to her roots and bringing in Matt more to reset the balance of crazy and normal.
ReplyDeleteThe question however are show writers capable of DOING that?
ReplyDeleteThis whole season was supposed to be all about "dialing back" from magic overuse and plot twists that make no sense, yet we got even more of that and in terms of quality this season was indeed worse than the second, because as atrociously horrible sacrifice storyline and everything that is connected to Elena, was in S2, it at least had some sense of direction. This season? Not. So. Much.
Bassically we are seeing the thing that has been happening in last two seasons of Supernatural - show is running around without a clear purpose and writers have long lost the sight of what they wanted their characters to be. As result you have these plotlines that rely on the entire cast being as stupid and illogical as possible.
Now usually such situation can be remedied by interesting main protagonist. Heck, SN still has considerable fanbase because the main protagonists are not really personality-less(although by my standards they are outright unlikeable, but thats entirely another discussion).
TVD does not have that. The whole trio of TVD main leads are one trick ponies. There are only that many tears Damon can shed while being "misunderstood" before it gets stale. There are only that many brooding frowns and cries Steffie can show, before the fanbase loses respect to both of them.
WIth Elena, however, all she has is "I care a lot"(and even that is but a statement, since show itself contradicts it, if one looks at it all logically). Elena is pretty much a missed opportunity. Because I got to admit, in her backstory alone, there was a lot of juicy potential for plotlines(seeing her deal with grief for example). Sadly writers outright ignored her, expecting us to believe that she is this perfect caring, emotionless messiah who is never wrong...
The only REALLY consistent character so far has been Caroline, who has had a sensible character development arc through entire show so far. Everyone else?....lets just say they act and think the way writers want for that moment.
So, CAN TVD do that? Take it back to relatable and make us care about Elena? So far the evidence is against the show.
Its something that should have been done a lot sooner. S1, start of S2...
Now after 65 episodes, one episode is supposed to bring balance, logic and good quality writing into the show? I really really doubt it...and to make us care about Elena is already impossible. There's only so long you can have your character be a blank page, trying to sell on just how FLAWLESS AND PERFECT that character is, before everyone and their mother start to outright ignore and despise that character...
What the writers did equals writing a book about a chracter, spending ALL the pages of the book talking about the lovely garden that character had and only having some sort oc character buildup on the title-character in the very last paragraph of the book...Sorry, it just does not work that way.
I'm with ya. Love everything about this show.
ReplyDeleteNot everybody thinks Elena is a nuisance. I like Elena. Yes, I'd like to see her with Damon, but I think she's better off without the Salvatores. And yes, sometimes I'd like to smack her in the face, but I still like her most of the time.
ReplyDeleteAs to her parents... I completely agree with you. I don't care one bit about them. The writers epicly failed to introduce most of the characters this season and I honestly don't see how they fit into the story.
What a lovely picture! I would love to know what's the context behind this story in the last episode.
ReplyDeleteI have to say that I absolutely do not agree with what you said.
ReplyDeleteAs those who commented on your post before me, I too don't think that nobody cares for her. Yes, she can be quite a pain in the a**, but just how boring would a show be that only has 100% perfect and flawless characters? At least that's my opinion.
I and probably quite some other members of the audience still do care about Elena ... what happens to her now and what happened before she met Stefan.
(Also, I think it's ok to voice your opinion, but you shouldn't talk for the whole fanbase. Each and every single on of them has their own opinion. And just because Elena can be quite a difficult person doesn't automatically have to mean that the whole fanbase of the show hates her.)
Before I start with what I want to say, let me ask you something: Why do you even keep watching TVD? From what you've written, it seems like, with the exception of Carolines character, you can't find anything about that show that you like. But is that really the case? Or isn't it that characters that are not flawless or characters that simply seem annoying (at times) are what makes a show realistic and likeable?
ReplyDeleteThere's some things I don't like about certain characters as well. But then again, what if all of that was gone? What if the characters were written in a way that'd seem "perfect" (whatever that might meen) to me? It'd be boring.
I for one absolutely hate Bonnie. I liked her in the first episodes, but everything they did with her ever since she got back from learning to deal with her powers just annoys me. But then again, all of the witches in the show are like that. They have their opinions and their ways of dealing with trouble and I don't like it, but I still prefer me complaining about it than the characters being all boring.
I personally like the storytelling because there are a lot of twists and turns. Again, it keeps it interesting. Also because it only proves that the characters in the show are only a bunch of young high school or soon-to-be college students that got thrown into this mysterious world they know nothing about. And there is so much they don't know about - or ever will know about. The secret they keep is full of questions. The live the vampires of the show are living - no matter how old they are - is an unknown path. There is so much to know, even for them. So, naturally, there are a lot of twists and turns and there is a lot going on. But does this mean there is no sense of direction? I don't think so. The only thing I would agree with is that the direction may not seem obvious to the audience. But, again, in my opinion, this keeps it interesting.
