Enzo is the Morally Gray Character Everyone Pretends Damon is

Let's discuss.

Backstory

The writers didn't even try to hide it as they paralleled much of Enzo's background with Damon. If anything, his story is more tragic than the "poor little rich boy" story we get from Damon. I'm not discrediting the abuse Damon suffered, more pointing out the privilege Damon lived with, especially given his role in the Confederacy. No child should have to suffer abuse. But this privilege is often ignored when discussing Damon.

Enzo has a tragic childhood, being orphaned at just four years old and forced into a workhouse. Unlike Damon, Enzo was turned without any prior knowledge of the supernatural world. And he was turned by Damon's mother, tying them together. He was then abandoned as the only vampire he knew was locked in a prison world, leaving him to figure everything out himself. Damon was also alone, but this was done by choice. Like Damon, he also fought in a war, but unlike Damon, he fought on the right-side of WWII. We don't know much about this time in Enzo's life, but I do love that they almost give this story to Damon as well. However, Damon was only joining to be with Stefan and ended up not enlisting at all when Lexi talks him out of going with Stefan.

Enzo was captured by Whitmore and experimented on for ten years. He found love but compelled her to forget him to keep her safe, but was later killed by Damon. Similar to how Damon compelled Elena to forget him, but unlike Enzo when Elena chose to compel the memories away, he can't just let her be happy without him.

When Damon was also captured by Whitmore, Enzo befriended him, showing he still was caring person despite everything that had happened. Despite being held captive for twice as long as Damon, Enzo gave Damon his rations of blood for a year, starving himself so they could escape. But when the time came to escape, Damon left Enzo behind for dead. Because of Damon's actions, Enzo is then held captive for over 50 years.

Throughout the Show

When we meet Enzo his anger is initially directed at Damon, but upon learning that Damon kept his promise on killing the Whitmores, he forgives him for leaving him for dead and shifts his anger to the Whitmores. Enzo killing Aaron made sense since this was his entrance and his anger was still fresh, whereas Damon killing Aaron just showed that he hadn't actually had any character development that the show claimed he had. Damon also uses his position with the MF gang to manipulate Bonnie into helping by threatening Jeremy.

Enzo only turns on Stefan when he believes that Stefan was the one who killed Maggie. Finding out that it was his only friend that killed the woman he loved, instead of trying to kill Damon, he turns off his humanity because he feels so betrayed and heartbroken. Without his humanity, he targets Elena to get revenge on Damon. Stefan kills Enzo so then Enzo seeks revenge against Stefan. It's all logical.

The worst thing Enzo did was Sarah. This is my least favorite Enzo storyline, but not just because the death felt so pointless. But because it all felt out of character and random. Why was Enzo holding onto such a strong grudge for Stefan? Yes, Stefan killed him, but only because he was trying to kill Elena. Enzo's anger would have made more sense directed at Damon, but the writers couldn't let anyone be angry at Damon for more than an episode. But then Enzo doesn't even kill her. Sarah convinces Enzo to let her go

When Enzo kills, it is strategical. He doesn't do it out of joy, but rather because he feels he needs to and he has so much anger inside of him. Right or wrong, this is different than Damon's stance of killing for fun. When Caroline pushes back to Enzo, he says sometimes they have to kill for survival and they can't afford to hesitate. When Damon is called out on his killing, he says it is just part of being a vampire. He revels in it.

Even when Enzo is reunited with his long lost family, the Heretics, he doesn't enjoy taking their side. He is torn because he has never known a family and doesn't know what one feels like. He doesn't like harming the people he has known for a short while. He again chooses his blood family at the Armory initially, still hoping to find that family. But he's not really betraying anyone by doing this. The MF gang was never his family. Damon was his friend who betrayed him. He didn't owe them loyalty. But when Enzo finally finds family in the MF gang, in Bonnie, nothing will make him betray that. Unlike Damon, Enzo's loyalty isn't transactional.

Growth

The biggest difference between Damon and Enzo is that Enzo has the character development the show desperately tried to pretend Damon had.

Enzo values his friendships. When Damon dies, he is one of the main characters seeking to bring him back. Even attacking Stefan for giving up. Enzo comforts Caroline throughout the summer as she struggles. He counsels Bonnie to let him go because he'd rather her live and be safe than bring him back to life. He even talks her into forgiving Stefan so she doesn't live the rest of her life in pain.

Damon does very little to bring people back, usually just resorting to begging/forcing Bonnie. Even when Elena's in a coma, he doesn't spend the years seeking a loophole, rather he decides to desiccate and abandon his friends and brother. He misses his dead friends but doesn't honor their memories.

