Vampire Diaries Season 1 Episodes 1 -

More than a decade later, the first episode of The Vampire Diaries holds up as one of the best genre pilots ever made. Why?

If you’ve just finished Vampire Diaries Season 1 Episodes 1, you are standing at a precipice. Episode 2, "The Night of the Comet," introduces the mystery of the Founder’s Council and deepens Damon’s obsession with opening the tomb under the old church. By Episode 6 ("Lost Girls"), you will learn the full history of Stefan and Damon’s transformation. And by the season finale ("Founder’s Day"), you will have experienced one of the greatest finales in television history. vampire diaries season 1 episodes 1

The pilot is a promise. It promises romance without being cheesy, horror without being gratuitous, and a mythology so rich that it eventually spawned two spin-offs (The Originals and Legacies). More than a decade later, the first episode

While Stefan is clearly the "good" brother in the pilot, the genius of The Vampire Diaries Season 1, Episode 1 is that it plants the seeds for the epic love triangle immediately. Damon is introduced as a villain, but he is a magnetic one. When he first meets Elena at the Mystic Grill, pretending to be a stranger, you can see the spark of recognition (and fascination) in his eyes. He doesn’t know she is Katherine’s doppelgänger yet—he just knows she is beautiful. Episode 2, "The Night of the Comet," introduces

The episode ends with Stefan revealing his secret to Elena in a very public, very vulnerable way. After Damon attacks him at the cemetery, Stefan shows up at Elena’s window. He pulls down his shirt collar to reveal his neck, once torn open by a vampire’s bite. Then, in the episode’s final, iconic moment, he shows her his ring—the lapis lazuli that allows vampires to walk in the sun.

Without a word, he steps into her room, stands in a beam of moonlight, and lets his vampire face emerge: the dark veins around his eyes, the glowing red rims, the fangs. Elena gasps. Cut to black.