The Vampire Diaries 2.16 “The House Guest” Review

The Vampire Diaires has managed once again to cram so much in to one episode; romance, action, shocks, death and heartbreak. With so much content it would be easy to gloss over certain aspects yet they still manage to tell each part of the story as if only a few things happened.

Katherine is out of the tomb which means that the mischief begins from the outset, making it hard for viewers and Salvatore’s alike to know which is the real Elena. Stefan for a brief moment thinks that he has got all hot and heavy with the wrong person, which was rather cruel but brilliant, not that Elena would agree after being thrown against the wall and not in the good way. Nina Dobrev once again shone with this double portrayal and even though it is less than likely to happen showed why she should be bestowed with acting awards beyond Teen Choice. The scenes between Katherine and Damon are a particular delight, both are the game players of the show and both try to use these best tactics on each other and whilst Damon seems to be not submitting with some ease it clearly hurt him that Katherine knew that the dagger would kill him. The best and most frustrating thing about Katherine is that you can never trust anything that she says or how she acts, is she being honest when she shows her dislike for Elena? I’m going to go with yes on this one, she has the real human life that Katherine was denied as the Petrova doppleganger and she has both the Salvatore men where Katherine once had them.

Katherine did prove her use with team Martin, first taking a really good moment to go to the basement for a drink and discovering the plan to remove the dagger from Elijah. Luka’s invisibility here made this scene all the more tense but the earlier introduction of Damon’s newly acquired toy from the werewolf pack meant that this flame thrower would be doing some harm. Harm it did do, barbecuing the young Martin, so long Luka we hardly knew (or particularly liked) you. This death meant that Dr Martin was not surprisingly less than happy and out for revenge, making his way to the Grill where he appropriately turned it in to a grill. This set of actions set several things in motion but ultimately led to his death at the hands of Katherine (and partly Stefan) but not before he could do the classic horror movie come back to life trick that is oh so popular. I appreciated the twist here though that he looked like he was attempting to harm Bonnie, instead he was returning her powers and bestowing something we won’t find out until April, pesky cliffhangers.

The romance and heartbreak count was rather high this week with both Caroline and Alaric facing stumbling blocks in their relationships with all the secrets they are keeping, Elena made the rather astute point that maybe keeping the secrets is causing more harm than if they knew the truth. We didn’t have long to find out how Matt would react to this knowledge. Though for a brief moment in time all was sweetness and light after Caroline did the grand romantic gesture of performing ‘Eternal Flame’ for Matt, being Mystic Falls this didn’t last long. Dr Martin had to go and ruin this by turning fire starter and attempted murderer by plunging a broken bottle in to Matt’s neck. Of course Caroline would have to save him and of course he would react less than favourably, particularly after what Vicki had said after she was attacked back in season 1. I’d kinda forgotten about this whole Vicki revelation so it was good to see that Matt certainly hasn’t and is now convinced that his girlfriend did the harm. Will Caroline compel Matt or will he be able to handle the whole truth?

Alaric faired less well with Jenna who is still not willing to let him back in, even after he tells her he loves her. Hopefully the humdinger of an ending with Isobel turning up will let Jenna turn in her captain oblivious cap and become a vital part of the group. The conflict that this will cause Alaric is something that I am more than looking forward to seeing, why is April so far a way?

A couple of other witch related revelations that are very significant for what is to come is that Damon seems aware already of where the witch massacre sight is and that one of the journals contains some important information that he shared with Stefan and not Katherine. The other being that Katherine ratted Emily Bennett out leading to her death, this I can see being an issue for Katherine as we have already seen that Emily has some powers beyond the grave.

Some great performance tonight in a jam packed episode that expanded the mythology further and cut the cast down again with a couple of timely deaths. There are enough cliffhangers to definitely leave me clamouring for more and wonder why April 7th is so far, far away, really stellar work from this consistently brilliant show. A

What did you all think? Glad to see that Matt knows the truth? Happy to see Isobel? What do you make of the double Martin deaths? Let us know in the comments below or join us in the forum. Be sure to check out the always fabulous Mark and his full recap here.