The Originals - 3x03 "I'll See You In Hell Or New Orleans" Official Synopsis

FLASHBACKS TO THE FIRST VAMPIRE EVER SIRED — With tension running as high as ever, Klaus (Joseph Morgan) and Elijah (Daniel Gillies) are forced to come together in order to uncover Lucien’s (guest star Andrew Lees) true motives in New Orleans. Cami (Leah Pipes) is caught off guard when she finds herself face to face with Lucien and is surprised when he reveals some unexpected information about his past with Klaus. Elsewhere, a mysterious figure presents an enticing offer to Marcel (Charles Michael Davis), while Hayley (Phoebe Tonkin) turns to an unconventional way of coping with her current situation. Finally, an old acquaintance from Elijah’s past arrives in New Orleans and delivers some startling news involving the growing threat to the Mikaelson siblings. Yusuf Gatewood also stars. Michael Grossman directed the episode written by Declan de Barra & Michelle Paradise (#303). Original airdate 10/22/2015.

The Originals - 3x02 "You Hung The Moon - Official Synopsis

IMPENDING THREATS AND A DIRE PROPHECY — After discovering that poachers have begun taking out werewolves in the bayou, Elijah (Daniel Gillies) and Jackson (guest star Nathan Parsons) grow concerned for Hayley's (Phoebe Tonkin) safety when she fails to show up during the full moon. Meanwhile, Davina (Danielle Campbell), the only one with the answer to Hayley’s whereabouts, plots ways to use that to her advantage. Elsewhere, Cami (Leah Pipes) approaches Klaus (Joseph Morgan) with her theory on who is behind the series of murders in the French Quarter, while Lucien (guest star Andrew Lees) delivers to Elijah an unsettling warning about the war brewing among the sire lines. Finally, after receiving a dire prophecy about the future of the Mikaelson siblings, Klaus takes extreme measures to determine the validity of this potential impending threat. Charles Michael Davis and Riley Voelkel also star. Jeffrey Hunt directed the episode written by Carina Adly Mackenzie (#302). Original airdate 10/15/2015.

The Originals - 3x01 "For The Next Millennium" Official Synopsis

A WAR BREWING BETWEEN THE SIRE LINES — Months following their violent and deadly showdown with the powerful witch Dahlia, a rift continues to divide brothersKlaus and Elijah, while Freya searches for a way to heal their fractured bond and return their family to the way they once were. Meanwhile, Klaus’ suspicion piques when he learns that an old vampire friend named Lucien has arrived to New Orleans with a mysterious agenda involving the Mikaelson’s remaining sire lines. Elsewhere, Elijah questions whether he can truly forgive his brother for his mounting offenses, while Hayley struggles with being cursed to her wolf form in the bayou. In the French Quarter,Vincent and Cami assist Detective Kinney after a series of gruesome discoveries are made, leading them to believe they may have a serial killer on the loose. Finally, Marcel, who has regained control of the French Quarter once again, tries a new strategy to recruit vampires, while Davina, who is now Regent to the New Orleans witches, makes a decision that will find her and Marcel on opposite sides of an escalating conflict.

Paul Wesley Interview - Video

The Vampire Diaries star Paul Wesley has admitted that he "didn't buy" the shock ending to the third season.

The finale saw Wesley's character Stefan let Elena (Nina Dobrev) drown - and consequently turn into a vampire - after she asked him to save her friend Matt (Zach Roerig) instead.

However, Wesley has now told Digital Spy that he believes Stefan would have ignored Elena's requests in order to save her life.

Watch Paul Wesley speaking about the end of season three of The Vampire Diaries below:

Comic Con Footage

All new Season 4 footage...

 

Candice Accola Spills Season 4 Scoop

Candica Accola spills on Season 4 at the CW Upfronts...

“I don’t think they necessarily closed that story line at all,” she told me. “Characters take breathers … so I’m sure he’ll return.”

OK, you can officially breathe a massive sight of relief. (I know I did!) I also had to ask Candice for her thoughts on new vampire Elena (Nina Dobrev), specifically whether she expects Caroline to take her under her wing and show her the ways of the fang.

