The Originals Season 1, Episode 14: "Long Way Back From Hell" Recap/Review

This was a pretty exciting episode, right? It's sort of a continuation of the themes we talked about in "The River in Reverse." With the Originals being pretty much truly immortal (unless you just happen to have some ancient white oak wood laying around), it's easy to forget that they aren't completely invulnerable--if you've got enough smarts, patience, and and nerve, as well as some magic on your side and plenty of desire for revenge in your heart, it is possible to torture them in one way or another. We have Klaus being physically tortured, Rebekah psychologically tortured, and Elijah emotionally tortured, all in one episode. Man, Genevieve is about as bonkers as they come, isn't she? I don't know whether to be impressed by her nerve and rationale behind her actions, or terrified. She's almost giving me Victoria Argent from Teen Wolf vibes, though that might just be the redheaded similarity.

Also, can we talk about how amazing Claire Holt was in this episode? Seriously, she is a completely underrated actress, and I loved every bit of her performance. Get ready to hear more gushing about her, because I'm not going to stop here.

ANYWAY, let's dig into "Long Way Back From Hell," yeah?

Previously, on The Originals: Klaus, the new leader of the French Quarter of New Orleans, announced to his and Marcel's crew of vampire lackeys that the witches have officially declared war on the vampires. Back in the day, there was actually one person that Klaus actually feared, and that was his stepdaddy, Mikael Mikaelson, the vampire vampire-hunter. Apparently, back in the late 1910s, Rebekah and Marcel conspired to bring Mikael back to town in order to run Klaus out so they could finally be together. Elijah had his own supernatural love back in the day, a powerful dark witch named Celeste, who was revealed to be still alive and currently possessing the witch Sabine's body. She set up this impressive plan that involved jacking the magic from the Harvest ritual in order to resurrect three dead witches who would be more than happy to help her in her quest for vengeance against the Mikaelsons. Step 1 of this plan involved poisoning Elijah, and then putting all three people he truly cares about (Klaus, Rebekah, Hayley and her baby) in danger, so he would only have enough time to save one. Naturally, he saved the one who WASN'T immortal, Hayley, which resulted in Klaus getting stabbed in the heart with a Knife of Excruciating Pain, and Rebekah getting attacked by a pack of werewolves during Hayley's full-moon party. Klaus was left under Bastiana's care, while Rebekah was left under Genevieve's. And that's where we pick up this time!


We open this episode in the Fleur-de-Lis Sanatorium, where Rebekah is laying unconscious on an old bed. She is COVERED in werewolf bites, which means she's in for one hell of a bad trip when she wakes up, which she does after a moment. She immediately sits up and looks around, and we can tell she's already hallucinating, because the previously empty hospital is now full of people who are coughing and screaming in agony as they slowly die of Spanish influenze. Nurses in old-fashioned dresses and aprons walk around wearing masks, caring for the various sick patients. In reality, the sanatorium is derelict and slowly falling apart, and when Rebekah sees the room for what it really is, she starts to freak out, before being hit with more hallucinations of people coughing up blood and screaming. She's finally able to stand up and make her way out of the quarantine room and into the hallway, where she desperately searches for anyone to help her out.


Once she's outside, she realizes where she really is, and mutters, "How the hell did I get here?" It must be weird, being an Original vampire, huh? Sometimes you wake up after being staked in the heart, or chomped on by some werewolves, and wake up in weird places and are just like, "Aw, man. What an inconvenience. Guess I better find my way home." She makes her way down the front steps, and eventually stops to catch her breath, which was a dumb move, because she ends up getting staked in the heart from behind! Naturally, it's Genevieve, because she's not quite done torturing Rebekah yet. Rebekah is shocked to see her, because she must have forgotten her involvement the night before. "Rebekah, tell me you're not leaving already," Genevieve chirps. "I thought we might reminisce?" Rebekah passes the fuck out, and Genevieve just smirks as she looks toward one of the windows of the sanatorium, where Celeste-as-Sabine is just chilling out. She walks away from the window and towards a table, where Klaus is laying half-naked and restrained by the wrists and ankles, just in case he tries to escape. Judging by the nasty looking wound where the knife went into him, something tells me that isn't likely. TITLE CARD!


At LaFayette Cemetery, a groundskeeper is fixing the Deveraux crypt from the damage Monique did to it when she sprang back to life. A large group of witches, all wearing black, surround the crypt, where they're consecrating Sophie's remains. Man, I kind of miss Sophie already. Who saw that coming? Out of nowhere, one of the witches gets yanked from where they stand and thrown against a nearby crypt, and suave Elijah appears out of nowhere to elbow another two witches in the gut for good measure. I LOVE BADASS ELIJAH. I am so glad he's back! Most of the witches back away from him, but Monique just stares at him as he announces, "My siblings have been taken. Where are they?"


Monique sternly informs him that he's interrupting her aunt's consecration, and judging by Elijah's reaction, he had no idea she was dead. When he asks her how it happened, Monique simply explains that she was a "casualty of war." Damn, the ancestors sure did a number on her while she was in limbo, eh? Good lord. Elijah threatens to kill everyone in the cemetery and raze the whole place afterward if he doesn't get what he wants, but Monique tells him it won't be necessary. She claims she has a message from Celeste and raises a hand in front of him. All of a sudden, names start being tattooed all over Elijah's body, starting from his shoulders and going all up and down his arms and torso. "To find what you're looking for, follow the path she left behind," Monique says cryptically, before walking away with the rest of her coven.