The writers actually learned from their mistakes with Damon. Damon entered the show as a villain in Season 1 and that was really hard to come back from. His assault on Caroline, killing Lexi, Vicki, and countless other people for fun, his yo-yoing back and forth between "good" and "bad" depending on how Elena was treating him, it was all too much without a really good redemption arc. Which they didn't bother doing. We don't see Damon ever feel remorse or apologize for anything. Everyone just forgives him.

While Enzo actually works to repair his relationships. He feels remorse for what he's done to the extent that he warns Caroline and Bonnie not to live like him. His very last actions are to make sure Bonnie forgives where he couldn't so that she could move on the way he couldn't.

Enzo was far from a perfect person, but he is by far a better "morally gray" character than Damon.

Race

While the show essentially white washes Michael Malarkey's background, we have to acknowledge the racism that plays a part. And even the larger disenfranchisement of Palestinian actors or even just Pro-Palestinian actors. Michael is proud of his Palestinian heritage. We can't ignore the impact this has had on him in the fandom and even with the cast and crew given their stances.

People are always quick to talk about the racism in the fandom, yet it always seems to fall short when discussing Michael/Enzo. It could just be because of the whitewashing in the show, but I've seen the discussion brought up more with Michael Trevino who is also a whitewashed character thanks to the shows blatant racism.

A lot of the complaints against Enzo is that he was taking roles they wished their favs had and he wasn't even a "main character. But why is Enzo not considered a main character? He has a 59 episode run time (4 seasons). He is classified as a main character online, but the fandom continues to sideline him. He has a longer run time than Klaus by double, yet we wouldn't say that Klaus wasn't a main character on TVD.

I've never actually seen legitimate reasons to hate Enzo. All of the reasons are farfetched or cherry-picking the plot so bad I swear they only watch certain character scenes.

Damon was a bad person who had moments of goodness. Enzo was a good person who had moments of "badness." I don't get why everyone wants to hate on Enzo just to make them feel better about liking Damon. Just like Damon.

But I love Enzo and I have so much respect for Michael Malarkey. They both deserved better from the fandom and the writers.

I love when y'all try to get me canceled.

Just joking. I'm all about honesty here, even if it is unpopular. I've talked about a lot of unpopular opinions so I'll try for ones I don't think I discuss that much. But remember, y'all asked for my most unpopular opinions, they are going to be unpopular.

I will make my normal disclaimer. This is simply a personal blog about a show that ended ten years ago. Yes, we have serious discussions, but at the end of the day, it is my opinion of my interpretation. Me not liking your favorite character/ship is not a reflection on you or your opinions. We can have civil conversations even if we disagree over opinions.

So without further ado.

My most unpopular opinion on TVD is that Delena is a bad ship and wouldn't work out in the long run. (Don't get angry, I'm tagging this appropriately. If you want to read this and have a genuine discussion, great. If not, please just scroll).

Damon was brought on the show as the main villain in season 1 and did unspeakable things to Elena and her friends. Yes, there are times we can move past this. I once said that Enzo is what they wanted Damon to be. I feel like in the later seasons they learned their mistakes and attempted to rewrite a lot of the history, but unfortunately, the history was already there. With Enzo, he did really messed up things, but his back story was directly linked to his terrible actions. Whereas Damon just did bad things because it was fun and then had a bit of a sad backstory.

Damon's issue is that he loves too deeply/obsessively. He was so obsessed with Katherine that he was willing to leave Stefan behind to become a vampire with her. He wanted to become a vampire for Katherine. He only changed his mind when he thought she was dead and then didn't want to turn with Stefan. Once he found out Katherine might be alive, he spent every second attempting to get her back. Even using Elena. He was not at all interested in Elena in Season 1, except to antagonize Stefan. He only really turns his interest on her when he loses hope of Katherine, essentially transferring his obsession.

Delena fans often say that Damon loved Elena for herself while Stefan only loved her as a human, but I disagree. Elena was most as herself as human, but once she got caught up in Damon, she began to become like Katherine. He essentially turned her into Katherine when he couldn't have Katherine.

We see repeatedly that Elena chose Stefan over Damon when she had the choice. Damon and Elena have some nice moments, but it was clearly platonic/boyfriend's brother vibes. She cared for him because Stefan did. They only get closer when Stefan is forced to leave town and Damon does everything in his power to turn Elena away from Stefan. But even after that, she was still choosing Stefan.

The sirebond was the nail in the coffin for Delena in my opinion. I may have been able to get past some things if they hadn't done that. Elena never wanted to be a vampire. She says this so many times and even talks about wanting to die rather than being a vampire. Stefan shows Elena the positives of vampirism, but somehow Damon gets credit for it because of the Whitmore House scene. I think people forget the scene immediately after she runs off the dance floor, when she disgusted by what she's done. Between the thrill of the moment and the sirebond, she acts in a way that she never wanted to and regrets it instantly. Damon showed her the parts of vampirism she feared, but because the scene is sexy people love it.