“I think she’ll definitely be a part of helping Elena through the transition,” she said. “I can’t see it all going perfectly, but I’m really excited.”

As for how Candice thinks Caroline will react when she discovers that Tyler (Michael Trevino) is actually possessed by Klaus, she had one word to describe her emotional state: ”disturbed!”

Nina Dobrev On What To Expect From Elena In Season 4

After three seasons, Elena Gilbert finally -- and accidentally -- became immortal on The Vampire Diaries' finale Thursday.

When Nina Dobrev's character drowned -- she begged Stefan Salvatore (Paul Wesley) to save Matt Donovan (Zach Roerig) instead -- her friends presumed her to be dead. What they didn't know, however, was that Elena had vampire blood in her system, and she would soon join Stefan, Damon Salvatore (Ian Somerhalder) and Caroline Forbes (Candice Accola) as a vampire.

"I liked having one human and one vampire, because then I get the best of worlds and I get to do a variety of things," said Dobrev, who also plays a vampire named Katherine Pierce. "But, then again, it is going to be different for me and it's going to be challenge. It's going to be more fun to sort of explore that world."

"We're definitely going to see her whole transition into becoming a vampire. We're not going to skip over it, as we have with others," Dobrev assured us. "Becoming a vampire, everything you feel is heightened. . . We know what Elena's like: She has high morals, she looks out for other people. So what's Elena going to be like with those things accentuated?"

Teen witch Bonnie Bennett (Kat Graham) won't likely be pleased to learn Elena is now a vampire. "Their relationship is probably going to be so strained because of that. Her best friend, the one person she's been fighting to protect, is now what she's been fighting against all this time," Dobrev explained. "It's going to be interesting."

Prior to her death, Elena also made a tough decision when she chose to be with Stefan instead of his brother, Damon.

"It does kind of feel like you're disappointing half the people. But you're always going to disappoint half the people with this kind of storyline," Dobrev said of the series' central love triangle. "I think we gave them both what they wanted at some point or another during the season, so it's not like we shunned them or disregarded their wants."

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Julie Plec On The Finale And What's To Come Part 4

In Season 2, you guys told the story of Caroline's transition to being a vampire so beautifully. How do you expect Elena's transition to be different, so that it feels like a new story?

I think the differnce here is that you have two vampires, two brothers who love this girl equally, who are going to have significantly diverging opinions about how it should all go down and what the most effective way to be a vampire is. One of the things we've seen in the last three years, especially this season in the [1912] flashback, is that neither of them particularly took to vampire life all that well. Damon was bitter and pissed off about it for 50 years before he realized he could have fun, and Stefan had his own demons, his Ripperhood. They're both going to have an opinion on how to help Elena. Stefan's method was very successful for Caroline, and we'll see him trying to teach Elena, where Damon is taking the opposite point of view. We're going to have a lot of conflict attached to those opinions.

Do we know whose blood Meredith used to turn her? We know she did have a stash of Damon's blood.
That will be a good question to ask and answer when we come back. 

Was there a debate in the writer's room as to whether she would choose Stefan or Damon in this episode, or did you always agree that it would be Stefan?

We were heading toward the end of the road knowing that as a human, Stefan was Elena's choice. We also knew what was going to happen at the end of the episode. Elena is no longer a human when she wakes up and when the memories come back and when her whole life goes upside-down. Who's to say what that does to her? Who's to say what kind of person she becomes, and how that impacts who she loves and why she loves them? I'm not saying that's going to send her running instantly into Damon's arms, absolutely not, but it's going to cloud the issue even more.

Her kiss with Stefan in her house was the first one they've shared all season.

We really wanted to see Stefan and Elena come back together after a really long and really horrible season. She was his champion and fought for him, even when he didn't deserve to be fought for, she still came back and said "I couldn't stop loving you, I could never stop loving you." That deserved payoff. When we wrote "The Last Day" last year, we knew where Stefan was going, and that was the last romantic episode those two were going to have probably for a year. We knew it was all going to go to hell, so finally being able to have one tiny moment of intimacy was nice.

