Legacies (CW)

For someone who loves The Vampire Diaries as much as I do, I approach any spin-off with an equal amount of excitement and fear, particularly a spin-off that takes us back to the town where Elena first met the Salvatore brothers, and the house that holds so, so many memories. (Damon and Vicki’s dance party! Countless “I love yous!”) But the goal of a spin-off is always to enrich the established world while building its own identity, and I’m happy to report that Legacies does exactly that. As much as I loved every mention of the characters and the town that I know and love, I walked away from this premiere feeling as if Legacies stood on its own. It wasn’t trying to be The Vampire Diaries, and it wasn’t trying to be The Originals. It was trying — and succeeding — at creating a fresh and exciting world filled with new mysteries and yes, a few callbacks. (But not enough to pull you out of the moment.) So without further ado, let me either welcome you — or welcome you back — to Mystic Falls.

The episode starts with the familiar voice of Hope Mikaelson. She’s a student at the Salvatore School for the Young and Gifted, and tonight, she and her headmaster, TVD‘s Alaric Saltzman, are off to find a new recruit. That business takes them to Atlanta, where a young guy named Rafael is meeting his foster parents at a Catholic church to confess his sins after he apparently threw a lawn mower through their patio doors. His foster brother Landon — whom Originals fans will recognize — is there with him but is asked to wait outside. It turns out, this is less of a confession and more of an exorcism. Rafael’s foster parents think he’s possessed, but really, he’s just a werewolf. And tonight is his first transition under the full moon.

Alaric and Hope show up just in time to stop the priest, knock out the parents — all of which Hope does with magic — and chain Rafael up before he completes his transition. And once that’s taken care of, Rafael and a very confused Landon return to Virginia with Ric and Hope.

While Lizzie and Josie Saltzman — the twin daughters of Alaric and Caroline Forbes (who’s MIA) — give Rafael a tour of the Salvatore School, Ric and Hope have a chat with Landon. Ric gives him the rundown: The Salvatore School is a school for the supernatural, but the citizens of Mystic Falls think it’s a private school for the rich and troubled, and they want to keep it that way. As Ric tells him, “I used to have a speech prepared, carefully unpeeling the layers of mystical history, but it turns out most people have read Harry Potter and are actually cool with me skipping the tee up.” Although, unlike Harry Potter, this school has a multitude of supernatural creatures, from witches to vampires to werewolves.

As for what they need from Landon, Ric wants to know who Rafael killed recently. See, the werewolf gene isn’t activated until you kill someone, so if Rafael transitioned, well, you can figure it out. And Ric needs to make sure they’re not about to accept a cold-blooded killer into their school. Landon assures them that Rafael is no killer. About a month ago, he was driving with his girlfriend when they got into a car accident. Rafael’s girlfriend didn’t make it.

With that figured out, Ric brings in MG, his vampire student aid, to compel Landon and erase his memory of the school. But when the compulsion doesn’t work, Landon is taken to the cellar, where Hope explains that they think Landon has ingested vervain. Sheriff Matt Donovan (!!!) sometimes slips it into the coffee at the gas station that they stopped at earlier in the day. Vervain prevents vampire compulsion, so until it passes out of Landon’s system — which will take approximately 24 hours — he has to hang out in the “werewolf transition space,” which is essentially a jail cell.

While all of that is going on, the Saltzman twins show Rafael everything from what classes are offered at the school to the sport of choice: Wickery, a game that Caroline and Ric made up when their daughters were 10. As Lizzie puts it, “Alyssa Chang made a broom fly in physics last year but Rick Rogers fell 30 feet during practice so real-life quidditch remains an elusive pipe dream.” Sitting in the stands, Josie hangs out with MG — who clearly has a thing for Lizzie — while Lizzie puts her foot in her mouth with Rafael, something she definitely inherited from her mom. Lizzie tries to offer her condolences about Raf’s girlfriend, but when she says the wrong thing, he ends up walking away. And that leads us to, as Josie calls it, a “clean-up on aisle L.”

