Cool! Yet another new show. New shows are exciting, and filled with excite, so we should enjoy this and throw a party. (Okay, so it's not my favourite new show of the 2013-2014 season, but it still deserves a small party. With cocktails. Yes?) Let's hop right in, because I have nothing to say. That was a lie. I just said a lot. I always have something to say. Always. Ready to go!
Elijah is giving a melodramatic voice over about family as we see a random drifting rowboat and a bunch of fog. Ooh! Ooh! Handy words at the bottom of the screen! I love those words. They say that it's the Mississippi River, 300 years ago. A random sailing ship is sitting in the middle of the river. Why? I dunno. Neither do the two guys standing and staring at it, but they want to find out. They go onboard, and down into the hold. It's a weird, deserted ship, and everything is dripping. Isn't that a bad sign, if your ship is dripping? There are two coffins. They're shiny. The foolish men decide to open one, and inside they see... I can't tell which Original that is. He's daggered, anyway. I think it might be Kol (Nathaniel Buzolic). Suddenly, something sails around snatching the men and dragging them off, until only one is left. He's abruptly greeted by a random girl in a silly dress. It's Rebekah (Claire Holt). She wipes blood off her mouth, says that the guy is handsome and asks if she can eat him. I want to know what handsomeness has to do with taste. Elijah (Daniel Gillies) doesn't want Rebekah to eat the guy.
At this point, Elijah compels the dude to remember nothing and asks for help getting their cargo ashore. Even though the dude's mind is supposed to be blank, he asks what kind of hellbeasts they are. Rebekah cheerfully introduces everyone (pointless, since the guy has either already forgotten or will shortly forget) and it's Kol and Finn in the coffins, in case you were wondering. Klaus (Joseph Morgan) shows up but Rebekah doesn't like him. He throws a body at her. Elijah asks the dude where they are (near New Orleans) and apologises for eating all his friends. We're treated to a rather unnecessary view of a bunch of dead, bloody bodies. I think this show is trying a bit hard to tell everyone that it's more nitty gritty than its parent show. It's sort of like when child stars go over the top trying to prove to everyone that they're sexy adults now. Hopefully this won't crash and burn quite as badly. We're treated to a title flash, and ooh, it's present day.
And the bartender is back. I thought as much.
Anyway, Elijah spends a while telling Camille the bartender (Leah Pipes) about how Klaus is in trouble. He needs to know where to find Jane-Ann Deveraux. Uh, correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't she die in the backdoor pilot? Camille says she might know someone who can help and leads him to a witch who moonlights as a tour guide. Elijah follows her around for a bit and then she tells him that Jane-Ann is dead and her sister Sophie (Daniella Pineda) will want to talk to Elijah.
A bunch of witches are holding a candlelight vigil for Jane-Ann in the middle of the road. I guess there's not much traffic in New Orleans at night. Elijah wanders up. It's worth noting that Jane-Ann looks fairly recently dead, so I assume that this is an identical story to the backdoor pilot - filling in the missing pieces from Elijah's point of view. That's incredibly boring and annoying. Ugh. Anyway, Marcel (Charles Michael Davis) shows up and steals Jane-Ann's body after a brief confrontation with Sophie. This means that Jane-Ann's spirit won't be at peace. Rude. Elijah calls Rebekah and gives her the rundown on what is going on - Marcel is alive, annoying, and ruling New Orleans with an iron fist. Klaus is in trouble. Rebekah doesn't care, because she doesn't like Klaus and she refuses to help him. Elijah is all 'yeah, you've said that before' but she always winds up helping him anyway.
In an alley, Sophie is being harrassed by two marauding vampires. Haven't we seen this exact scene already? The vampires get pushy and want to know what Jane-Ann knows about Klaus, or something. Jane-Ann is dead, the vampires are dumb. Sophie points this out, and they start to threaten her. Boom. Suddenly, Elijah shows up and kills them both. Yay? This is a boring episode. If any more of it is reused footage I will kill someone. With a stake. Through the heart. (That was a joke, I'm not a murderer, don't arrest me).
Sophie takes Elijah to a random cemetary. Since it's sacred ground, he has to be invited in. Sophie invites him. Good job, Sophie.
Thanks.
