Candice Accola On Rest Of Season 3

First thing's first -- Tyler's coming home in this week's episode! "He's been working on trying to break the sire bond that he has with Klaus, so when he comes back to town we're going to see if he was successful or if he was not, and it's going to be put to the test," Candice teases. "We're going to hear about his experiences that he's had, and we're going to hear about his trip." 

Though the sire bond is still an important plot point leading up to the finale, Tyler's main concern will be the fact that he is a part of Klaus' vampire bloodline, and if Stefan and Damon kill Klaus, they're killing Tyler, too. Spoiler alert: Tyler's life isn't really a priority for the Salvatore brothers. "If they find out that someone else created their line, do they really care about who Klaus has created?" Candice says.

Before any murdering starts, though, Candice promises there's going to be a little romance. "Caroline and Tyler fans, I think, will be very happy with this reunion... for a little while."

Tyler attends his first Mystic Falls High dance in the April 26 episode. Though Caroline planned a '70s dance, the natural follow up to Season 2's '60s dance, Rebekah stomps her foot and demands a return to her roaring '20s heyday. "I just have a blast working with Claire Holt," says Candice. "I think she's an incredible addition to our family." 

She's not easy competition for Caroline when it comes to her Queen Bee status. "She's way cooler, because she has an accent. Who am I kidding? I can't compete," Candice laughs. "I love their banter, I love the ping-pong that they have in both these characters' dialogue." 

Of course, Caroline's time at the dance is further complicated when Klaus shows up, making big promises and grand plans for the future he sees them having together. It's an overwhelming prospect for the girl who realized her greatest dream by becoming Miss Mystic Falls. 

"She likes to be very safe," Candice says. "She's safe within her bubble in Mystic Falls, and she could never dream of going anywhere else, but the viewers have seen her grow into such a strong character. Then you bring in Klaus, who has lived out every dream and every fantasy and has been around for such a long time, and who still, at the core, wants the same thing that Caroline wants -- just to be loved." We may finally see Caroline falter in her quest to resist Klaus' charms.

Given the amount of emotional trauma that Caroline has endured this season -- and the amount of trauma that's to come (let's just say that the writers are not done torturing our girl) -- we're almost expecting her to have a complete breakdown before the end of the season. Still, Candice tells us that Caroline remains collected in the fact of unimaginable pain.

"This is a way that I also connect with her very much as a character, is that she's a fix-it person," she says. "She will avoid as much emotional confrontation as she can by just fixing it, or throwing a party. That is something that I do. Any sort of thing, I just try to say 'Oh, we'll just have a dinner, and everything will be okay! If I buy a new pillow, it'll make it all good! Yeah, everything's perfect!'" 

For the record, if you're planning to stockpile tissues for the season finale, you'll want to speed up your plans, because like last season, we can expect some eventful (read: tragic) episodes before the finale. Candice tells us that the last episode will be a treat for fans who have been invested for day one. "I will say that viewers should look forward to the fact that it's brought back to the beginning," she says. "This was a very crazy season... but what I love, what the writers did with the finale, is that they kind of calmed it all down and brought it back to what the show began as in Season 1. I think that's going to be a theme going into Season 4 as well." 

 

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