Damon wakes up tied to a chair at Vamp Villa with a poker in his chest and his daylight ring on the floor. He still suspects Stefan because his real captor is someone he can’t see: Mason’s ghost. Stefan finds him and denies responsibility. He pulls the poker out of Damon and removes one of his binds but doesn’t free him completely. After Stefan leaves the room, Mason opens a curtain so Damon gets burned by the sun.
Downtown, people are setting up for the town’s Night of Illumination. A Fell family member named Tobias offers a history lesson about the annual event, but let’s be honest, no one cares. Alaric’s present because Tobias is the head of Mystic Falls High’s history department and his attendance was mandatory. Jeremy’s present because Alaric threatened to fail him if he didn’t participate.
Elena joins the two of them as Anna pops up, though she’s still only visible to Jeremy. Anna’s unhappy with the festivities because they’re a celebration of the town’s post-Civil War prosperity, which mostly came about because they stole everything left behind by the vampires they locked in the tomb. Jeremy chuckles at her annoyance, then has to pretend nothing was funny when Elena notices. He and Anna hold hands.
Caroline and Bonnie recap the ghost situation for us: Bonnie’s spell got rid of Vicki’s anchor to the real world, but Jeremy still has a line to Anna and can see her as often as he wants. Bonnie accepts that these are the consequences of what she did to bring Jeremy back from the dead, but that doesn’t mean she has to be okay with it.
Damon arrives, having finally freed himself, and tells the girls that he thinks Mason is the one who was messing with him. Mason did the same thing to Damon that Damon did to him, so it wasn’t hard to figure out. Ghosts aren’t supposed to be able to interact with humans physically, so this is definitely a problem. Damon tells Bonnie to fix whatever she screwed up. Matt’s nearby and overhears the whole conversation.
Outside the Grill, Elena tells Jeremy and Alaric that Lexi has always been able to bring Stefan back when he’s gone dark, so maybe Jeremy can reach her and get some information on how to help Stefan. Jeremy isn’t sure Lexi’s on the Other Side. The three discuss what the Other Side actually is; it’s like a purgatory for supernatural beings, but they can’t see each other or interact with humans. Alaric notes that Vicki could interact. Jeremy says she had help from a witch on the Other Side. Anna hasn’t had that help. Alaric thinks they should have learned their lesson about summoning the dead. I’m going to remember you said that in season 7, Ric.
Matt tells Bonnie and Caroline that he hasn’t seen Vicki since Bonnie banished her, so he’s sure she’s not the one who messed with Damon. But Bonnie hopes it was her because if it was another ghost, something’s gone wrong. Matt wants to sit this one out, which is fair. Caroline thinks Jeremy should be as strong as Matt was in letting go of Vicki. Bonnie brushes her off. A grimoire falls out of her bag and the pages start turning themselves until they land on a manifestation spell that will reveal “veiled matter,” AKA ghosts.
Back at the Grill, Elena still wants Jeremy to consider contacting Lexi. Alaric thinks they should drop it, since he doesn’t like the idea of dead vampires watching them. Anna announces (well, to Jeremy) that she doesn’t think all supernatural spirits go to the Other Side. Some find peace. From the way Jeremy’s listening to her, Elena guesses that Anna is there. Jeremy lies that she’s not, at Anna’s request, and makes an excuse to go inside.
Stefan takes his seat and flips through one of his old journals, which Elena’s been reading for Lexi-related intel. He advises her not to torture herself with memories. They should just move on. Alaric tells Stefan to leave, but since Stefan’s job is looking after Elena, he’s going to stay. Plus, there’s a big event tonight, which means an all-you-can-eat buffet. No, no, he’s just kidding. Maybe. After he leaves, Elena tells Alaric she’s not going to drop her quest to get through to Stefan.
Bonnie and Caroline go to Hex House so Bonnie can do the manifestation spell. Caroline’s spooked, but Bonnie assures her that the witches who died there have left and don’t plan to come back. At the Grill, Jeremy goes into a bathroom for a private conversation with Anna. He asks why she told him not to let Elena know she was there. Anna thinks that Elena would disapprove, since it would hurt Bonnie.
Jeremy asks how it’s possible that he and Anna can interact physically. Vicki couldn’t do that without magic. He asks if Anna’s getting help from the same witch as Vicki. Anna promises that she’s alone, and she’s not a danger to Jeremy or anyone else. She takes his hand, but he drops hers, saying this isn’t okay. Anna reminds him that she’s only there because he’s thinking about her, so he can stop that and send her away. But he can’t bring himself to do it, and he wants to kiss her while they’re able to kiss.