Just as Ric is in the middle of sparring with Hope — something he used to do with Elena — and trying to convince her to be more social, Josie gets him to check on her sister. As for Lizzie, she’s in the middle of a witchy temper tantrum that’s completely destroying the school’s kitchen. However, I will say that Jenny Boyd’s delivery of “Hi daddy” when Alaric walks in — which he follows with a “Hey baby” — is my favorite part of this episode.

Ric tries to get Lizzie to meditate with him because, as he tells her, her “biological mother’s crazy ass witch ancestors left you with a legacy of darkness that you have to work through.” (For those of you that didn’t watch TVD, Caroline Forbes is not their biological mother. Their biological mother was named Jo, and she was a member of the Gemini coven, which I’m sure we’ll learn much more about in this show.) Lizzie, cutting to the core theme of this show, tells her father, “I don’t ever want to hurt anybody,” and her dad assures her that’s why they opened this school, so that young supernatural beings could learn control before they enter the real world. As for why Lizzie hates Hope, she explains that she’s tried to be friends with her over the years, but Hope’s experienced a lot of loss in her life and isn’t exactly looking to let anyone in.

Hope does, however, seem to like Landon. She pays him a visit when she can’t sleep and the two of them talk about the day they danced, which happened roughly two years ago (and on The Originals). She explains that she needs to keep her distance from him because she can be dangerous to people, a fact that results in her feeling restless. She leaves Landon and asks Alaric for permission to run the woods as a wolf — oh yeah, she’s a wolf too — and he tells her to steer clear of the “secret party” that he’s going to break up in 10 minutes.

Speaking of that party, Josie uses magic to break Landon out of his cell so that he and Rafael can have some fun, but when Landon sees how wonderfully Raf is fitting into his new environment, he decides to leave his foster brother behind and try and make a break for it. Meanwhile, Raf is bonding with Josie. The two clearly share a connection as he tells her about his ex-girlfriend, but she, ever the good sister, encourages him to give Lizzie another chance.

As for Rafael, he doesn’t make it very far before Hope tackles him. And seeing as how she ran after him in her wolf form, she has some explaining to do. So, she takes him to the Stefan Salvatore Memorial Library — R.I.P. Stef! — and explains to him that she’s the daughter of Klaus Mikaelson, one of the world’s original vampires, and a werewolf alpha, both of whom are now dead. Combine her parents with her witch grandmother, and that makes hope a hybrid of three creatures, or a tribid if you will. She is the only one of her kind.

Using her powers, Hope shows Landon her memory of the day that they danced in the town square. Mostly, she shows him that she was the one who got revenge on the guy who’d bullied Landon when he was working at the Mystic Grill.

Taking Landon back to his cell, she once again uses her magic to make the ceiling look like the night sky in the hopes that it will help Landon — who’s not good with small spaces considering he was locked in closets as a kid — sleep. Realizing he won’t remember any of this come tomorrow, he decides to go for it: He pulls her in for a kiss.

But not everyone’s night ends so perfectly. After the party, Penelope, who’s Josie’s ex, tempts MG with a good time in the kitchen. She wants him to drink from her neck — which is not allowed — and he nearly does. The two make out, but before he can take a bite, Josie catches them, which prompts her to end her night in Lizzie’s bed with a sisterly chat. Lizzie tells her that she should find a new crush to focus on, but considering that Lizzie also announces that SHE is setting her sights on Rafael, things could get complicated.

The next morning, Landon asks Alaric if he can stay. He doesn’t have a home anymore, and he could work at the school. But Ric wants to make one thing clear: His students are predatory creatures, and it is not safe for a human (other than Ric) to be here. So, MG compels Landon, and he says his goodbye to Rafael … but here’s the thing: Dorian discovers that one of the supernatural artifacts — a knife — is missing from the library. And when they realize that Landon never went home, which is what he was compelled to do, Ric tells Hope that this can only mean one thing: If he can’t be compelled, then Landon must be a supernatural being.

