Check out these interviews with Julie Plec from TV Guide, TV Line & EW. She sheds light on the season finale, previews season 5 and answers questions you all may have! Don’t read any further if you haven’t watched the episode yet!

Via TV Guide:

How long before everyone finds out that Stefan is really Silas?
Plec: Truth be told, I don’t think it’ll be too long. I think that there’s more fun to be played with people learning quickly, but independently of the other so there’s a lot of good bait-and-switch Katherine-style stuff that could happen early in the season. And people that know Stefan well will be able to catch on pretty quickly I would hope.

Can we expect double Paul Wesley scenes?
Plec: Part of the fun of having an actor play two roles are those opportunities to put them face to face, but they’re difficult to shoot and they take a lot of time and the stuff we do even with Katherine and Elena we do so sparingly. So we’ll definitely see it, but of course Stefan will be on his own journey presumably at the bottom of the [lake] floor so we’ll see when and who gets him out of that mess.

Read more from the interview over at TV Guide.

Via TV Line:

TVLINE | Speaking of, why Damon? What were you hoping to get to explore in Elena choosing Damon?
Damon’s a character who’s been driven by feeling like he’s not worthy of love. Now that he’s on the receiving end of that love, what will that mean for him? And where will he have to make changes in him, in his behavior? Or will he still be, “I am who I am. You love me for who I am. I’m not going to change for you”? It’ll be a fun dynamic to see him either trying to exercise restraint or not being able to exercise restraint in the name of love of this girl, especially as he’s got a new houseguest. He’s [living] with Jeremy Gilbert as Elena goes off to college.

Read more over at TVLine!

Via EW:

Did you start the season knowing that you were going to end it with Bonnie dying?
Interestingly enough, that was a pitch that was on the table for the finale last year. For us, it’s always been a question of how much we want to show of the other side. And is there an entire world that we can play over there, or do we really want to keep everything grounded in a real world universe. Having Jeremy able to see ghosts and now Bonnie over on the other side, it felt like an exciting complication to a budding romantic relationship that we were looking forward to playing in that. And also relieving ourselves of the burden — as Kevin [Williamson] calls it, the witch storytelling burden — which is that when you have a witch, they should be able to fix all the problems, but if they could fix all the problems, then you’re not telling the story. But if they can’t fix the problems, then they’re really bad witches. [Laughs] So it’s a nice relief from that for a while.

How much will we see of Kat Graham next season?
She will be a regular. She will be around. If anything, we’ll see as much if not more of her. And it gives us a great way to develop more stories for her outside of just her being the witch that comes in and tries to save the day. I’m excited about the opportunity to tell a romantic relationship between two people who can’t physically be together. Talk about your hurdles.

Read more over at EW.

The Vampire Diaries Executive Producer, Julie Plec teases what’s next for Elena after the heart-wrenching episode we all had to endure last night. Julie spoke with EW about how they anticipated that fans would write-off Jeremy’s death as a fake out.

Did you anticipate most of the fans writing off Jeremy’s death as a fake-out? Many of them were actually like Elena, now that I think about it — total denial.

That’s what we wanted to do, truthfully. We wanted to end the previous episode with Jeremy’s death, but I said as I was writing the script that [I knew] the ride I wanted the audience to be on in this episode. The instant that episode 14 was over, the very first thing somebody was going to say is, “No, wait! Was he wearing his ring?” Then somebody else was going to say, “Wait, the ring doesn’t work anymore.” Then somebody else was going to say, “But what if it does? You never know.” And we wanted to dramatize all those questions because on this show, death is not always final. And we do have this sort of reputation for turning a story on its head and surprising people. So we wanted to play those questions so that as Elena came to terms with reality and what had happened, so too, would the audience.

Also check out what Julie had to say about the show heading to New York and an upcoming flashback!

Speaking of the house, are we going to see a new home base for everyone? The house is — at least to me — such an important meeting point for everyone.

They’re going to definitely take up residence in the Salvatore mansion. Although, we go on the road a little bit in the next two episodes after that. We head to New York and we head to small down Pennsylvania. So the adventures of new vampire Elena and how we try to keep her reigned in is what’s driving the next few episodes.

You head to New York!?

Yes, we do! Well, not literally. It’s a very well dressed corner of downtown Atlanta.

When’s the next time we’re really going to dig into the Silas aspect of this mythology?

We very, very quietly slow-play it in the next episode, but in the one after that, we start to see what his plan is with Bonnie and if he’s going to be successful in getting her to do what he wants to do. And Stefan and Caroline — and Klaus, of all people — figure out what going on and and try to put a stop to it.

And the next flashback?

That’s the same episode. While our hometown heroes are dealing with what Silas is up to, Damon, Elena and Rebekah take off to New York as Damon relives a time in his life in the ’70s when he was not so well behaved, either.

Read the rest of the interview over at EW.

Julie also spoke to TV Line and TV Guide. Click the links below to what she had to say!

Vampire Diaries Boss Reveals Why She Killed Off [Spoiler]! Plus: Scoop on Elena’s New ‘Happy Place,’ Bonnie’s ‘Visions’ and More!

How Will the Salvatores Handle Dark Elena? The Vampire Diaries Boss Answers That and More!