Richard DucreeThe CWWho's ready to meet the original doppelganger on The Originals?
The Vampire Diaries star Nina Dobrev is leaving Mystic Falls to head to the Big Easy in tonight's big crossover episode of the spinoff series, and executive producer Michael Narducci warns that Elijah (Daniel Gillies) won't be as excited as the fans are to see Tatia.
In fact, he told us that Esther's making Elijah relive the horrific day that Tatia was murdered, almost as if she's "forcing him to go through rehab"—she's really gunning for Mother of the Year, isn't she?!
"In the last episode, she got her hands on Elijah in this brilliant trap that she set," Narducci told us. "Poor Oliver [Chase Coleman] got snatched up as well and we'll find out what happens to him in the next episode, but Elijah is now trapped and confronted by his mother. She needs to make a case for why being a vampire is the worst thing."
Esther's big plan to "fix" her family is to convince Elijah, Klaus (Joseph Morgan) and Rebekah (Claire Holt) of what she's already convinced Finn and Kol: that being a vampire is a curse, and they should let her put them into new bodies and live out the rest of their lives as a human. Of course, we all know Klaus, Elijah and Rebekah won't be persuaded of that easily, so she's starting with Elijah.
"To convince him of this, she needs to confront him with the very thing that is his—if I can borrow from the DC mythology—his kryptonite," Narducci said. "What is the thing about Elijah we've always said is his weakness? He doesn't like other vampires. Eljiah hates being a vampire and his defense mechanism is to dress it up and have a code of honor. That's his blind spot, the thing about him that he has buried away. Esther is attacking that and making him confront that to destroy him and break him down completely to build him back up."
And part of her plan to break him down is to make him relive the memory of when he fell in love with Tatia (Klaus was already in love with her) and she was murdered by Esther to make Klaus' werewolf side dormant. But there is a huge part of that story that he doesn't know, and finding that out will have a major effect on him.
"That's a big part of Elijah's story going forward," Narducci teased. "And what does [Esther] intend to do to Klaus? What does she intend to do to Rebekah? If that was Elijah's kryptonite, then what's theirs? We're going to see what she has in mind for Klaus and what she has in mind for Rebekah." And he also revealed that we'll be seeing Rebekah's return before the holidays!
Narducci was so glad that Dobrev was available and willing to cross over to The Originals to tell Tatia's story.
"It was phenomenal [having her]," he said. "She's incredibly busy as the most important character on The Vampire Diaries. We knew that we couldn't tell this story unless we had her. This is a true origin story. [Executive producer] Julie [Plec] pulled some strings and some drinks were purchased, conversations were had, and Nina, to her credit, managed to balance double-duty."
And while the flashbacks to Tatia's murder are a huge part of the episode, so much happens in the present as well. In fact, Kol's secret is about to come out! At least one person is going to discover that Kaleb (Daniel Sharman) is actually Kol back from the dead.
Narducci revealed that he didn't want Kol's identity to stay a secret too long. "If you as an audience member know a secret and the other characters on our show don't know that secret, how long before you sitting in your room watching the show are just like, ‘Come on, people! Get with the program!'" he said.
The Originals airs Mondays at 8 p.m. on the CW.