The flashback to Elena and Damon's first meeting was a big shock for fans. In terms of your thought process there, what was the purpose of it? How did it drive the story?

It serves multiple functions. When Damon shows up in the pilot, he knows a lot about Elena, so there's always been a question about where he's been and what he was up to. How did he know all this? He clearly didn't just walk into Mystic Falls with his crow. He's been around too. We always said that one day we'd find out what he's been doing. It was us wanting to give Damon something to fight for. Ric is unbeatable, a jillion times stronger than Damon. Damon was a dead man, and Ric was relishing beating him, and Damon had nothing left to live for, having been passed over once again. It was just that slight little thing that she said to him, when she was just trying to take the sting off: "Hey, maybe if you and I had met first." She was just trying to soften the blow. But in reality, he had this memory that gave him the will to fight back. I love that moment, where Ric's about to drive the stake into him, and he's like "You know what? I'm not ready to die today."

Bonnie took charge in this episode, helping Klaus into Tyler's body. Was that a function of her being tired of being kicked around all season, or was it the influence of the dark magic she tapped into for the spell last week?
It's definitely a result of being kicked around all season. It's Bonnie saying, "I'm not the pawn anymore. Don't underestimate me and don't tell me what to do." I think the witches sending her to Alaric really burned her, because she'd already been fighting to get her strength against the vampires, and then her own "sisters," as they said, betrayed her. For Bonnie, this is like "Hey, look. I've got a point of view, I've got the ability to do something about it, and damn it, I'm going to do it." To tap into that kind of power she had to dig even deeper into her darkness. In the first episode back, I can't imagine that we won't be looking for some kind of magic to prevent Elena from having to transition. It'll be a question of how far Bonnie is willing to go to help her friend, and what are the repercussions and consequences attached to that.

Does Klaus owe Bonnie one now? Or does he never owe anyone anything?

I think that this definitely changes the dynamic between Klaus and Bonnie a little bit. 

When "Tyler" was saying goodbye to Caroline and talking about her beautiful future, was he already Klaus, at that point?

Yeah. We definitely were hinting at that with the "you're beautiful and you'll have a great future" line. That was a classic Klaus-Caroline line, so we wanted to give a little hint there. All that smooching and all that emotion wasn't Tyler at all, in fact, was Klaus. 

We didn't see Klaus's body turn to ash, so I assume there's some plan in place to keep Joseph Morgan in the mix.

Yep. I'd say there's a fairly significant chance, if not a 99.9% likelihood that body did not burn up in that coffin.

Before we see him return to that body, is he going to have a little fun being Tyler?

Yep. He's definitely going to prolong his stay, at least in the first episode, due to circumstance. Whatever goes down between Caroline and "Tyler" in the first episode will actually be happening between Caroline and Klaus, so we'll have some fun there.

I know you said Stefan and Elena will definitely make a go of being in a relationship again, but outside of that, where is Stefan's head right now? How is he looking at the choices that he made? He looked absolutely wrecked in that final scene.

He was destroyed for so many reasons. Meredith had already broken the news to him, so in that moment of lying over Elena's body, he was mourning her as a human and realizing that ultimately he was unable to save her from the one thing she never wanted, which was to be a vampire. That's going to weigh on him really heavily and it's going to piss Damon off like nobody's business, that Stefan saved Matt instead of Elena. Stefan had a big burden in that moment and what he had to do was be true to Elena. It's like choosing to take someone off life support because it was their wish or to keep them on because you can't let them go. It was what she wanted, and Stefan, if nothing else, has always been able to let her make her decision. If, as a vampire, she starts to make the wrong decisions, then we'll see a shift in Stefan and how he feels about helping Elena through things. I think we'll start to get a glimpse at the different sides of Stefan in a relationship, where it's not going to be all peaches and cream and love and unconditional, unwavering support of Elena's decision. Elena is no longer Elena.

Would you say that the love triangle will be stronger than ever next season?