Bonnie does the spell as Elena and Alaric go looking for Jeremy. Damon intercepts Alaric, wanting to have a drink with him and talk about Mason’s ghost, but Alaric is still bitter over Damon killing him and doesn’t want to be his friend anymore. Damon brings up how they conspired to kill “Uncle Werewolf” and says Mason seems to be holding a grudge. Hmm, I think Alaric knows how he feels.
Bonnie continues the spell, worrying Caroline as wind whips through Hex House. It suddenly stops, and Bonnie and Caroline see Sheila in the room with them. At the Grill, Elena steps into the bathroom and is shocked to see Anna there with Jeremy. On the street, Stefan’s walking by a car when he sees Lexi’s reflection in a window. And at the bar in the Grill, Mason steals Damon’s drink, then smashes the glass against Damon’s forehead. “Told ya,” Damon says to Alaric.
Stefan can’t figure out how Lexi’s there, since she’s dead. She notes that, technically, he’s dead, too. She also doesn’t know how she’s there or how long it’ll last. But that’s not important to her right now – what’s important is that Stefan is off the wagon and out of control. Stefan tells her to leave him alone, but Lexi isn’t going to walk away from him. She’s always helped him before, even when he resisted. She slams his head into a car window and knocks him out.
Bonnie has a tearful reunion with Sheila, who also has something more important to focus on than being visible. She’s not happy that Bonnie brought Jeremy back after the witches warned her there would be consequences. Bonnie says she didn’t have a choice. She loves him and couldn’t let him go. Sheila understands, but his resurrection opened the door to the Other Side, and a witch took advantage of it and Bonnie. Sending Vicki away allowed the witch to open the door even further. Now anyone with unfinished business can come to the real world.
Sheila’s heard all this from witches on the Other Side; they’re the ones who make the rules there. Bonnie asks what the witch who was working with Vicki wants. Sheila says that’s the Originals’ business and Bonnie needs to stay out of it. Sheila’s there because Bonnie needs to restore the balance of nature by closing the door to the Other Side.
Caroline gets on the phone with Elena to tell her that the witch on the Other Side is using her talisman for this magic. Elena realizes that talisman is her necklace. Caroline tells her that Bonnie needs to destroy it. Elena’s okay with that, since it’ll get rid of the ghost who was just kissing her brother. Caroline doesn’t let Bonnie hear that part of the conversation. Elena tells Caroline that Damon has the necklace, so she’ll need to ask him where it is.
Once she’s off the phone, Elena orders Anna to get lost. Jeremy says it’s not her fault, and Elena agrees – it’s his. Anna disappears as they try to figure out what’s going on. Jeremy asks Elena not to tell Bonnie about Anna. Elena was already planning to let Jeremy break that news to his girlfriend after they’ve banished all the ghosts. She leaves the bathroom and runs into Lexi, who remarks that today was a good day for Elena to be thinking about her. She’s ready to give Elena a crash course in detoxing Stefan. Elena’s hesitant, but Lexi knows she’s desperate.
Mason keeps drinking at the bar, since there’s no alcohol on the Other Side. Damon tells him that if he wants revenge, he’ll need to get in line. Mason says he wants an apology, which makes Alaric laugh, since it’s never going to happen. Damon thinks Mason should be spending this time with Tyler instead. Mason says he’s there to help his nephew, but Damon says that’s impossible while Klaus is alive. Mason disagrees – they could find a weapon to kill Klaus.
He knows about a lead on one, but he won’t tell Damon about it until he apologizes. With a push from Alaric, Damon semi-apologizes: “I didn’t have to kill you. I do a lot of things I don’t have to do.” Mason decides that’s good enough and tells Damon to meet him at the old Lockwood cellar alone, with a shovel. Damon thinks he might end up buried alive.
Lexi has locked Stefan up in the old jail cell, which is really proving its use this season. She tells Elena that they’re going to convince him to turn his humanity back on. It won’t be pretty, but Elena thinks she can handle it. Stefan orders Lexi to let him go, but she shushes him so she can get in his head. Stefan tries telling Elena to get rid of Lexi, but I don’t know why he thinks Elena would listen to him. Using some vamp magic that never quite gets explained, Lexi gets in Stefan’s head and makes him appear to desiccate.
Damon meets up with Mason, who knows that Damon tried but failed to make headway with Mikael. Mason observes humans a lot because the only thing to do on the Other Side is watch people screw stuff up. He tells Damon there’s an old family legend about a weapon that can kill an Original. He starts trying to break a brick wall with a shovel, but Damon’s impatient and uses his vamp strength to speed things up. They uncover the path to some underground tunnels, which neither guy wants to enter first.
