hmm maybe you could just rank them according to your personal preference?? i think it would be a little different from the other one right
Sure! I’m sticking to canon ships.
1. Stelena
I have an entire masterlist dedicated to why Stelena is number 1.
2. Forwood
Oh, Forwood:
Caroline and Tyler were fundamentally altered because of their supernatural conditions and that shift was the basis of their relationship. Becoming a vampire empowered Caroline, she had a sense of strength that she never had, she was confident and centred, she became everything she wasn’t in season 1,
which allowed her to be emotional support for Tyler
who, because of the werewolf curse, became everything he wasn’t in season 1 too: humble and vulnerable and grateful for assistance
and that allowed him to actually take the emotional support from Caroline
so they actually grew together through this time, complementing each other and seeing different sides of their personalities, surprising each other even though they’d known each other since childhood.
And also no one gives Tyler credit for being a loving, whipped boyfriend
and like
and just look at them
I don’t care what anyone says, this is such a cute exchange
3. Stebekah/Steferine
I put them together because which one I prefer more depends on the day. I like Stebekah because they’re dark and there was a lot of potential there:
I think that Katherine unfairly gets credit for the second half of a Dark Stefan ship. Every time Stefan has been rebellious or dark and has had a woman at his side, it’s been Rebekah such as in the 20s:
And such as season 4. When Stefan was just tired of all the Delena and Defan and triangle bullshit and was like fuck it, I’m doing something for me, I don’t care if it’s a bad decision, he went to Rebekah for some crazy sex with a crazy ass vampire:
So I think Rebekah has insight into the depraved, dark, deviant Stefan because she relishes it with him
I like Steferine a) because of Dobsley chemistry b) because I find their dynamic interesting
[Steferine is] the one ship that the show portrays the baggage and the hurt and the sort of inescapability of certain connection quite well although it’s not emphasized so I wonder if they actually portrayed it well on purpose? But anyway.
The reason why I think it’s done well is because I think the relationship contradicts the idea that loving someone is always good, Katherine’s “love”/obsession with Stefan in fact continuously destroys him and hurts him […] She is more in love with the idea of Stefan loving her than she actually is with Stefan. That’s why she hijacks Elena’s body in season 5 and attempts to seduce him because let’s think about that. Katherine hijacked the body of a woman she hates and tries to seduce Stefan as that woman, a woman whose break up with him was a trigger for his PTSD, a woman who was in a relationship with his brother and she doesn’t think or care about how seducing him as this woman would fuck with his head:
It’s also why in season 2 she threatens to kill Elena while Stefan watches because it doesn’t matter if he’s scarred or hurt, what matters is owning him:
And Stefan knows that about Katherine and yet Katherine knows Stefan’s psychology, she knows how his mind works, she knows which ways to get through to him:
and that creates a lot of tension for Stefan and you see it because it’s like, “you legit ruined my life though, like you completely fucked with my head, fucked with my life, I hate you, like I legit hate you”
and yet, AND YET, I can’t help but be of comfort when you’re in need
and as much as I hate you, when you’re around there’s just, there’s this thing (because Stefan always looks like he’s a half-step away from having hate sex with her)
At the same time, Stefan is never able to let Katherine in completely
And he also experiences catharsis by being able to torture her in season 2 then kill her in season 5 and despite dying with her, killing her again in season 8, he gets to continuously avenge himself which other victims on TVD don’t get to do
4. Beremy
Here is the thing about Beremy and my opinion on them is definitely framed by the fact that I now know that the only other relationship Bonnie is really in is with Enzo and I think Bonenzo is bullshit, but the thing about Beremy is that Jeremy goes hard for her (especially in season 2) and I don’t think that’s quite acknowledged.
I definitely think that Kat deserved a better screen partner because Steve didn’t really have much of a presence onscreen
but I do think his lack of presence is also why a lot of good and cute Beremy scenes go unnoticed.
and I don’t think their chemistry was bad, like it’s not Grahamwood chemistry, it’s not Somergraham chemistry but it’s not like Steroline flat or Delena cringey, it’s decent:
like their first kiss is a good first kiss
and I’ve also said that they’re at their best when they do angst, that’s where they live. It’s not Stelena angst or Forwood angst but it’s pretty good angst
The way Enzo is supposed to love Bonnie, I think we actually see with Bonnie and Jeremy
Jeremy is this puny pre-hunter human but he goes into the tomb for the moonstone so Bonnie won’t have to use her magic.
In 2x18 when it was all don’t tell Elena that Bonnie will die trying to take down Klaus, Jeremy essentially chose Bonnie by telling Stefan what was going to happen.
Like look at the way he smiles here:
but the writers really fucked this over: And here’s the thing about that. I can understand the fact that Jeremy never really got closure from Anna and that seeing your girlfriend get dragged out, screaming, by cops and knowing that your uncle killed her would be traumatic. But it’s like JP wanted to humiliate Bonnie with this triangle because first of all, Bonnie is the only character who’s been cheated on and not only are the overall stakes of the show super low for the consequence of Bonnie using her magic to be Jeremy being able to see his ex-girlfriends, it’s a petty way to punish Bonnie. Moreover, it’s not just that Jeremy kissed Anna, it’s not even just that he’d been talking to her and essentially having an emotional affair with her, it’s that he degrades his relationship to Bonnie for Anna and when Bonnie finds out, Jeremy legit couldn’t give a fuck and he does nothing to get her back and he’s just never apologetic about it, not toward Bonnie anyway and then it just gets to the fact that Jeremy has a tendency to only care about the women he dates when they’re about to die and it’s just, I understand why the whole Anna situation keeps people from shipping them or giving Beremy the time of day.
