In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.
Okay, I feel like the wicked witch right now. The naysayer. The parade pisser uponer. I was working on my Sherlock recap at 8:00 PM and I decided to plug on until 8:30, before watching The Vampire Diaries, so I could fast forward through the commercials. At 8:30, I realized I needed time to get my head out of Holmes' London before returning to Mystic Falls. I started the episode at 9:00PM. In the meantime, I trawled Twitter because while I wasn't spoiled, I've been fairly certain for quite some time where this episode would take us.
And damn it, I was right. In "500 Years of Solitude," we spend an hour watching Katherine die, connecting with her humanity, appreciating her refusal to possess her own daughter's body, only to watch her end up squatting in Elena Gilbert's body by the episode's end.
For me, the worst part is that so many TVD fans I know and like find this episode moving and brave. I find it derivative and predictable. Those cameos by former characters that you loved (Klaus, Vicki, Alaric), are, to me, the height of audience manipulation. Don't get me wrong. It might play out great in the future, but in this episode it was a craptacular waste of time.
Stop the show -- I want to get off. Matt's in trouble, must be Thursday. Fanfic comes to life: Caroline bangs Klaus. St. Stefan is the saintliest saint who ever sainted. Damon's a drinker. Katherine Pierce possesses Elena Gilbert's body. What comes ? Both brothers sex her up? Gag me with... well anything that isn't ejaculated by a Salvatore.
I'll be back with the recap, ASAP. In the meantime, please grade the episode at the top of the page, and then come on over to the forum, where we're cheering, squeeing and weeping with joy (if we're everyone else)… or toying with a resignation letter (if we're Cindy, which we are, for all quantities of we which equal me).
Want more? The full recap starts right below!KATHERINE: So, back in 1490, I was living with my parents in Bulgaria, when I gave birth to a little girl. My father whisked away my newborn daughter, before I even got to hold her.
NADIA: I'm that daughter. Today, I'm at Mystic Falls Hospital. Stefan tells me my mother has probably had a heart attack, and doesn't have long. There is no way Katherine Pierce is dying of a heart attack.
KATHERINE: Right? I don't have heart attacks. I cause them.
CARDIAC MONITOR: __________ ____________
STEFAN: Nadia, I compelled the doctors to let me take her home so she's more comfortable, but she's dying. I don't think she'll survive the rest of the day.
RECAPPER: Stefan, they're currently shocking her heart back to life. When did you compel these doctors? It makes no sense that they'd have even come out to talk to you, yet, nor does it make sense that you took her to the hospital for treatment, only to compel them to let you take her home, before they've stabilized her.
STEFAN: It's...um...it's in the script.
RECAPPER: Okay, so the writers are compelling you to speak senseless lines at the wrong time, so that they can set up the KATHERINE IS DYING Drinking Game with her in the house, but still "heighten" the "tension" by playing the old, "She's coding. Clear!" hospital bullshit?
STEFAN: Script! So, yes, Katherine is toast.
NADIA: My mother will fight this.
AUDIENCE: One way or another.
DAMON: Bourbon and I are taking nice quiet nap on the Mystic Grill bar, when Jeremy and Matt come in and disturb my beauty sleep.
AUDIENCE: You've had plenty.
DAMON: Bourbon or beauty sleep?
AUDIENCE: Truthfully, both.
ELENA: Meanwhile, I'm back at Whitmore College which is a few hours, and a few minutes, away from home.
RECAPPER: Dear Editorial, stet the commas in Elena's above line, because she means it as written. When the plot dictates it, Whitmore college is a few hours away, AND when the plot dictates it, it's but a stone's throw.
BONNIE: Caroline and I wake up Elena with a breakup breakfast. I think it's tacky to celebrate that Damon dumped her, but I'm just so glad to get some screen time, I've decided to keep my opinions to myself.
CAROLINE: Hey, you can't sleep with people who've done any more evil than I have. Anyhow, Stefan calls. Elena wants to ignore the call, so I take it. We have to get back to Mystic Falls, right away. How far away is it today? Are we there yet?
