This is almost it, folks. There is only one more hour of The Vampire Diaries left before we enter the long, hot summer with no vampires, witches, or werewolves to keep us company. …On The CW anyway.
And if you’ve been watching you know that things have been ramping up to a cliffhanger that I’m sure will put most of us in temporary comas or at the very least cause temporary loss of bladder control.

A lot has gone down in this third season of a show that continues to surprise me each week but the following are the sort of basics you should know before going into Thursday night’s season finale:

Alaric – If someone had told me a few months ago that Alaric Saltzman would be a major obstacle at the end of this season I probably would have laughed at them and gone about my business. But from his trance killing sessions to being converted into an immortal vampire with the goal of killing all of the originals (and therefore every other vampire by default) Alaric has risen to become the series’ most difficult nemesis.
This past week in particular saw him kidnapping and torturing Caroline in an effort to turn Elena into a vampire slayer of all things. This action prompted just about every other person in Mystic Falls to band together in hopes of immobilizing him with a spell but he makes quick work of Damon, Stefan, and Klaus with his new found strength and nearly kills Klaus until Elena realizes that she and Alaric are bonded together. She threatens to kill herself and this of course calms him down a bit.
His mischief didn’t end there though. He then called an emergency town council meeting and called Mayor Lockwood and Sheriff Forbes out as frauds for having children that are supernatural although they pretend to lead the council, which protects Mystic Falls from such “threats.” Can anyone say “chaotic fallout to follow”?

Klaus – For the past two seasons everyone has either feared or been trying to kill Klaus and I think we can all agree that he’s got it coming to him. Nothing has gone particularly smooth for Klaus lately and things got a whole lot worse recently when his own mother turned Alaric into a killing machine with him as the target. Wise younger sister Rebekah encourages Klaus to get out of town while he can but he instead insists on getting Elena and her doppelganger blood supply first so he can make more hybrid vampires as his slaves.
He temporarily tries to join forces with Damon and Stefan to take down Alaric but when that fails he instead kidnaps Elena and proceeds to drain her body of all blood. This actually kills two birds with one stone. On one hand it supplies him with the precious blood that he needs, but on the other it will kill Alaric along with her. Sounds like a good plan to me! It is ultimately foiled though by Tyler who gives up pretending that he is still under Klaus’s control. This act almost gets him killed but at just the right moment Stefan and Damon zip in and help Bonnie complete the spell that was intended for Alaric which stops Klaus’s heart and puts him into indefinite sleep.
We hear talk of Klaus’s body going to be dumped into the ocean but no body has had the chance to do it yet so I can only assume that he’ll be brought back to life in the very near future (maybe even on Thursday night) but its nice to know that he’s down for at least a little while.

Elena – Our girl has obviously been through a lot in the past three seasons and now its time for her to make a big decision: choose between Damon and Stefan. We know she has feelings for both but now the pressure is on for her to pick one or the other to be all lovey dovey with. We get to see the brothers promise each other that one of them will leave town if Elena chooses the other so that’s intense, but obviously won’t happen.

In more urgent matters, the blood draining activity seems to have had some effect on Elena’s health since the end of this past week’s episode saw her collapse to the ground in pain from something. Doppelganger migraines?

Bonnie – Our favorite witch has been very busy lately and also very bitter to top it all off. Last week saw her be controlled by spirit witches and this week saw her willingly cast a dark spell that her own mother warned her not to cast. Doesn’t she know that mother knows best?!

Jeremy – And finally we have Jeremy who seems dead set on protecting Elena no matter what. This is noble but requires him to keep wearing the magic ring that once made Alaric go crazy. Will this dreamboat be far behind?
The show’s official website has a preview giving us brief glimpses of what to expect on Thursday night from a car crash to Alaric chatting up Jeremy and beating up Damon, but whats really shocking is appearance of previously dead Elijah! What’s he doing there?!
Post your predictions below and buckle your seat belts for a bumpy hour of television on Thursday night!