Yes. I say that at my own peril, but yes. People can get frustrated by the love triangle, people can find it grating or whatever, but the premise of the show is two vampire brothers and their love for the same girl. That's where we started and it's always going to exist in the landscape of "The Vampire Diaries." Some years it'll be more in the forefront than other years, when it's delicately laid in the background. Elena becoming a vampire will make it fresh. It changes things, and makes us ask new questions. It makes things a lot deeper. It's all part of this process of growing up. As our characters are working toward graduation and all kinds of life decisions -- do I go to college, do I leave my hometown, is my high school boyfriend going to be my college boyfriend -- all those life things, it's all going to be supported where Elena is with Damon and Stefan.


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Julie Plec On the Finale & Whats To Come Part 3

Why can't they take a route that doesn't include Wickery Bridge?

It's the only way in and out of town, maybe, but I think from now on they'll be a little bit gun-shy.

Please tell me Tyler isn't really dead.

No, he's not dead. In fact, if you look at the times we've used the spell in the past with Klaus and Alaric and Esther and Rebekah the magic is the same. So if and when Klaus vacates Tyler's body, Tyler will still be there.

How will Stefan following Elena's orders to save Matt and not her affect him?

The first episode is a lot of people feeling a lot of guilt, a lot of torment and Elena having to manage all of that in the midst of realizing she has a big decision to make. Obviously Stefan knew he was going to come right back for Elena, but she ran out of time. That is a decision that's going to haunt him and infuriate Damon, but probably lead Elena to explain even more to Stefan why she chose him because of that.

How will Damon react to Stefan's fatal choice?

This could drive a pretty severe wedge between the brothers. Certainly the intention is not to subtly and forcefully rip them apart; it's more that they're going to have different points of view. It's going to bring back a lot of the issues about Damon when he came to Mystic Falls and what he expected his vampire life to be. They're just not going to agree. It's going to be frustrating for both of them, and even though they're in it together, they're coming at it from different sides.

Does the flashback scene between Elena and Damon soften the finality of Elena picking Stefan?

It was meant to illuminate that we don't have all the information and neither does Elena. She's made her decision and she believes in that decision wholeheartedly based on who she is in her life and what she knows, and now she's going to wake up and be a completely different person and have all this new information. Do I think it's going to immediately make her say, "Oh, I've chosen wrong?" No, but it's yet another thing that's going to be in her head confusing her about her feelings.

How soon will we see Elena's transition?

The transition of it all will take place in the first episode. There's a nice 24-hour window there and that will be particularly dramatic and traumatic. Looking past that, all I can say is if Elena becomes a vampire, if you really think about who she is and what we've seen in her, she's fiercely protective, she spent a lot of time in this last season getting physically stronger, her compassion is her greatest gift and her greatest weakness, so in death that becomes magnified.

When will the others learn about Bonnie's spell?

Bonnie's first thing that's going to have to happen is that we're going to learn how long she has to keep this secret, what kind of bargain she made with Klaus, is she going to be able to tell her friends, specifically Caroline, right away? As a witch who can be looked at for solution, trying to figure out a way to keep Elena from having to be a vampire is going to be high on her priority list and she's going to have a very limited amount of time to do it. In the first episode, we'll see Bonnie step right up to the precipice of the darkest form of her magic and need to either jump on in or stay back on the ledge.

And how will Caroline react to all of this information?

She's just been completely bamboozled and experienced the most horrifying and devastating moment of her entire life, so realizing that it wasn't real and that all of those painful goodbyes were not Tyler but were with Klaus, that's going to be a low blow.

The finale was so action-packed. Was there anything you had to cut for time?

I loved a line where after Alaric confronts Meredith, he's walking out the door he looks back at her and says, "Too bad, you and me, it was kind of love at first sight, wasn't it?" I loved it, but ultimately the story was told just fine without it.


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Julie Plec On The Finale And What's To Come - Part 2

How did the cast react to the finale, especially given how much is changing for their characters?
They were very, very, very positive and supportive of the finale. So many of them found a beauty in what they felt like was returning to all the things they loved most about the show in the early episodes of the series. Stuff that was simple and pure and steeped in character and emotional. And they loved having Sara Canning back in their world.