RECAPPER: Let's see, Jeremy, Matt, and Damon have been at Mossy Manse long enough for Damon to grab a tray, a bottle, and a bunch of shot glasses, and for each of the guys to say a couple of lines, so today Whitmore is three minutes further than the Mystic Grill.
DAMON: I'm going to recap the rules of the game for Caroline, Bonnie and the other one, because you didn't let me get them out before the girls got here.
ELENA: The other one?
RECAPPER: I thought it would at least take them a whole scene to arrive from a college A FEW HOURS AWAY.
DAMON: Are you ever going to drop that?
RECAPPER: Give me something to sing about.
DAMON: Fine, Buffy, dance 'til you burn. Rule number 1: Think of the worst thing Katherine Pierce has ever done to you. Rule number 2: Toast to the glory of her impending death. Rule number 3: If you come across something that's worse, which you will, repeat rules one and two. Now I'm going to repeat the worst things she's done to me.
RECAPPER: I've got this. She ditched you and let you pine for 145 years. You drink. She pretended to be Elena and kissed you. You drink again, even though that is not worse than the first thing, so you've contradicted the rules to the game you made up, in your first play of the game you made up.
DAMON: It's in the script.
RECAPPER: I'd rather cover you and the rest of the cast doing improvisational theatre. Hell, at this point, I'd prefer mime.
OZ: Nobody deserves mime.
AUDIENCE: Could there be nudity?
RECAPPER: Stop that. I'm tired of smut, and the general exploitation of this cast, to be honest.
READERS: Wow, Cindy. You came back wrong.
SPIKE: You belong in the dark, with me.
RECAPPER: Wrong show, buddy.
SPIKE: I'll take anything. Besides, you didn't kick out Oz.
RECAPPER: He knows when to be quiet. Shoo. I am pretty sure in this universe, I can smudge your shoes with vervain and make you disappear.
AUDIENCE: The vervain rules are -- there are no rules.
READERS: Much like this recap, apparently.
BUFFY: It's different. He has a soul, now.
RECAPPER: Who are you even talking to, B? Never mind, either start staking these fools or get out.
BUFFY: Why are they all so good looking? Sometimes, you'll get a hot vamp or two (I, personally had two) but mostly, they give a whole new meaning to bumping uglies. Not that I... I don't... bump.
RECAPPER: Hush.
SHERLOCK: Cindy, what leads you to believe these people are vampires? The one vampire case I investigated turned out to be a jealous half-brother armed with poisonous darts. The mother was sucking the poison out of her baby's neck, not his blood. She didn't have the heart to tell the father, who misinterpreted her actions.
RECAPPER: How did you get here, so fast?
SHERLOCK: While John's on his sex holiday, I mean honeymoon, I'm leading a seminar on the science of deduction, at Whitmore College. Have you been? It's right in the back garden.
REGINA: Want me to make them all disappear?
RECAPPER: Well yes, but your magic doesn't work in Mystic Falls or, sadly, on the CW.
CARA: Me, and my crew (of which I am the newly elected leader) could teleport them out of state. Plus, same network. Maybe it's time for a crossover bonanza.
DAWN: Get out. Get. Out. GET. OUT!
RECAPPER: I take it you've watched The Tomorrow People.
DAWN: Yes, and you have my deepest sympathies. That Cara thought you'd rather see her than anyone in Mossy Manse is pretty funny, never mind the idea of you enduring a crossover.
RECAPPER: Right? Now, thanks for the assist, but you need to go, too. I'm sorry about that, readers. I really hate this episode, so my mind was wandering to shows that I still love.
FAITHFUL READERS: You don't even like The Tomorrow People.
RECAPPER: Quite right. It's the exception which proves the rule. Thinking about other shows is just a defense mechanism I employ, so I don't have to think on this one, too hard. Where the hell are we?
DAMON: You caught everyone up on the drinking game rules and then criticized them, when really, people are never fussy about drinking game rules, unless the rules don't let them drink.
JEREMY: Katherine fed me to Silas, which killed me. Also, she made me crash my car. Can I drink twice?
ELENA: Only because you played your round before the show's biggest hypocrite arrived.
TARA: You think you know what's to come, what you are. You haven't even begun.