5. Maroline
OK Maroline gets a lot of flack and it’s not that I don’t understand why and it’s not like they didn’t have issues but 1) their coming together was organic and on a show like TVD, having two people come together organically is actually pretty rare, it’s basically Stelena, Forwood and Maroline. I enjoyed the fact that despite being opposites, they found emotional common ground, they bonded over the fact that they were both lonely and they both felt isolated and they were both desperately seeking someone to love them
and their respective stories support this interaction
it’s not just something that’s said to be said, we see Matt’s life, we see him have no parents, we see him to the best of his ability try and keep tabs on Vicki, who is dead but he thinks she bailed, we see Elena fall in love with someone else right in front of him, we see Caroline’s abusive relationship with Damon, we see her insecurities from Day One in the pilot but their bond didn’t just stay at them wanting company, they actually had fun spending time together, they actually liked each other
and I liked that it was no pretense, I liked that it was Family Guy and junk food. You know, Klaroline ha the champagne and the ball gowns, Forwood would just “be” a lot, you know, they were the enjoying each other’s silence kind of ship, Steroline as a couple .... but Matt and Caroline, like, hung out and I liked that.
2) They were super realistic for a teenage relationship and I respect that. Like this is so high school
I remember being 16 and doing things to “test” my boyfriend or the guy that I liked, I remember my guy friends being reluctant to express liking a girl because of what their friends would say, I remember being a teenager and just doing teenage things, which is what Maroline did,
I don’t fault them for that, and yes, in season 1, Matt would be like, we’re not going to last etc.
and I don’t blame people for being put off by that, I wasn’t because it’s pretty 16/17-year old boy but you also see how that doesn’t seem to be what he actually thinks
and we see that expand in season 2
which is why the infamous Mattlena hug scene in 1x17 had me, like, the writing is just contradicting itself now because in 1x16, we have this out where Matt explain being over Elena and seeing her as a friend and at peace with the fact that she loves Stefan because he’s into Caroline so having Caroline look in on them again was like, we’ve already covered this especially since it’s not consistent after 1x17 either.
Like the whole thing is that she can be exasperating --- and people forget that Caroline actually can be exasperating, she made an offhand classist remark about Bonnie liking the bus boy, which Matt overheard, she was dealing with vampirism and Tyler’s transformation but Matt didn’t know anything about that so she just came across to him as hot and cold, he didn’t have context --- but he loved her anyway
With regards to when he finds out she’s a vampire, I like how people are more pressed about Matt being involved in trying to take her down when he has no frame of reference for vampires other than the fact that one killed his sister and they’re not like, wow Liz, that’s your daughter, but I also like how as they ‘grow up’ and become entrenched in the Supernatural, despite the fact that Matt consistently says he wants nothing to do with it, both of them look out for each other
6. Klaroline
I’m pretty indifferent to Klaroline, I don’t have strong feelings about them but I have maintained that they are better than Delena
Even Klaroline does a better job with that dynamic and those kinds of arguments than Delena because you see Caroline be like “I can’t do this, why the fuck am I even here?” every time they’re together
the dynamic DE was supposed to have better, the “fiery” “passionate” thing works for them because they know how to argue and because they play up the conflict
I’ve also maintained they have good chemistry: and yet their chemistry begins winning me over in the scene and I think what really sells it is that Candice reacts to the phone call in a way I’ve only seen Caroline react to Klaus and it’s this sort of… she catches her breath/is stunned
I have a vid that’s basically just of their gazes because they’re always charged, they have a very seductive chemistry and it suits their dynamic because the more Caroline interacts with Klaus, the more she’s drawn to him and that shows with the kind of chemistry they have where, as someone who is quite indifferent to their dynamic, the more they interact onscreen the more I want them to remain onscreen, I start off unimpressed (much like Caroline) and move toward being engaged (again like Caroline) and like I said, they do their dynamic well too, Caroline’s annoyed-but-charmed and Klaus’ arrogant-but-charming
(although their physical chemistry is not great) I just don’t think they have any real narrative.
7. Simara
This is purely about Dobsley chemistry: I have spoken about Silas and Amara quite a bit actually, but honestly, mostly in relation to the chemistry between Paul and Nina because I think that the SIlas and Amara storyline is textually weak and it felt rushed, there isn’t much nuance so I don’t find their story particularly tragic because we didn’t spend enough time on it but I still find them tragic because of how Paul and Nina played the tragedy.
Like it was a storyline that just let Paul and Nina do their magic onscreen,
they didn’t have to try to undercut it with dialogue or anything so I appreciate Simara because I love seeing Nina and Paul working together but in terms of the content, I’m like I don’t really care.
Last: Delena/Bonenzo/Steroline
You can look at the masterlists!
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