And this isn't the first time we see Damon not having respect for Elena's decisions. When he forced blood down her throat before the ceremony. Or when he yells over the phone that they shouldn't listen to her about Elijah. When he kills Aaron because 'she' broke up with him. This never gets better. The only character development we really see in Damon is when he becomes friends with Bonnie. No, I don't think it is a girlfriend's job to 'fix' their boyfriend, but they should at least bring out a good side of them. Delena brought out the worst sides in each other.

I'm honestly not even advocating for Stelena. If anything, I think Matt and Elena could have had a nice life together. Or just be a normal girl and go meet someone in college or later in life. Damon didn't want the normal human life and Elena didn't want the violent vampire life. They have so little in common, not even their morals or principals. I just found them to be a really unbelievable couple. The flirtation was more interesting to me than anything that happened after they got together.

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My TO opinion: Kol is kind of a one-dimensional character and benefits very heavily from pretty-privilege. (Again, no need to read if this will just upset you)

I am talking about Nate, but I refuse to put his face on my page. But I will try and put my hate of him aside to talk about Kol.

Kol could have been a really interesting character if he was given more time and more backstory, but the show just didn't go there and left so much up to the audience to fill in the blanks.

We first meet Kol in TVD and he essentially is the Mikaelson psychotic "enforcer." He is wild and unruly, doing whatever he wants. Like targeting Matt for no reason at the Mikaelson ball when even Klaus was on his best behavior. I really feel like they made Kol the way they did to make Klaus look like the sane, practical one since Klaus was quickly becoming a fan favorite.

The storyline with the Cure was interesting, but we don't really get a lot of the backstory of how Kol knew what he knew. I would have loved some flashbacks with Kol and the witches that he supposedly learned this from. But as interesting as this storyline was, it did little to flesh out Kol as a character. He spent most of his time just trying to kill everyone to prevent Silas from being released. It would have been more impactful if they had given Kol a bigger motivation. Explained his backstory with Silas more. I left TVD not really caring if Kol came back. We got one little sad story right before he died about Klaus unfairly daggering him, but really after seeing how unhinged he was in TVD, I kind of didn't care that he was daggered. I felt worse for Finn who seemed relatively harmless.

I didn't mind Kol as a witch too much, but again, felt his character was little more than a charming rake. We knew he was only flirting with Davina initially for his mother, and I even buy his quick infatuation with her since we know he likes powerful witches, but his betrayal of Rebekah just felt impulsive and dumb. It took away from the genius witch they were trying to create. Sure he learned a lot of tricks with the dark objects from witches, but then he imprisoned his sister in an instable witch he did zero research on while his family was still in danger. It felt like he was less of a developed character and more of a plot device.

Similar to Damon, I just didn't feel like his backstory was enough to make me sympathetic. I know we are told he was daggered a lot, but we are also told that he was off on his own a lot. In the 11th century we know Kol had gone off on his own and then for much of the middle centuries he is exploring and meeting witches. The few times we see him in flashbacks, he is covered in blood, smiling at the death he created. I know people say he went off the deep end because of his loss of magic, but the show should have done a better job fleshing that story out. Really go into his spiral, because it happened very quickly. Kol was the only one reveling in killing in 1001, a year after they became vampires. This is also our first encounter with Kol as we don't see him during their human flashbacks. The only daggering we really see that felt unjust was in the 1900s when he was attempting to turn the witches against Klaus and create a weapon. But that also felt out of place in how Rebekah betrayed him but then wanted to do the same a mere year later.

The back and forth with his family also annoyed me. One moment he was building a weapon to put Klaus down and the next he was hugging him, just wanting to be a part of 'always and forever.' I understand why Davina was so annoyed by it. They attempted to garner sympathy for Kol based on how he was not part of 'always and forever' but he never really seemed to want to be. Every chance he had to leave them, he did. I don't blame him, but he can't be mad for not being included when he was always leaving. Even in 1001, Kol was the first one to suggest they split up. He and Finn left immediately after being turned and leaving Klaus, Elijah, and Rebekah to clean up the mess their family made. This tracked through their 1000 years. He even parties with Klaus multiple times after being undaggered, holding it against Rebekah more than anyone. He never seemed to care for any of his siblings outside of Klaus and yet Klaus was the one harming him the most.

Like most of the characters honestly, if Kol had been played by a less attractive or charismatic person, he would have been despicable and annoying at times. I will own that he has moments of character growth in the later seasons of TO, but they all felt like they came out of nowhere since they appeared to happen off camera. Even his relationship with Hope felt strange in Season 5 when he hardly even acknowledged his niece in the previous seasons except to use her to save Davina. His character, to me, felt like it was constantly changing to fit whatever role they needed him to play so he became less of a character and more of a plot device making it hard for me to connect with him or truly understand his underlying character.