Back at the sanatorium, we're treated to a sight of just how much Rebekah's past actions against Genevieve fucked her up. Genevieve is humming a little tune as she pours some herbs a bowl and grinds them up with a mortar. Rebekah wakes up in the same hospital bed as before, with the wooden stake still impaling her, just as Gen pricks the end of her finger with a straight razor and drips a couple drops of blood into the herb mixture. She sucks the rest of the blood off her fingertip as Rebekah tries and fails to pull the stake out of her chest. Beks asks her what the fuck she's up to, but Gen's still working that fake-concern angle. "Poor Rebekah, you should rest! You're looking a little peaked." She pulls the stake out of Rebekah's chest, and drips Rebekah's blood into her potion. "Of course, that's to be expected, given the impressive amount of werewolf venom in your system." Rebekah gasps that if she weren't so sick, she'd rip her pretty little head off, but that just plays right into Genevieve's plan. "But you ARE sick, and comforting the sick always was a talent of mine. I take care of my friends. We were friends, weren't we? Of course we were." YIKES! Genevieve takes a damp cloth and blots at the sweat on Rebekah's brow, which sends us into a flashback...


It's 1919 in New Orleans, and Rebekah is working as a nurse at the Fleur-de-Lis Sanatorium. Of course, it IS Rebekah we're talking about, so being comforting to human strangers isn't exactly one of her best skills. The man she's caring for is coughing blood onto a rag, and she awkwardly pats him on the back ash she forces herself to smile as she takes a peek at his chart. "There, there...unidentified sick man." The man starts to cough blood onto Rebekah's apron, which is the last straw for our Beks. She proclaims this to be a bad sign, and calls out to Genevieve, "You! Red!" Genevieve heads over with a glass of some herbal concoction, and coaxes the man into drinking as much as he can. Once he does, his coughing subsides, and he's able to rest a bit. "Mmm...just like magic," Rebekah coos, as she touches Gen on the arm so she would know that Rebekah is a vampire. "But then, what would you expect from a practicing witch?" Genevieve ankle-dips a bit, and modestly explains that it's just an herbal remedy she whipped up, which won't cure them--it'll just help with the pain and the coughing fits. Rebekah lays on the flattery by telling Genevieve she's very good at all this nursing stuff, and asks for some pointers.


GENEVIEVE: "Certainly, though it is a bit odd, [lowers voice to a whisper] a vampire serving as a nurse?"
REBEKAH: [whispers] "Please, darling, I'm an Original vampire. If my city is under attack from this nasty influenza, it's my duty to lend a hand. Besides, if this entire lot dies, who'd be left to eat?"
GENEVIEVE: [smiles nervously] "You're wicked!"
REBEKAH: [smiles back] "You know, I think you and I are going to be fast friends...What do you say you join me at this swell little jazz joint I've discovered on Basin Street tonight? We can toast to the health of New Orleans."
Genevieve seems thrilled to be making a new friend, but before she can reply, she notices a brunette nurse nearby who is giving her the stink-eye. Rebekah notices this exchange, and rushes over to the brunette to invite her to come along as well. "After playing angels of mercy all day, I'd say we all deserve some fun." Genevieve smiles broadly as Rebekah walks away. OH GEEZ. This actually makes me really sad, because it seems they could have been legitimate friends for Rebekah. I JUST WANT HER TO HAVE FRIENDS, YOU GUYS. In the present day, Genevieve glares angrily at Rebekah as she gasps away in her hospital bed. In a flash, Genevieve is gone, and Rebekah is left all alone. She rolls off the bed and onto the floor with a groan.


Back at the Abbatoir, Elijah quickly enters the room as Marcel sends out more of his paid-off cops to head the search for Klaus and Rebekah. He asks Marcel if there's been any news, so Marcel catches him up on what he's accomplished the last couple hours. "They're putting eyes and ears out everywhere. Daywalkers are working every contact we've got; cops, dock workers, guys in the Treme. Word is out, anyone trying to earn favor with me gets a lifetime of it if they find them." Aw, that's actually really nice of Marcel, tbh, I'm both surprised and impressed. Elijah is glad to hear that they're doing all they can, and asks Marcel for a pen and paper. Marcel's not thrilled to be taking orders from him, as you can imagine, because he thought they were going to be working together, but Elijah is still freaking out about the dozens of names that are currently tattooed all over his body. Elijah strips off his jacket and gets to work on his dress shirt's buttons when he orders him to do what he said. "I want her back just as much as you do, you know...the both of them," Marcel admits, before fetching the supplies from a desk drawer.


Hayley waltzes in the room just as Elijah has finished taking his shirt off, and is momentarily distracted by the glorious sight that is Daniel Gillies' shirtless bod before she notices the tattoos and asks what the fuck is happening. I love that this sort of thing doesn't even faze them anymore. They're just like, "Oh, you've got the names of several dozen ladies magically tattooed all over your chest and biceps? Cool, I'll start writing." Elijah asks Hayley to make a list of all the names, so she starts to walk around Elijah as she reads all the names scrawled in fancy script along his back and sides. She sees the name "Sabine Laurent" written along his right forearm, and immediately realizes this has something to do with Celeste. Elijah agrees. "I believe they represent the names of the women Celeste inhabited for the past two centuries," Elijah admits, as Marcel walks in and hands the pen and paper to Hayley.


"It's called a Devinette," Marcel explains. "It's old school. Kind of a riddle. Witches use them to teach their kids. Solve it, and it disappears." Hayley is pretty confused, and asks what point Celeste is trying to make, but Elijah thinks he knows. "Celeste forced me to make a choice between yourself and my siblings, and now she means to mock that choice, taunting me with a childish game. The longer the game, the more they suffer. To find Klaus and Rebekah, we need to solve this riddle. The solution lies somewhere in these names." Marcel is examining the various names on Elijah's body, and recognizes the one next to Sabine's name--Annie La Fleur. Apparently, she was shunned by her coven a little over a year ago, and though Marcel doesn't know WHY, he claims he can find out, and runs off to do so. Aw, yes, the return of badass Elijah!