A conversation ensues in which a bunch of exposition that I've already heard before is provided. Ugh. Basically, Marcel is terrorising the witches of New Orleans, the witches are over it and they want Klaus to kill Marcel for them. All caught up? Good. Sophie also tells Elijah about how she found Hayley the werewolf (Phoebe Tonkin), who is pregnant by Klaus. Yeah. I knew that already too. A bunch of witches bring Hayley out of... a crypt? Weird. Hayley has cool boots and an even cooler drape/shirt/jumper/poncho/wrap thing. She and Elijah have a brief competition to see who can look the most sulky and broody. Hayley wins. Apparently she's gained Elijah's respect this way, because he asks for a moment alone with her.
Inside the... yep, I'm pretty sure it is a crypt - anyway, Elijah and Hayley chat. The witches kidnapped Hayley and did "...weird witchy tests." Hayley doesn't understand how she could be pregnant, so obviously she skived off sex-ed classes in school. (To be fair, those classes were embarrassing at best and horrendously creepy at worst.) Elijah wants to give Hayley some memories to show her how Klaus is a hybrid, instead of just using his big boy words. I didn't know vampires could do that. You would think in four seasons of The Vampire Diaries they would have mentioned that, right? (If they did mention that and I just wasn't paying attention, please tell me so that I can delete this bit and not look like an idiot. Ta.) He recaps how the original vampires were created. I'll run through it just in case anyone is watching the spin-off without watching the parent show. Once upon a time, Elijah and Klaus lived with their siblings, mother and father in some place where there were a bunch of werewolves. One day the werewolves killed their youngest brother. Oops. Their father was like 'not on my watch' and so he made their mother use black magic to turn them into vampires, which would make them stronger and faster and mostly immortal. Unfortunately it also made them crave blood, so they started killing people. After Klaus killed someone for the first time (in this world, werewolves only start turning after killing someone - accidentally or on purpose, it doesn't matter) he turned into a werewolf, at which point his father realised that he was actually someone else's son. Awkward. So they cast yet another spell, this one to suppress Klaus' werewolf powers. That's not so important since he broke that spell during the second season of the parent show I mentioned.
Hayley is fairly awesome and witty, I like her a lot. She introduces herself to Elijah and wonders why she slept with a known psychopath. Yeah, that was a bit of an oversight. Oops. Now she's carrying a potentially psychopathic baby that could be a werewolf, a vampire, or a weird alien with five heads and three noses. We'll never know. (Unless the baby is born during the series which doesn't often happen because baby actors are expensive but which might happen if we're lucky. I suspect everyone really wants the baby to be born. It's exciting!)
Speak for yourself! You're not the one who'll have to push out those five watermelon-sized heads.
Anyway, Elijah bemoans the fact that Klaus is never happy and wonders if the baby might make him happy. In spite of the fact that I'm excited for its birth, I'm vaguely insulted that no one is giving Hayley any other option. You know, the right to choose? To choose to abort the mysterious evil baby that might eat its way out of your womb? Yeah. Anyway, Sophie tells Elijah that she needs Klaus to kill Marcel and that Marcel will almost certainly kill the baby if he finds out. Hm. Elijah will try to convince Klaus to do it. I'm seriously super bored. WE ALREADY KNOW WHAT WILL HAPPEN! Klaus is all 'Oh I'll think about killing Marcel' and then he's all 'I'm actually secretly excited to have a baby' and then he's like 'my soul is tortured' and Camille the bartender agrees with him, giving a speech which melodramatic fans quote all over the internet while saying 'I totally get what she means, this is totally how I feel'. It's weird, but we've been through it once already. Does it have to happen again?
We get a cut-down repeat of past scenes - Elijah goes to find Klaus on a balcony, Klaus refuses to believe the baby is his but is convinced (in a scene which feels much-less meaningful than it did the first time around - possibly because of the lack of music but also some of the line deliverance feels different. I assume they didn't refilm the scene, so maybe it's just in my head). Okay one of those lines is definitely new. Things proceed, Elijah tells Klaus to listen to the baby's heartbeat. He does. Do babies even have heartbeats that early?
*one quick Google later*
They do. It seems a fetus will develop a heartbeat at around 4 - 6 weeks. Cool! Anyway, back to this very boring recap of a recapping episode. Klaus tells the witches they can kill Hayley if they want, because he doesn't care. He storms off. Elijah tells the witches not to touch her (I want a Hayley and Elijah friendship. Seriously. Can I ship a friendship? Well I do now) and follows Klaus.
