TVF: On "The Rager," we witnessed Stefan’s concern about his own past as a ripper and keeping himself grounded. How will that manifest in the coming episodes?

JP: What it’s done is we’re seeing the nuclear fallout of this big move. Elena’s a vampire and so while we could very easily make the transition simple for her, instead we wanted to make the transition as complicated and as fraught as possible. Though we knew we wanted Stefan to be her hero, to really reaffirm all the ways and all the reasons why she chose him at the end of last year... we also didn’t want it to come without its own difficulties and consequences for him, where he may not be able to be a true hero to her, because he, himself, is plagued by infinitely deeper problems that come with being a functional vampire.

We wanted to let Damon have the point of view, which, you know, for three seasons we all sort of rolled our eyes and clucked our tongues and shook our heads at Damon’s logic and yet finally have him be the guy that’s like, ‘hey, I’m right, you all know I’m right. You all are living in fantasyland’ and start understanding that Damon’s reality is really the most rational reality at this point.

TVF: And that love triangle that’s still alive, but are there some unexpected turns coming up?

JP: This is all I can say without getting myself into terrible amounts of trouble across the board. I think that people watching and paying attention to the seeds we’ve been sowing to probably chart the course of the next big turn that this triangle is going to have.

Есть какие-нибудь новости о Тайлере, Кэролайн и Клаусе?

Поклонники Кларолайн, прежде чем вы прочтете следующую новость, возможно вам будет удобнее встать, чтобы станцевать восторженный танец: Клаус продолжит вбивать клин между Кэр и Тайлером (разумеется, не без помощи своих дьявольских сил), и он весьма в этом преуспеет, уболтав действующую мисс Мистик Фоллс пойти с ним в этом году на конкурс красоты в качестве его дамы!