We return to the sanatorium, where Klaus is still lying bound to an old-fashioned gurney in an empty room. Genevieve swans into the room and heads for his bedside; Klaus' eyes are closed, but he seems to be more-or-less conscious. She runs her fingers over the painful-looking scar on his chest where he was stabbed by Papa Tunde's Knife of Excruciating Pain, and frowns when she sees how bad Klaus looks, all sweaty and pale. "You poor thing," she croons, as she walks over to a nearby cart and picks up a scalpel. Klaus' eyes open, and he watches her in fear as she returns with the scalpel and goes to cut open his abdomen. "Don't worry, I'm here to help," she promises, as she cuts open his stomach. She pushes up her sleeve and plunges her hand into his chest, which, as you can probably guess, makes Klaus scream bloody murder. He thrashes against his restraints and yells in agony until she finally grabs the knife and is able to pull it out of him. EW! I've seen a lot of disgusting stuff in my day, but that squicked me out pretty bad.


Elijah and Marcel have made their way to the neighborhood where Annie La Fleur lived. They managed to run into one of Annie's old friends from their coven and decided to see if they could get any information about her. "Annie was a good girl," the manwitch admits. "The witches did her wrong, shunning her like that. Claiming she was doing dark magic. There was no way, but they had proof. So, she just quit, and I can't really blame her for that. 'Cause once you've been shunned, what's the point in going on, you know?" OH SHIT, that is AWFUL. Okay, so we know that Celeste is a very powerful witch who is known for doing dark magic, because how else has she been able to more or less stay alive for the last two hundred years? So she's been hopping from one female witch's body to the next, using it to practice magic, and then once her actions have cost her new identity too many problems, she kills the body and hops into a new one. THAT IS SO TERRIBLE. Those poor girls! Now, I wonder, is Celeste's dark magic separate from the ancestral magic that the rest of the witches practice? Could she be cut off from it, or it completely separate, just like how Bonnie Bennett from TVD could use Expression magic, even though she was psychologically unable to practice her traditional earth magic?


Later, Elijah is walking through the streets of the Quarter as he catches Hayley up on what he's learned about Annie La Fleur. She's shocked that Celeste killed herself in Annie's body, but Elijah doesn't really seem surprised, especially considering the fact that Annie died from drowning in the Mississippi River, after jumping from the spot where Celeste and Elijah had their first kiss. He figures she just got tired of her identity once Annie was shunned from the coven, so she offed Annie and then hopped right into Sabine. Hayley declares that to be "poetic, in a creepy vendetta sort-of way," but Elijah is still stuck on the fact that she killed all these young women in an effort to enact her revenge. "I suppose we have no choice but to see where they take us," Elijah says with a sigh, before telling Hayley that he'll have to call her back later when he knows more. Hayley's been doing a little digging of her own, though, and stops him.
HAYLEY: "Elijah, wait!"
ELIJAH: "What is it?"
HAYLEY: "Ask Marcel if he knows anything about a name on that list. Brynne Deveraux. Sophie said that it was her family's bloodline that put the curse on the Crescent wolves, but Celeste said she was the only one who could break it. If Brynne Deveraux was actually Celeste when she cast the spell, then maybe Celeste can still break it."
ELIJAH: "I'll see what he knows."
HAYLEY: "Elijah, I'm really sorry that you're going through this. If I had known that Celeste made you choose who to help--"
ELIJAH: "--You were going to die in that fire, Hayley, along with my brother's child. There was no choice." [hangs up]

MAN, how long are we gonna have to wait for some real development in the Hayley/Elijah relationship front? Then again, there's still Klaus and that Jackson guy to contend with, so that's just going to be super messy. Also, how on earth has Celeste been able to convince everyone she is who she says she is? Annie La Fleur, Sabine Laurent, Brynne Deveraux, they all had friends and family, didn't they? And NO one noticed they were acting differently? Did Celeste study them or something? I HAVE SO MANY QUESTIONS.

Genevieve has bandaged Klaus' wound up, and is in the process of helping him put his black thermal on when Klaus whines that he's not healing. "The amount of dark magic contained in that blade?" Genevieve cracks. "It's gonna take a little while." Klaus is a paranoid person by nature, as we know full well, so he's suspicious as to why a witch who was brought back from the dead by Celeste, who so clearly has beef with Klaus/the Mikaelsons, would should him kindness, but Genevieve just strokes his face. "You never did anything to me. And the truth is, seeing you like this, I can't help but pity you." Naturally, this is exactly what Klaus wants to hear, and tries to turn it on her. "Then betray the others and stand with me! I will reward you in ways you cannot possibly fathom."


BAHAHA. Oh really? Genevieve chuckles, and claims she's flattered that Klaus would offer a deal to her, but first, she wants to talk about Rebekah. Klaus' mood immediately sours, and he states that Rebekah is none of her concern, and outlines the usual threats if she is to do anything to harm her. Of course, he's not going to feel that way for long, and Genevieve knows it, which is all part of her plan. "Ah, the protective brother. A shame that loyalty isn't reciprocated. But then, I'm not stranger to Rebekah's treachery. Something you and I have in common." She holds out the bowl full of the blood and herbs that she was preparing when she talked to Rebekah earlier, and urges him to drink it. He's weak, and it has blood in it, so despite his hesitation, he ends up gulping it down, though after one swallow, he knows that it doesn't taste right, and he tries to spit it out. Genevieve puts her hand over his mouth and tips his head back so he's forced so swallow it.


"Your sister had an unfortunate run-in with some wolves last night," Genevieve admits. "I imagine you're tasting the werewolf venom in her blood. It's the only way I can show you what you need to see. In her weakened state, I'll be able to guide her down Memory Lane. That's how I'm going to have my revenge. By showing you her betrayal." She places her hand on his forehead, so she can link his mind to Rebekah's through her own. In the hallway, we catch up with Rebekah, who seems to have been stumbling around all this time. She starts to hallucinate again, and imagines Klaus standing in the middle of the hallway, staring at her. She runs toward him, passing door after door with creepy images inside. A young boy, maybe five years old, coughing blood into a rag. A girl with blank eyes sitting in a bathtub, blood running down her face and the front of her nightgown. A man in a robe, coughing up blood, reaching for her. She reaches the end of the hall and pushes her way through a set of double doors labelled "CREMATORIUM." Oh God.


