Let’s get straight to the point here. Was anyone really shocked about this episode’s death? When new characters are introduced into a cast of this size and a show clouded by a theme of death, you can’t help but wonder which of the new people are the most expendable. Well, unfortunately for Luke, he was expendable. Like I said, it wasn’t really a huge surprise. Liv was clearly the favorite of the two story wise and their familial relationship certainly made his death heartbreaking. In this episode Luke ended up sacrificing himself to merge with Kai so Liv could live. This will hopefully be a move worth making as the stories moves forward.

So- tonight we said goodbye to Luke. Let’s look into how we got there.

The episode opened with an old school scary movie feel as Caroline’s hopeful miracle makes his way to her house. Colin, the cancer patient Caroline fed her blood to last episode is not looking good and covered in blood as he stands in front of her. When Stefan arrives he realizes that Colin became a vampire, which means that he had died (which we saw last week) sometime after Caroline gave him blood, meaning that her idea did not work. It also means that the blood she gave her mother the night before is still in her system, killing her.

Over in Damon and Elena’s world, Damon is asking Elena out on a kind of first date. The only catch is that the date he is trying to go on is actually a date that they already had. When Elena catches wind of this she vehemently declines. She wants to start making new memories instead of living in the past. She still agrees to the date but wants to do something new.

Sometimes I think the writers of Vampire Diaries do not like to commit. It’s extremely clear when they bring back loved characters from the death (Jeremy, Bonnie, Alaric) but also in some of their everyday story-lines. I feel the Damon and Elena story line could have been dragged out a bit longer and been a lot richer. It may just be me and I may be a little bored of Damon and Elena but it just seems old and repetitive to me. I really wanted to see the struggles of both of them during this period of Elena’s forgotten memories.

While trying to figure out what happened to Colin, Jo diagnosis’ him with stage 10 cancer, which obviously is not even a diagnosis that exists. Caroline’s blood sped up Colin’s cancer which puts everyone on edge about Liz. Elena blames Stefan for letting Caroline go through with it and not doing more research on the topic. Everyone else is brainstorming ideas as to how to get the blood out of Liz’s system.

Jo thinks that a blood transfusion is their best chance of getting the blood out of her system. Meanwhile, Liv and Tyler are snuggling up in her dorm room when Father Gemini appears reminding her and alerting Tyler that today was Liv’s birthday. That means it’s time for Luke and Liv to merge. And while it seems to change daily who is required to merge, this appears like the real deal and Luke and Liv have to figure out a way to get their father to reconsider the merge.

Back at the hospital, Colin’s blood transfusion did not work which sends Caroline into a frenzy having to come to terms with accepting the fact that her mother will be dead within the next day or so. She runs away to go and pick some flowers for her mothers impending memorial. She is basically just trying to avoid the horrible situation that is right in front of her. This is where Stefan finds her and my heart flutters.

Stefan actually brings up his mother. I can’t really remember another time with the matriarch of the Salvatore family was mentioned and I have to admit that I was super intrigued and wanted to know a bit more! Maybe they will open this story more in the upcoming seasons. Stefan opens up saying that when his mother was ill, he spent all of his time avoiding her and what was going on because it was too hard to see her that sick and weak.

While it seemed to be a good plan at the time, all of the sudden his mother had passed away and he’d wasted all of their final moments they could have had together. He needs Caroline to go back to hospital. He does not want her to have to go through that…Stefan knows her so well to know that she would really struggle and be in a bad place if she were not to be around for her mother right now.

Caroline reaches for his hand and agrees to go back and see her mom. Again, my heart flutters. Stefan and Caroline are the only couple that I want to happen right now. They are a really great match and so interesting to the future of the series. I’ll always be a Klaus and Caroline fan but knowing that will probably never happen I am more than happy about Stefan and Caroline’s potential.

Tyler is taking matters into his own hands as he does not want to face that fact that his girlfriend could be dying that day. He sneaks over to Alaric’s apartment where Kai is still sedated and tries to wake him up so that he can merge with Jo instead of Liv and Luke having to do it. Thankfully, Damon intercepts him. Damon also comes up with a brilliant plan to help save Liz.

Damon tells Father Gemini that there is an opportunity to perform a merge tonight and that he needs to find a way to get Liv and Luke to merge or else Damon will have Kai merge with Jo, giving the Gemini coven the ruler of a psychopath.

This is where Damon’s plan gets good. Since Kai has the ability to absorb magic, Damon wants him to try and suck the vampire blood (magic) out of Liz. It actually works until Liz’s heart gives out, distracting Damon long enough to get his neck snapped by Kai. Kai grabs Jo and makes a break for it to get the merge started. Elena is working to get Liz’s heart started again.

So basically, Tyler knocks our Father Gemini, who was trying to force Luke and Liv to merge and Luke decides to take one for the team to go and find Kai. This is where Luke’s sacrifice begins and he shows that he is definitely the smartest Gemini.

Since Luke and Kai share a bloodline and are both sets or twins and the same age, thanks to Kai being stuck in his personal prison, Luke thinks that they are a match for a merge. Kai eventually agrees and a merge begins.

Over at Mystic Falls Hospital, the doctors are unable to do anything for Liz and unfortunately pronounce her dead right as Caroline walks in. I’m not going to lie I definitely started crying. I love Liz and have always admired the character that she became to the town and the characters, more specifically Damon.

We are able to get a little peek into Liz’s mind as she says goodbye to Caroline who is in full on vampire mode. It’s all a little bit confusing, but the way I saw it-she knows there is more to Caroline than that and she did not want that to be her last image of her daughter. With that, Liz wakes back up to all of her friends and her daughter. Thankfully, Caroline will be able to spend a little more time with her and make their final moments special.

Elena storms out of the room to search for Damon,  as opposed to staying and comforting her best friend…what has become of Elena these days? She starts making out with Damon, because she believes that life is too short and she doesn’t want to wait around for things to possibly pass her by. Again, they are just not doing it for me anymore. Please go console Caroline, Elena. You of all people should understand the grief that will shortly be upon her.

After making a promise to Caroline that she will stick around as long as she possibly can, Liz sends Caroline to get her some coffee. Liz takes advantage of this moment alone with Stefan and opens up about what she hopes for Caroline. Apparently Liz also sees the chemistry, love, and potential between Stefan and Caroline as well. You can tell through her heartfelt speech.

“When I’m gone, Caroline is going to need you, even if she doesn’t know it. She’s going to need someone to help her move on with her life, someone to just make her smile. Promise me that you will do that, Stefan.”

You can’t deny a mothers intuition. Caroline is standing outside and hears the whole thing. I am unsure whether or not this is a good or bad thing. I’m going to go with good. Caroline and Stefan is just gold to me. They’ve individually both come so far and together they bring out the best in each other. I swear one day I blinked and Caroline and Stefan were a ship sailing off into the night and I was totally on board.

As we cut back to the merge we see that Kai and Luke are both laying on the ground- not yet dead…for one of them. Whoever wakes up first has won the merge. Again, who is the most expandable but also whose death would also provide an emotional punch? Luke. Luke does not wake up. Kai has won the merge, which is good because he is just so good for this season as a whole.

Hopefully now we will never have to hear the word “merge” again. It’s really sad that Luke had to go, but in a way it was necessary. It’s time to move the Gemini story forward and the looming merge was holding that back. Liv will have to find a way to carry on without the boy she’s had by her side her entire life…whose life was taken away at the hands of her brother, Kai.