Compulsion Comparisons?

[Doppelgänger]

This is something I'm seeing all over the internet and I feel it's erroneous so I'm making this subject for discussion.  Hopefully we can all wind up agreeing about it.   The argument is that Stefan was able to resist the compulsion of Klaus to bite Elena but Damon was not able to resist Kol's compulsion to kill Jeremy.  This is false.  First of all, just because Damon said Stefan resisted does not mean it's true.  Damon often says things that aren't true about himself.  They are true to him, but in fact are not actually true.  This comes from a place of poor self-esteem on his part, like when he said that he was 'that selfish' to Elena because he would have saved her.  If he had saved her, it wouldn't have made him selfish, but deep down inside he thinks he is selfish so he always relates everything he does to being selfish.  In this case, he feels inferior to Stefan and unable to live up to Stefan's image, Elena's perceived image of Stefan but also his own perceived image of Stefan that Stefan was able to resist, when in fact he had just as much trouble doing it. 

If we look at the two compulsion scenes side by side it becomes apart that they both struggled against the compulsion in almost the exact same way.  Stefan tried to physically stop himself by stabbing himself in the stomach.  Damon tried to stop himself by moving slowly and telling Jeremy to shoot him numerous times.  Even after Damon had said he was sorry to Elena he did not immediately attack Jeremy when he got to him.  He stopped and told Jeremy, "Shoot now."  All the way along he was begging Jeremy to kill him so he wouldn't kill Jeremy and even at that point where some people say he lost the fight against the compulsion, he didn't.  He was still fighting it, and then Stefan showed up and we know Jeremy survived.  In effect, Damon resisted the compulsion the same as Stefan had.  Stefan fought it, but he did eventually bite Elena.  So neither one of them didn't resist and neither one of them lost to the compulsion completely.

Stefan then makes an inflammatory remark about Damon to Elena saying he tried to kill Jeremy twice as if he hadn't resisted at all.  So, if you took the statement from Damon and the statement from Stefan and didn't actually consider what happened in the scene you might draw the conclusion that Damon didn't resist, but that isn't want happened and here are the two scenes in question:

Damon resists the compulsion:

 

Stefan resists the compulsion:

[Ruby2579]

I just hated the scene because I felt they were trying to compare the brother's love for Elena. 

Before I get into my debate   I wanted to point out that I rewatched the episode yesterday and this is how it should've went down.

Elena telling Damon oh I love you and you love me and etc etc got him listening and paused.
She was close enough now and while talking to him and distracting him and
SNAP she could have been the one to snap his neck and save Jeremy.


But since thats not how it happened. I looked at both Compulsion resistants and BOTH BROTHERS tried to resist the compulsion differently but STEFAN was a little more successful at it and I will explain why…


 Damon's:
• Damon was smart enough to realize he was compelled by Jeremy
• Damon the whole time kept warning him to get away and to just kill him
• Showing in fact that he was trying to resist it and also showing that he cared that Jeremy Lived bc he knew how much it would hurt Elena if jeremy died and then at the hands of    Damon himself. So he would had rather died the hero then hurt Elena that way


• Damon did not physically try to stop himself from fighting the compulsion
• He easily had two people there who could've stopped him but choose not to (Elena and Jeremy: Snapping his neck/KIlling him)
 


Now on to Stefan's:
Stefan was compelled and knew right away he was compelled (I guess because Klaus did not tell him to forget)
When the clock hit 0:00 Stefan also warned Elena to run to get out of there and basically gave her a head start.
Stefan Physically fought the compulsion himself hence hurting himself so he can slow down (Banging into the lockers, stabbing himself and straight on just fighting from going to attack Elena) He did all HE COULD DO HIMSELF to fight the urge to get to Elena
When Klaus tried to compel him again to turn it off STEFAN WENT ALL CESAR FROM PLANET OF THE APES AND WAS LIKE NOOOOOO" 
BUT THEN Klaus did it again told him to turn off his humanity and thats when Stefan was not able to resist any longer


SO Stefan was a little more successful at it because as well as fighting against the compulsion he had to fight against the ripper from hurting Elena. And thats where Klaus' famous line comes from "The only thing stronger than your craving for blood is you love for this girl." and Stefan had to be compelled twice before he actually bit Elena


And about Stefan making that remark I think it was more just to get at Elena was it a cheap shot I admit yes but he was trying to compare Rebekah and Damon.. Damon had no fault in trying to kill Jeremy I'm very aware of that and I'm sure stefan was too. But again this debate is not about that it was about the compulsion so I won't continue any further on it. 


