by Dianna Berrian
This week on “The Originals”, you’ll come to find your definition of a “harvest” is about to change. The episode picks up right where we left off in Davina’s attic where she and a grey faced Elijah have a stand off of sorts. Throughout their exchange, please note how intently he keeps looking at the throbbing pulse in her neck to imply that he’s hungry. Well, duh! The little witch wonders what the “honorable” Original could want with her, and he shares his belief that, together, they could stop the war between witches and vampires before it begins. On his end, he’ll keep Klaus in check and all he asks of her is to behave as her true self, not some tool for Marcel or the witches. Why should she trust him? What, the fact that he hasn’t pounced on you and drained you because he has class isn’t enough? Apparently not, and she decides to test his will with a prick of her finger. She begins teasing him with the drop of blood on the pin until he takes it, and just like that, the hideous grey face paint disappears and he looks like normal ol’ Elijah again. (Sidenote: I preferred the almost dead effects in “The Vampire Diaries” to the face paint.)
In other news, Klaus pulls a solo ambush on Sophie and brings her back home to berate her for letting Hayley get attacked by the slew of witches she calls “extremists”. The attack was all thanks to Sabine, the witch who had a vision of the demon baby bringing death to all witches. Klaus grows fonder of the child by the second. Oh, you! That’s when he and Rebekah drop the bomb on her that Elijah is talking to Davina. It takes her by surprise and throws her into a flashback of her party days, when she didn’t really believe in anything witchy. We see the return of the late JaneAnne in this flashback, and the first mention of something called “The Harvest” – a ritual done by the witches every 300 years to ensure the bond to their ancestral magic is restored. Continuing with the tale, we see a line of young girls in the flashback being prepared for the “Harvest” by having their palms sliced. One of these girls just so happens to be Davina. Sophie tells Klaus that four were chosen for “Harvest”. But back then, she had always believed it to be a myth. A phone call from Marcel interrupts story time. He tells Klaus about the bunch of dead witches in the Bayou, torn up in a way only a werewolf would do. He decides he wants Klaus to accompany him in investigating. After he agrees and hangs up, Sophie says he can’t go. She needs to get the remains of those witches and consecrate them otherwise they lose their link to the magic. Too bad Sophie doesn’t realize that Klaus does what Klaus wants. And everybody else has to stay put. Psh. Yeah, like that’ll work.
Marcel continues with his day after speaking to Klaus and walks into the church where Davina is hidden. Along the way he runs into Father Kieran and has a brief argument about his intentions with holding Davina captive. Stick to your humans, Father Kieran! Just before Marcel gets into the attic, Elijah hides and listens to him tell Davina that he’ll be moving her out to a new hiding spot. She’s overjoyed, but doesn’t let him know Elijah is awake yet, taking him by surprise after Marcel leaves. Her excuse is that they’re not done talking yet, and they begin to discuss the witches and why she is against them. She says they are liars and deserve what they get. To back up her anger, she begins telling him about the“Harvest” ritual with a handy dandy flashback to go with it.
It turns out that the girls’ participation in it would bring their families strength and health, and the four chosen would be celebrated forever as saviors in the community. The “Harvest” is when they put the 4 in a state of peaceful limbo as part of the offering. After comes the “Reaping”, where they’d awaken and be reborn. But she didn’t get as far as the limbo part, so the Harvest is incomplete. In order to complete the ritual, Davina has to die.
Just to leave us all in suspense for a little while, we cut back to the cemetery where Sophie is gathering supplies to go consecrate those witch remains, just like Klaus told her not to. Hayley shows up, also disobeying, wanting to go with her. She makes a small speech about how the only reason she came to NO was to find out about her birth family and clever adds a mention of how Jane Anne told her Marcel ran the wolves out of the Quarter and into the Bayou, hoping to play on Sophie’s family oriented heart strings. And as if two weren’t company, Rebekah shows up to try to stop the two. But she just ends up tagging along for the hell of it, doing the she-wolf’s bidding and making sure Klaus and Marcel are stalled. She calls Klaus to inform him the “witch is on burial mission and [his] baby mama is on a spirit quest. So keep Marcel distracted.” Now that’s how you delegate.