Lexi’s trick is making Stefan hallucinate that he’s been deprived of blood for months, then years. He tells her he’s glad she’s dead. “Aww. I miss you, too, friend,” she replies brightly. Caroline calls Elena to tell her that the necklace isn’t where Damon said it would be at Vamp Villa, and she can’t reach him. Elena tells Caroline to get Bonnie to hold off on banishing the ghosts until Lexi can get through to Stefan.
Caroline doesn’t really want to wait, but she agrees to figure out which boyfriend/ghost situation is more important after they find the necklace. Bonnie overhears and asks what she means. Caroline tells her about Lexi, but Bonnie knows there’s more. Caroline admits that Elena caught Jeremy and Anna kissing. She reminds Bonnie that Anna is only here temporarily, but that doesn’t change the fact that Bonnie’s boyfriend kissed someone else.
Everyone’s downtown for the Night of Illumination, so Jeremy’s having a hard time finding Anna. He runs into Frederick, but he doesn’t know that that’s a problem. Meanwhile, Carol can’t find Tobias, who was supposed to do the lighting ceremony. Anna encounters Frederick as Carol subs in Alaric for Tobias and starts the illumination part of the Night of Illumination.
Jeremy spots Anna just then, and Frederick notes that Anna must have forgotten how one of Jeremy’s family members killed her and Pearl. Jeremy joins them, followed by some other tomb vamps, and Frederick says they have unfinished business with the founding families. Alaric calls for the lanterns strung up everywhere to be lit, but that just illuminates something no one has noticed until now: Tobias’ bloody corpse has also been strung up.
Stefan is suffering, and he begs Elena to help him. Lexi tells her to ignore him. Elena says she’s doing this to help Stefan. He promises to change, but Lexi warns Elena that he’ll say anything right now to get her to stop this. She needs to separate herself from her emotions. Stefan tells Elena he loves her, but she doesn’t believe him. Then, like a guy who hit on a woman and got rejected, Stefan’s all, “I never liked you anyway.” He regrets all the time he spent with her; it was all a waste. Lexi tells Elena that’s the Ripper talking. The key is to get him weak, then cause him pain and make him feel things, even if one of those things is anger. It gets him to see past the blood and his cravings.
Lexi stakes Stefan in the shoulder and tells Elena that she’ll have to do this routine over and over like any other daily routine. Eventually, he’ll be ready to be saved. She moves to stake him again, and Stefan roars that he’ll rip her apart. She reminds him that he can’t, since she’s already dead. She stakes him in the shoulder again, and Elena decides she can’t watch this anymore. She goes above-ground to get some air and realizes that something major has happened at the town event.
Bonnie and Caroline continue searching Vamp Villa for the necklace (and yes, Caroline looks in the bowl of soap). Jeremy calls Bonnie, and Caroline picks up the phone so Bonnie doesn’t have to talk to him. He tells her the tomb vampires killed Tobias, so they need to find the necklace before anyone else gets killed. Caroline realizes that someone must have taken the necklace. Her money’s on Anna. Jeremy believes Anna when she denies the accusation, and Caroline tells him he’s an idiot.
Damon and Mason trek through the tunnels as Damon wonders what Mason’s inevitable ulterior motives are. Mason says he doesn’t have any; they’re on the same side, and he knows Damon won’t screw him over, since he wants to help Stefan. They come to a fork in a tunnel and Damon asks which way to go. Mason reminds him that he’s a ghost, not God. He suggests they go left, so Damon goes right. Mason tells him he has trust issues. As Damon continues walking, long stakes fly out of the walls and he gets impaled a bunch of times.
Elena gets a status update from Jeremy and agrees with Caroline that Anna took the necklace. Jeremy knows they need to get it back, but that means really saying goodbye to Anna. He knows he shouldn’t feel the way he does about her, but he loves her. Elena reminds him that it’s not real. Anna’s dead, and Jeremy’s holding on to the past. “Are you gonna love a ghost for the rest of your life?” she asks.
Anna appears, and Elena tells her that Jeremy’s just starting his life. Anna’s presence is holding him back. She knows Anna knows that. Anna holds out the necklace, and Elena tells Jeremy to call Bonnie and let her know they have what they need to get rid of the ghosts.
Damon groans about having a bad day as Mason finds something to use to cut him free from the stakes. Damon asks again what Mason’s really up to. Why is he helping the person who killed him? Mason says that on the Other Side, you can only watch the people you left behind and regret your decisions. He can’t change what happened to him, but he might be able to make things better for Tyler. Mason wants redemption, not revenge.
