(S01E15) "Is there a problem? Did you find her? What's going on?" - Woman's voice on the other end of the cellphone Elena picked up after the mystery guy was hit by the truck

Well, I did what we talked about in the last review and re-watched the earlier episodes of 'The Vampire Diaries' leading up to this one. I think it helped, so I appreciate the discussion we had.

The big thing to me this week was the storyline revolving around Elena's mother -- who she is, what happened to her, and the mystery surrounding whether she's alive or dead. More after the jump.

The connection between Elena, her mother, Alaric, and Damon is intriguing. From what we know from last night's episode, it appears that Elena's mother is Isobel, who's also Alaric's wife, but who at first glance is dead, having perished at the teeth of Damon in North Carolina years earlier. But then the mystery guy who appeared outside Trudy's house -- and killed her -- told Elena later in the episode not to seek out any info on Isobel.

"Stop looking," he said. "She doesn't want to know you. She doesn't want to talk to you. You need to stop looking. Do you understand? Good ... I'm done now." And then he steps into the street and promptly gets hit by a truck. And whatever his deal is, it was important enough to kill Trudy -- but we know he's not a vampire because she didn't invite him into her house. Also that Trudy knows all about vampires, since she didn't invite Elena in and served vervain tea.

And then there was that tense meeting between Damon and Alaric towards the end of the episode. That's where we learned that Damon had actually turned Isobel, not killed her. "I turned her because she begged me to," said Damon. "I guess she wasn't happy at home. Wasn't happy with life, in general. Wasn't happy with you."

So now it appears that Isobel -- Elena's mother, though I'm not going to say this for sure, even though it seems that way -- is a vampire. The flashback that Alaric had indicated that Isobel was fascinated with vampires, for one reason or another. And the ring that she gave to Alaric protected him and brought him back to life after Damon left and Stefan arrived.

Not only that, but when Elena called on the mystery guy's cellphone, it seems that Isobel was on the other line. I say "seems' because you never know which way things are going to go with this show. What seems one way could be something totally different.

I was glad to see Damon back to his partying ways, and it appears that Matt's mother Kelly is going to shake things up now that she's back in Mystic Falls. This entire episode seemed to shift the show into another chapter; it's almost like a new season has begun.

What did you guys think of this episode?