RECAPPER: Leave. Don't make me get Warren. Tara has a point though. By episode's end, Elena has a challenger to the throne.
MATT: Vicki is dead because of Katherine.
DAMON: Let's make this more about me.
ELENA: Jeremy, you're cut off.
AUDIENCE: In this town, you should say "shut.' Someone could take "cut" the wrong way.
ELENA: If anyone's drinking to Katherine's death, it's me. She impersonated me, repeatedly, compelled Jenna to stab herself in the stomach and cut off Uncle Daddy's fingers.
JEREMY: He might have deserved that.
AUDIENCE: Poor Uncle Snark Daddy.
UNCLE JOHN'S GHOST: Occasionally, you can catch me on Once Upon A Time, where I appear as Dr. Victor Frankenstein/Dr. Whale. Bonus, Cindy doesn't hate that show.
RECAPPER: Give me time. Now skeedaddle, you.
BONNIE: Grams died trying to close the tomb Katherine wasn't in.
CAROLINE: It's Katherine's fault Tyler's werewolf curse was triggered.
ELENA: Klaus followed her to Mystic Falls, which is why we lost Jenna.
DAMON: And Alaric.
MATT: We're gonna need more booze.
RECAPPER: Oh, Pudding Pop. Send an immortal for it?
MATT: I can't. It's in the script.
RECAPPER: I have a lighter, fresh paper and spare toner cartridges. I'll write you a new one.
NADIA: No, Cindy, because I need to get Matt alone, so I can kidnap him, bury him alive, and use him as leverage against your Fellowship of the Falls, so I can save my mother.
RECAPPER: Oh, Nadia, you've done just fine without her for more than 520 years. Let it go.
CAROLINE: You guys are going all out of order. Elena says Katherine tried to kill her at least twice. I point out she did kill me, but I'm weirdly better off.
KATHERINE: Upstairs, Stefan is sitting on my bed. I ask if they're talking about me, which doesn't seem like something I'd even bother to ask. The script says I'm supposed to say I deserve everything they're saying. No way would I say that. , I move onto more important subjects, like if my hand looks wrinkled. I tell Stefan if I start to sag, anywhere, he's to jab a knife in my carotid.
RECAPPER: And yet, the show would never have the balls to do that, because perfect Stefan (who rips people apart, puts them back together and throws out teen girls' cell phones) could never do anything slightly naughty. Hell, he's not even playing the drinking game.
STEFAN: She's dying. I, for one, have compassion.
RECAPPER: You must have caught it from Elena, back when you were drinking her blood.
MATT: Can I get kidnapped now?
NADIA: Your wish is my command. I whack his cute Pudding Pop face, and knock him to the floor. The bottle in his hand shatters, yet no one in this house full of vampiric bionic hearing even flinches.
AUDIENCE: It's like the vervain rules.
RECAPPER: It's worse. The vervain rules are crazy, but they're consistent. If it splashes on your skin, it burns you. It also burns your mouth. But if it's injected into you, it calms you. If you breathe it in a vaporized form, you're weakened. The strength of vampire hearing depends on how much the writers want a vampire to overhear something. It's like the Whitmore College distance rules.
AUDIENCE: Can we start drinking, too?
RECAPPER: Not if you're a minor, or a recapper with an 8:00AM deadline.
STEFAN: Just after Damon tells the gang it might have been Katherine who burned Atlanta, I come in and tell them they're being insensitive.
WILLIAM TECUMSEH SHERMAN: And I, frankly, feel cheated.
DAMON: I remind my brother what a psycho Katherine is.
STEFAN: I grab a shot glass, and tell everyone how in 1864 Katherine compelled me to love her, seduced Damon, and got us killed. But centuries before that, she was an innocent girl who was cast out by her family, so for 500 years, she did what she did, to survive. It's to that survivor I drink, today.
RECAPPER: Who wants to survive 500 years?
DAMON: Watch this. Please, one night of sex with her and you're brainwashed.
ELENA and BONNIE: What?
CAROLINE: Um, I forgot to mention that.
NADIA: 'Sup?
DAMON: Hey, Demon Spawn. Caroline, did you tell Elena about that?
ELENA: My mind just exploded.