On their way back to Hex House, Bonnie and Caroline see that Carol has crashed her car. Frederick and some other tomb vamps are approaching her. Caroline tells Bonnie to go get the necklace and do the banishment spell – she’s going to rescue her boyfriend’s mother.
Jeremy reminds Anna that this won’t be goodbye, since he’ll still be able to see her. But Anna knows she has to let him go so she doesn’t keep holding him back. She took the necklace because she knew the tomb vamps would come out, and she thought Pearl might, too. She has no idea what happened to Pearl after she died, whether she found peace or whether there’s even the possibility of finding peace. Jeremy thinks that possibility has to exist. He promises he won’t let Anna be alone anymore. She gives him the necklace and sends him to meet up with Bonnie.
Elena returns to the old jail cell, where Lexi’s still working on Stefan. He taunts that she wasted her life taking care of him, and now that she’s dead, she still doesn’t have anything better to do. Elena tells Lexi they’re running out of time, but Lexi says she needs more. Elena tells her the others already have the necklace. That gives Lexi an idea. Stefan found the necklace during one of his dark periods, and when he got through it, he told her it represented hope. Stefan says it’s ironic that that symbol is about to be destroyed.
Damon runs into an invisible roadblock in the tunnels and finds himself unable to enter a cave. It’s the same kind of boundary that keeps him from entering a house when he hasn’t been invited. Mason doesn’t want to stop now, so he tells Damon to trust him, then goes deeper into the cave (which I call the No Vamps Allowed Cave).
Jeremy takes the necklace to Hex House, where Bonnie throws it in the fireplace and starts the banishment spell without saying anything to him. Sheila takes her hand and chants with her. (Music: “This Woman’s Work,” Greg Laswell covering Kate Bush) Carol sees Caroline fighting the tomb vampires in the street. The vamps suddenly disappear. Mason finds something really interesting in the cave but also disappears before he can tell Damon what it is.
Lexi seems to sense that her time is almost up. She tells Elena that the good Stefan is still inside him, and Elena can reach him. Elena says she knows what to do now. Lexi can be free. In the town square, Anna is lamenting her plan’s failure when she sees Pearl. The two of them embrace each other before disappearing together. The spell’s done and the necklace has been destroyed, but Sheila holds on a little while longer so she can tell Bonnie she’s “stronger than all of this,” and Sheila’s proud of her.
Damon has no friends and only trusts two people, Alaric and Elena, so he’s called Alaric to check out the No Vamps Allowed Cave. (I have to assume he called Elena first and she didn’t answer.) Damon thinks that if Mason can get past the fact that Damon killed him, Alaric can get over it, too. Alaric says he shouldn’t have to get over it. He was Damon’s friend, so Damon shouldn’t have done it in the first place. Damon repeats his semi-apology: “Sometimes I do things I don’t have to do.” Alaric didn’t like it the first time and he doesn’t like it now, but Damon says he didn’t mean it when he said it to Mason.
Elena decides to leave Stefan in the jail cell while she deals with other other messes in her life. He taunts her for giving up, thinking she’s finally realized what the future holds if she stays with him – she’ll have to do this detox with him again and again. Elena says she still has hope, but she can’t do anything for Stefan until he gets his back. She tells him he can fight and feel something. If he doesn’t, he’ll lose her forever: “I won’t love a ghost for the rest of my life.”
Jeremy tries to talk to Bonnie at Hex House, but she’s still mad. Matt let go of Vicki before Jeremy let go of Anna. She doesn’t want to have to listen to his excuses for that. She tells him to leave. Suddenly sparks fly up from the fire in the fireplace and the necklace reappears.
Alaric confirms that there’s something in the No Vamps Allowed Cave, though he’s not sure what it means. It’s a bunch of drawings of people and a tree.
Keep in mind: There’s a cave underneath Mystic Falls that vampires can’t enter (the No Vamps Allowed Cave).
Etc.: So what were Tyler and Rebekah doing during this episode? Think they were together?
I’ll never stop laughing at Alaric telling Damon, “We’re not friends. I don’t like you anymore.” Damon’s not invited to Alaric’s birthday party, either! And he can’t have any of the cookies Alaric’s mom sometimes puts in his lunch box!
I don’t really care about Anna at all, but I like that she and Pearl get a happy ending. Anna was lonely for a long time, and she just wanted her mom. It’s satisfying to see her finally get that. And since we never see either of them again, I’m going to pretend that they both found peace and got to go to the afterlife together.
An Eternity of Misery 