Alaric enlists all of the students to help find Landon and the knife that he stole, and when Hope witnesses an angry Josie set Penelope’s arm on fire, she sees a “kindred spirit in revenge.” Hope asks Josie to use dark magic with her in order to track Landon, and it works: They can see him sitting on a bus when the knife starts glowing red.

Cut to Matt Donovan welcoming Ric and Hope to the crime scene. It seems the local police think that whatever happened on the bus was a chemical spill, but it’s up to them to figure out what that knife really did. As they walk onto the bus, they find nothing but charred corpses, and Landon is nowhere to be found. As Hope’s voiceover says, “Turns out Landon isn’t the hero of my story at all, but when I hunt him down, I’m going to be the villain of his.” And THAT is the line that gives me chills every time I see this episode.

In one hour, Legacies has me fully invested in what feels like a brand new show that has the added bonus of using nostalgia when it wants. In other words, if a compelling story is the sundae then nostalgia is the cherry on top.

Legacies Recap: Let's Talk About the 'Stuff That's Not Supposed to Exist'
By Andy Swift / November 1 2018, 6:59 PM PST

We all have our dragons to slay in life — some more literal than others, as seen on Thursday’s Legacies. With Rafael by their side, because he’s apparently as hot-headed as he is regular-hot, Alaric and Hope went hunting for Landon “Must be Addressed by His Full Name at All Times” Kirby, discovering something even more dangerous (and scaley) in the process.

Locating Landon Kirby actually turned out to be the easiest part of the group’s mission; the brooding fugitive was hiding in a forest shack full of contraband, all of which he “doesn’t remember” stealing. (Sure, Jan.) But the situation became a little more complicated when a fire-breathing witch arrived on the scene looking for the knife. You know, the one Landon Kirby stole and lied about “losing.” (Is anyone else starting to feel like this guy is more trouble than he’s worth?)

Initially believed to be a “pyromancer,” the aforementioned fire-breathing witch eventually revealed herself to be a full-blown dragon — and she wasn’t going to slay herself. In lieu of “courage and a sword,” which is apparently the preferred method of dragon disposal in the Vampire Diaries-verse, Hope and the dagger would have to suffice… which they did not. And after Alaric was done cleaning up Hope’s mess, he called her out for bringing a death spell on their mission, one she was thinking of using on Landon Kirby.

“This hatred, this vengeance — it’s your father,” Alaric told Hope, warning that further use of black magic could very well destroy her. Fortunately, she won’t have to worry about using any more of it on Landon Kirby; while Hope and Alaric were busy fighting the dragon, he and Rafael took off. Again. And the whole experience clearly took a toll on Alaric, who ended the episode by wondering how he can continue protecting the students from “stuff that’s not supposed to exist.” Speaking of which… is that a gargoyle?

While their father was busy slaying dragons in the forest, Lizzie and Josie faced off against equally fearsome creatures: townies. Thursday’s episode marked the annual football game between the Salvatore Boarding School students and the god-awful swamp teens of Mystic Falls. Seriously, these kids are garbage. (Then again, Tyler Lockwood wasn’t exactly a peach in TVD‘s early days, either.)

The plan, as always, was to let the townies win and avoid raising suspicion about the Salvatore school, but that plan changed when a particularly nasty piece of work named Dana made a comment to Lizzie about being off her meds. Despite Josie’s strong objections, everyone started using their powers, narrowing the gap between scores considerably. But Josie was still determined to lose, using magic to sabotage Kaleb’s potentially game-winning catch, even after her fellow supernaturals agreed to stop using their powers.

But even though the Stallions lost, Lizzie still got to punch Dana in the face — while serving up a callback to TVD‘s “Not now, Dana!” — so it was like they won. Josie also came clean to Lizzie about throwing the game and doing black magic with Hope, a confession that brought them a little closer together. So, you know, it was also a win for sisterhood.

Also worth discussing…

* Are we supposed to dislike Penelope? Between her dialogue in the premiere (“I’m an equal-opportunity evil temptress”) and in this week’s episode (“The next time you burn your ex’s hair off, make sure she can’t work a lob”), I’m kind of loving her. She keeps things interesting.