In front of a flourescent "Food To Go" sign, Elijah and Klaus have a deep and meaningful conversation about their life and how they want a new family. Everyone is scared of Klaus, Elijah says that love and loyalty is totally better than that. He gives an intensely long speech during which he doesn't seem to breathe (oh but he's a vampire so he doesn't need to). Klaus waits a while after the very long speech is finished for dramatic effect and then answers with a single word. "No." Oh, the powers of concise speaking.
Back in the crypt, the witches are aguing about Sophie's solution to their vampire problem (more vampires!) and Hayley is practicing her best sulky expressions.
Honestly, I don't think they need any more work.
I wish I could pout like that. Anyway, Elijah wanders in and asks the coven what is going to stop Klaus from murdering then. Sophie grins, like, I'm glad you asked and stabs herself in the hand with... something. Sharp. Anyway, Hayley bleeds at the same time from the same place, so obviously that would be why. This was the result of the magic Jane-Ann did. She points out that even if Klaus is pretending not to care, Elijah obviously does, and she's happy to kill Hayley if that's what it takes. Elijah has until midnight to get Klaus to change his mind. Yada yada yada.
Klaus wanders into the middle of a party while Elijah watches from above. He confront Marcel. He wants to know how Marcel controls the witches and how he managed to take over New Orleans. Marcel isn't going to share his secrets and makes it quite clear that this is his town and he expectes everyone - including Klaus - to play by his rules or die. Obviously, this pisses Klaus off, so he grabs a random bystanding vampire and bites him. Because werewolf (and hybrid) bites are poisonous to vampires, said random bystanding vampire will now die.
Elijah calls Rebekah to have a rant about how annoying it is that Klaus lost his temper (and Marcel's trust). Rebekah doesn't want to keep her niece or nephew. Elijah does. He goes to a bar/club, where Marcel is saying to someone on the phone that he knows how to deal with Klaus. Elijah wants to have a little chat. He tells Marcel that Klaus' blood can cure his friend, and bargains the blood for the body of Jane-Ann.
Back at the crypt (seriously, why do these witches hang out in a graveyard?) Elijah shows up with Jane-Ann's body as proof that he cares about his brother's baby. He says that he just needs a little more time, and threatens the witches if anything happens to Hayley or the baby.
In some random... disused train station, or something, Klaus and Elijah take turns beating each other up, occasionally with a metal pole.
Oh, jolly good shot, brother. Nice swing.
Eventually Elijah gives a speech about how family should come first and he regrets not helping Klaus the first time their father beat him. Klaus seems to have been won over but it's hard to tell.
Another melodramatic voice over from Elijah about the importance of family while we see Rebekah ignoring her brother's calls (well he never really calls to say anything helpful, does he? I'm not surprised) and Sophie and the witches laying Jane-Ann to rest while Hayley practices her sulky expressions some more. I'm wondering if the wind changed and her face got stuck that way. Klaus and Elijah have another deep and meaningful conversation about how the baby could give Klaus unconditional love. We-ell... only if he's not a psychopath around it. I know people think children love their parents unconditionally, but there is a very clear, defined line, and if a parent crosses it then there's no coming back. So I'm pretty sure that if Klaus murders people in front of his new baby, the baby won't love him anymore.
In a very white and massive house in the middle of somewhere, Hayley is taking sheets off stuff. She coughs. It's dust. Elijah wanders in to tell her that she's now the most important person in the family (until that baby claws its way from her dying body and then everyone will forget about her). Elijah does ask her how she feels about being a mother, which is nice. Hayley was abandoned when she was born. Also I heard her accent slip there. She doesn't know much about motherhood. Elijah promises to protect her, which is nice, and then Klaus shows up to be sarcastic and annoying as usual. He's given his blood to Marcel's friend and Marcel trusts him again. Or he thinks Marcel trusts him. Elijah is wondering about what the witches really want, because he doesn't think they're being entirely honest.
In a random room, we see the reason Marcel knows when witches are doing magic. It's another witch, who looks kinda young but could just have a baby face. Her name's Davina, and Marcel thinks she's powerful enough to kill the originals. Okay then. Back at the mansion, Klaus and Elijah are hanging out when Klaus spontaneously daggers his brother because he thinks family makes him weak. Seriously. I don't know why any of them trust him anymore. Hasn't he done this like a thousand times already? Idiots. So, that brings us to the end of this very special and totally unique pilot episode that was absolutely not half comprised of scenes from the backdoor pilot. Yay! Bye.