"The whole trio of TVD main leads are one trick ponies." ... I do not agree. Simple as that. And I'm pretty sure many others wouldn't as well.
Also, you mentioned Supernatural and how the main prtagonists are - by your standards - outright unlikeable. Yet, this show seems to have one of the most solid fanbases of all of these shows.
You said that you think Sam and Dean from Supernatural are not personality-less and that's why you think they have this solid fanbase. But if you asked me, the characters from TVD have personality too.
Seriously, if TVD was as bas a show as you just made it sound then they'd hardly have any fans left. Yet, they have a pretty solid fanbase, too.
I'm sure you'll find many people who will gladly start complaining about one or another character, or maybe even more, but I also think it's unfair to assume that - just because that's how you feel - all of the characters are unlikable and no one cares for them - especially Elena, since you seem to have pretty strong feelings against her - anymore.
But you see, you just exactly said the biggest mistake they did with elena.
ReplyDeleteShe is portrayed as utterly flawless, caring mary sue archetype. Everyone who ever meets her goes all "oh my gosh you are so caring and awesome and I agree with everything you do and say". no one challenges her. She does is not allowed to make mistakes and even if she does a mistake its whitewashed and everyone forgives her because she is so "awesome".
THATS WHY she is boring. She has no realistic flaws, nor personality.
You obviously care a lot, because you comment every time a TVD spoiler is released, why you don't like Elena, the show and why "noone cares". Fact is, people do care (proof: ratings, comments here). And you do too, otherwise you wouldn't read or post here.
ReplyDeleteAlso I don't think her character was ever meant to be flawless, because noone ever is.
Actually she/he didn't say that, varjotvirva wrote that it would be boring if all the characters were flawless.
ReplyDeleteWhy do I watch it? I wonder about that too. I guess I LOVED the first season and second season still had some great ideas and plots, especially in its first half till Masquerade, when show started to lose the plot.
ReplyDeleteAlso the show still has Caroline, who is awesome.
Otherwise, meh, I doubt I will return next season. The show has gone far too downhill to care and I am sticking till finale only out of respect for Brett Mathews who is co-writing the finale, because he created one of my favorite Firefly episodes, "Heart of Gold".
You assume I do not like ELena because she is not "flawless". Its the opposite actually. I STRONGLY dislike her because she is portrayed as this flawless messiah and I STRONGLY like Caroline because she has enough of realistic character flaws to make her relatable and well-written character. Elena is thoroughly unrealistic as personality and as teenager and thoroughly uninteresting as the lead.
You have Elena Gilbert whose ever action is excused and forgiven and who is treated as pretty much second coming of jesus christ(hence, the classic writing archetype of mary sue). And you have two brothers whose actions are ALSO constantly getting whitewashed and forgiven. None of their decisions matter, nor have consequences, nor dynamically alter their characters. They are as static as static can get.
Damon storylines always involve "angst for humanity", his feelings for elena, TEARS. him messing up and him being misunderstood. Now repeat that for 66 episodes.
Stefan storylines ALWAYS involve his metaphoric symbolism of "alcoholism", his caring gentle personality,his oh-my-gods-darkside(which we will never see) and his uber-epic-love for Elena. repeat for 66 episodes already.
Elena storylines always involve....her caring about stuff or being involved in love triangle. Thats it.
Twists and turns in storytelling are good and dandy AS LONG as they are executed correctly and sensibly and plot coherence is NOT sacrificed for the sake of cheap twist. Heroes tv show was pretty much eaten alive by that problem. And somewhere in second season, TVD started to fall into that hole too. Whats more, S3 plot twists are not only requiring to sacrifice character and plot integrity to work, but also have been utterly predictable and anti-climatic.
You know I WOULD love the show if it actually built up the premise you are imagining it has. Sadly we never see their REAL LIFE. we never get a feel they have one. Its all cheap plot twists, benny hill plot chases that end up where they began and love triangles now.
None of the cast except maybe Caroline, feel like teenagers, nor students, nor human, minor relatable. And that is A HUGE problem.
This season so far suffers from Writers not knowing where to go. We had wht,, 20 or so plot goals,with each ot hem getting abruptly ended and the show backtracking back to the start of the season again and again?
What was the point of "bad stefie"(which we never seen, nor whiche ver happened fully)? What was the point of coffin hunt? Gloria and necklace? Elena's death faking? Final coffin? Everything this season feels like writers throwing darts at the target, while blindfolded.
