Remember when the witches at the Salvatore School worked together to make a new ascendant and then sent the mora miserium to the prison world? The zombie eye that the Necromancer keeps using to spy on the school was watching them. Now the Necromancer and Chad know that the mora miserium, which the Necromancer wanted to get dark magic from, is gone. Chad thinks it’s touching how the girls put aside their differences to work together. He tells the Necromancer, who’s throwing one of his tantrums, to be more positive. There has to be something else at the school that they can use.
With the qareen gone, it’s time for another Malivore monster to pop up. (Music: “Come and Get Your Love,” Motor Sales) The new one has feathered wings and a bow and arrows. He goes into a suburban neighborhood and starts shooting people, who immediately feel the effects of the arrows. Two people make out, a mailman cuddles a dog, and a sheriff’s deputy develops an attraction to a guy he pulled over. Pleased with his work, the monster – whom we can reasonably assume to be Cupid – heads to the Salvatore School.
Landon thinks that since he’s a phoenix, he should have the ability to fly, so he’s trying to trigger it by jumping up and down on a trampoline, telling himself, “Fly! Fly!” You may be surprised to know that it’s not working. Wade suggests that he flap his arms. He asks why this is so important to Landon. No one there can fly – who cares if Landon can’t? Landon notes that he was the one person who believed in Wade yesterday, so he’d appreciate it if Wade repaid the favor. Then he asks if Wade knows how he can get a key to the roof of the school. Nope! Shut it down! That’s a horrible idea. As Landon packs up the trampoline, he sees Cupid flying over the campus.
Dorian asks Emma to cancel her flight (heh, nice segue) and help him run the school while Alaric is…wherever he is. Emma says Caroline needs her more. Dorian suggests that Caroline get Bonnie to help her instead. Listen, Bonnie spent years dropping everything for her friends at a moment’s notice. Leave Bonnie alone. Emma doesn’t think it’s a good idea for her and Dorian to spend too much time together, but Dorian wants her help interpreting the Sphinx’s prophecy.
“The sins of the father are visited upon the daughters here…and not here” must be a reference to the prison world. Emma isn’t sure, since prophecies are vague, like horoscopes, so they can be applied to multiple situations. Dorian doesn’t think the next line sounds vague: “A new hero rises but can be felled by the golden arrow.” She advises him to keep any new heroes from rising until she comes back. Dorian says he would feel better if she would stay with him. Emma apologizes and tells him she has to go. But before she can, they both get hit with arrows. Suddenly Emma’s all for staying with Dorian.
Hope has locked Alyssa up in the basement and is trying to get her to spill where the ascendant is. It’s not working – Hope did a spell to force Alyssa to tell the truth, but Alyssa took a potion to counteract the spell. She doesn’t have any intention of helping Hope bring back the Saltzmans just so Hope can be the hero once again. This isn’t about her. Hope asks where the ascendant is, but Alyssa refuses to tell her.
M.G. joins Kaleb, who’s out for a run in the woods, to try to get his permission to ask out Kym. Kaleb can’t really argue that M.G. wouldn’t be a good boyfriend, so he agrees to help him plan a great first date. He tells M.G. that Kym loves pool parties, chocolate-covered strawberries, and frosé. Cupid aims his bow and arrow at Kaleb after M.G. leaves, but Landon attacks, shouting, “Phoenix powers, activate!” He’s able to save Kaleb from getting shot, but not himself. Hope, however, is right there to grab the arrow in midair.
Hope and Landon take Cupid to the gym, where Hope cuts off his wings. She threatens to cut off something that won’t grow back if he doesn’t tell them why he’s there. Cupid says he doesn’t serve Malivore – he serves “the highest power of all, love.” His arrows are harmless love arrows. They help people express the love they already feel.
Hope asks why Landon didn’t come get her when he encountered Cupid. Cupid laughs over Landon being such a pathetic “hero.” He finds Hope pretty impressive, though. She’s unhappy about Landon’s attempts to get himself to fly. If he keeps trying to be the hero, one day she’ll have to choose between saving him and stopping something horrible from happening.