At the end both brothers did not succeed in fighting the compulsion completely they were just able to take a detour 

[Doppelgänger]

Yes, that was my point in this was to examine the statement that Damon didn't resist but Stefan did that I have been hearing in cyber world and even from both sides for that matter! They both did resist but neither one was able to completely resist the compulsion. Damon did physically slow himself down. He's a vampire. How long do you think it should have taken him to get to Jeremy at vamp speed? He didn't have a handy dandy broom handle to stab himelf with and really they aren't going to repeat the same thing with Damon but it was obvious he was trying NOT to kill Jeremy, by not moving as fast as he could, by yelling out to Jeremy to run, warning him that he was nearby and that he would have to kill him, even asking Jer to kill him when he got near him, which is the point. That is resisting compulsion. It doesn't matter really who we think did a better job of it. Jeremy and Elena both survived and if Stefan hadn't jumped in at the end we don't know how it would have ended, whether Jer would have shot Damon or if Damon would have killed Jeremy. We can't know that but we do know he tried to stop himself.

[Doppelgänger]

On another note it was sort of dumb the way Elena just stood by helplessly like she forgot she was a vampire, too. She could have vamp sped Jeremy away, got in front of him to stop Damon, any number of things. Damon would never hurt her to get to Jeremy.

[Ruby2579]

THATS WHAT IM SAYING I was actually pissed that she even called Stefan IM like you a big girl now right you stay telling people you can handle yourself and you was all pissed off when Jeremy was in Danger with Conner and upset so she could've easily taken advantage of the moment when she told Damon she loved him because it stopped him and I felt bad for him because you could tell in his face like he wanted to appreciate the words but was like really elena you had to tell me this now lmao
She could have easily did a badass move and snapped his neck locked him up all by herself -_-

I really hate even thinking about the scene because it pisses me off 

[Doppelgänger]

I'm kind of tired of the damsel in distress thing they do with her. That was really short sighted of them but I suppose they wanted to involve Stefan in it to show that he didn't just ignore it when she said she was in trouble.  I mean he could have.  He could have just said, "Good, Damon will kill Jeremy and then she'll hate him forever," but he didn't do that.  He came through and I'm quite sure that's why it happened the way it did.

[Doppelgänger]

See that? I can find something good in what Stefan does. I think I shocked myself...

[mysticangel]

There were some slight differences that I noticed between the way Klaus compelled Stefan versus the way Kol compelled Damon.

Klaus actually seemed to think that screaming the compulsion order at Stefan would have some sort of effect on him, whereas Kol essentially checked to make sure that something would work before issuing the order to kill Jeremy. In both cases, however, they left some fairly glaring and obvious loopholes.

On another note: In the scene in which Tyler was compelled to turn and kill Elena & co. before the gym clock ran out,season 2 I think) I was left wondering why nobody simply shot the clock off the wall after Klaus left- but that would've made things too simple. Lol. In both Stefan and Klaus' compulsions, Klaus and Kol seemed to find it necessary to make absolutely certain their compulsion worked.

Which is interesting, because Rebekah seemed to think hers would simply work regardless of any extenuating circumstances. What do those two know that Bekah missed?

[Ruby2579]

Jan 29, 2013 11:19:00 GMT -5 Doppelgänger said:

See that? I can find something good in what Stefan does. I think I shocked myself...

haha Doppel you surprised me hahahah I already know a debate with you the only thing we always agree on is to disagree hahahahahah 

[Doppelgänger]

Gotta love the fish slap... Yes, Mystic you are far too logical for this show...

[Ruby2579]

I think Mystic that Kol was testing it to see if there was any vervain…Klaus and Bekah know theres no Vervain left in Mystic falls

[mysticangel]

Part of the fun of this show for me is chasing improbable logic herrings. There are a metric ton of them.