* That said, I’m concerned about Penelope’s reason(s) for helping MG win over Lizzie. I can’t help but feel like it’s part of a larger revenge plan against Josie; as we learned this week when Lizzie puked black goop after Josie did black magic, their connection is strong.

* This episode had quite a few nods to both TVD and The Originals, but this shot was easily my favorite:

* How do we feel about that dragon? I knew Legacies would be introducing new creatures into the franchise, but I wasn’t expecting a literal flying, fire-breathing beast. I figured that “pyromancer” was as far as we’d go. I welcome the surprise, but I’m curious about what’s next. (I mean, when you start with a dragon, the possibilities are pretty much endless, right?)

Hope Mikaelson, a student at the Salvatore School for the Young and Gifted, assists her headmaster Alaric Saltzman in recruiting werewolf Rafael to the school. In the process, Hope runs into her old friend Landon, who is also Rafael's foster brother, but since the school for the supernatural is deemed to be too dangerous for humans, Landon is turned away. When student vampire M. G. fails to compel Landon to forget his knowledge of the supernatural, it is assumed that Landon has injested vervain and he is locked up until it can clear his system. Hope visits Landon in his cell while Alaric's daughters Josie and Lizzie give Rafael a tour of the school. Hope tells Landon the truth about her supernatural origins and, knowing that his mind will be erased, he kisses her. Once Landon leaves, it is revealed that the compulsion has still not worked and that Landon stole a knife from the school. Hope enlists Josie to help her locate the knife and Landon. Landon's bus explodes and as Sheriff Matt Donovan evaluates the crime scene, Alaric deduces that Landon, who is missing, must be some kind of supernatural being. Hope vows to track him down.

After using black magic to find Landon, Hope is forced to see the guidance counselor, but covers for Josie. Busy searching for Landon with Hope and Rafael, Alaric is unable to attend the flag football game against Mystic Falls High and orders the students to lose the game to retain the school's cover. The search uncovers another survivor of the bus explosion and while Alaric gets her to safety, Hope and Rafael find Landon, who swears he is not responsible for the bus, which Alaric corroborates when the woman starts breathing fire. Alaric initially believes her to be a pyromancer, but she is later revealed to be a dragon. Landon denies any memory of taking the knife and says that he lost it, but the woman tries to get it from him. Tired of being bullied by the other team, the students start using their powers, but Josie sabotages them to ensure their loss. After shifting into its full form, Hope takes down the dragon with black magic and Alaric kills it with the knife before scolding Hope. Meanwhile, Rafael and Landon split, but Landon leaves Hope a note apologizing for everything.

Alaric assigns the students community service as punishment for the fight that broke out after the game, which Lizzie blames Josie and Alaric for. Hope is also there for using black magic, and starts to bond with Josie. After confronting Alaric, Lizzie is reassigned to the gardens, where she is scratched by a gargoyle and left paralyzed. Josie senses that something is wrong with Lizzie and she and Hope return to the school. Rafael and Landon try to make it on their own in the woods, with Rafael using his powers to make money, but Landon shields him from a threatening message on one of the bills. Alaric discovers that the gargoyle is the protector of the knife Landon stole, but only from supernatural creatures, meaning that it will not hurt humans. Hope and Josie combine their powers to make the gargoyle explode. Jeremy Gilbert saves Rafael and Landon from a werewolf hunter and brings them back to the school. Hope and Landon see one another, but Hope walks away without saying a word. Meanwhile, Mystic Falls students Dana, Sasha, and Connor plan to deface the Salvatore School, but are attacked by an unseen being.

After Dana and Sasha are reported missing, Alaric sends some students undercover to Mystic Falls High to gather intel. Looking to prove his worth with his knowledge of the school, Landon accompanies them to Hope's annoyance. Alaric and Matt discover Dana's body, but it disappears when they look away. M.G. reveals that fellow vampire student Kaleb has been feeding on Dana and other humans, making the others suspect that Kaleb is responsible for the girls' disappearance, which Kaleb denies. Soon after Dana emerges from the woods and is met by the Salvatore students, she begins puking violently and ultimately dies. Josie helps Rafael calm down after being harassed by the werewolf pack. They discover Sasha trapped in a web which they get trapped in as well. Josie frees them by siphoning magic from Rafael's kiss. Josie, Hope, and Lizzie fight the shape-shifting arachnid together and Josie encourages Alaric to add offensive magic to the curriculum. Rafael is accepted into the pack and Matt confronts Kaleb about him feeding on humans, but Alaric decides to handle it internally. Alaric calls his associate Dorian to tell him it's safe to return with the knife, but Dorian is confronted by another creature.