NADIA: I need help saving my mother. Oh, and I have Matt trapped in that old safe/Stefan's summer home. It and he are buried somewhere on the grounds. Also, I took his protect-o ring.
RECAPPER: That gets the gang's attention, so Nadia drives Elena and Stefan somewhere secluded.
NADIA: I'll free Matt when they get me a Traveler. Katherine is of a Traveler bloodline, so if a Traveler teaches her how, she can become a passenger in someone else's body.
ELENA: Why aren't I running away, or at least putting up a "No Vacancy" sign?
STEFAN: It's not in the script.
ELENA: Well, why aren't you worried about someone else being inside my body?
STEFAN: I've had some lead time to get used to the idea.
EXPOSITION FAIRY: You missed the part about how Nadia's boyfriend Gregor was a passenger in Matt.
RECAPPER: Not missed. Skipped. It's a whole different vibe.
EXPOSITION FAIRY: One of my many jobs is to highlight how the writers seeded this storyline, at the beginning of the season.
RECAPPER: No, that's one of the writers' jobs, and they already did it. Now you're overdoing it. This is midway through season 5. There are no new viewers. If there are, they can watch on Hulu or Amazon, or whatever. Just stop it.
NADIA: We finally arrive at a boarded up shack. Stefan and Elena have been bickering. I'll spare you. Elena is concerned about letting Katherine take up residence in someone else's body. Even though I'm new this season, it's clear to me whose body my mother is going to invade. I can't count on Elena remaining distracted by Stefan's sex life, so before she uses her fingers to add two and two, I lie and say Katherine is going to take up residence in me.
AUDIENCE: Strictly speaking, you're not lying, right?
RECAPPER: SPOILER -- it doesn't matter.
JEREMY: Back at Mossy Manse, Bonnie, Caroline and I are trying to find where Nadia buried Matt.
CAROLINE: I'm more concerned with gossiping about Katherine and Stefan.
JEREMY: We've all slept with bad choices.
BONNIE: No offense taken.
AUDIENCE: Really, Bonnie? Even the Germ isn't that dumb.
CAROLINE: You two? And you didn't tell me. Does Elena know? Scandalous sex. I want some.
JEREMY and BONNIE: We'll leave, so you can run into Klaus, even though he lives in an entirely different state.
JOHN LOCKE's GHOST: All right, all right. Would you believe that when I moved the island, it affected magnets under Whitmore College, and under New Orleans, such that it affected the space time continuum, when um...science magic God stuff?
RECAPPER: Oh, yes. I miss covering Lost, so much. Everything was so clear to me then.
JOHN LOCKE'S GHOST: It can't be that bad.
RECAPPER: Locke, during this episode, I find myself longing to cover anything but, even Jack shagging Bai Ling.
JOHN LOCKE'S GHOST: You poor kid. The whole gang will pray for you in Co-Exist Heaven. Boone was worried about you, so he asked me to pop in, since I still sort of owe him for getting him killed so young, and all.
RECAPPER: He ought to worry about me. It's his fault I'm here. I'm sorry, John. I shouldn't take it out you. But don't you have some heavenly boar to hunt, or something?
KATHERINE: Back at Mossy Manse, I dream about returning home, one night in 1492, to find my whole family slaughtered. You're supposed to feel sorry for me, so you'll hate me even more, later. Then Damon invades my dream, looks at my dead family and says he misses Klaus. I can't get him out of my head. Let's not belabor it.
DAMON: Not even the part where I rub in how Katherine's family's death was her fault.
SHERIFF FORBES: Katherine is awake now. I catch Damon trying to suffocate her with a pillow.
DAMON: Every awful thing I've done is linked to her. She taught me how to kill and like it.
SHERIFF FORBES: Too much paperwork.
AUDIENCE: Does she know Katherine is the one who turned Caroline?
CAROLINE: Out in the woods, I'm calling for Matt, but run into Klaus. We shag.
KLAUS: Not yet.
ELENA: Meanwhile, Nadia leads us into the shack. She blahs about Travelers, until one named Mia shows up. Nadia steals our daylight rings, grabs Mia, and Stealth Salvatores the two of them out of the shack. We are trapped. Chanting Travelers invade the shack and tear boards off some of the windows. Part of the roof falls in. Streaming sunshine blocks our movement.