We flashback to 1919, where Nurse Rebekah walks into the crematorium for a rendezvous with her main squeeze of the day, Marcel. They hug, and then start making out. He pushes her against the wall and works his hand up her thigh, but she swats at him and tells him to have some respect. "Yeah, I don't think they mind," Marcel jokes, as he glances around the room at all the dead influenza patients, waiting to be cremated. He asks her if she's asked Genevieve to do the spell, yet, but she's clearly stalling, so she tells him she plans on it, when the time is right. "Rebekah, you've been hanging around that witch for weeks, waiting for the time to be right," Marcel whines. "She wasn't supposed to become your sidekick. One little spell and we can finally be together for real. What are you waiting for?" Rebekah clearly feels bad, because she likes Genevieve, and thinks she's really nice, so she feels bad for using her.


Marcel suggests they find another witch who is willing to do the spell, one who doesn't have to be her friend. When she doesn't say anything, he wonders if she's gotten cold feet about their plan, but she insists that's not the case. "I want to wake up with you in our home, in the bed that we share. I want to walk down the street with you by my side, so everyone knows that you are mine and I am yours. I don't want to be afraid of what my brother will do to me for loving you. If this is the only way to get it, then no, my mind hasn't changed." Okay, but what about the common political opinions of this time period? Forget Klaus, are the majority of people going to be fine and dandy with a proper white society woman publicly dating a black man? Obviously, they're vampires, so it's not like they had the usual physical consequences to worry about, but still. I guess TVD/The Originals exists in some sort of alternate universe where racism wasn't an issue. (Except when TPTB decide to kill off pretty much every POC character who isn't the token main character, I guess) ANYWAY, the two kiss, just as Genevieve enters the room with an armful of bloody sheets. She immediately apologizes and insists she didn't know anyone was in there, and hurries out before Rebekah can catch up with her. "Genevieve!" Rebekah calls out.


(via theoriginxls)
In the present day, Rebekah walks back through the doors and into the main part of the hallway to follow Genevieve. "Genevieve, wait! I'm sorry!" Klaus pulls himself out of Rebekah's mind, only to chuckle in a mildly bored way. "So, this is your great betrayal? Rebekah and Marcel have been sneaking around my back for the better half of two centuries," Klaus snarks, which is totally true--hell, recently Klaus even ALLOWED Rebekah to distract him by fooling around with him, so he really doesn't care that much at this point. Gen seductively struts around him, and reminds him of all the times he's warned them not to be with each other anymore, and how harshly he had punished him for those transgressions. Klaus gets defensive, and insists he had his reasons, but Genevieve isn't at all bothered by it. In fact, she gets rather ass-kissy.


"Oh, you don't have to convince me! As far as I'm concerned, you only needed one--that it suited you! Have you ever read the Old Testament, Nik? You see, God wasn't powerful because He was right," she purrs, as she runs a hand up his thigh. "He was right because He was powerful." YIKES! I can't tell if this lady is truly bananas and is actually into Klaus, or if she just really, REALLY knows Klaus' nature and is manipulating him into helping her. Maybe it's even both. Klaus sighs, and says that he has no idea what her endgame is, but if her intent is to turn him against his sister, it's been pretty much a huge failure. However, since we're only about twenty minutes into the episode, we all know that this is just a small part of the real story. "You poor thing! After a thousand years, dishonesty from your family has come to be expected. I wish that was the sum total of their treachery. Unfortunately, it's not." OH SHIT.

A bunch of Marcel's henchvamps are chilling in the bar room, drinking, when a man is thrown through the doors and lands in the middle of the floor. The nightwalkers jump out of the path of the sunlight leaking through the door, and watch as Elijah and Marcel follow behind him. As Marcel forces him into the chair, the man asks what they want from him. "Well, I assume you're familiar with this pigsty, quite appropriately known as the Pit," Elijah begins. I am SO glad that room finally has a name! "See, awkwardly enough, only weeks ago, a group of human beings just like yourself slaughtered many of the companions of the vampires that you see assembled before you here." Nice to see a call-back to that, although I was under the assumption that all of the human faction died except for Kieran? Maybe one of them missed the meeting.


Marcel continues where Elijah left off, and exposits about the fact that the man is in charge of the records room in City Hall, where rumor has it that the recently-deceased mayor kept detailed records of the names and pertinent information regarding the witches, vampires, and werewolves of the Quarter. So, Marcel and Elijah want him to hand over those records, including the death certificates. The man claims that he has no idea where it is, but Elijah immediately calls his bluff. "I think we both know that's a fib. Anyone feeling hungry?" The vampires descend upon him, fangs out and hunger in their eyes. The man, not wanting to become vampire kibble, gives up, and confesses that the records were moved to the sacristy of St. Anne's Catholic Church after the mayor's death. Of course they were. Elijah praises the man for having the smarts to do this the easy way, as he patronizingly straightens the man's tie and brushes off the shoulders of his suit jacket.


Rebekah is still running around the abandoned Fleur-de-Lis Sanatorium, and when she turns down another hallway, she hallucinates that two young boys in neat, late 1910-era suits, are standing in the middle of the hall, staring at her. She's horrified, naturally, especially when the kids let out a deafening scream, which causes Rebekah to stumble backward and run right into Genevieve, who is LOVING being able to grind salt in her metaphorical wounds. "Rough day?" Genevieve chirps. "Oh, Beks! Those bites are looking nasty." Rebekah doesn't understand why she's being forced to relive what happened in 1919, since they both know how it ends. Au contraire, mon ami.


