Lizzie meets a genie, who offers to fulfill her wishes, all of which have to do with Hope no longer being a part of her life. However, each wish makes things progressively worse, until the world is plunged into a war between humans and supernaturals.
- Aesop Amnesia: Since Lizzie's final wish retcons the entire episode, so she forgets her realization about her own selfishness and about the Merge. Though Jinni's wording should be taken into account here: She says that Lizzie's conscious memories of these events will be erased, and her reaction to seeing Josie when she returns to her reality suggests that she has retained a vague subconscious memory of what she learned.
- Apathetic Teacher: Alaric really doesn't like teaching history at an ordinary high school, so he typically gets drunk every morning, resulting in him forgetting what he's supposed to be teaching that day. He's clearly ecstatic when Hope offers him the position of headmaster at the Mikaelson School, while Klaus is busy running the European campus.
- Blessed with Suck: Jinni can do pretty much anything at the snap of her fingers. But someone else has to make a wish first. She can't do anything for herself or even take the urn without having someone wish her to have it. Lizzie's final wish appears to free Jinni from that particular "suck".
- "Eureka!" Moment: Lizzie demands why Jinni can't just grab the artifact herself. The silence makes Lizzie realize Jinni is incapable of doing anything she hasn't been specifically wished to do.
- For Want Of A Nail: Lizzie's simple wishes always seem to have unintended consequences:
- Lizzie wishes that Hope never came to the school. As a result, the school is short on money and students, since Hope's father never wrote Alaric a check for a very large sum, and many of Hope's additions are gone. Meanwhile, Hope is a mass murderer, having never learned to keep a lid on her violent impulses.
- Lizzie wishes that the Salvatore School never existed. She and Josie go to the regular school, with Lizzie being the weird outcast (no one is coddling her anymore) and Josie being the cheer captain and the most popular girl in school. Alaric is a history teacher at the school, who is perpetually drunk. Without the Salvatore School, Hope's father founded the (much more successful) Mikaelson School.
- Lizzie wishes that Hope was never born. Without a daughter, Klaus Mikaelson started a war on the humans, outing all supernaturals. As a result, supernaturals are being hunted to extinction all over the world. And Josie is dead.
- Lizzie wishes that Jinni never met the monster who trapped her in Malivore, thus freeing Jinni and preventing her from granting Lizzie's wishes. Except this means that Lizzie has never learned about the Merge and about being less egotistical, going back to her It's All About Me self.
- Genre Savvy: Lizzie thinks she's this with the wishes. "I use my first wish badly, I waste my second wish trying to fix it only to make it worse then my final wish to never have made wishes!" As it turns out, she's a bit wrong.
- Hostile Show Takeover: Lizzie uses her wishes to get rid of Hope, causing her to become the main character. Accordingly, the show's title changes to "Lizzie Saltzman's Legacies".
- In Spite of a Nail: After the second wish, despite the Salvatore School never existing, a similar Mikaelson School is created in its place (in the same building, actually), although it's much more successful and they're even expanding to Europe. And Alaric once again becomes its headmaster.
- It's All About Me: Lizzie doesn't care that her father and sister are happy to join the Mikaelson School. The wishes are for her and no one else. She's even willing to Ret-Gone Hope in order to get her way.
- Lampshaded by the Jinni herself stating Lizzie is one of the most self-absorbed people she's ever met in her centuries of existence.
Lizzie: This is not about you!Jinni: I rest my case. - Laser-Guided Karma: In the world, where Lizzie and Josie go to a regular school, Josie is the popular one, while Lizzie is a weird outcast. Lizzie doesn't take being at the bottom of the school hierarchy well. It's explained that Josie finally managed to shine after she stopped constantly watching out for and coddling her sister.
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Les Yay: Josie is clearly attracted to Hope after the second wish. - Literal Genie: Lizzie accuses Jinni of sabotaging all her wishes. Jinni points out that Lizzie is the one being non-specific. In fact, Jinni says that pretty much everyone does that, with second wishes usually being requests to undo the first.
- The Magic Versus Technology War: Lizzie's third wish results in a world plunged into a war between humans and supernaturals, with the latter being hunted to extinction.
- Memory-Wiping Crew: When Lizzie has an episode in the normal school, Hope, Kaleb, and several others show up seconds later to extract the Saltzmans and mind-wipe the school, while wearing matching uniforms.
- Our Genies Are Different: Genies can grant as many wishes as they want, but they have to actually want to grant a particular wish. They are also forbidden from using their powers without a wish and can't even do something as simple as steal an object on their own. The only way to free a genie from their wish-granting obligation is for them to faithfully carry out other people's wishes for 500 years straight. Unfortunately for Jinni, she ran across a monster, who sent her to Malivore on the year 499, basically resetting her countdown. Lizzie's final wish acts as a Reset Button, allowing Jinni to finish her 500 years and be free.
- Really 700 Years Old: Jinni is over 500 years old.
- Reset Button: Lizzie's fourth and final wish reverses the event in Jinni's past that resulted in her being imprisoned in Malivore, meaning she was never sent after the urn by the anonymous Big Bad in Malivore and thus never granted any of Lizzie's previous wishes. Unfortunately, this also erases Lizzie's learning of the Merge and the Character Development that she received during the experience with Jinni.
- Ret-Gone: Lizzie's third wish wipes out Hope from existence. As a result, Klaus never had any reason to change his worldview, resulting in a war between humans and supernaturals.
- The Reveal: Apparently, twins born into the Gemini Coven will eventually turn on one another, resulting in one sibling killing the other at the age of 22 (as hinted by their biological mother earlier). This is called the Merge. Alaric and Caroline have been looking for ways to prevent the Merge, while keeping their children in the dark. Lizzie learns about the Merge in the war world. Her unhinged personality results in her growing increasingly more paranoid, before killing Josie during one of her episodes. Alaric blames himself for failing to prevent it.
- Shout-Out: In the first wish reality when the Saltzmans are looking at various newspaper articles to be on the look out for supernatural adolescents. There's a focus on an clipping that states " Strange Activity in New Mexico" subtly referencing Roswell, New Mexico Carina Adly Mackenzie's (An writer and story editor The Originals) new CW show.
- Swapped Roles: In the world where the girls attend Mystic Falls High, Lizzie is stunned beyond words to realize that Josie is now the ultra-popular cheerleader dating the quarterback and flaunting magic in a selfish way while Lizzie is the weird outcast no one likes.
- Title Drop: Lizzie drops the episode title when she laments to Alaric that she carelessly wished away the safe world he'd created for her.
- Three Wishes: Subverted. Lizzie assumes that's how it works, only for Jinni to reveal that she can grant someone as many wishes as she wants... but she can also ignore any wish she doesn't want to grant.