KLAUS: I'm in Mystic Falls to gloat over Katerina's demise. When that doesn't interest Caroline, I taunt her about Tyler. She says he chose wrong and zoops away. I've got to meet a better class of woman.
SHERIFF FORBES: Here are some sedatives.
RECAPPER: For me?
SHERIFF FORBES: Are you still looking for Matt?
RECAPPER: Shouldn't you be, rather than protecting Katherine Fricking Pierce?
SHERIFF FORBES: Any word from Elena?
RECAPPER: ANY WORD FROM YOUR DAUGHTER, OR OH SAY, YOUR DEPUTIES?
KATHERINE: Damon broke up with Elena, because he's too bad for the little white dove. It's all my fault. Oops.
DAMON: Time to force-inject you with some sedatives courtesy of our drug delivering Sheriff, who won't let me kill at 500+ year... thing -- the thing that killed her daughter.
SHERIFF FORBES: My work here is done.
KATHERINE: I dream about the first time I saw Stefan, back in 1864. He's yummy.
EMILY BENNETT: I'm with her!
BUFFY: Kendra? Is that Kendra?
RECAPPER: Sort of, but here she's a Civil War era witch who serves evil vampires.
BUFFY: Oh, I know this one. She's a robot.
RECAPPER: Buffy, please. I'll get in touch, after, via NetFlix.
BUFFY: Am I still your girl?
RECAPPER: Always.
KATHERINE: Hey Damon, you know that show, How I Met Your Mother?
RECAPPER: Yeah, I dropped it when it got unbearable.
KATHERINE: I'm talking to Damon. Damon, do you want to hear how I met your brother?
DAMON: I'll choose Dr. Whitmore Cuts Off Slices Of My Eyes for $500, Alex.
ALEX TREBEK: Leave me out of this. Cindy hasn't watched Jeopardy in years.
RECAPPER: True story, Bro.
KATHERINE: I want to think the prophecy about the universe drawing together the doppelgängers together is absurd.
RECAPPER: Because it wasn't a frigging prophecy. It was Qetsiyah's theory, after watching history unfold. It wasn't a prophecy until the writers started making you call it one.
ANYA: Sort of like I elevated Olaf from troll to Troll God, even though I'm the one who turned him into a troll, via magic?
RECAPPER: Exactly, also, my husband saw a bunny hop through our yard earlier, so go away.
ANYA: YIKES!
THOR: That was my hammer, anyhow.
RECAPPER: I love you more than chocolate, but like Anya, you have to leave.
DAMON: I'd rather listen to them than Katherine telling me about the fateful moment she met my brother.
ELENA: Back at the shack of my captivity, the Travelers chant. Sunshine confines Stefan and me to tight quarters. Awkward. I'm sorry for snarking on your sex life earlier, Stefan. It's not my place to judge.
TRAVELER: Doesn't speak English.
STEFAN: He's draining some of our magically delicious doppelgänger blood into buckets, and we're not healing.
CAROLINE: Now I shag Klaus.
KLAUS: But not until she makes me confess that Rebekah is currently saving Matt, and she also makes me abandon my vengeance quest against Katerina.
MATT: I'm finally out of the safe, and what do you know -- there's Rebekah. You'd think I'd ask her to take out Nadia, but...
RECAPPER: I know. I know. It's not in the script.
KATHERINE: I tell Damon to go away, and then he turns into a knife-wielding Jenna.
AUDIENCE: YAY!
RECAPPER: Don't get excited. It's just Damon manipulating Katherine's dreams and the writers manipulating our hearts. We are better than this.
AUDIENCE: But at least she gets to stab Katherine.
UNCLE SNARK DADDY: No, like me, she's imaginary. So Katherine only imagines that, much like she's going to imagine me cutting off her fingers.
REGINA: Whale, our presence here distracts Cindy.
UNCLE SNARK DADDY: No, I'm really in this scene. I mean, I'm imaginary, but the recapper isn't imagining me, one character is causing another to dream about me.
ELIJAH: Enough!
KATHERINE: You're here.