At PaleyFest, when someone asked if Elena will become a vampire like in the books, you very coyly replied, “We’ll see.” How hard was it to keep this secret?
Oh my God, when that person asked, my heart just fell down from my chest to my toes! All I thought was, “Answer this as though she isn’t. As you would answer it if you hadn’t spend the entire year in the writers room planning for this.” [Laughs]

So she’s definitely becoming a vampire?
They’re going to try to pull out all the stops to try to prevent it when we come back, but I think the writing is on the wall as far as her journey.

In the past, Elena’s been very adamant about not wanting that life. How will this affect her?
It’s going to affect her in a lot of ways. It changes everything for her. It’s not going to be easy. It’s going to be a struggle. It’s going to illuminate a lot of things about who she is, and it’s going to screw with her head and her emotions. It’s going to be tough. But the beauty of Elena is now we’ll get to see her try to rise above it and be a champion in spite of this. We’ll see how hard that is and how long it takes her to become a functioning vampire, if at all.

Given how crazy her life has become and all the supernatural elements in it, was this inevitable for Elena?
Yeah, I think so. Who knows if the books hadn’t turned her into a vampire at the end of book one if we would have gone down this road or if it never would have occurred to us to go down this road? That’s hard to say. But when executive producer Kevin Williamson and I signed on to this project, we did know that, at some point, we would be turning her. It really just was a matter of when. It’s definitely the next chapter in her story.

Were you surprised it came this early? Most shows would save this for a series finale.
No, there was actually a moment at the beginning of Season 2 where Kevin and I thought we would get here by the end of Season 2. We didn’t want to, so I’m glad we didn’t. But we were following the path of her character. Heroines are very difficult to write. It’s very difficult to keep them dynamic and fresh and new. We knew that we would reach a breaking point where we didn’t really want to see Elena continue to go through the same thing again and again and again.

At what point did you come up with the idea that Damon met Elena first and erased her memory of that moment?
The details of that scene happened as we were talking about the end of the season. But the question that we’ve always had since the beginning of the series in the writers room is, “Where was Damon while Stefan was entering school and meeting Elena?” Damon came into the pilot armed with a lot of knowledge, which, in my opinion, implies that he’s been there for a little while. So we’ve always wanted to ask and answer that question. It felt like the right answer there was [that] he was having his own experience with Elena. [Laughs]

One of the side effects of becoming a vampire is that she’ll remember all the things Damon compelled her to forget. How will that effect Elena’s choice?
It’s just more information. I don’t think anything is going to make her sit up and say, “Oh my God, I made the wrong decision!” and change her mind in Episode 1 [of next season]. But in the ongoing journey of her point of view about how she feels about each of these brothers, it’s going to impact her feelings for Damon and her understanding of Damon.

Does Damon stand more of a fighting chance with her now?
Both brothers continue to stand a fighting chance because we’re only halfway through the series. So yes. [Laughs]

This does redefine the love triangle in a way.
Yeah. We’ve been in the writers room for four weeks after we wrapped the season, talking about Season 4. The one thing that got us all so excited is that everything we’re talking about feels both familiar in all the right ways, of the early parts of the series, and also fresh. It feels so fresh. And yet, it’s the same people that we know and love. They’re just going through new experiences. There’s a lot we can do here. We’re really excited about it.

Two burning questions about Stefan: Does he know she picked him? And when he was crying over her body, was it because she had died or because he knew she was going to come back as a vampire?
He does not know that she picked him. I like to think that that moment when he’s crying over her body, he’s crying over the loss of her human life and that now she’s going to be the thing that she never wanted. I don’t think Meredith would have been like, “Oh, I’m going to keep that secret from Stefan, but tell Damon.” [Laughs]