As for argument about majority of fanbase? Ask yourself this, does Twilight have the sizeable fanbase it does have because of its brilliance of plot? Quality? Or just because there are a lot of fangirls and the lead character is unimpressive and bland enough to work as "Self insert" . Its sad fact, but TVD has been surviving purely on fanservice this season.
And TVD fanbase has been going downhill. There's barely any debate left about anything that is not about cheap love triangles and who should be with whom. And the previous few episodes have had the series low ratings-wise and were universally condemned by critics. The show also is getting a LOT of deserved head about its misogynistic writing and blatant sexism.
Okay, let's leave Supernatural out of this.
ReplyDeleteTVD has a difficult road to follow, they have no procedural elements really, even Buffy had the bad guy of the week to fall back on instead of having to continuously create new drama around a couple of high school kids in a really boring town that they don't really leave and nothing interesting comes to except killers, but they have a lot of parties. They have two main tension points to hit: romantic and fear of death. So, yes, they play the Elena is in danger who will save her and who will Elena love now cards quite frequently. But saying the season has no direction is quite harsh, it is the season of the originals. Last year, it was about stopping Klaus, unfortunately he was too good a character to kill to he stayed and bought his whole family with him, it upped the ante from last season, it's given us great antagonists and a little spark, it put Damon and Stefan in their places. It's developed the brotherly relationship, and it isn't done yet. I think the show keeps getting better.
And yes, Elena is supposed to be "good"/pure/whatever. And that is really hard to make interesting. She is "human," she is weak, she is frail. She can't do what she wants to do without putting the people around her who are stronger in danger. But if you don't like her or the supporting cast, then the show isn't for you. She's never been strong. She's never made good decisions. She's never going to apologize for doing what she thought was right even if it blew up in her face. Characters can only grow so far. You say that Caroline is the only consistent one. Caroline started out the goody-two-shoes obnoxious brat. They did a complete turnaround on her character when she turned into a vampire. I can accept that because it was a major transformation--and she rocks now. But if Elena did the same kinda turn it would upset everyone who liked Elena from the beginning. We are too far into a show to alter the personality of the main character. Eventually we expect Stefan to be brooding and tortured and sanctimonious again. They aren't one trick ponies, they are consistent characterizations applied to new situations. Damon's gonna want too much, not know how to go about getting it, and get blamed for something he may or may not have done, and act out at the injustice or guilt. That's who he is. If he suddenly did something different, he wouldn't be Damon. In the end we need our good guys and the main characters we fell in love with.
So...no freaking mention about Jeremy? Seriously? Has nobody considered him? First look of 'Elena's parents'. Uh hello, they are also Jeremy's parents. Actually, they are his biological parents. I don't deny that they are Elena's parents too because they completely are, but when people disregard the 'other child' in this situation, then that makes me a little angry.
ReplyDeleteWell, I wouldn't say that EVERYBODY hates Elena, because I know a bunch of people that like her. I, for one, don't. She's my least favourite character but at least up until the end of last season (in fact, the last time I liked her was when she admitted she didn't want to become a vampire), I tolerated her and actually kind of liked her. This season? Not so much. But I think people that still like Elena are mostly Delena fanshippers. Again, MOSTLY Delena fanshippers. Not all, but most. She keeps being retconned. The tenth episode of this season was the first time since last season that I saw her caring about Jeremy. She's portrayed as this angel, or 'saviour of the damned' but in reality, she actually isn't that great. I mean, she tries to do all this stuff (often with horrific results) and sure, she does the best she can, but has she really cared about anyone other than the Salvatores? I mean, there's Elijah but that's because SHE felt guilty. Not because she actually wanted to save him. And there's Bonnie sometimes (I haven't seen her care about Caroline yet). But that's it.
ReplyDeleteSo although Elena does try to help with the difficult situations, she needs to learn that she's just human and can't do much against vampires. The writers also need to address that she's not perfect and sometimes she can be a self absorbed bitch.
But again, this season has been all about lack of continuity (Klaus is the perfect example. He goes from villain to weepy thirteen year old, pony-drawing boy every two episodes) so I don't expect any less for this season. I can't believe I'm wishing for a Katherine/Jeremy/Elijah/Caroline/Tyler/maybe Kol spinoff.
Show does not need to be procedural constantly to work. Once Upon A Time and Revenge, for example, mix the serial elements with procedural elements that become recurring serial elements.