She looks through Cupid’s arrows, which are specified for different types of love. She tells Landon to take care of the Cupid problem (“hey, hey – what Cupid problem?” Cupid title-drops) by babysitting him. If Cupid wants to prove that he’s not a bad guy, he can give Hope an arrow to melt Alyssa’s heart. Hope takes that arrow to the basement and stabs it into Alyssa’s stomach. Alyssa gets giggly and admits that she has a crush.
M.G. gets Kym for their date, but she’s nervous around pools, thanks to a near-drowning experience when Kaleb pushed her in one as a kid. M.G. quickly guesses that she also isn’t a fan of chocolate-covered strawberries (two things she’s allergic to) and frosé (she’s never had it). Kaleb, 1; M.G., 0.
Hope asks Kym for help researching Cupid. Kym’s thrilled (seems she’s a big mythology geek) and asks M.G. for a rain check. He chastises Hope for ruining his date, but she says that’s perfect. She needs his help, though not with Cupid. She sends him to complete his pool date with Alyssa instead of Kym.
Landon looks through Cupid’s arrows, making Cupid think he’s looking for something to fix his relationship issues. Landon asks if Cupid, a god, was ever in love with a mortal. Cupid says he tries to keep his work life and personal life separate. Landon confides that Hope “wears the pants” in their relationship. “Have you tried both not wearing pants?” Cupid asks.
M.G. keeps Alyssa occupied while Hope searches their room for the ascendant. A spell that simulates a listening device allows Hope and M.G. to communicate without the phones the school won’t let the students have. She notices that Alyssa has a bunch of pictures of French bulldogs and advises M.G. to use that as a topic of conversation. He’s not sure how to bring that up without seeming weird. Well, if you were allowed to have a phone, you could just watch videos of puppies together for hours.
M.G. decides Hope is messing up his game and effectively deactivates his listening device. Speaking of games, he suggests that he and Alyssa play one. It’s called Where Would You Hide a Special Object? Alyssa isn’t interested and instead suggests a game called Let’s Make Out. Kaleb jogs by and sees M.G. kissing a girl who is definitely not Kym.
Landon is using Cupid as a therapist, complaining about how Hope treats him like he’s fragile. He hasn’t noticed that Cupid’s wings have grown back. Cupid tells him to stick Hope with an arrow that inspires hero worship. Landon declines, since he wants them to have equal feelings for each other, and for Hope’s feelings to be real. Cupid promises that the arrows bring out real love. Landon clarifies that he wants to earn it.
With his wings back, Cupid decides he can leave, and since the barrier spell Hope used to keep him in the gym doesn’t extend to the ceiling, he just flies straight up. Landon tries to activate his own flying abilities, but he still doesn’t have any luck. He ends up gathering the Super Squad…sort of. Most of the real members are away or busy, so Landon was only able to get Jed, Wade, Pedro, and a witch named Druscilla. Even though they’re not heroes individually, Landon thinks that together, they comprise “one relatively capable hero.” Wade wonders if this is supposed to be a motivational speech.
It gets more motivational when Landon rallies his classmates to step up and show their peers and “mysteriously absent authority figures” who they are. They’ll charge straight into their destiny, which, at least for today, is getting Cupid back before Hope finds out that he’s gone. Jed’s on board, but he thinks his destiny is somewhere else. He leaves to find her.
The others agree to help Landon, as long as Pedro’s back by snack time and Druscilla can keep Cupid’s wings after using them for a locator spell. Kaleb comes in, saying he was looking for the Super Squad meeting. He’s underwhelmed by the turnout, but he has Kym’s research and is ready to go find Cupid. Pedro calls shotgun.
M.G. and Alyssa have moved to a hot tub, and she’s ready to make things a little more intimate. He draws the line at getting physical, no matter how attractive she is. He admits that he only did all this to get her to tell him where the ascendant is. Alyssa admires his honesty and agrees to take him to it.