Tell me about the decision to kill off Alaric.
Oh… [Long pause] It’s too painful. [Laughs] What was really important to us was that Elena lost everything, as far as adult parenting [and] that she as a human had no support structure in her home. So Alaric as the guardian of Elena and Jeremy had a shelf life at the end of this season because of where we were going with [her]. Alaric’s character, in my opinion, could have been sitting in that bar next to Damon for the next four years, every episode, having a bourbon, and we all would have been perfectly happy. But Matt Davis is better than that and deserves more than that. Now’s his time to shine. [If he has] the opportunity to go out there and shine on another show while still being available to us should we decide to have a few ghostly visits from dear, departed Alaric, then it’s the best of both worlds. That being said, every single scene that I had my hands in from the time he became his alter-ego to the end of this season, I would sit at the computer and weep. Tears would fall onto the keys, knowing that in a lot of ways this was goodbye. It was definitely very emotionally traumatic for me. [Laughs]

What about Joseph Morgan? Have we seen the last of him?
No, we have not. It is as temporary as when he was inside Alaric’s body.

So both of their vessels are OK should Klaus get out of the Tyler’s body?
Yes. Desiccated Klaus is a little crispy right now, but he’s probably salvageable.

It seemed for a little while there that Klaus was being written off. Why did you decide to bring him back in this way?
Rarely do you have a character that comes in [during] the middle of the series and just explodes and an actor that embodies him so well that people love to hate him and hate to love him. Joseph Morgan as Klaus is pretty special. Though we wanted our heroes to have a victory after all this time, we also realized that there’s still so much more of Joseph Morgan as Klaus that we need to see on the show. We tried to make sure we got both the win for our heroes and the win for our show, which is still having Joseph a part of it.

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Julie Plec on Season Finale and what Happens Next

How long have you known Elena would end season 3 in transition to become a vampire?
The ending had been in the works for about two years. In the first series of books, that’s what happens to her. When Kevin [Williamson] and I first came on the show, we said, “Well, it can’t happen to her the way it happens in the books,” which is on, like, page 200 of the first book. [Laughs] That felt obviously too soon, and rushed, and we didn’t want to make a show about a teenage girl who instantly becomes a vampire. But we always knew that her journey would take her there eventually, and we just kept riding the wave of when it felt right. You’ve got a girl who just sorta lost her last adult living family member when Aunt Jenna died last year, so when we started this season, what we really wanted to do was begin this relationship with Alaric as her guardian and mentor, and then tear that away from her at the end leaving her and her brother with nobody. It felt like now was the time — when you’re left with no grownup, no adult supervision, no parent, no guardian — for Elena to experience the next evolution of her journey. All the stuff that we did with having her get stronger over the course of the year, training and getting in touch with her physical self, and all the grief and all the emotion that she went through, all the compassion that she has for everybody, it will all play into next year and what kind of person and vampire she will actually be — if she should choose to see the transition through.

Obviously, she will transition?
There will be a discussion to be had about it at the beginning, but the road we’re going down is pretty balls out.

It wasn’t until that moment when ghost Alaric appeared to Jeremy that I was like, wait a minute, they could conceivably kill Elena because Nina Dobrev would still be on the show as Katherine. 
We’re pretty notorious for being willing to go there and do radical things that other people wouldn’t necessarily feel good about doing, so there was a sense of fun in that moment. People were gonna be thinking, poor Matt, he’s such a goner, and mourning him in that moment and not even thinking ultimately that Elena was in any kind of jeopardy. So when that happened, it’s just like, Oh s—!

The way Nina died in the water, just going lifeless and floating — so good. 
That girl. If there were acting awards for underwater emoting, she would win everything.

Did Elena know that Meredith had given her vampire blood when she told Stefan to save Matt first?
That is a question that we will ask and answer when we come back next season.

And just checking: Matt did survive, right?
I think for Matt to not survive that after everything would be just too damn tragic.

