Julie Plec wanted Nina Dobrev to stay in Mystic Falls — just like the rest of Us. The Vampire Diaries creator talked about the actress’ shocking exit after season 6 during a KCRW podcast on Wednesday, April 29.
“She was just looking forward to moving on with no hard feelings and no drama,” Plec, 42, said. “This is taking the personal out of it completely, from a storytelling point of view it’s a great challenge. As writers in the room we’re finding it very rejuvenating. Just on a strictly creative exercise level.”
Indeed, and it’s a tricky situation that they’ve seemed to solve. During the episode “I’d Leave My Happy Home For You” on May 1, Elena Gilbert (Dobrev) took the cure to be human again. The new development comes after Plec admitted she tried her best to keep Dobrev from leaving the vampire series.
“Nina had said earlier this year that she wanted to be done and we spent a little bit of time trying to talk her out of it. [We’d say,] ‘Oh, look at all these great plans of how you can stay!'” she explained. “And she finally was like, ‘No, I signed up for six years. I’ve done my six years. I’m ready to move on and spread my wings.'”
And with that, Plec and Dobrev decided what social platform they would use to break the news to fans: Instagram. The reason? Plec didn’t want viewers to be caught off guard. And it was actually the death of The Good Wife’s Will Gardner (Josh Charles) that helped with the decision.
“A lot of people had a hard time with that. It was a beautiful shock, but there’s grief attached to that. And I’m looking at Vampire Diaries, which is now six years deep, and it’s the main character,” Plec said. “A lot of our audience — they’re still teenagers — and there is a profound attachment to this character and to this show. I started looking at it from a fan point of view and being like, ‘We need to tell them that it’s happening before it happens. You can’t just end the season and do what we’re going to do to this character.'”
She added: “As a fan I would die. I would be devastated.”
As for any regrets? Not likely. Plec even briefly brought up the recent death of Derek Shepherd (Patrick Dempsey) on Grey’s Anatomy. Fans were outraged and upset to learn that McDreamy would never return to Seattle Grace Mercy West Hospital ever again.
“It’s really funny because watching this whole Grey’s thing now happen after the fact…” she mused. “I’m like, ‘Mmmhmm, okay, interesting.'”