Kol also seemed to be confused or worried when Damon asked if they'd met before at the ball the Michaelsons threw, it leads me to believe that Damon may have run into and/or resisted compulsion by Kol before. Hence why he had to check to make sure it was working, although the vervain is also a decent excuse (if a flimsy one. MF is not the only place in the world vervain can grow, and Damon and Stefan seem to have nothing but time on their hands, lmao.)

I'm also wondering if the older vamps, like Lexi, would have had a better time resisting the originals' compulsion due to their age and experience. The oldest vamp outside the Originals was Finn's girl, and she was compelled- problem is she was compelled to team up with Finn, which she wanted to do already.

Katherine was old and was compelled by Klaus, but she's terrified of him anyway.

[Sweetluv4DE]

Ok Ruby I agree with most of your post except the part where you think Stefan resisted it better because he physically hurt himself. I will point out where Damon physically hurt himself!

Stefan stabs himself in the gut.... (he doesn't touch his heart, he doesn't beg for death he just stabs himself in the gut)

Damon begs for death. He begs Jeremy over and over to kill him! He finally gets to him in the tunnel and he begs Jeremy to shoot him in the HEART. Jeremy shoots him in the head.

The shot to the head and the stabbing one self in the gut is essentially the same.

Damon may have not done it himself but he begged to be shot.

One can say Damon fought it better than Stefan and I'm not saying this but one could argue that Damon begged for death and Stefan just stabbed himself in the gut. What if Jeremy actually shot him in the heart like he asked him to do twice. So Damon would die for Jeremy so it would not cause Elena an eternity of pain but Stefan just resisted the compulsion by stabbing himself in the tummy.

I'm not one to go with this but it can be argued. I personally think the brothers both fought valiantly! Most vampires couldn't do what they did and it was all for the love of Elena.

[Slash]

Jan 29, 2013 11:06:08 GMT -5 Doppelgänger said:

On another note it was sort of dumb the way Elena just stood by helplessly like she forgot she was a vampire, too. She could have vamp sped Jeremy away, got in front of him to stop Damon, any number of things. Damon would never hurt her to get to Jeremy.

This is what I hated about the whole thing. Damon was resisting as best as he could, slowing himself down. Elena could have simply snapped his neck with no resistance (she's ordered Stefan to do it before and now she has the strength to do so on her own) since he was trying to get Jeremy to *KILL* him and carted him off to Klaus to 'secure' so when Klaus did have his next run in with Kol, as a gesture/favor to Elena (or honoring a deal), he could drag Kol back to Damon to undo the compulsion. As long as Elena has a deal with Klaus, he won't hurt Damon (and even when he has, he's never killed the guy so...).

Elena just standing there doing nothing was just a "What the hell?" moment. Or like I've said before, Kol was the one who did the compulsion, Elena could have tracked him down or talked to him herself via Klaus' phone and asked for a deal with him to free Damon. The Originals for the most part do like making deals/hearing people out.

[Slash]

Jan 29, 2013 12:21:16 GMT -5 mysticangel said:

Kol also seemed to be confused or worried when Damon asked if they'd met before at the ball the Michaelsons threw, it leads me to believe that Damon may have run into and/or resisted compulsion by Kol before. Hence why he had to check to make sure it was working

I've posed this same theory earlier. That if they've met in the past and Kol has tried to compel Damon to 'forget' about him for whatever reason but the meeting at the ball where Damon asks if they've met before probably raised a 'red flag' that the compulsion either didn't work fully or because Kol was daggered over the years (so it's still somewhat in place but flimsy).

Yeah, the vervain thing does work but I really want to know the history between the two. Like maybe Kol was torturing Damon because of their last run in (Damon did put him down) or because of something that happened decades before (have a little fun before compelling him cause once again, the 'old times sake' comment he made to Klaus sticks out to me). It's not exactly out of the realm of possibility as it seems Damon has run into some older Vampires during his time (Sage, Mary or whatever her name was who was the link to finding out where the gang's bloodline came from that Kol killed) so why not an Original? Or would it just be too much to have both Damon & Stefan running into Originals and being compelled to forget?