ReplyDeleteTVD does not really try. There's so much plot possibilities in their HUMAN LIVES alone. How all those supernatural things affect their daily lives, what are their personalities and how their decisions and actions self-reflect on their character. TVD skims through all of that. Heck, Steffie possibly being BAD had at least half a season potential if the show explored HOW it affects everyone. Katherine alone, who was put on the bus since Masquerade, had possibilities to be a season-long villai and a great way to build Elena's personality and character as someone who targets Elena's personal life. TVD skimmed over that.
You do not need to be superpowered badass to be useful and properly characterized. Cordelia from Angel the Series had no powers whatsoever(pretty much 85% of main cast had no powers or supernatural stuff). Yet she had a character build up and WAS memorable. Same with the Buffy example. BTVS did not rely on Buffy having powers. It established and expanded her human side. Out of recent examples you have Game of Thrones and the fact characters like Sansa, Arya, Daenerys, who are but a normal frail humans, get enough character development to BE their own characters.
Writers just do not even bother with Elena, while there's a HUGE potential in her human backstory and life alone. Show had many chances to show how her life is affected by EVERYTHING that happens, to build up her character. yet it ignored Elena to such an extent, that she came off pretty much sociopathic in S2 and S3.
And let me say I completely and utterly disagree with your interpretation of Caroline. What happened was a natural progression of her character archetype. It was her gaining confidence, letting the walls down. It was a natural progress of who she is. She gradually changed into what she became through entirety of first season. Turning sped it up but it was not the cause. She had a starting point, a character development goal, self-conflict, etc.
With Damon, i'd say the problem is that writers have already lost the sightof who he is. S1 damon had sensible progression of character. S2 Damon and S3 Damon pretty much has only two patterns to go through. A work of fiction is about character journey and change. None of three mains do that,. A best example of sensible character growth would be Buffy the vampire Slayer, you referenced before - EVERY character grew, while remaining who they are. Buffy especially. Her morals, worldview, emotions changed throught he show as she matured, but the character baseline of who she is was retained and even expanded and explored further. TVD so far just ignored character growth and even concept of it is sadly unknown to TVD.
TVD is the show that had a huge potential. Sadly it has now been irreversibly damaged beyond repair by the writing staff unable to realize it..
First, to clarify. I didn't say TVD needed procedural elements, I said procedurals were easier to write.
ReplyDeleteSecond, Cordelia had a massive character switch between Buffy and Angel. That wasn't growth that was just change. There is a fine line between growth and changing a character. I'm not saying that characters can't or shouldn't grow, they should, but it has to be organic from plot elements or time passing (the Scooby Gang grew up, fine. Willow woke up one day and decided to be a lesbian, hard to swallow, because we all loved Oz and it was an out-of-left-field change). But in the end everybody was still basically the same group: they talked the same, they acted the same, they made similar decisions. Damon and Stefan have been alive for a long time. They are who they are. Grownups just don't change that much.
Third, I'm sorry the writers didn't write the plots you wanted them to. I'm pretty happy exploring the originals, because I'm not interested in Elena whining more than she already does. Plus, there isn't anything really new to explore with that. People died, she's sad. Got it. Stefan is bad? Elena missed her boyfriend, was slightly appalled that he killed people, but was totally ready to forgive him and try to save him. There's just not that much there that doesn't involve brooding or rehashing what we've already seen but in more depth.
Fourth, Buffy most certainly relied on her having supernatural powers. She was the Slayer. Without her being the Slayer, no show. If she was weak, if she had to be constantly saved by Giles or Angel or Xander, it would have been a completely different. And her running things would have been much harder to write as well as watch. GOT is mainly about humans fighting each other so they don't need superpowers they need armies or to learn to be assassins like Arya. Sansa is a whiny brat. She is weak and unwatchable/readable and isn't a lead, she is a pawn who gets good people killed. Daerenys has dragons (and will have armies)--she isn't entirely weak, but her wishy-washy convictions that go wrong is hard to watch, now that she is in charge of something. The same way Elena's plans and wishes blowing up in people's faces is hard to watch. I want the good guys to win, and for that to happen I'd prefer if the good guys weren't silly. But Elena has always been silly. They want to call it her humanity or her compassion. But really it is that she doesn't look past the next move to understand consequences. But she's the lead. She makes the decisions. And it is hard to have a weak character who's only card to play is her death be in an alpha role. They have a hard line to walk. But if tomorrow she woke up and turned all rational, and easy going, willing to make sacrifices to stick to a plan, she wouldn't be Elena.
I agree with the majority of the statements here Elena needs to go let Kathrine have her already, if she foils one more plan with her not so brilliant ideas, then cries when things go wrong (cause she messed them up) i am going to throw up!
ReplyDeleteAgreed !!!!
ReplyDelete