THE ORIGINALS would have been better without The Originals.
I'm pretty sure I've mentioned before that I think this spinoff would have worked better in the long run without the Mikaelsons in it. I also fully admit that it's partially my own bias against that damn family, but my favorite aspect of the show was the turf war between the various supernatural factions of New Orleans and as the show went on, it took more and more of a back seat to the Mikaelson Melodrama.
I understand the need for a grounding aspect of the story, in this case, that being the Mikaelsons at the center of everything, but as anyone who's seen my posts before knows, I particularly revile that family within this shared universe.
So this is my pitch for a potential rewrite of The Originals
I am also fully aware that I am writing this with the benefit of hindsight.
First off, we'll keep the time-table the same, having the story kick off after season four of The Vampire Diaries, when their high school story ended, and they all went off on their separate summer adventures. Which would lead to my idea. We'll keep the vampires in Mystic Falls, which seems appropriate given that the show is called The VAMPIRE Diaries. That means Elena and Caroline, Damon and Stefan will all remain in Mystic Falls and continue the story of Silas and the Doppelgangers, but without the characters that the narrative often overlooked or often times, forgot about entirely.
That being the characters of Tyler, Bonnie, Matt, and Jeremy. And without the Mikaelsons, that leaves just Hayley, Davina, Camille, and Marcel as our New Orleans characters in their established roles.
Obviously, this wouldn't include a magical miracle-baby.
In all honesty, this would actually be very easy to set up, especially if we factor in the ending of season four of TVD. We'll start with Tyler Lockwood, and this would also factor in Hayley Marshall.
At the end of season four of The Vampire Diaries, Klaus ran Tyler out of town after he attempted to take down the Original and finally be free of him, ironically due to the decision of Hayley to sell him and his pack out for her own purposes.
So, when we last left Tyler, he was on the run from Klaus, and we know from the beginning of season five that he was helping out some werewolf pack and didn't come to Whitmore to join Caroline for college. Let's stick with that and have him go a little further south. He heard about a pack around New Orleans (the Crescent pack) being terrorized by a local vampire who labeled himself king, and he goes to help out. There, he learns about Marcel, a vampire turned by Klaus, who acts like Klaus. Except this isn't an invincible vampire who would take an entire sireline's worth of vampires down with him if he was killed.
This is a version of Klaus he can fight.
Of course, while he's down there, he runs into Hayley, who is looking for answers about her family and her ties to the Crescent pack, which brings her into direct competition with Tyler, as they're both trying to do what they think is best for the pack and both distrust the other, leading both to fight for the position of Top Dog, creating a kind of civil war within the pack.
You add in the stuff with Francesca Guerrera and Jackson Kenner, and you have a pretty fleshed out werewolf story.
I also think you could have a pretty cool use of hybrids here because I always thought it was incredibly stupid that ONLY Klaus could make hybrids, and ONLY with doppelganger blood. It doesn't make any sense, especially given what we know about how vampires were made. But, on the other hand, I also really hated the idea of hybrids, so I'd be okay either way.
Next up, we have Matt Donovan, who was never given any kind of storyline on TVD until the final season when they finally shoehorned in his ancestry at the last second because they realized they were closing shop and they should probably do SOMETHING with him before the end. So, for my idea, he goes on his Eurotrip with Rebekah, and when he comes back, he decides he's done with Mystic Falls and the Salvatore Brothers and all the unpleasantness that comes from living in a vampire town, so he packs up and leaves.
He's trying to find out who his father is, so he goes looking based on the few details he managed to get out of his mother over the years. Maybe he even calls his mother, and she sends him an address in New Orleans where she met him, and that address turns out to be Rousseau's, where he meets Camille.
We'll find out over the course of a few episodes that they're cousins and that his father was either a part of the O'Connell family, or maybe Father Kieran himself, once again dragging Matt into the middle of things he doesn't want to be involved in. But this time, with Kieran's collection of Dark Objects, he can fight back and protect the regular people from the tyranny of the supernatural citizens of the city, leading to him getting involved with the Faction.
