John Gilbert

Johnathan (John) Gilbert was the biological father of Elena Gilbert as well as the uncle of Jeremy Gilbert. He was a member of the Founders Council and generally had an antagonistic role due to his hatred of vampires. He came to Mystic Falls early in season 1 and had a recurring role after that.

Season 1 He first appeared in Under Control and it was established that he had had a rocky past with Jenna, claiming that the two had 'slept together'. Jenna generally had a strained relationship with him and did not like having him in the home. It was soon revealed that John was there to get rid of several Tomb vampires that had escaped. He set his plan in motion by utilizing a special and rare device that could affect any vampire within earshot of it, rendering them helpless against the Council.

During the attack and by using his brother's old medical building, John staked Anna, his nephew's vampire girlfriend. Satisfied, he went home and soon met Katherine, who at the time was pretending to be Elena. The two talked somewhat comfortably until Katherine, in order to get his ring, sawed off his fingers using a knife, she then stabbed him in the stomach with the words, "Hello, John. Goodbye, John." She left him there bleeding and dying on the kitchen floor until Elena found him and called the paramedics.

Season 2 

Elena soon finds John on the floor of the kitchen where John, seeing Katherine, tells Elena to look out. Terrified, she explores the rest of the house. Soon the paramedics arrive and take John to the hospital. She and Stefan later go and front him at the hospital, demanding to know what he knows about Isobel and Katherine. He refuses to tell them and instead says that if Elena was truly his daughter, she would have driven a stake through Stefan's heart already.

Stefan waits until Elena leaves before threatening John and saying that John may be okay with dying, but that if he didn't leave town within twenty-four hours, he would turn John into the thing he hated the most and would watch him hate himself even more than he already did.

He soon gets released from the hospital, now with his fingers reattached and with a cast on.

As he leaves town, Jeremy contronts him about Anna's death and he tells him that his father, might have done things differently but that there was no other way to see it. Jeremy asks John what his father would have thought about Jeremy dating and falling in love with a vampire.

John says that Grayson would think that he was young and still finding his way. Jeremy, in dispair, asks why the ring protected John but not his father. John explains that the Gilbert ring protected against anything supernatural but a car accident was a natural eath and therefore the ring would be useless. John then leaves town for several months.

He later returns to Mystic Falls in The Descent and explains to an angry Elena that until he could trust her more, all he was telling her was that he was there to protect her. She later angrily tells him that although he might be her father, she would never be his daughter. Later on, she and John finally have a talk and John

tells her that he would probably never make things right with her, but that he would do everything he could to protect her and protect his family. He also gives her a bracelet that once belonged to her "mother" Miranda.

He later is enraged when Jenna allows Elena and Stefan to go to the lakehouse alone. He threatens Jenna and Alaric's relationship by telling Jenna that Ric wasn't being entirely truthful about his wife and how she died. Later, John was proven right when Isobel shows up at her doorstep. John and Elena finally have a real heart to heart where John tells her that he didn't know that Katherine and Isobel were working against him and that he genuniely loved her because she was the first person he ever loved. As he leaves, Elena tells him that he screws everything up but because he was her father, she could learn to not hate him.

John is not seen again until the night Klaus uses her in his sacrificial ritual. To save her life, John works with Bonnie to do a spell that would essentially transfer John's soul to Elena's, thus restoring her to life. As a result though, John died after she woke. He left her his protection ring and left her a letter:

Elena, 

''Its no easy task being an ordinary parent to an extraoudinary child. I failed in that task and because of my predjudices I failed you. I am haunted by how things might have played out differently if I had been more willing to hear your side of things. For me, its the end; for you a chance to grow old and someday do better with your own child than I did with mine. Its for that child that I give you my ring. I don't ask for your forgiveness or for to forget. I ask only that you believe this: Whether you are now reading this a human or as a vampire, I love you all the same as I've always loved you and always will.''

-John