DAMON: Psych!
RECAPPER: Damn it, Damon. Tease Kiki all you want, but don't do that to me.
NADIA: Shall I apply a broken neck nap?
RECAPPER: To Damon? Be my guest.
ELENA: Back at the shack, Stefan and I are done bleeding. We bond over his gratitude to Katherine, and my hatred of her. It reads weird, but it's a thing. He tells me Damon's only pushing me away because he hates himself.
STEFAN: I also remind her that she never gave up on me, so she shouldn't give up on Damon, and shouldn't let him give up on her.
ELENA: Once the Travelers get enough blood from us, our wounds close and our daylight rings magically reappear on our fingers.
MIA: Back at Mossy Manse, Nadia and I try to get Katherine to incant the spell. She won't say it though.
KATHERINE: I tell Nadia we don't have time for this. Letting my father rip her out of my arms...
RECAPPER: She wasn't in your arms.
KATHERINE: Metaphorically. Whatever. Worst moment of my life. I've had a long full life, and I've finally gotten to know my beautiful daughter. Don't waste another minute on me, Nadia. It's your turn to live. I've made selfish decisions all my life. Let me do right, for once.
NADIA: Fine. Leave me. Drift off into oblivion, but I won't sit by your side and watch you die. And for the record, Ms. Recapper, you'll see I wasn't lying to Elena.
RECAPPER: We'll revisit that before the end.
KATHERINE: I shoot myself up with more drugs.
DAMON: I was awake, but played possum to listen to the whole, touching scene.
RECAPPER: Dupe.
CAROLINE: Now's when I finally shag Klaus.
KLAUS: We have a touching and revelatory conversation.
RECAPPER: Um, yay.
KLAUS: At least cover the confession, or let Caroline.
CAROLINE: College. Life building. Plans. Future. Promise to walk away and never return and I'll be honest with you about what I really want.
KLAUS: Promise.
GEORGE MICHAEL: I want your sex.
RECAPPER: You've got to be kidding me. Send her off to New Orleans, too.
AUDIENCE: And that's Elena's Hypocrisy Queen challenger?
RECAPPER: Good Lord, you poor dears have had so much needless exposition crammed down your throats, you're starting to crave it.
STEFAN: When I return to the bedroom, Katherine is out of it, and Damon is just getting up from his broken neck nap. He gloats about taunting her all day. I shame him. He leaves. I give Katherine one of those dreamy send-offs.
ROSE: Like Damon gave to me.
READERS: Is Rose in this episode?
RECAPPER: No, but who cares?
KATHERINE: In my dreams, Stefan erases my dead parents and their blood. , my newborn is again in my arms.
RECAPPER: Again? You mean for the first time.
STEFAN: You were a 17-year-old girl, none of this is your fault.
RECAPPER: When your villain is coming clean, it's not a good time to erase any guilt she's feeling, even if some of it is misdirected.
ELENA: Is she dead?
STEFAN: Not yet, but the drugs will keep her unconscious.
UNCLE SNARK DADDY: He's not a doctor, nor does he play one on TV, but I play two, on the same show. ABC, Sundays, 8:00PM Eastern. Once Upon A Time returns March 9, with all new episodes.
DAMON: Outside, Stefan and I share a drink. He tells me to fix things with Elena, because she's the best thing that ever happened to me. I say I can't live without her, but I'm no better than Katherine. Elena will be better off without me. Don't give me that look. I'm being selfless.
RECAPPER: At exactly the wrong damned time. With body-jacking spells afoot, fueled by doppelgänger blood, and the doppelgänger you can't live without hovering over the death bed of the doppelgänger you know should die. Argh.
DAMON: Katherine Fricking Pierce has a selfless moment, and I'm not allowed to.
RECAPPER: Not right now, no.
DAMON: When I get Elena back and the whole universe freaks because the fated doppelgängers are torn apart, just remember you're the one who talked me out of doing the right thing for the universe and all mankind.
RECAPPER: I'm just talking about the fact that a lot of people went to a lot of trouble to get that blood to do a spell, and you're buying that Katherine isn't going to cast it..
STEFAN: I think he's talking to me.