Alaric agrees to hold elections for a student honor council consisting of one representative from each supernatural faction before leaving to meet with Dorian. Rafael seeks out each of the front-runners for confirmation that they will let Landon stay at the school. Lizzie and M.G. agree, but Jed refuses. Rafael challenges him for the title of alpha and wins, which also earns him the votes to be the werewolf representative. Josie is elected for the witches thanks to her ex Penelope's campaigning, and Kaleb is elected for the vampires. Alaric and Dorian catch a dryad, who tells them that she is looking for her lover, a vampire named Oliver. They find Oliver, but he doesn’t remember her. Hope finds no evidence that Landon is supernatural and, after Jed attacks Landon, Hope votes against Landon staying along with Kaleb and Josie. Upset with Josie, Rafael finally gives in to Lizzie's advances. Hope sends Landon to a contact in New Orleans and they kiss goodbye. Dorian kills the dryad, who explains her desire to find the knife and take it to a place called Malivore. A picture of Landon's biological mother shows her wearing a necklace with the Malivore symbol.

As Hope hits the books to learn more about the latest creature to arrive to the school, things take a turn leaving her to confront one of her darkest fears; Alaric attempts to help Rafael cope after his past comes back to haunt him.

During a stressful week of exams, Hope, Rafael, Landon and MG's attempts to study get thwarted by the arrival of a new monster that feeds off their worst fears; Hope struggles with a secret she's been keeping from Landon.

Caroline Forbes informs Alaric over the phone that she cannot attend their daughters' 16th birthday party due to her "recruiting" mission. Alaric is then confronted by his deceased ex-fiancée and the biological mother of his twins, Jo Laughlin. Alaric is skeptical, but their twins burst into his office and Josie instantly recognizes their mother. Hope apologizes to Rafael for sending Landon away and teaches Rafael to dance in preparation for his date with Lizzie. Penelope locks Hope and Rafael in the gym so that M. G. can step in to be Lizzie's date. Hope and Rafael escape the gym and Rafael confesses to Lizzie that sleeping together was a mistake. On their way to the party, Jo becomes a full-blown zombie and buries Josie alive. Hope, M.G., and Josie rescue Josie and Jo has the girls siphon the magic from her, thus removing her life force. Before she dies, Jo learns that Alaric has not told their daughters about what happens when they turn 22, and that Caroline is searching for a solution. Josie expresses her distain for what Penelope did before they share a passionate kiss. Meanwhile, Alaric confronts the one who rose Jo from the dead, the Necromancer.

The Necromancer causes Rafael's deceased girlfriend Cassie to return on Remembrance Day. As Alaric's torturing yields no new information, Hope recruits M. G. to help her enter the Necromancer's mind. There, Hope finds herself in Rousseau's, a bar in New Orleans. She is then trapped in a void and confesses that she wants to know about her father, prompting the Necromancer to inform Hope that Klaus Mikaelson will not find peace until she does. M. G. panics and calls Alaric. Once Hope regains consciousness, she and Alaric argue over his alcoholism and her recklessness stemming from her repressed grief. Hope locks Alaric in his office and the Necromancer tells her that he remembers that the knife is one of the three locks of Malivore, and sent Cassie to steal it. Meanwhile, Kaleb tries to teach M. G. how to feed on humans, but M. G. struggles to stop. Rafael makes peace with Cassie's death and Hope finally processes her grief for her father. Dorian reveals that he takes off every Remembrance Day in honor of his family who were killed by Stefan Salvatore, the namesake of the school. Hope gets an emergency alert from Landon.