Having no choice but to do as he’s told, Klaus keeps Marcel busy with a brigade of questions about Davina. Marcel is, of course, suspicious and promises Klaus he’ll never get her. But Klaus is curious and wants to know how the two even met. Marcel obliges, going back eight months and flashes back to a steamy shower sex scene between himself and…wait for it…Sophie! While the divide between witches and vampires wasn’t so huge back then, it was still a secret love affair. And the two vampires laugh it off, acting all cute and bromancy for a bit as the alcohol goes to their heads. Marcel explains how Sophie went to Father Kieran and told him everything about the witches and what they were planning to do. They wanted the power to fight off the vampires, and as an advocate for the human population he says their plan is going too far. They take their business elsewhere, not before putting a hex on Shawn, Kieran’s nephew – also known as Cami’s brother – which made him slowly go crazy until he went off the wagon and killed all of the seminary students and himself in that brutal massacre. The worst part? The whole hex was merely used as a distraction to keep Kieran out of their business. Seeing as he promised Cami he’d solve the mystery last week, this leaves Klaus’ panties in a bit of a bunch. But at least he’ll score some points with her. Am I right? Does anyone really care about Cami and Klaus’ relationship though?
Finally we get to find out why Davina has to die. But first, Elijah makes nice and asks about her friends. She tells him about Tim, the violinist Klaus nearly killed, and her best friend, Monique, another chosen for the “Harvest”. She goes into the process of the ritual, beginning with the four chosen girls being led out like princesses with a wordy speech about their sacrifice, calling upon the four elements to bind their future and past magic together. They already knew what to expect after preparing for it: the magic used to cut their palms would put them to sleep, and, later, they’d be resurrected together and all powerful. But that wasn’t the whole truth. Monique’s aunt was the only one who spoke out about the Harvest, questioning what they were doing. Oh, and by the way, Monique’s aunt is Sophie. Shocker, right? So Sophie intervenes in the ritual just as the first girl is up at the alter to be put to sleep. Sophie is held back by other witches – can I just ask why she didn’t just use some of her powers here? – and they all watch as the first girl’s throat is slit and she dies. The three other chosen are horrified. They weren’t putting them to sleep, they were slaughtering them. Davina begged for help and her own mother turned her cheek as the second girl’s throat was slit. Just as Monique was about to be killed, two vampires swooped in to stop it, snapping necks left and right. Marcel walks up all vampy and growly, saving the day. Father Kieran told him, after the devastation of the massacre, all about the “Harvest” ritual and asked him to stop it. But he was too late to save Monique. Davina was the only one to survive, and he saved her because he saw a kindred spirit in her when he watched her fighting for her life. Hey…they’re doing that mirroring thing again. Klaus thought he and Marcel were kindred spirits too! (Please note, that was sarcasm dripping from my words because I detest an abundance of repetition.) Before Marcel whooshed her off, Davina did some kind of light thing with her hand to absorb the magic from Monique. As it turns out, the power released from each girl that died went to the next so, in effect, she took in all the power of the three girls. That should mean that the ritual was working, but if the witches lied about how they were killing them, how does she know they weren’t lying about being resurrected?
Davina would rather take her chances not completing the ritual and not dying. If the ritual isn’t finished the witches will lose their power and cease to be witches all together. Their power will drain away and they’ll be normal. If they wait it out and don’t complete it in the alloted time, they witches will be punished and she’ll be free of magic. Aha. Sob story alert! Davina hates being a witch because she can’t control her magic she hurts people even when she doesn’t mean to. She just wants to be normal! Sob, sob, sob!
Back to the trio of explorers in the woods, Rebekah begins asking for more info about the “Harvest” from Sophie but they reach the mutilated bodies of the witches first. Hayley notices the wolf tracks and scratches into the tree. Here we go again with more in your face information that is unnecessary… Some disoriented guy walks out and sees Rebekah, crying out “Original!” (okay, he mutters it mindlessly) and speeds off. Thinking it might be Marcel’s informant on his way to tell him, Rebekah calls Klaus to inform him. That’s all well and dandy but he says he needs a distraction for Marcel, and poof! She’s on her way. Later after Hayley and Sophie finish gathering remains, they talk about Sabine’s vision about the baby. Hayley questions whether or not it’s real because if Sophie thought the “Harvest” was fake and now believes it’s real, how can she be sure Sabine’s vision isn’t real too?
Not much later, Rebekah shows up at the bar and Klaus disappears to “use the loo” which translates to him finding the so-called informant and snapping his neck. While he’s gone, however, Marcel implies that he and Rebekah have a past that Klaus doesn’t know about, secrets she wouldn’t want him to know. And then there is some gratuitous eye sex between them. Bow chicka wow wow.