"You and I both know, but I thought your brother might like to hear our story," Gen taunts. "So, I liked your mind to his. You're gonna show him EVERYTHING." Rebekah immediately starts to freak the fuck out, for good reason--you know Klaus is going to try to dagger her ass, or worse, once he gets the whole story, because it's Klaus. She pleads with Genevieve to stop, and swears that she'll do literally ANYTHING to keep her from spilling. Unfortunately, there's nothing Gen wants more than revenge, so she informs her that it's too late. Rebekah tries her hardest to attack her, but she's still too weak, so she gets hit with a mystic migraine faster than Rebekah can blink. Rebekah grabs her head and screams in agony until she passes out again, and Genevieve leaves her alone in a heap as she walks away.


Elijah and Marcel have made it to some file room at St. Ann's, and quickly search through various file cabinets and storage crates for any information regarding the names written on Elijah's body. Elijah finds Brynne Deveraux's death certificate, and tries to innocuously bring her up to Marcel without raising any suspicions about Hayley. Unfortunately, he kind of fails at it.
ELIJAH: "Marcel, here's another name from our list--Brynne Deveraux. Says here she drowned herself some twenty years ago. Do you recognize the name?"
MARCEL: [smiles] "Brynne? Yeah, yeah, we used to hang out, knock around a little bit."
ELIJAH: [mildly disgusted] "You can spare me the details, please."
MARCEL: "She used to do some spells for me now and then. Girl had power, cursed a whole pack of werewolves just because they were pissing me off. Speaking of, what do you think Klaus is gonna do when he finds out you left him to suffer while you saved Hayley and her wolf friends?"

OH SHIT, so wait, if Celeste was possessing Brynne Deveraux during that time, then Marcel technically slept with Marcel, yeah? Man, for all the hate he gets from the witches, they still end up always being charmed by him, don't they? ANYWAY, Elijah gets tense, and reminds Marcel to keep his nose out of his business, but Marcel just scoffs. "Oh, come on, Elijah. I got guys all over this city. You honestly think I don't know that the Crescent wolves had a little family reunion out at the plantation last night? Thanks for letting the house burn, by the way. Good riddance! But my question is, what's Hayley doing with that bunch?" Elijah doesn't straight-out tell Marcel that Hayley is part of the Crescent wolf clan, but he might as well have, because he basically tells Marcel that if he lays a hand on Hayley, it will be the last thing he ever does.

Marcel realizes he struck a nerve, but Elijah, who has been skimming through various other death certificates, quickly changes the subject. "We were right! Every name upon my flesh signifies a witch who died by her own hand. All but one. Clara Summerlin." OH SHIT, we already heard about her, remember? In "Dance Back From The Grave," during the first flashback with Papa Tunde, Genevieve was hanging out with Clara Summerlin. This is gonna be so bananas! Marcel asks him if he recognizes the name, but he doesn't, so Marcel wonders how she died, if she didn't kill herself. Elijah reads further, and learns that she died of the Spanish Influenza epidemic in 1919. Marcel's face immediately tenses as he processes that information. All of a sudden, the tattoos fade from Elijah's body, so he assumes they have their answer, though he has no idea what any of it means. Judging by Marcel's face, I think it's safe to assume he's starting to figure out what's really going on here.


Back at the sanatorium, Genevieve sets an old record player out on an antique wheelchair sitting in the hallway and winds it up. She puts on an old jazzy number, which echoes throughout the entire hospital. Rebekah starts to wake up as she hears it, and it seems to stir up some more old memories, despite her desire not to think about it. She shouts, "NO! NO! Please!" as she starts to run off, but of course, no one is listening. Klaus can hear the music from his own room, and when Genevieve joins him again, she continues down Memory Lane to spill more dirt on Rebekah and Marcel. "Your sister's tryst with Marcel was only the beginning," she tells Klaus with feigned sympathy. "You see, the burden of your condemnation was too great, and as a result, your deepest fear came to pass--that their love for each other would overshadow their love for you and turn it into hate. Nik, they conspired to rid themselves of you for good." Yup, she really does have Klaus all figured out. Meanwhile, Rebekah finds the record player and smashes it onto the ground, but the song is already stuck in her head, and launches her into another round of flashback-hallucinations.


It's 1919, and Rebekah walks into the jazz club she was telling the girls about, with Genevieve and Clara in tow. They're all in their flapper best, and look amazing. Clara insists that she's buying the next round, and Genevieve tries to protest. "Clara Summerlin, no! I'll be soused!" Rebekah encourages her to live a little and drink up while they still can, since it's likely this is the last real gin in the city, since Prohibition was just getting started at that time. Clara heads to the bar to grab the girls' drinks, while Rebekah and Gen find themselves a table. Genevieve turns to Rebekah and admits, "You're nothing like I thought you'd be, when I first met you. I was brought up to think your kind were, well..." "An abomination of nature?" Rebekah supplies helpfully, but Genevieve insists she isn't. "Not just you! Your whole family is so...elegant," she says with a sigh, as she catches a glance of Elijah entering the club. It's true, though, despite being monsters, they are quite sophisticated. After about 900 years of life at that point, I'd imagine you'd learn quite a lot about etiquette and customs, wouldn't you?


Rebekah assumes Genevieve is referring to Elijah in particular, but it's actually Klaus to whom she's begun to take a fancy. "Klaus? Genevieve, who'd have thought a saintly little witch like you would go for the bad boys? I knew we were destined to be friends!" OH YIKES, so maybe Genevieve's sympathy and concern for Klaus isn't fake after all? Maybe she wants revenge on Rebekah and Marcel, and wooing Klaus is just icing on the cake for her? Damn, she's cold!


