RECAP AND REVIEW – “THE VAMPIRE DIARIES” SEASON 3 EPISODE 9 – “HOMECOMING” – ORIGINAL AIR DATE 11/10/2011
Recap: After faking the death of Michael, Klaus returns to Mystic Falls with a horde of hybrids with him. Tyler does the bidding of his sire and ruins the high school’s homecoming dance and hosts a lavish party at his house. In the end, Klaus kills Michael with the white oak dagger and Stefan ends up taking off with Katherine.
Key Plot Points:
The Plot to Kill Klaus: Stefan calls Klaus and tells him that Michael is dead, making a crack about Michael not actually being his father. When Klaus asks what happened, the scene flashes back to Stefan, Damon, and Elena plotting how to convince Klaus to come. Michael appears and tells them that Klaus will want to see Michael’s body. Michael also reveals that he has a dagger made from the ancient white oak tree safely kept in a secret location. He gives Elena a dagger and she stakes him. When they call Klaus, Rebekah speaks with him and convinces him that it’s true. Rebekah tells everyone that he believed it and that he’s coming back.
As Rebekah is getting dressed for the dance, Elena enters the room. Rebekah talks about how it’s her first high school dance because she’s always been on the run. Elena thanks her for helping get Klaus to come back to town and presents her with her mother’s necklace. After Elena helps her put it on, she stakes her in the back. Elena apologizes to the unconscious Rebekah, saying that she can’t leave anything to chance. Damon covers Rebekah with a sheet and defends Elena’s actions with a somewhat backhanded compliment saying that it was “very Katherine”. Damon confides that he doesn’t have any trust in Michael or Stefan and that he has a plan, but doesn’t want Elena anywhere near when it goes down.
The Ruined Homecoming Dance/Tyler’s Party/Assassination Attempt: Tyler causes the school gym to flood, cancelling the dance. In return, he invites the student body to his house for a party. When the guests arrive, there’s a large stage with a band playing and everything ready to go. Caroline wonders out loud to Bonnie how he planned the party faster than her and they wonder who all of the people are, not recognizing many of the people there.
Klaus makes an appearance on the stage, telling the party-goers that they have much to celebrate that night. Matt and Elena arrive together since his date, Rebekah, was unable to make it that evening.
Stefan and Klaus talk about how Klaus can reunite the family now that Michael is gone. Stefan offers to take Klaus to Michael and Klaus insists on having Michael brought to him. Klaus promises Stefan that he will receive his freedom in return.
During a conversation between Tyler and Klaus, we learn that many of the guests are hybrids that Klaus brought with him as an insurance policy in case anyone tries to kill him.
When Stefan arrives home to retrieve Michael, Michael drinks from him and leaves him on the floor of the house. Damon and Michael head to the Lockwoods’.
Klaus and Elena have a conversation during the party and Klaus thanks her for Michael’s demise. She reminds him that it’s not the first time she’s killed an original. He threatens her to go ahead and try again, telling her that she won’t succeed.
When Damon arrives at the party to kill Klaus, he kills one of the hybrids standing watch for Klaus. Tyler spots Damon and they fight inside the house, stopped when Bonnie gives them “witchy migraines”. We find that Damon has Michael’s dagger to kill Klaus. One of the hybrids reports to Klaus that he has a visitor named Michael. Klaus orders everyone out back. Klaus and Michael talk at the door since Michael can’t enter the home while hybrids line up behind Michael. Michael berates Klaus and reminds him that the hybrids are part vampire and can be compelled by him. Michael threatens to kill Elena and continues to berate Klaus. Klaus calls his bluff and tells him to kill Elena because Michael would lose his leverage. Damon goes to stake Klaus and “Elena” tosses “grenades” filled with wolfsbane onto the hybrids. At this point, we learn that Katherine was posing as Elena. Stefan stops the struggle between Klaus and Damon and Klaus drives the dagger into Michael, who goes up in flames. Klaus tells Stefan that he’s earned his freedom and releases him from his compulsion.
Katherine’s Involvement: After the failed assassination of Klaus, Damon tells Elena of Katherine’s involvement. However, he doesn’t know how things went wrong. We learn from a flashback that when Klaus was talking to who we all thought was Elena at the party, it was Katherine. The flashback showed an extended conversation in which he swore that Damon would die if he was killed. This was enough to have Katherine thwart the plan to save Damon and free Stefan. We see her wake Stefan at his home after Michael left him there and she tells him about Klaus’s plan to have Damon killed if he’s killed.
When Stefan asks her why she risked letting Klaus live when she’d been running from him for 500 years, she said that it was to save both Damon and Stefan’s humanity. She confesses to loving both of them and laments that humanity is a vampire’s greatest weakness. She tells Stefan that if he doesn’t allow himself to feel anything, then he can’t do what needs to happen next…get mad.
Stefan’s Revenge on Klaus: The final scenes feature Stefan calling Klaus to thank him for his freedom and commenting that the price was too high since Klaus is still living. He then goes on to tell Klaus that “revenge never gets old”. When Klaus opens the storage container that houses the coffins with his family members inside, he finds it to be empty. The scene goes back to Stefan surrounded by coffins.
Relationships:
Rebekah/Michael: When Michael rouses from being daggered, Rebekah tells him to save the “fatherly rubbish”. She defends Klaus as her family and he tells her that Klaus killed Esther. Rebekah tells Michael that she blames him for making them into killers and destroying their family.
Caroline/Tyler: When Tyler learned of the hybrids and the potential for his friends to be slaughtered, he drugged Caroline and had Matt take her home from the party. When she woke up, Tyler was at her house. They argued about his bond with his sire. He told her that it was preferable to being bound to the moon like he was before. He begs her not to turn her back on him and she barely gets the words out, but Tyler realizes that she can’t get past it and he leaves.
Bonnie/Jeremy: Bonnie is visiting with Elena while Elena looks for something to wear to the homecoming dance. They talk about the Jeremy situation and Bonnie tells her that she can’t talk to Elena about it because of the brother/sister thing. This is the extent of the Bonnie/Jeremy love drama in this episode.
Review:
This was one of the better episodes for me because it featured Katherine, who I just love. I totally did not see the twist of Katherine posing as Elena. I’m still a bit confused as to whether the real Elena was ever at the party at all, though. I’m thinking that she wasn’t because Damon had mentioned that he didn’t want her anywhere around when his plan went down. It should be interesting to see what Stefan has in store for Klaus now that he’s apparently “mad” as Katherine urged.