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Again, don't hate me if you disagree. These are just some unpopular opinions I don't think I've talked about on here.

TW: Rape/SA

I 100% agree with everything you said.

People are misogynistic when they talk about Katherine and Damon. I absolutely cannot stand season 1 Damon. He was meant to be a villain and was. There is no question that he raped Caroline. It doesn't matter that she was flirting with him or even that she initially wanted to be with him. As soon as she said no and changed her mind, it crosses over to rape. A person is allowed to change their mind at any point for any reason. She very clearly expressed it and Damon ignores it and continues to compel and use her for months.

Season 1 Caroline is why I will always have a soft spot for her, even when she made decisions I didn't like or annoyed me. What she went through at such a young age just broke my heart and I feel like the show never gave her the time to process it or even acknowledge it. Hell, even just having Stefan and Caroline be able to support each other and trauma bond.

I do not allow any slut shaming on my pages for anyone. I do see it a lot with Caroline. People often blanket it in a way that they are trying to defend another character, but it's still not appropriate. It's one thing to say that her having sex with a certain character was problematic, but it's completely different to just shame her for sex in general.

I do also agree that it was a writing flaw in how they portrayed Katherine's past. I indirectly said this in the previous post. I think it really has to do with the fact that they hadn't anticipated keeping the Mikaelsons on for so long. In TO they wanted to make the Mikaelsons look more sympathetic, which would have been harder to do if every flashback showed them mercilessly hunting down Katherine. Unfortunately, this made Katherine look cruel for how she used and abused people in order to stay "hidden." Again, I do headcanon that they had people looking for her and chasing her, but she still did things that weren't necessary and continued to do things she didn't need to even after the Mikaelsons were no longer chasing her.

I also agree that Katherine and Elena owed no one anything, especially not Klaus. I also hate when people blame one character for another's behavior. Katherine attempting to hand Elena over to Klaus, yes we can blame her. But we can't blame Katherine for the inevitability of Klaus seeking Elena out. If anything, like I said in the last post, Katherine could have sold out her ancestors earlier. She was the only one who knew she had a child and that more doppelgangers could have existed. I'm not sure when she discovered the lore of everything, but she did at some point and I like to believe she didn't immediately start trying to sell out her ancestor for her own freedom.

Thanks for the ask!

Trigger Warning: Discussion of r*pe/SA

I agree, there is no difference in what Katherine did to Stefan and what Damon did to Caroline and Andie.

I'm going to start by saying I do not like either Katherine or Damon. Yes, I know it is a show about supernatural creatures and we have to suspend reality, but no matter what world/fandom we're in, there is still a moral code. If there wasn't, we wouldn't have "good" guys and "bad" guys.

I can overlook and move on from a lot of bad things because with most "bad" acts there are mitigating circumstances. I truly believe anyone can be pushed to commit a lot of the terrible acts on the show, like murder, given the right circumstances. Usually it'll take a lot more than what's on the show, but that's where we suspend reality a bit. However, rape and sexual assault, no. There is never mitigating circumstances. No tragic backstory is going to make me overlook this.

I do believe in rehabilitation, but because the writers refused to admit what they did, we never get that with either character. No matter how you see it, both Damon and Katherine compelled people's choose away and proceed to have sex with them. That is the definition of rape. I will not argue with anyone on this point. It doesn't matter what the person intended the second before. The moment Damon/Katherine took their ability to consent away, it was rape.

Personally, Damon is my least favorite character and Katherine is close by it. Yes, I enjoy some of their scenes and they are "iconic" at times, but I could just never get past those scenes. I dislike Damon more because he received no consequences. He got a happy ending while Katherine didn't, so I'm more at peace with that story arc for Katherine.

I want to put a caveat so everyone is clear: I am never going to tell people who they can like or not like or who they should ship. Everyone comes to the fandom with different life experiences and like different ships for different reasons. Fiction allows us to like our toxic ships or like our healthy ships, whatever helps us cope with reality. But I do think it is important to acknowledge the potential harm so that we can recognize it in real life. This blog is just my personal takes on the situations/characters.

If you want to like daroline or steferine, go for it. But, again, it's important to acknowledge the toxicity in both. We all love a good anti-hero and some people enjoy enemies to lovers (not my cup of tea), but be prepared for others to not like it. We could all use a deep breath and take a step back in this fandom when it comes to ships. A lot of them are really toxic and some are less so, but still probably toxic. But at the end of the day, being toxic online to real-life people will always be worse than liking a toxic fictional character. (this is not directed to anon, just a general note for the fandom because I've seen so many people get into such nasty fights over fictional ships)

Thanks for the ask! Sorry I went off on a side tangent there <33