And with Cami, aside fromher being a therapist to the supernatural vitizens of New Orleans, will bond with Matt, both being alone after the deaths of their siblings due to the direct actions of the supernatural, with Matt trying to warn Cami away from Marcel because he's seen what happens when a human loves, and is loved by, a vampire.
Next up would be Bonnie Bennett.
Instead of Bonnie dying to resurrect Jeremy, she lives and actually goes on that road trip with her mother she faked to hide her death. Abby may not be a witch anymore, but she's still in touch with some witches, and to make up for all the years she abandoned her daughter, she introduces Bonnie to them, letting her explore and get in touch with her witch heritage. While she's on this spiritual journey, she learns about the Nine Covens of New Orleans and decides, since she's graduated highschool, she might as well continue her sabbatical from Mystic Falls and head down to the Big Easy to build connections with a whole community of witches.
Except, when she gets there, she finds the Quarter in the grip of Marcel, who forbids witches from practicing magic under penalty of death. She obviously doesn't know the full story of the Harvest and just assumes it's a vampire terrorizing witches, just like she's used to, except now she's beefed up (magically speaking) and isn't going to stand for it anymore. She sides with Sophie Deveraux and the French Quarter witches, bringing her into direct competition with Davina Claire.
Davina is the final Harvest Girl, containing the full power of the ritual and the ability to sense and interfere with any witch who attempts to access the Ancestors for power, but Bonnie is a Bennett witch, with a legacy that goes back centuries. If it comes to a magical showdown, who will win? And when the Reaping happens and an unseen enemy hijacks the power for themselves, will Bonnie see that the witches of New Orleans aren't the victims she's been led to believe and reevaluate her loyalties?
Also, as the story progressed, would we see Bonnie warming up to Marcel? Maybe even in a more than "just an ally" way?
And last but not least, we have Jeremy Gilbert.
Bonnie used the last of her Expression to resurrect Jeremy while the Veil to the Other Side was still down. And while Jeremy was grateful to be back, his sister did kind of burn his house to the ground and the entire town mourned his passing. So instead of him attempting to reintegrate back into society, he thinks it's better that everyone thinks he's dead. Whether or not that would include Elena is a matter for debate, but know that he's not staying in Mystic Falls and instead goes out on how own journey, embracing his nature as a member of the Five and hunting vampires.
Which is what brings Jeremy to New Orleans.
He's hunting a vampire, and maybe this vampire is a part of Marcel's inner circle, so he tracks him to New Orleans and kills him, much like Rebekah did to those vampires she ran into at the beginning of The Originals when she finally came to the city to look for Elijah. So Jeremy lurks on the outskirts of the city because he might be one of the Five, but he can't take on a whole army of vampires, so he bides his time.
This could also give an opportunity to bring in Rayna Cruz, but not as "The Phoenix Hunter." Just have her be one of the Five, and she and Jeremy team up only to end up enemies in taking down a vampire: Marcel. Maybe Bonnie talks Jeremy out of it, and Rayna won't back down. I'm even thinking of a plot where the power of the Five could be channeled or pooled into one person, making them stronger and faster, putting them on more of an even playing field when it comes to fighting vampires.
Rayna could even be a potential love interest for Jeremy
I think this would have worked great as a story because it not only gives us a glimpse of what the wider supernatural world is like, but it grounds it with characters that we already knew and that weren't used much. It also makes it that much more interesting when you have characters that have grown up together dealing with the supernatural and the ramifications on their life, suddenly in a city and on opposite sides of a conflict. Do they come together or come to view former friend as new foe?
And obviously, we would bring in other characters like Josh and Vincent and Jackson and Keelin, with appearances from the rest of the Mystic Falls Gang, and possibly flashbacks to when the Mikaelsons had passed through the city. As well as the series staple of turbulent and inappropriate romances.
The downside would be interesting concepts like the Trinity and The Strix being relegated to TVD to bother the Mikaelsons, but we could still have Lucien terrorizing New Orleans with his killings so that he can frame Cami to get to her Dark Objects, setting up a nice crossover.
The only think I can't figure out, for the life of me, is what to call this. Someone suggested FACTIONS, which could work, but, at least to me, it doesn't have the same umph to it.