At the bar, Clara finally gets to order and asks for a martini just before the man next to her accidentally spills his drink on her dress. She's startled, but before she can even react, Elijah, always the gentleman, appears next to her and hands her his handkerchief. "Please, allow me," he says with a smile, before insisting that she keep it for herself. She watches him with a smile as he leaves. Maybe there's something about Celeste that shines through all her various meatsuits, and Elijah keeps getting drawn to it? He had a similar chemistry with Sabine, too. It's crazy that she was still alive all that time that the Mikaelson's continued to stay in New Orleans, and they never knew it!


Back at the table, Rebekah suggests that Genevieve might like her brother Kol even more than she likes Klaus, if bad boys are her thing. Present-day Klaus stands in the vision, and watches as Rebekah starts to sow the seeds of her plan with Marcel. Genevieve asks where Kol is, and honestly, I'd like to know, too. In TVD, before he was killed, he told Elena that he was alive and undaggered in New Orleans in the 20th century, because he said he made friends with the witches and held them in high esteem. BUT, other than that one shot of him being daggered in the coffin in the pilot, we haven't heard about him at all. "It's complicated," Rebekah admits. "Like all siblings, we've had our ups and downs. Family feuds. In fact, I was thinking of reaching out to someone we haven't seen in a very long while. I was hoping that maybe you could help me contact them. But, it would have to be a surprise. No one could know." Genevieve, already loving Rebekah and feeling loyal to her new friend, says she'd be happy to, and asks her if she wants her to find Kol. "Actually, I'd like you to find Mikael...our father," Rebekah confesses.

In the present day, Klaus pulls out of the vision and bellows, "ENOUGH OF YOUR LIES!" Genevieve, to her credit, is not the least bit frightened, and simply reminds him not to shoot the messenger. "Part of you must have known! Suspected, at least. Your father came to New Orleans in 1919 to kill you, did he not? And as the city burned, he nearly succeeded." I love the way this show integrates the supernatural into the actual history, such as Rebekah helping the Casket Girls (and likely turning them into vampires so they could protect themselves), and Mikael starting the fires in New Orleans. Klaus, surprisingly, insists that despite the shitty things he and his siblings do to each other, Rebekah would never go as far as to contact Mikael, no matter how angry she was. Genevieve gives him a condescending little smile, and says that while it's sweet of him to want to believe the best in his sister, in this instance, he's wrong.

At the Abbatoir compound, Elijah enters the study to find Hayley on the laptop, researching their current dilemma. She immediately informs Elijah that she found something, but he cuts her off with a gesture and quickly whispers that she was correct about Brynne Deveraux. Unfortunately, Marcel walks in before they can discuss it further, and asks Hayley if she found anything about Clara Summerlin. "Not much," Hayley confesses. "She was a nurse at the Fleur-de-Lis Sanatorium." Marcel freezes in his tracks, so Hayley assumes that means he remembers her, and pulls up a picture of the nurses outside the hospital on the computer to show the boys. Elijah doesn't recognize her, but when he asks Marcel if he does, he notices Marcel's shady behavior and wastes no time calling him out on it. "Marcel? Do I need to remind you that Niklaus and Rebekah are somewhere suffering horribly? If you know something, talk." 

Marcel sidesteps the nasty details, and simply states that they'll find Rebekah and Klaus at the sanatorium, but as you can guess, that isn't enough information for Elijah, who asks how he knows this. "If I'm right," Marcel admits reluctantly. "You need to know exactly what we're walking into. We did something, Rebekah and I...the witches are trying to use it against her. It's, uh...something that you're not gonna like." OH CRAP, I just realized that Marcel and Rebekah knew that Genevieve was back as recently as "Crescent City," but they were too wrapped up in other drama to figure out what to do about it. THIS IS GONNA BE SUCH A MESS.


We return to Klaus and Genevieve's room at the sanatorium, where Genevieve asks Klaus if he's ready to get his proof. He remains silent, so Genevieve links their minds again and starts to walk him through it. We flashback to 1919 again, where Genevieve is performing a spell at the LaFayette Cemetery. Marcel and Rebekah stand behind her, watching, as present-day Klaus stands nearby and does the same. Genevieve holds up the same newspaper article with Marcel and Klaus at the opera that Cami stumbled upon a few episodes ago, and crumples it in a ball. She takes a large blade with a wooden handle and puts it into the flame of a candle, which causes Klaus to gasp.


When Present-Day Genevieve asks him what he's seeing, he brings up the blade, which used to belong to Mikael. "It went missing when I was a boy. He beat me half to death, so sure I had stolen it. [beat] Rebekah was so kind to me in the wees after the beating...I should have known she was the culprit. She never could stand weapons were things not meant for girls." Back in the flashback, Genevieve chants, "Pran ce mesaj sa a, les cendres sur le vent," with the blade being held in the flame in one hand, and the crumpled newspaper held in the other. The newspaper bursts into flames and disintegrates to indicate that the spell is complete. Elsewhere in the hospital, Rebekah, knowing what Klaus has just seen, screams "NO!" Klaus tears up as he realizes that Rebekah and Marcel really did send Mikael for him, and snits, "My sister. Rebekah. REBEKAH!"


Elijah must have heard the same story from Marcel himself, because when we return to the Abbatoir, Elijah is pretty pissed. "For the better part of a century, I have wondered how Father found us, what foolish mistake that we made to destroy our time in the one place that we could finally call home. Did you know, I even blamed myself for a time, Marcellus?" YIKES. Elijah zoops over to Marcel and pushes him against the wall in a choke-hold, which causes Hayley to run up to him to stop him. Marcel tries to backpedal a little bit, but Elijah reminds Marcel that Klaus treated him like a son, which is not something to be taken lightly, considering Klaus' attitudes toward most people. Marcel tries to reason with Elijah by putting it into a context he can understand.


