The CWRIP Elena Gilbert (Nina Dobrev)?
Ever since Dobrev and executive producer Julie Plec revealed that The Vampire Diaries season six finale would be Dobrev's last episode, fans everywhere were left to wonder if the CW show would do the unthinkable and kill off her character. It's been weeks of back-and-forth speculation, but it all comes to an end tonight when the season six finale airs, and the question of Elena's fate will finally be answered.
But since we can wait that long, we went straight to Plec, Dobrev, and even Michael Trevino, who is also exiting the series after tonight's finale, to find out if we'll be mourning or celebrating by the time the end credits roll.
"Well…," Plec tells E! News with a laugh when asked if Elena was going to die. "I don't know how to answer that without either hinting a yes or hinting a no. I'll just say that we're very happy with the choice we made about how to handle her character's departure. We'll see if everyone agrees."
Trevino reveals that no matter if Elena lives or dies, her exit will be permanent (unlike his, which Plec and Trevino both told us is not so permanent).
"It's an end note for sure," Trevino tells E! News. "It's a big period at the end of the sentence, if you will. It's beautiful. As we know, Nina Dobrev is leaving our show so we put a stamp of an ending there for our beloved Elena."
And no matter how you feel about Dobrev leaving, Trevino promises it will be a satisfying way to say goodbye to her character.
"They did a beautiful job with her send off," Trevino says. "I wouldn't necessarily call it a cliffhanger, but it definitely is a, ‘where do we go from here?' You're going to be asking yourself, what is season seven going to be about? It's mysterious in a way."
Plec reveals that the TVD showrunners knew all along that Elena was going to leave the show in this way, but the only question was when it would happen.
"We always knew how it was going to go, but we just didn't know at what point," Plec says. "We were still talking about whether we'd be able to move that into season seven or not. We definitely knew the ending."
And that ending for Elena's story doesn't change the series ending idea Plec has always said that she and executive producer Kevin Williamson had planned from the start.
"That particular pitch got adjusted after we got rid of the Other Side," Plec says. "But the spirit of what our intentions for that pitch were is still very much alive. It will be in a different form but the same idea behind it. In other words, there were ghosts involved in our final pitch and now we can't have ghosts anymore. Every time I tell someone what the ending of the series is, I start to cry. It's like a Pavlovian response, I get choked up pitching it to other people. I feel pretty good about it."
Press play on our exclusive videos below to find out what Dobrev had to say about her final days on set and more!
The Vampire Diaries season six finale airs tonight at 8 p.m. on the CW.