Landon finds his mother, Seylah Chelon, who knocks him out and interrogates him, not believing anything he says. Landon triggers the magical alert. A merman attacks them, causing Seylah to escape with Landon, while setting off a gas explosion at her home. Hope and Alaric track them down and learn that a clandestine government agency is also looking for Seylah. Seylah accepts that Landon is her son and reveals that she used to work for that agency and hunted down various monsters and then brought to a facility that houses a puddle of black goo. Anyone dropped into the goo would end up in Malivore, and all memories of that being would be wiped from the public consciousness. Seylah started asking uncomfortable questions and was thrown into Malivore. She later found herself free and pregnant. She gave the baby to foster care and fled. The merman tracks them down to a motel and takes an Egyptian urn, which is revealed to be the second Malivore key. Seylah decides that to help Landon she must go back into Malivore. The merman tries to infiltrate the Malivore facility but is killed. No one remembers Seylah or the events of the day, except for Hope. She retells the events to Alaric and they resolve to keep the urn safe. Hope and Landon become a couple. A government agent finds the photo of Seylah holding baby Landon and disposes of a witness by pushing him into Malivore.

A creature invades the dreams of everyone at the school and terrorizes them, while demanding that they hand over the urn. Most of the students are evacuated, but some choose to stay in order to study for the exams. They keep themselves awake. Rafael keeps seeing dreams of Hope kissing him and realizes he's attracted to her. He tells her that he won't betray Landon, but they can no longer train together. Hope manages to trick the creature and get it to appear in physical form, allowing her to kill it. Meanwhile, the government agent finds Seylah's file in the agency archives and visits Landon's foster parents.

A genie named Jinni* offers to fulfil Lizzie's wish that Hope never came to the school. In the new reality, the school has no money and few students, since Klaus financed it. Following a magical signal, the Saltzmans go to New Orleans and find Hope as a ripper. Alaric offers to bring Hope to the school to teach her self-control. Annoyed, Lizzie wishes that the Salvatore School never existed. As a result, she and Josie go to Mystic Falls High, with Alaric being an alcoholic history teacher at the same school. Lizzie is a social outcast, while Josie is popular. Lizzie has an episode and is taken to the Mikaelson School, located in the same building, where Hope offers the position of headmaster to Alaric. Lizzie is dissatisfied and wishes that Hope was never born. She awakens to find that the world has been plunged into a war between humans and supernaturals. She also learns that she killed her sister after learning that twins born to the Gemini Coven must eventually turn on one another in the Merge. Finally, Jinni offers Lizzie a final wish but only if Lizzie gives her the urn. Lizzie wishes that Jinni never ended up in Malivore, freeing her and putting everything back. However, this Lizzie has no memory of any of these events.

To recover the urn, the Saltzmans, Hope, Kaleb, Dorian, and Emma take a road trip to Maple Hollows. During the trip, Lizzie accuses Hope of ruining another Saltzman family vacation, leaving Hope confused and annoyed. When they arrive in town, they find Clark, a government agent from the Triad Organization, and are met with a plague of swarming insects caused by a mummy. After defeating the mummy, Clark offers Alaric the urn in exchange for Emma and Dorian’s lives, forcing Alaric to give him the urn. Kaleb and Alaric later talk about how the Salvatore School needs to protect itself more, by getting real blood, and teaching the witches offensive magic. Lizzie continues to berate Hope, this time about Hope allegedly badmouthing Lizzie's years ago, which Hope denies, leading to the revelation that Josie facilitated the misunderstanding between the two to cover up the fact that she had a crush on Hope. Emma tells Dorian that she kissed Alaric, prompting Dorian to quit. Later, a man tells Clark that their boss Mrs. G wants the urn locked up right away, but instead, Clark kills the guard and tosses the urn into Malivore, setting off a bright explosion of light.