"Rebekah. I loved her. I still love her. All we ever wanted to was to be together, but as long as Klaus was around, that was never gonna happen. But hey, I guess you wouldn't know anything about that, huh?" It's funny, because that could be referring to Katherine, or Celeste, or even Hayley. Elijah seems to understand where Marcel is coming from and reluctantly lets go of him, but that definitely doesn't do anything to make him less pissed off. He points out that when Klaus finally learns the truth of what they did, he will basically be an atomic bomb of rage, and Elijah refuses to allow Rebekah to be harmed by Klaus. Marcel agrees, and insists that they get to her ASAP before that can happen. Yeah, a little too late there, kids.













(via xnolifewithoutmusicx)
Rebekah continues to stumble around the hospital, and sighs in relief when she finally finds a set of double doors. She runs over to them and pushes against them with all of her strength, but since she's still weakened from the werewolf venom and not having fed in God knows how long, she can't get the doors open. "Just give it up, Rebekah," Celeste calls out from behind her. "It's inevitable at this point." Rebekah addresses her as Sabine, but she claims she prefers the name Celeste. "All these names I've had over the years, and I still prefer the first. Perhaps it was the way it sounded on Elijah's lips, like a declaration of love. Oh, he was a good liar. All of you are." Rebekah weakly protests that Elijah is a good man, regardless of how bad she and Klaus may be, but Celeste just chuckles.
CELESTE: "Still defending him, even until the bitter end. Good. I'm counting on that familial love. It'll be the ruin of you all. Now that Klaus knows what you've done, he'll never stop until he's had his revenge. He'll kill Marcel. Do something horrible to you. Elijah will never forgive him. Your betrayal will ultimately pit brother against brother. And the fabled Mikaelson bond will crumble."
REBEKAH: "I'll kill you, you bitch!"
CELESTE: "You already did. Though, at the time, I wore a different face."

We flash back to 1919 again, where the ladies are working another shift at the sanatorium. Genevieve and Clara are comforting an influenza patient when Rebekah approaches them and asks Genevieve if they can talk privately. Clara encourages Genevieve to go talk and wash up anyway, and reminds her to incinerate a bloody rag that she had just taken from a patient as soon as possible. As she does so, Clara's face flickers into Sabine/Celeste's face and back again, just so we haven't forgotten that Celeste was inhabiting Clara's body at the time. Shouldn't it have been Celeste's real face? Did Rebekah even really know Celeste back then? In the present day, Rebekah realizes that Celeste was in Clara Summerlin's body back then, and snits, "You should have minded your own business." Celeste insists that since she though her friend was being exploited, it WAS her business.


Back in the flashback, Genevieve and Rebekah have gone to the morgue to talk, and Genevieve screeches, "Call it off? Are you mad?" Rebekah is nearly in tears as she insists that she was wrong to want to contact her father, and that she was stupid and impulsive to even have done it in the first place. "I'm begging you, please don't bring Mikael here. If Klaus finds out what we have done, what YOU have done..."


Genevieve gasps when she realizes her role in this, and starts to freak out that Klaus will end up killing her and her family. Rebekah points out that that is why she needs to stop it, but Genevieve reminds her that magic doesn't really work that way--the spell contacted Mikael, and now he's coming. So, their only recourse is to tell the truth and see what happens. Naturally, Rebekah isn't game for that, because it will inevitably end in her being daggered and locked in a coffin for another century, so she demands that Genevieve say nothing about this to anyone. Genevieve realizes that she's been played this whole time, and becomes furious. "You used me. This whole time, our friendship. All you wanted was a favor, and now you want to take it back? Well, you can't, and I will not suffer because I was foolish enough to trust you." 


Rebekah grabs her wrist and continues to beg her to stop, because it was a mistake that will destroy her entire family, but Genevieve just starts to mutter a spell under her breath that gives her another mystical migraine. "You brought this on yourself," Genevieve spits angrily. "I will not be destroyed along with you." Rebekah pulls herself together, sees the bloody rag in Genevieve's pocket, and vamp-speeds toward Genevieve. She pulls the rag out of her pocket and pushes it against Genevieve's face and nose, forcing her to inhale all the nasty influenza germs. "I'm so sorry, Genevieve. But, if you tell Niklaus you summoned Mikael, you're dead either way." Clara walks into the morgue, and asks Genevieve if everything is okay before she realizes what's going down. When she does, she drops a large brown glass bottle on the floor in fear. In the present day, Celeste finishes off the story. "So, you infected me, too. Compelled the orderlies to keep us in quarantine until we died. Fortunately, I just took another body. Genevieve wasn't so lucky. Well, now that she's back, YOU'RE the one who's luck's run out."

In Klaus' room, Genevieve is trying to comfort Klaus after everything he's learned today. "I'm sorry. I know how much this hurt, to see what she did. To see who she really is. But, you needed to know. You needed to see it. And, now that you have, you can take your revenge. OUR revenge." She holds her arm out in front of his face, and urges him to drunk from her. "Please," she coos. "Go ahead. You'll need your strength for what comes next." I am not always Klaus' fan, but I seriously thought that he was smart enough to see when he's being manipulated. Like, seriously, Genevieve is not subtle AT ALL about what she's trying to do, and he's just eating right out of the palm of her hand. Is he really that betrayed and that hurt that he would allow himself to be so thoroughly played by this witch who seems to have ulterior motives?


Anyway, he feeds from her, and when he's done, she picks up Papa Tunde's knife and holds it as she undoes his bindings, as an additional gesture of good faith. Once he's been freed, he quickly jumps to his feet and grabs Papa Tunde's blade before swiftly aiming it at Genevieve's neck, as if he's going to slit her throat with it. I was SO hoping he would do it, which makes me sad, because I hate rooting for death, even in TV shows for fictional characters. But instead, he dashes away and leaves her wholly unharmed and grinning gleefully at her plan going just as she wanted.


