The Originals – Gather Up The Killers

By: Stacy Miller

As the episode opens, we learn that it’s been five years since the fall of the Mikaelsons.  Vincent (Yusuf Gatewood)  is addressing a gathering of witches and telling them that with the infamous vampire clan out of commission, New Orleans has been doing well as witch/vampire relations has never been better.  But course, the city is visited by those with motives that mess with the alliance struck between the witches and the vampires.  And the visitors want Klaus (Joseph Morgan), who Marcel (Charles Michael David) is holding prisoner in the ruins of the Mikaelson estate.

Marcel himself is living in the opulence of Lucien’s penthouse. He’s king of New Orleans and every king should have a palace right?  He meets with his right hand woman, Sonfya (Taylor Cole), who gives him information on the news around the city.  It seems that a few of Klaus’ enemies and the covens are trying to steal Klaus away from Marcel.  And strange sigil have been popping up all over town. Gerard will speak with Vincent about this witch situation.  But a king’s work is never done. Marcel also learns that a vampire that Klaus sired, Alistair (Neil Jackson) is in town searching for Hayley (Phoebe Tonkin) as he believes that she is the key to finding Klaus.  Alistair knows that if Elijah’s (Daniel Gillies) sire line, The Strix, is alive then so is Elijah. And people are wondering if Hayley is trying to bring back The Mikaelsons.

Meanwhile, Hayley meets with Jackson’s grandmother Mary (Debra Mooney) and they talk about how Hayley needs to find all seven werewolf packs as part of a ritual in order to bring the Mikaelsons back; she found six and now has a lead on the seventh. Hayley is determined to wake the Mikaelsons as well as find a cure for Freya’s (Riley Voekel) poisoning.  After asking Mary to look after Hope (Summer Fontana), Hayley is on her way to Texas to locate the seventh member of the werewolf packs, a woman named Keelin (Christina Moses).

Marcel goes to Rousseau’s to have a meeting with Vincent.  He questions Vincent about the sigils and the secret witch meetings.  Gerard needs for Vincent to keep the witches in check as he has to contend with the out of town vampire visitors (particularly Alistair). Vincent meets a woman named Maxine (Karan Kendrick) who he seems to be taken with. Marcel leaves and goes to see Klaus, who he is holding prisoner. Marcel tells Klaus that it’s time they had a long overdue chat. Marcel tells Klaus that they have two ways in which to do this: The easy way (a vial of blood for the starving Klaus) or the hard way (the Tundae dagger of unimaginable agony). He outlines the situation for his surrogate vampire father.  Marcel wants Klaus to give him information on Alistair’s weakness so he’ll be able to handle him.  You see back in the day, Klaus was the one who sired Alistair and then compelled the newly turned vampire to kill his own wife and child.  So, Alistair is definitely not a card carrying member of the Klaus Mikaelson Fan Club (for that matter, who is?).  Klaus takes the easy way and grabs the bag of blood. He then tells Marcel that Alistair’s weakness is the vampire’s pride.  He suggests that Marcel host a huge party and invite Alistair.  Marcel leaves and goes to invite Alistair to his gathering.  Alistair will attend; he also tells Marcel that he believes that the Mikaelson siblings live because they were somehow linked to Klaus.  He plans to spill Klaus’ blood at the party to kill the entire Mikaleson clan.  A furious Marcel goes back to Klaus; wondering what game his vampire sire is planning. Klaus finds it interesting to see Marcel having to deal with the duties (and headaches) of being king.  But Marcel reminds Klaus that if Alistair has Mikaelson’s blood, he’ll be able to find Hope and Klaus’ daughter will be in danger. At the mention of his child, Klaus tells Marcel to let him deal with Alistair.  Vincent prepares the Mikaelson estate for the party guests.  And by prepare I mean he uses witch magic in order to place the home under a barrier in which people can come in but can’t leave. It’s obvious that the spell is for the soul reason of trapping Alistair and his vampire cronies inside the mansion.  But to what purpose?  Later, Alistair and the guests arrive and Marcel makes a big spectacle of dragging a chained Klaus before the crowd.  Oh, how the mighty Mikaelson has fallen! Alistair taunts Klaus. It looks like it’s going to be a fight to the death between Klaus and Alistair.  For a while, Alistair kicks Klaus’ vampire ass all over the place. But suddenly, Klaus gets the upper hand and bites Alistair!  And as any viewer of “The Originals” knows, a werewolf bite is deadly to vampires. Klaus challenges the other vampires to fight him. “Meet you maker,” Klaus says. It’s a good thing that Klaus’ sire line is no longer linked to him because killing them would be like killing himself…literally. Marcel’s had enough of fight club.  He puts the vamp wolf down (at least temporarily) by snapping Klaus’ neck.  Then, he addresses the group by telling them that he is keeping Klaus alive for his werewolf bite curing blood.  And in the event the other Mikaelsons show up. Marcel tells them that he can put Klaus down whenever he wants and keeps him alive because he can. So in case anyone misunderstands Marcel’s little speech, he spells it out; he is king and New Orleans is his city. Long live King Marcel! Part over…guests go home.

Vincent puts Klaus back in his prison cell.  He tells Klaus that Cami believed in Mikaelson and saw the good in him, but Klaus has only shown how wrong Cami was. After Vincent leaves and Marcel arrives, Klaus taunts him with the real reason Marcel keeps him alive.  “I am the source of the approval you seek.” Klaus knows Marcel needs to have him around to “keep from becoming the monster you fear yourself to be. You are weak.”  Tired of hearing Klaus talk (the truth hurts, doesn’t it Marcel?) Marcel stabs Klaus with the Tunde blade of unimaginable agony.

Meanwhile, Hayley has kidnapped Keelin. She brings her to a warehouse.  After Freya is awaken, a spell is done to help save Elijah, Kol, and Rebekah.  But Alistair’s men are hot on Hayley’s trail and she has to wolf out to protect Freya in order for her to complete the spell.  Freya is successful and also cures the deadly bite on Elijah’s arm. Elijah awakens from his long winter’s nap just in time as after Hayley has changed back into her human form, she realizes that she still has a few more of Alistair’s cronies waiting for a fight.  But before she has a chance to revert back to wolf girl, they are killed.  Hayley doesn’t even have to turn around to know that Elijah is there.  He puts his jacket over her shoulders and then Hayley turns around and they share the kiss of lost loves finally reunited. Hayley learns that Kol and Rebekah’s hunger were too intense so they didn’t come with him.  He then asks Hayley about Hope.  Hayley assures Elijah that Hope is okay.  So there’s only one member of the Mikaelson family to be reunited with. “Let’s go get him,” Elijah says.

As the episode concludes, Maxine’s little boy Adam has gone missing.  We see him in an empty building and he notices a strange serpent sigil.  Adam is frightened by something he sees. At that moment, Hope wakes up from a nightmare. There are pieces of paper of something she’s been drawing – the same sigil Adam had seen. What is this symbol? What does it mean and why has Hope been drawing it?