Kaleb drives Pedro to the Mystic Tap in his new Corvette. Landon, Wade, and Druscilla arrive moments later on scooters. If the Super Squad wants to travel together, they’ll need to get a car that’s not a two-seater. Landon’s ticked that Pedro called shotgun and got a ride. Anyway, they all go inside to try to intercept Cupid before a meeting of Mystic Falls’ Lonely Hearts Club. They’re too late to save a bartender whose heart he’s in the process of eating. Druscilla can’t handle the gore and runs out. Wade throws up, but fortunately, it’s just fairy dust.
So why haven’t Emma and Dorian done anything to help the students with their Cupid problem? Because those arrows he shot them with have inspired them to go to City Hall and get married. Jed crashes the ceremony to announce his love for Emma. He asks her to marry him instead and make him “the happiest wolf in the pack.” Dorian takes off his jacket, ready to fight for his fiancée.
Landon fires arrows at Cupid, since apparently he can be defeated by just one of them. But Landon’s not very good at archery, and it doesn’t help that Cupid can fly around, making him a moving target. Cupid snags one of the arrows, blind love, and says it makes victims “nice and plump for the picking.” He throws it at Pedro, but Kaleb zooms him out of the way. It hits Wade instead.
Hope inevitably arrives to save the day. Kaleb tells her that the arrows are Cupid’s weakness, so she levitates them all and fires them into him. She leaves angrily, telling Landon they’ll discuss this later. Wade stumbles around, blind from the arrow, even though the magic should have worn off after Cupid died. Kaleb realizes that his body’s gone, despite all the arrows Hope fired into him.
Alyssa gives M.G. the ascendant, which she hid with a cloaking spell. She thinks Lizzie is the girl who’s standing in the way of them being together. M.G. says he’s over her, which Alyssa doesn’t buy, since he’s chased after Lizzie for years. M.G. notes that Alyssa was just with Jed. She calls him a “booty howl.” M.G.’s the kind of guy someone could be with forever. He says that’s his “natural vampire smolder” and he’ll tone it down. As Alyssa moves in on him, he blurts out that he’s interested in someone new. She sadly realizes that he was never going to choose her. She offers him the ascendant anyway, then drops it so it breaks.
Back at the Mystic Tap, the Super Squad (B team) wonders how all the lore about Cupid turned out to be wrong. Kaleb realizes that they might have the wrong monster instead. Cupid had siblings, the Erotes. They each represented a different type of love and had different weaknesses. So now the Super Squad has to figure out which of the seven siblings they’re dealing with.
Hope’s upset to see that the ascendant is broken. This is exactly why she does everything herself. M.G.’s like, “You’re welcome for manipulating Alyssa and hurting her feelings, by the way.” She’s obsessed with him, and not the way Hope wanted her to be. Obsession isn’t the same as love. Hope sends M.G. to Kym, since Alyssa will likely go after her, and stays back to try to salvage the ascendant. She hears a noise nearby and doesn’t realize until there’s an arrow in her stomach that Cupid is outside the window.
Kaleb finds Kym in the library and tells her that not-Cupid is causing trouble. M.G. comes in next and tries to whisk Kym away to safety. Kaleb calls him out for making out with Alyssa and won’t listen when he tries to explain what happened. Alyssa comes in just then with a battle axe and does a spell to make M.G. and Kaleb move in slow motion when they try to zoom at her. That leaves her a clear path to Kym.
Not-Cupid tells Hope that he’s Cupid’s brother, Pothos. The arrow he hit her with, burning love, will burn her from the inside out. Once she’s turned to ash, he’ll eat her heart. Landon runs in and tells Pothos to eat him instead. Ooh, not as cool as you think, Landon. Pothos has no interest in his heart, since he’s a weakling. Landon stabs himself with an arrow to try to prove that he’s not.
Kym asks Alyssa if they can talk through their issues like the mature women they are. No, Alyssa would rather swing around her axe and complain that M.G. fell for a human instead of her (“like, have standards, M.G.”). Kym says that she and M.G. haven’t even gone on a date, so if Alyssa wants to go for him, she’s free to. Alyssa tells Kym that M.G. wants her. Kym’s able to kick away the axe, but Alyssa picks up a stake instead. She decides that if she can’t have M.G., no one can. Kym knocks Alyssa out with a book before she can stake M.G. This ends the slow-motion spell for Kaleb and M.G.
