The Vampire Diaries: Cold as Ice Recap

Synopsis: Stefan and Damon hunt Julian, only to be caught and forced into the Phoenix Stone. Caroline freaks out about having Alaric’s babies.

Rating: ★☆☆☆☆

Well that was one of the weakest mid-season finales in Vampire Diaries history.

This episode was fairly unremarkable — we’ve got a story going in three different directions: 1. The Salvatore brothers are hunting Julian for revenge; 2. Caroline is freaking out about her supernatural twinspawn; and 3. Nora and Mary Louise concluding their breakup drama.

Three years from now, we learn the (probable) reason Stef and Care never worked out: Stefan ends up with Valerie romantically.

In the present, the Salvatores, Nora, and Valerie hold a funeral for Lily. Everyone grieves except Damon, who still doesn’t care that speaking ill of the dead is in poor taste.

Stefan, bent on revenge, drags Damon through multiple towns to find and kill Julian. Once they do find him, the trio get into a scuffle. Too bad for the Salvatore brothers, Julian managed to find some backup dancers fighters. They all have non-speaking roles which is super awkward because they each nod poignantly for a full 3 seconds of screentime when they’re introduced.

Julian plays the Bond villain for a hot second during one of their encounters, promising Damon that he’ll lock him in the Phoenix stone as punishment for his unforgiving behavior toward Lily. After that bit of grandstanding, the brothers escape, come back for more, and subsequently get stabbed by the magic stabby Phoenix sword (Damon by Julian and Stefan by Nora) and transported into their own personal hell.

My personal hell, however, is having to watch this episode.

In story number 2, Caroline is reading every book about pregnancy she can to prepare for childbirth. She and Ric go to a birthing class, and it becomes apparent that Caroline’s cravings (for blood and marshmallow fluff) aren’t the only things which are a little off in her life. When another couple makes nasty comments toward the pair, she loses her temper and vamps up; later, she does the same to Ric.

After calming down, she goes to her mother’s grave to confess how lost she feels and ask for help.

In the third and least interesting storyline, Nora starts to enjoy her time without Mary Louise. She starts volunteering at Caroline and Bonnie’s toy drive and enrolls for classes at Whitmore. ML and Nora get together and end things officially- leaving Nora to bond with Bonners… until Stefan takes ML hostage to lure Julian out in the open, which is precisely the moment when Nora loses her cool and stabs Damon with the stabby Phoenix sword.