Let’s talk about Elena’s goodbye speech to Damon when she told him if she had to choose, it would be Stefan. 
What we’ve said all year is that this is the choice for who she is at this moment in her life, and what she wants out of her life, and who she wants to have in her life in a romantic way. Though she has obviously grown to love Damon, and probably be in love with Damon, over the course of three seasons, what she said was 100 percent true: Even at its worst, she never fell out of love with Stefan, and you just can’t let somebody like that go. So letting Damon go was the right thing to do for her. Of course now, who knows what’s gonna happen? Her life just got completely turned upside down and ripped inside out. God only knows how each brother is gonna handle it? If they have opposing viewpoints [read: Damon definitely would have saved Elena first, so she'd still be human], then how are they going to handle each other? They just miraculously survived this year tighter than ever as brothers, what will this new development due to that relationship? There’s all kinds of great questions that are gonna come up as a result of all this.

One of the twists we didn’t see coming — conveniently after Elena said maybe her choice would have been different if she’d met Damon first — was that Damon HAD actually met her first on the night of her parents’ crash, but he compelled her to forget because he didn’t want anyone else to know he was in town.
Damon now has a small collection of things that he’s compelled her to forget. If there’s one thing that everyone knows about our vampire rules it’s that when you die and are in transition, your memories start to come back. So, there’s some new information that will be introduced to Elena in the first episode of next season. I think it’s just all part of the ongoing friendship and romantic entanglement that Elena has with Damon. She’s never gonna be able to shake it completely, and new information is only gonna get under her skin and embed itself into her even more. And so, it will cause complications with Stefan, of course. But she’s committed to Stefan. She loves Stefan. We’ll get to actually see them be together for a little while.

So she made her choice, but you set up that it’s not necessarily final — the sexual tension will still exist, even if it’s just simmering. I feel like fans on both sides should be happy with this.
No. No. The most passionate of the opposing teams are never quite happy unless they get exactly what they want. But, I would say everybody else can understand that end game means end of series. We’re in the middle of the journey, and our heroine just made a life decision and then EVERYTHING in her life is about to change. We’re starting Part 2. We’ll continue to ask the question “Why was it right for her?” and answer it as we move into next season. Elena as a character will continue to evolve and change, as will our boys, as will their feelings for each other and for her. It’s a marathon, not a sprint.

Let’s talk about Bonnie’s deal with Klaus.
It’s the same magic that was able to put Klaus into Alaric’s body and Esther into Rebekah’s. So you can extrapolate the future of Joseph Morgan on this show from that logic.

We saw Klaus’ body burning like Mikael’s and Finn’s, so I’m thinking we’d only see Joseph Morgan himself again in a flashback or something.
You know, I myself did not see his entire body burned to bits. So I can’t say 100 percent that we’ve seen the last of him.

And Klaus really is the start of Damon, Stefan, and Caroline’s bloodline?
Yes, that is the truth.

Before we talk about Klaus as Tyler, we have to touch on the scene where Tyler and Caroline were planning to meet in two hours and run away together. I almost started crying, and I didn’t even know why.
Yeah. I loved that moment. One of the things that we do every now and then on the show is we get to play in a little wish-fulfillment teen fantasy land. The idea of running away with the boy you love and escaping danger — it had this awesome Escape From Witch Mountain vibe that I remember so much with being a kid. So I love that scene for the enthusiasm they have for their adventure in spite of all the darkness that surrounds it. They’re two teenagers in love who are going off to be in love on the road.

So what happens with them next season? What will Caroline be thinking?
The first thing she’ll be is fairly shocked, and stunned, and probably borderline ecstatic, but also very confused when she realizes that presumably Tyler will live to see the other end of the story. And then she’s going to be, excuse my language, f—ing pissed at Klaus, who is doing some and will continue to do some subterfuge as far as who he’s pretending to be inside of Tyler’s body. [Laughs] We’ll see how much play he gets out of that.

That’ll be fun. But the Council still knows what Caroline and Tyler really are.
[Laughs] Oh yes, they do. That’s definitely gonna be the focus of our first episode back. The Council knows too much and needs to take action against not just those on the inside who have been deceiving them [Mayor Lockwood, Sheriff Forbes, and Dr. Fell], but also the vampires that have taken up residence in the town.

Are you thinking of introducing any new badass Council members? 
We’ll definitely meet new characters in that context who have a very strong point of view about what this town should be doing.