During all the time Davina spent explaining the “Harvest”, Elijah managed to fix Tim’s violin for her. There’s an earthquake of emotions when she takes it back. No, literally. There’s an actual earthquake and it’s an eyeopener for Elijah to see just how powerful this little girl is. He offers to help her control the magic that she harbors and, if she lets him free, he will show her his mother’s grimoire and help her. If she leaves with Marcel, they may not see each other again and not be able to help one another. She’s afraid it might be manipulation. But he’s offering a deal. Ominous…
When Klaus returns from his trip to the “loo”, Marcel is gone. Rebekah didn’t know he was leaving either and the two begin to wonder, were they stalling him? Or was he stalling them? Turns out to be the latter, because during that short time span of flying under the radar, Marcel shows up to pick up Davina and take her away to a new location. She grabs her back and takes off with him, appearing to have turned down whatever deal Elijah offered. But she has an abrupt change of heart and pulls a stunt with her magic to make him bring her back up, faking that something was coming and she needed to stay and then passing out. He brings her back up, tucks her in bed and goes on his merry way, no questions asked. As he’s leaving the church, he has another run in with Father Kieran. They bicker some more and Kiera tells him to stay away from Cami, revealing that’s his niece, and Marcel puts the pieces together about the massacre and the boy with the hex on him that had a twin. Aha. So now Klaus and Marcel will both have to vie for her with that bit of information.
Klaus, in the mean time, surprises Marcel after realizing Marcel took him on a field trip to distract him while he was trying to get Davina into a new hiding spot. He refuses to let Klaus take her from him, to which Klaus refutes, “the strong always take from the weak.” Homeboy’s got a nice juicy comeback for that though: “If you were so strong, you wouldn’t have run way from New Orleans like a little bitch all those years ago.” Cue Klaus bringing the beatdown. And just as Marcel goes to retaliate, a wild Elijah appears! Cause if anyone is gonna teach Klaus a lesson, it’s him.
Back home at the Originals’ mansion, Rebekah and Hayley are bonding some more. Eugh. Klaus shows up with Elijah and Rebekah does the run and hug, overjoyed. Hayley looks happy too, quietly sauntering outside with a little smirk. The looks between them, while nauseating to me, are meant to be that flirty kind of eye contact that suggests naughty things. Elijah walks out to her where she states the obvious “you’re back” and then slaps him with a coy little, “Don’t make promises you can’t keep.” And then she smiles and says, “Welcome home”. And he looks…happy about that? I’m sorry. I have to stop here and take a second to choke my food back down because this is disgusting writing to me. This girl is knocked up by Klaus and is making googly eyes at his brother now. What about that is morally correct? I understand fiction knows no bounds and that this is a TV show not meant to be taken so literally but it’s making Hayley seem completely trashy and Elijah seem, I don’t know, desperate? Which is not one of his character traits, nor is letting anyone get away with slapping him across the face. He’s an Original. Show a little respect!
Anyway, after settling back in, he begins telling his family that Sophie’s reason for bringing them out there was wrong. It was all about Davina. We’re shown a flashback of JaneAnne and Sophie making a secret pact to finish the “Harvest”, no matter what, to bring Monique back. Somehow that turns the war more against her and not Marcel.
Here’s the thing. This episode was great for making fans want to root for both sides of the war, and learning more about Davina and Sophie. But it did become confusing at times with who has what motive and who should really be against who here? On the one hand, that’s what a writer should want. A conflict that has fans debating and arguing and taking interest. But at the same time, I felt like a few things were a little underexplained. Not to mention the constant pulling out every sob story in the book (Hayley the orphan who just wants her family; Davina just wants to be normal; Rebekah forever seeking love in all the wrong places; Marcel the whipping boy who became a king; Klaus wanting to betray his best friend; etc.). Then there’s the whole mess of every character having at least somewhat of a romantic relationship with every other character: Klaus slept with Hayley, but Hayley likes Elijah, and Elijah likes Sophie’s drive, but Sophie was with Marcel, and Marcel had a thing with Rebekah before and might want it again now but Marcel also likes Cami but Cami is sort of attracted to Klaus and Klaus likes how Cami’s mind works, and it’s just exhausting, if not out of character for some.
Do I think there is definite potential for the show to be great? Yes. Absolutely. But I think right now, what’s coming out of it is too many ideas weaved in together that aren’t completely thought out enough to be as great as they could be and being patched up quickly with some sticky tape that will only hold until they need it to break again to feed another plot hole. It feels like a rough draft that needs a few dozen revisions. With such clichéd writing and predictable storylines, I’m starting to wonder not only if Hayley’s baby will survive, but will the show?
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