He’s back, baby! Kai Parker has returned, and the reveal that he’s staying on for a multi-episode arc is an exciting and unexpected turn of events.

It’s been over a decade since we last saw Uncle Kai, but I’m happy to report that he hasn’t changed one bit.

He still diabolically crazy, angry in an unexpected way, full of 90s reference, and cannot be trusted.

Unfortunately, poor Josie learned that the hard way. Despite all the warnings from Alaric, Josie thought she knew better and figured her best bet at getting out of the prison world was to align with the uncle that killed her mother and tore her family apart.

As much as I’d like to blame Josie for this lapse in judgment, I cannot. Not only has she always been taught to see the best in people, but Josie also wasn’t old enough to remember how messed up Kai truly was.

And even if she did know, like many of us do, she would have still been convinced that maybe all these days stuck in the prison world made him better. At the very least, they both shared a common goal of getting out of there so you’d think he’d play nice for a short while.

However, Kai couldn’t even keep his promise to his “girlfriend” Jade. The moment he thought he got what he needed to escape the prison world, he betrayed everyone in order to save himself. It’s a gentle reminder that Kai’s selfishness has always been his driving force.

Josie’s decision to betray her father and team up with her uncle largely set the tone for everything that unfolded throughout the hour.

She and Alaric became prisoners of Jade, Wendy, and Diego, three students who Alaric and Emma banished to the prison world because they couldn’t control them.

Since the trio – a wolf that learned to control when he turned, a witch with fire powers, and a ripper (a la Stefan Salvatore) – was bounded to the prison world, like Kai, they couldn’t actually die, and they made sure to use that to their advantage.

Before hunting Alaric down (and cheating by using a locator spell), Jade told him about what really happened the night 5 muggles were found murdered to death in Mystic Falls.

Alaric rightfully assumed it was them, but he’d also already made up his mind that the three of them were beyond fixing and that they showed no remorse for it when, in fact, the real story is that they were lured at the be the punchline, couldn’t control their anger and embarrassment, and killed some crappy humans who you may argue had it coming,

What followed were feelings of shame, anger, disgust, and eventually, the shutting off of humanity.

So, yeah, not as black-and-white as Ric made it out to be. It’s upsetting that he “didn’t see the signs,”  when he was all too familiar with what happens when someone turns off their humanity and allows their ripper settings to take over because of Stefan.

Arguably, the Ric we knew would never send anyone away to a prison world without making sure it was the only option. In my opinion, the prison world is reserved for the lowest of the low like Kai and Sebastian.

Alaric is the kind of person who always saw good in someone, even Damon Salvatore.

The chances of him banishing three young kids because they murdered someone seems slim. However, he wasn’t mistaken about one thing — they are killers. Those killer genes may never have manifested though if they hadn’t gotten trapped in a prison world and essentially forced to kill each other every day to survive and quell the hunger.

In short, Alaric is a prison world of his own making, and it’s that same fact that gives him the upper hand.

Ric knows all the tricks including where he stashes his weapons. For all our sakes, let’s hope whatever weapon he went to retrieve when Jade’s hide-and-seek hunt started has the power to kill someone bound to the prison world.

Then, there’s Josie, who got her mother’s “I know better than you” complex.

Kai was telling the truth when he said it’s what got her killed. Jo always thought she was one step ahead of Kai or that she could outsmart him at his own game, but Kai is incredibly savvy. Kai may hate everyone and everything including his family, but there were some moments where his pride at Josie’s attempts at manipulation impressed him. And in some twisted way, it was sweet.

Sadly, Josie got played because she didn’t even know she had the “get out of the prison world” answer this whole time, but when she told him about Malivore, Kai knew it was his only option.

Admittedly, he’s more versed in how the prison world operates and knows that it exists in the real world chances are it exists in the prison world.

While I didn’t expect Josie to arrive at the conclusion, I surely thought Alaric would.

The point is that it worked and instead of getting stuck in a pit of eternal misery, Kai found himself in realtime Mystic Falls and face-to-face with the Necromancer, a dangerous yet exciting pairing.

And once he jumped into Malivore, Josie and Alaric forgot all about him and the plan that successfully got him out of there.

As Kai lunged into the tar pit, Josie made the decision to break the Sandclock and unleash all that dark magic onto herself.

As Kelly Clarkson once said, “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.”

Or, as Kai said, to save her family, she must become a monster just “like… me.” There’s something so delicious about how maniacal he is! Sorry, I got sidetracked.

If there’s any place where Josie can and should embrace her darkness, it’s in a prison world where she can harness is to save her family and hopefully put an end to the three that are threatening them.

Man, Kai Parker finally got out of his Bon-Bon created prison world, that’s nuts you guys.

Lizzie’s presence in the prison world was frustrating to say the least because she ditched her family to gallivant around town with Sebastian.

She had every reason to be angry with Alaric for lying to her and banishing her boyfriend to an eternal prison, but she also didn’t stop to consider her father’s motivation or why he was so worried about them being here in the first place.

However, Lizzie was in her own danger and for much of the hour, she wasn’t aware at all.

Sebastian played the role of the perfect gentleman as he wooed Lizzie with the promise of forever, a beautiful house, and a Cinderella-inspired ballgown. Did anyone else get Miss Mystic Falls vibes from Lizzie’s descent down the stairs?

But the monsters have gotten arguably much more dangerous nowadays. Damon Salvatore did some cruel things, but he never took Elena’s choice of becoming a vampire away from her.

Sebastian went from being Prince Charming to an obsessive boyfriend without any respect for boundaries in a very short time as he revealed his plan for him and Lizzie piece-by-piece.

He spiked her wine with blood and had every intention of killing her with vampire blood in her system so that she would turn.

Now, usually, I’d argue that turning into a vampire is a great solution to the whole merge problem, but Lizzie’s reasoning for not being ready were so pure — she didn’t know if she wanted a family or if she wanted the grow old with someone.

Those are valid reasons for waiting.

However, Sebastian wasn’t convinced as he already had a plan in his head and didn’t respect her at all. What he did was absolutely wrong, but on some twisted level, you can also understand that he did it because he was concerned with losing her just like he lost Cassandra. It was well-intentioned had Lizzie been Cassandra, but she’s not and Sebastian is so hellbent on making her into his the love that he lost, he’s not actually in love with who she is.

Lizzie handled herself like a pro in this situation by siphoning him to death, but the risk was too high with the blood in her system.

When Josie unleashed the sandclock, Lizzie crashed the police car and likely died.

Will she come back as a vampire? Or, better yet, a heretic vampire?

As I mentioned previously, the only upside to evil Josie and vampire Lizzie this is that it may negate the merge completely!

Throughout the episode, I found myself posing this one question over and over: why didn’t Josie and Lizzie rely on their powers more?

If they’re supposed to be two very powerful Gemini witches, why didn’t they channel that power to get themselves out of these risky situations?

So, just to summarize:

• Kai Parker outsmarted everyone and escaped the prison world using the Malivore pit.
• Ric is on the run and hopefully has a plan.
• Josie broke the sandclock and embraced the dark magic.
• Lizzie might be dead and a vampire or a heretic vampire!
• Sebastian is CANCELLED. No one cares about your good looks anymore, boo.

Alright, well, I’m turning it over to you Cravers?

On a scale of 1-10, how great was it seeing Kai again and knowing that he never lost his lust for freedom, his wittiness and cleverness, his charm, or his deranged approach to not giving any effs about those around him?

Is Lizzie dead? What will happen to Josie now that she’s gone all dark Willow?

And will we see a face-off between Hope and Kai?