Focusing now on Bonnie, when I talked to Kat Graham earlier this week, she said there were two ways she could see it going for Bonnie after she seemed to enjoy the rush of dark magic when she stopped Jeremy and Alaric’s hearts: Bonnie could get scared of dark magic and think it’s something she should stay clear of, or she could become addicted to it. What can you say about where Bonnie’s headed?
What’s next for Bonnie really is a deeper, more emotional exploration of her witchcraft, of her legacy as a witch. Next year is really gonna be about having her understand not just that there are consequences for her actions, but that ultimately she needs to get in touch with who she really is as a witch and what kind of witch she wants to be. So there’s gonna be a lot of soul-searching and a lot of ups and downs for her. Hopefully it will be a really beautiful and thoughtful journey for her.

As Tyler, Klaus told Bonnie her witch sisters would not be happy with her for what she’d done to save her friends. Will them getting pissy with her be something we see next season?
I think definitely. What I love about what Bonnie did was she basically said to both her ancestors and sisters of witchhood and the vampires, “Stop pushing me around. I’m gonna do what I need to do to protect the people I love, and I don’t really care who likes it or doesn’t.” So it’s a big moment for Bonnie taking back her own strength, and we’ll definitely see the repercussions of that next year.

A lot of people had talked about leaving town: The Originals, Tyler and Caroline, whichever Salvatore that Elena didn’t choose. 
Now that what happened to Elena happened to Elena, I think anybody that was planning on leaving town or had agreed to leave town will have a change of plans.

So Damon sticks around. What can you say about Rebekah?
Rebekah is going to be persona non grata amongst the heroes of the show, if not everyone, for what was a very, very, very aggressive and [Laughs] murderous move. So even Matt, her sweet little football captain, is gonna probably have a hard time getting past that. He’s not necessarily gonna be talking to her anytime soon. So we’ll get to see how she responds to being ostracized even more so than she’s already been. And for a girl who doesn’t like to be lonely, that’s not gonna be the easiest thing for her. Also, she just ended Klaus’ opportunity to make hybrids, so he ain’t gonna be so happy about it either.

Did Elijah sanction Rebekah trying to kill Elena, or did she go rogue?
You know, actually, I don’t have the answer for that yet. I’d like to think Rebekah made a really bold and brash choice there and will pay some pretty tough consequences both from her brothers and for herself socially. I’ll have to discuss that with the other writers and make sure they’re onboard. [Laughs]

That’s what I would like to think, too, since Elijah’s still my favorite Original. Does he stick around town then?
Your favorite Elijah is our favorite Elijah, as you know. Daniel Gillies has a doctor show on NBC, Saving Hope [premiering June 7], and so his future with the vampire show is completely linked to his future with the doctor show. But we do get to use him sporadically with their permission, and they’ve been lovely about it, so we’ll see what else we can do moving forward.

With Alaric gone, and Elena no longer being able to help Klaus make his hybrid army, who is the Big Bad next season?
That is a question that remains. Where is the Big Bad gonna come from? That’s gonna be part of the fun of laying that out and understanding who our villain is gonna be and why.

Is there anything else you’d like to say about the episode?
Just don’t send hate mail or death threats via Twitter.

I saw your tweet earlier this week about being blindsided.
If I go back to Twitter right now and read my mentions, I’m going in fully warned and fully aware that a large majority of people will probably be hurling angry and hostile insults at me amidst all the beautiful love and wonderful support that the fans are so good at giving. But it’s on a normal Tuesday, when I’m just reading the news and chatting with some friends, and I get hit with a “You’re stupid, you suck, you have no talent, and you’re ugly.” [Laughs] It’s like, wait a second. I was just having a nice moment, and you completely just gut-punched me with rudeness. Those are the ones that are hard to get over. It’s like getting smacked out of nowhere when you’re not expecting it. But continued love and appreciation for what is without a doubt the most passionate fanbase I have ever encountered in my entire life — including as a fan, I’ve never seen anything like it. Kudos to them for caring so much. We appreciate it.

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