One of my favorite things about The Vampire Diaries is Damon Salvatore.

This article contains spoilers, so if you haven’t seen the episode “Postcards From The Edge,” please do not continue reading.

Since the beginning of the series, Damon has been a study in character development that has given fans an analysis of the growth and change that a person can go through when they have lived a long life. Of course, Damon is a vampire so his life is longer than most.  But still, he’s an interesting character full of uncertainty, guilt and regret.

In the most recent episode “Postcards From The Edge,” Damon was dealing with the guilt and remorse from having accidentally killed Elena by torching her ‘Sleeping Beauty’ coffin.  As expected, this caused him to revert back to his original vampire nature of “I don’t care that I kill not just to feed but because I want to.”  Additionally, Damon was on a path of destruction, engaging in a fight club with Julian and his cohorts.

I believe that Damon was hell-bent on punishing himself over his grief for killing Elena.  Damon has felt that Elena was the reason he became a better person instead of the monster he had been for centuries. Thus, he didn’t care if he died. In fact, he encouraged Julian to rip out his heart and was only saved because of Stefan.

As I’ve said before, the brother relationship of Damon and Stefan continues to be the balance in what has been an uneven season of The Vampire Diaries.  The Salvatore Brothers have a love/hate relationship where they will want to die for each other one minute and kill each other the next.

One of my favorite scenes of “Postcards From The Edge” was after Damon told his brother that he had killed Elena, Stefan decked Damon repeatedly before breaking down in his car. It was great to see that the show didn’t forget its history that Stefan loved Elena and her importance to him.

Damon is in a downward spiral.  The question is, can he bounce back?

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