RECAPPER: Fucking script.
CAROLINE: I'm picking leaves out of my hair, so you will remember I shagged Klaus.
MATT: Whatever. Bonnie, are you going to be able to feel Katherine's death?
BONNIE: Um, maybe?
MATT: Who else do you see over there?
BONNIE: My Grams. Vicki. I just don't talk about it, because it's...
VICKI: ...Depressing as Hell.
BONNIE: She's here! Let's get all emotional.
RECAPPER: Pass.
BONNIE: She's here. She says she loves you. She says other stuff I don't bother saying, but really I would. It's just the script.
MATT: What am I missing?
TYLER: Me?
RECAPPER: I'm behind on The Originals. Did Klaus kill him off?
AUDIENCE: No, he's back to be further ruined.
CAROLINE: I hope he can't smell Klaus on me.
BUFFY: A vampire/werewolf hybrid? Good luck with that, sister.
TYLER: Matt, Rebekah says to tell you I'm her parting gift.
STEFAN: We've gone through four bottles of booze today.
ALARIC: Will someone tell these idiots to lay off the booze? Qetsiyah had to create yet another, other side, to house my liver.
JEREMY: Alaric?
RECAPPER: You can see and hear Alaric, but not Vicki, with whom you slept?
MATT DAVIES: Cough.
DAMON: Ric's here?
JEREMY: I thought you moved on to find peace, or something.
ALARIC: Do you honestly think I'd leave Damon in charge and never look back?
RECAPPER: Ric, maybe you should be looking back at ELENA and KATHERINE, who is in possession of a body-jacking spell.
DAMON: He's talking about me, isn't he?
JEREMY: He says you're a dick.
RECAPPER: You're all dicks. Even the girls.
DAMON: Cheers, buddy.
ALARIC: Cheers.
BONNIE: Katherine!
DAMON: Ding dong. Does that mean the witch is dead?
KATHERINE: No. It's too soon. I can't. My spirit poofs from the parlor, back to my body, which is still in my death bed.
ELENA: Wow, you really don't want to die.
RECAPPER: Elena, meet Katherine Pierce. Like you have tens of times over the past five seasons.
KATHERINE: I have unfinished business.
ELENA: Me, too. I have a speech.
BUFFY: After a decade of self-reflection, I've decided speeches aren't the way to go. Sorry, Cindy, I just had to say something.
RECAPPER: I'll allow it.
KATHERINE: You just want to say, "Die, bitch."
ELENA: Well, yeah, but also, I forgive you. You weren't born evil. Life made you that way. You lost everyone way too young. Sounds familiar.
KATHERINE: Let's skip the "We're not so different," speech.
RECAPPER: Seconded!
ELENA: I'll save it for the funeral we won't have for you. I just want to get the forgiveness part out, because it's part of me I don't want to lose, because your death is really all about me.
KATHERINE: It's going to be. Here, bitch. Have a passenger, thanks to the Traveler spell you knew I was going to cast. Now let me in.
CORDELIA: I exhibit no surprise.
KATHERINE IN ELENA: Are you going to come up with a mashup name for me, like Kalena or something, to show I'm in Elena's body.
RECAPPER: Only if I have to, and this week, I don't.
TELEPHONE: *Ring*
ELENA: Hello?
MIA: Vyjit.
RECAPPER: Let's trust the closed-captions on that spelling.
NADIA: Hello, are you there?
KATHERINE-in-ELENA: I'm here.
NADIA: Talk to me, did it work?
RECAPPER: I knew you were lying.
KATHERINE: Of course it worked. I'm Katherine Pierce. I survived. I'll see you soon. I've got to look in the mirror, now. And say in a sweet voice, "Hi. I'm Elena Gilbert."
FAITH: If she starts saying, "That would be wrong," I hope Joss sues.
RECAPPER: Word. On the plus side, I've come up with the perfect name for Katherine-in-Elena.
KATHERINE: Great. What is it?
RECAPPER: Fuffy.
ACE: This is my verse, hello.
I'll be back with coverage of "The Devil Inside." In the meantime, please grade the episode at the top of the page, and then come on over to the forum, where, unlike me, not everyone is a miserable bitch.