Upstairs, Pothos is a little impressed that Landon stuck himself with the epic love arrow. Landon says his heart is more full of love for Hope than any Pothos has ever seen. Pothos notes that he had a long list of complaints earlier. Landon replies that that doesn’t matter. He and Hope have more love for each other than he ever thought he would find, or than he ever thought was possible to have. The only problem with their relationship is that he doesn’t know why Hope chose him.
Pothos says that’s the arrow talking, but Landon replies that he doesn’t feel any different than he did before. He doesn’t want to live without Hope, so if Pothos is going to kill her, he’ll need to kill Landon, too. Pothos is fine with that, and he reaches a fist inside Landon to pull out his heart. Hope cries out in protest, I guess forgetting that he’s a phoenix and will resurrect. Pothos turns to her as he takes a bite out of Landon’s heart. But before he can take more than a couple of steps toward Hope, he collapses, choking. He tells her that Landon’s smarter than he looks, then dies.
Once Landon has resurrected in his bathtub, Hope confirms that his plan (which she thought was ridiculous) worked. He explains that since he didn’t know which of the Erotes they were dealing with, he ate all of their weaknesses, like sheep’s brains, hemlock, and molten silver. That way, one of them would do the trick. Hope is flattered that Landon would go through so much to save her. She turns on the shower so he can clean up, and they end up making out under the water.
Unlike those two love birds, Kym isn’t ending her day in a good mood. She’s not up for all the scary aspects of the Salvatore School, so she’s leaving. M.G. is sad to see her go, but he gets it. They agree to stay in touch. Kaleb takes Alyssa a sandwich (she’s back in the basement) and urges her to tell the Super Squad how to bring back the Saltzmans. She admits that she doesn’t know how. He tells her to get comfortable, since she’s not leaving her cell any time soon. Also, he’s not pleased about what happened with M.G. and Kym, and he advises her to find a new crush. Alyssa’s like, “Done. How YOU doin’?”
Dorian and Emma return to the school, revealing that the effects of the arrow didn’t wear off before they went through with their wedding. They wonder if Pothos intended to distract everyone or if it was the outcome of another plan. Wade, who’s student security supervisor, tells them there was a breach in the protection spell around the school. Someone broke into the armory.
It was the Necromancer and Chad, who have taken their stolen goods, as well as Pothos’ body, to the Salvatore crypt. Chad spots a golden arrow, which Pothos said he wanted in exchange for distracting the students. The Necromancer is quite pleased.
With Pothos taken care of, now Hope can go back to finding a way to bring back the Saltzmans. She saw today that Landon can handle himself, so she invites him to help out. He promises that they won’t give up until they get the Saltzmans back. She asks if he meant it when he said he didn’t know why she picked him. He admits that he feels that way sometimes.
Hope shows him something she wrote in her journal about him when she got back from Malivore. It says that Landon is patient and kind and a bunch of things she never was. Even if she only gets to hold on to his memory, she’ll survive. They make out until Hope realizes that they’re floating a few feet off the ground. Landon finally figured out how to fly.
Etc.: I certainly hope all the shots of Alyssa in the pool in a red bikini are meant as a commentary on movies with that kind of unnecessary sexualization and aren’t intended to sexualize a teenager.
I’ve said it before and Landon brings it up again: There is a serious lack of adult supervision at this school.
There are two cute details I love in this episode: 1) Kaleb covers Pedro’s eyes when they walk in on Pothos killing the bartender. 2) The sheriff’s deputy and the guy he pulled over and is now in love with are at City Hall at the same time as Dorian and Emma, and when Jed declares his love for Emma, the deputy puts his hand over his heart like he’s going, “Aww, how sweet.”
I like the idea of someone on the show deciding that when Wade throws up, it’s fairy dust.
An Eternity of Misery 