He starts searching the building, shouting out his baby sister's name in an effort to hunt her down. Outside, Elijah and Marcel have finally made it to the sanatorium, where Elijah decides the two will split up and search either end of the building before meeting in the middle. Rebekah finally stumbles upon Klaus, and automatically goes into damage control. "Nik, Nik, it isn't true!" He claims he wants to believe that, but says her face betrays her. "You cannot hide from me, Rebekah! Nor can you run. This ends now!"


Celeste, who is super proud of her handiwork, leaves the sanatorium. Once she's outside, Hayley sneaks up behind her and completely whacks her on the head with a shovel. "Hey there, witch bitch," Hayley growls. "You and I are gonna have a little chat." YES! Get her, Hayley! She's been hurting your crush, your best friend, AND your biological family, so I'd say she's got plenty of reason to be pissed.
























(via littleheartss)
Inside, Rebekah stops running, and Klaus eventually catches up with her. He taunts her, and asks her if she's tired of running from him already, but Rebekah just retorts that she knows how much he loves the chase, and refuses to give him the satisfaction. "Well, then, I'll take my pleasure in other ways," Klaus decides gleefully. "No more "daggered in a box" for you. Trust me, sister, you'll be longing for what the dagger offered. How to describe exactly what this blade does?" Rebekah reminds her brother that he doesn't actually have to do this, but he just ignores her, and starts to ramble on about how he's going to stab Papa Tunde's blade into her heart, which will cause her to be immobilized in unspeakable pain until the blade is removed. She encourages him to get on with it, then, which makes Klaus laugh. "Are we skipping the part where you beg for mercy? For forgiveness? Because I was really looking forward to that." Rebekah knows that it'd be pointless, so she's just decided to embrace her state, which honestly, is probably the best move she could do. She might end up hurt, but at least he'll lose all the satisfaction that comes from her being at his mercy.

Klaus continues to taunt her. "That's it, then? You concede? Like a lamb to the slaughter. What would your father think of you now?" That is the WRONG button for him to push, because even despite being weak from tripping on werewolf venom all day, she still lunges at him, though he is able to push her away with ease, onto a pile of wood and other debris. She grunts in pain as she pulls herself up again, and picks up a pipe to use as a weapon. She just goes to town, backhanding up upside the head a handful of times, before he finally is thrown to his knees, a dribble of blood dripping down his chin.















(via xnolifewithoutmusicx)
He grins and hops up to zoop over to Rebekah and disarm her. He picks her up and fully SLAMS her onto the ground. She moans in pain and tries to shake it off, and before Klaus can do anything to Rebekah, Marcel vampspeeds from behind Klaus and tries to get the knife from him. Unfortunately, he, too, is thrown aside without so much as breaking a sweat. "Just the man I wanted to see," Klaus sneers, as Marcel groans from the impact from being thrown against the wall. "Rebekah's punishment won't be complete until she watches you die." Man, he really is the biggest baby. Like, I get it--he feels betrayed for what Rebekah and Marcel did, but I think what he hates most is just that they were THAT frustrated toward him, and managed to hide it from him. Despite everything that happened, I'd say it all worked out alright in the end; they may have had to flee New Orleans, but Klaus did end up breaking the curse AND killing Mikael, so it's not like he has anything to fear now, you know? But, it's Klaus, so of course he's not going to let this go.

Rebekah maintains that it was her plan, and so she should be punished, not Marcel, which Klaus finds to be quite precious. "Such loyalty to your beloved. You know, if you had offered me even a fraction of the same, I wouldn't have to do this." He lifts the blade, and is ready to jam it into Rebekah's heart, but before he gets the chance, Elijah sneaks up behind him and forces Klaus to stab HIMSELF in the heart with it, saving his sister and Marcel from Klaus' wrath. "Go. Both of you. Run as far and as fast as you can. Run!" Oh Elijah, bless you and your noble heart. Rebekah and Marcel don't have to be told twice before they flee, leaving Elijah sprawled on the floor, holding an immobile Klaus in his arms.

















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Next episode: Cami gets put on Klaus babysitting duty, while Rebekah and Marcel try to figure out what the fuck they're going to do to keep themselves from being tracked down by Klaus. Also, Hayley and the werewolves have some business to discuss with Celeste.

Click HERE to read my next recap of The Originals!

[screencaps via the-originals.info]

NOTES/SPECULATION/QUESTIONS:
-I am just so intrigued about Celeste, even though I'm not particularly fond of her as a person. Like, I just have so many questions--does she practice dark AND ancestral magic? I mean, I can't imagine the ancestors would be happy with a witch who jacked their power for her own revenge plots, and I was always under the impression that witches in general weren't fans of vampires because they believed that nature dictated that all living things must die. Even if Celeste is body-jumping, she's still more or less immortal, which seems like kind of a no-no unless you're using dark power in order to do it. Not to mention the fact that she has been killing her witch brethren after she's grown tired of their meatsuits, which seems to be something the ancestors would be particularly fond of, either. And why keep killing them? Is that the only way she can jump into another body? And was being able to seek revenge on Elijah and his siblings just a perk of her immortality, or did she seek out becoming more or less immortal in order to get her revenge? She seems to have been planning this FOREVER.

-I still miss Davina. PLEASE BRING HER BACK SOON.

-I also miss Sophie, which I never thought I would say. So, now the coven doesn't have any Elders, unless Celeste or Genevieve have somehow gained that power? Now that the Harvest is over, I guess it doesn't really matter right now, unless there's some other super special spell they need to do sometime.

-While I'm on the topic of people that I miss, where the fuck has Josh been all my life? He is like, the small light in the darkness that is this show.

Comments

  1. With regards to everything working out okay in the end, I agree. Klaus broke his hybrid curse, and because of that he now has a daughter on the way.
    Also, he wouldn't have hooked up with Hayley if they'd stayed in New Orleans.

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