The Vampire Diaries
Season One, Episode One, Pilot
First Aired: 10 September 2009
Foggy Wood Introduction
Why is Mystic Falls’ wood so smoky/foggy? Forget vampires, werewolves and witches, the biggest supernatural mystery is how a wood in dreary weather can look like a forest fire aftermath. This literally sets the scene for every The Vampire Diaries episode to come, complete with a totes emosh narration. For this episode vampire heartthrob, Stefan Salvatore, introduces the pilot episode.
Next!
An unsuspecting couple drive into a person only to find out it’s a greedy vampire – the oldest trick in the book. They die, of course.
Next!
Elena Gilbert writes in her diary – one action of many that will eventually fizzle out throughout the seasons. It could be worse; they could have called it “The Vampire Show With A Crow And Fog In It”. Now that would have been a mistake. Elena promises her diary that she will put on a brave face. Cue the awesome soundtrack that The Vampire Diaries has done so well from day one. Sort Of by Silversun Pickups is the first song featured on The Vampire Diaries.
Driving to school, Bonnie Bennet talks at Elena about how her grams reckons Bonnie is psychic. Snapping out of her daze, Elena says, “I did it again, didn’t I? [I zoned out of your boring ass stories, Bennet].” The awkward moment is saved by the bird, as a crow crashes into the windowscreen. The said crow watches them drive away. Strange happenings.
Caroline, hair curled perfectly as ever, greets the girls at school. This is the TVD season where Caroline is really annoying. Not even her friends have any respect for her.
Speaking of apparently flawed individuals, Jeremy Gilbert is smoking a biff with Vicki outside school. Elena follows Jeremy into the boy’s bathroom. In a desperate attempt to stop Jeremy smoking the wacky backy, Elena tries the taking-the-piss tactic. “Just chill, alright,” says Jeremy. “Chill?” Elena mocks, asking if that is his “stoner talk”. Really, Elena? You have more on him than “chill”. Look at that ridiculous spiked hair, for God’s sake.
Elena bumps into a leather jacket-wearing stud called Stefan. Romance fills the air with a fragrance of love masking the stink of the boy’s bogs, which they are stood outside of. Stefan persists with the Elena creeping as he stares at her throughout their next class (which he made sure they had together, by the way).
Elena walks to a graveyard after school to the sound of suspicious “cawing”. The cawing belongs to a crow that gets all up in Elena’s grill. It flaps around, scaring her silly. To make matters worse a forest fire has broken out! Oh wait, that’s the fog appearing. The crow continually harasses Elena. The hilarity ends with her falling down a shallow ditch and bumping into Stefan again. Feeling flustered by her crow ordeal, she mocks Stefan’s all famous Salvatore ring.
“There are rings, and there is that.”
To make matters worse, she reveals her bloody leg and Stefan gets the gips, which finally repels him away… for now. Stefan writes in his diary about what just happened. Thank God this bloke has a diary. Can you imagine what this guy’s Twitter account would be like? There certainly isn’t a gap in the market for another Stefan Salvatore account: Tweets about “stefan salvatore”
Stefan isn’t gone for long. He creeps up at Elena’s doorstep. Alarm bells would be ringing in my head at this point but Elaina is had at the word “journal”.
“You keep a journal? [OMG, so do I! We can be journal buddies],” says Elena.
The best journal buddies skip down to the Mystic Grill to hang with the gang. Of course, Caroline is the one to bring up a party that’s going on in the woods. There is an event or party going on in every single episode of TVD! Has anyone noticed this? And Caroline is almost always to blame for this.
After a few bevies with his new fwends, Stefan goes home to read his past diaries. Self-absorbed much, Stefan? He finds an image of Katherine, his last obsession who looks exactly like Elena. It might explain a lot but not enough to justify the full-on stalking of Elena.
Back to Class: a Teacher Gets OWNED
An absolute dick of a teacher tells Bonnie she is dumb, Matt he is a jock stereotype and Elena that he was lenient last year for “obvious reasons” (yes, your parents died, so what?) but the “excuses ended with summer break”. Stefan shows him up by winning a geekout about the town’s history. Check yo’ facts, teacher. This vamp lived through this shit. ya dig?
Party Time in the Woods
And identical twins kiss:
Bonnie touches Elena (innocently, I know it is not good structuring after that picture) and saw a crow! That blessed crow. No doubt, Elena is embarrassed that someone found out about her crowmare in the graveyard.
The woods become full of mixed emotions. Stefan and Elena take a stroll where she tells him the story of her parents’ death. She also says how her and Matt’s relationship wasn’t passionate. The word “passionate” gives Stefan bloody eyes, which is like a vampire boner. Meanwhile, Tyler Lockwood tries to get frisky with Vicki against a tree, much to Vicki’s disgust. He concludes it is her fault because she sleeps with people. Tyler is a complete ass. Seeing how dickish some characters were demonstrates just how good the show’s character development has been. Then again, five seasons later Tyler is still a complete ass.
Vicki walks off alone. She is surrounded by forest fire smoke, meaning an attack by crow or vampire is imminent.
Caroline gets Stefan alone and tries to hit on him, failing straight away with a blunt, “Caroline, you and me, it’s never going to happen.” He then basically asks Elaina if Caroline throws herself at all the guys to which she says Caroline just sees him as “fresh meat”. See, no respect for poor Caroline.
Intoxicated Jeremy finds Vicki neck-bitten and unconscious on the floor. Stephen looks from afar with knowing in his eyes. He feels this is a good time to leave. “Caw, caw!” What’s this? The crow has come to visit Stefan. For some bizarre reason, the crow has signified the presence of smouldering Ian “Smoulderhalder” Somerhalder a.k.a Damon Salvatore.
Stefan: “Crow’s a bit much don’t you think?”
Damon: “Wait until you can see what I can do with the fog.”
I think we can all agree that we have seen enough of the crow and fog. Damon mentions that Stefan’s hair is different. I am glad it is not just my who likes to note hairstyles (see other #ThrowbackThursday posts).
The conversation continues with lines such as, “Don’t you crave a little? Let’s do it together.” Would be surprised if a gay reference hasn’t come out of that on YouTube. I’ll leave that up to you guys to find the Stefan/Damon videos… that I know nothing about. Damon spews the banter from day one but just like the majority of the characters in TVD, he starts off as an annoying shite. He seems to exist to ruin Stefan’s life. Oh wait, he still does that.
Wood Afterparty
Caroline whines because Stefan rejected her. “Why do the guys I want never want me?”
Bonnie: “I’m not touching that.” (Yes that’s exactly what they say!) I think Caroline needs new friends.
Matt sits with Vicki in the hospital. Do they not have parents either?
The Fray’s Never Say Never plays to the final montage with Elena and Stefan’s totes emosh diary quotes. They should write quotes for Pinterest. Stefan has found his way back to Elena’s house. She invites him in for a talk – a talk about feelings and Pinterest quotes, I’d wager.
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