As the Salvatore School hosts the annual Miss Mystic Falls Pageant, Hope is still dealing with the trauma of Landon dying when her ex-boyfriend Roman comes to visit. Lizzie drops out of the pageant due to bad blood with the head judge and throws her support behind Hope, who seeks to blow off steam. Penelope encourages Josie to genuinely compete instead of going along with Lizzie's plan. Labeled a "killer" by his classmates, MG bonds with an unfamiliar girl named Nia. When his visiting mother and Alaric are turned to stone, MG realizes that Nia is a gorgon. After Landon apologizes to Hope for being jealous of Roman, Penelope tells Landon that Hope has been keeping secrets regarding his mother. Landon confronts Hope and then storms out when she falls silent. Between her guilt over Landon and discovering that the dress she was wearing was picked out by her father, Hope becomes overwhelmed as she wins Miss Mystic Falls. Nia attacks Landon outside, but MG comes to his rescue. After Josie finally reads Penelope's letter and discovers that she's moving to Belgium, Penelope also informs Josie about the Merge. MG’s mother kidnaps Landon and takes him to Agent Clark.

 Triad forces occupy school, using a magic-suppressing artifact. They have weapons with bullets made of Malivore mud and search for the chalice. Burr, commander of the forces, shoots Josie, who is dying from the spreading taint. Alaric and Dorian infiltrate the school through a secret tunnel and disable the artifact, allowing the students to fight back. Josie drinks some of Hope's blood, healing her. Rafael turns into a wolf and stops Burr. Alaric asks student council to decide his future as headmaster. Clarke takes Landon to a Triad warehouse and says he knew Landon would pocket the real key; an arrowhead. The Headless Horseman arrives and takes the him and the key to the Triad Facility. Before he throws the arrowhead into Malivore, Hope arrives, and she and Landon manage to kill the Horseman. Clarke arrives and tosses the arrowhead into the puddle, awakening Malivore. Hope knocks out Landon, realizing that her Tribrid blood is the key to stopping the golem. She calls Alaric and asks him to burn all references of her. She uses a mimic spell on Clarke, forcing him to jump with her into the puddle. Landon wakes up and finds Malivore gone; all his memories of Hope erased.

Hope becomes more determined than ever to find her way back to Mystic Falls; Alaric continues looking into the mysterious night Malivore was destroyed; as the students leave for summer vacation, Landon stays behind to keep an eye on Rafael.

In an extremely abbreviated nutshell, here’s how the residents of Mystic Falls spent their summer vacation: Landon divided his time between caring for a still-wolfy Rafael (movie nights in the woods!) and falling in love with Josie, who finally got her newly bearded father to reveal the secrets of the ascendant; MG visited Kaleb’s family, crushing hard on his “off-limits!” sister; and Lizzie saw Caroline in Europe, where she balanced self-improvement with a healthy admiration of the locals.


And then there’s Hope, who managed to screw over Clarke and escape from Malivore just in time to see her boyfriend locking lips with another. After shedding a few well-deserved tears, Hope concluded that Landon might actually have found happiness with Josie. But just as she was prepared to get the hell out of Dodge Mystic Falls, along came a big, ugly monster-of-the-week to keep her exactly where she belongs.

Summer vacation has arrived for the Salvatore School students. However, Landon has forgotten what happened the night Malivore disappeared and spends the summer purposely killing himself to remember, while also trying to find a spell to change Rafael back to human. MG spends the summer with Kaleb's family in Atlanta, and develops an attraction to his sister, Kym. Lizzie is in Europe with Caroline, trying to get help for her mental health. Josie stays behind to keep Alaric company, after losing his position as headmaster and to find out more about the merge. Josie and Landon grow closer as they spend time together. Hope finds herself in a black void alone with Clarke after going into Malivore. Since Hope is not a full tribrid yet, she did not completely end Malivore. Because of this, Malivore wants her out of its system. Clarke tries to leave with her, but Malivore will not allow it, which stops Hope from leaving. She ultimately leaves Clarke behind and makes it out. She finds Landon kissing Josie and leaves the school. She is then confronted by a monster. Clarke vows to kill Hope and rid the magical balance. A Red Hooded figure goes into the cemetery, conjures the Triad Symbol on a grave, as Clarke returns to the real world.