Supernatural Soap Opera That Outlived Its Substance: True Blood The Complete Series!

The Good: Moments of performance, Moments of character, Moments of plot, Themes
The Bad: Unfortunate descent into soap operatic plot developments, Loses decent performances, Initially intriguing characters get buried amid a bloated cast!
The Basics: A series that loses its initial spark and substance, True Blood The Complete Series is not worth picking up!


2014 saw the end of several long-running television series’ and many of them had, unfortunately, not been cancelled in their prime. One of the shows that had long outlived its coolness and quality was True Blood. The seventh season of True Blood aired in 2014 and shortly after it came to an end, HBO released True Blood The Complete Series on DVD and Blu-Ray, which tried to capitalize on the few people who still were enamored with the show.

True Blood The Complete Series is the study of a show that illustrates well diminishing returns. The series began with a great deal of potential and a thematic sensibility that made it must-watch television. But, as the series belabored explaining its own universe, it became diluted – from a cast that grew to an unwieldy size to storylines that hinged more and more on reversals that were more at home at a daytime soap opera than on HBO. True Blood was a supernatural drama series and True Blood The Complete Series is comprised of all seven seasons and includes the DVDs that were previously released as:
True Blood Season 1
True Blood Season 2
True Blood Season 3
True Blood Season 4
True Blood Season 5
True Blood Season 6
True Blood Season 7

Set in Bon Temps, Louisiana, True Blood is largely centered around Sookie Stackhouse. Sookie is a waitress at a local bar and grill, Merlotte’s, where she has been working for years, a fixture in the small town. Unbeknownst to almost everyone in town, Sookie has the ability to read minds and her telepathy has made her feel somewhat isolated in her hometown. One day, a vampire comes to Bon Temps and Sookie realizes she cannot read his mind. The vampire is Bill Compton, a former soldier in the Civil War, who has a mansion near Sookie’s house.

But the relationship that Bill and Sookie begin soon attracts the attention of the locals and makes Sookie a target of those who fear vampires integrating with humans. As Sookie and Bill defend one another and their romance, they find themselves at the mercy of psychopaths, orthodox vampires and supernatural beings like werewolves. Their relationship is put to the test as powerful vampires and human politicians clash and devious humans fight to remain in control of the world by setting plagues against the vampire population!

True Blood starts with initially intriguing characters and the series includes:

Sookie Stackhouse – The telepathic waitress who falls in love with Bill Compton, she is protective of her brother Jason after their Gran is killed and they inherit her home. Despite being romantically involved with Bill, she gets into relationships with Eric Northman, Alcide Herveaux, and she learns that her boss has a long-running crush on her. But her love for Bill experiences torsion when she is continually put in danger by being associated with him and the unnatural attraction other vampires have to her cause a truth about her heritage to be revealed that leaves her and Bon Temps shocked,

Jason Stackhouse – The dimwitted brother of Sookie, he gets into every stupid situation imaginable. From drug addiction (vampire blood being a powerful hallucinogen) to affairs with married women and religious zealots, Jason slowly grows to become the sheriff deputy of Bon Temps,

Tara Thornton – Sookie’s best friend for decades, she is a human who has an alcoholic, Evangelical, mother who has been abusive. Unnerved by how life in Bon Temps is changing, she runs away and ends up in the company of an evil witch. She returns to Bon Temps and her life falls apart,

Lafayette Reynolds – The bisexual cook at Merlotte’s, he is the local drug runner. But dealing in vampire blood is exceptionally dangerous and he soon draws the ire of Eric Northman. When his life is saved, he gets shellshocked for a while, but slowly comes out of his shell when he gets involved with a practitioner of voodoo,

Arlene Fowler – Another waitress at Merlotte’s, she has terrible luck with men. But after she has one supremely disastrous relationship, she finds love and redemption in the form of Terry. She is reticent to accepting supernatural beings in her life, though the more she is surrounded by them, the more she accepts them,

Terry Bellefleur – An Iraq War vet, he is shellshocked and works as a cook at Merlotte’s. He tries to rebuild his life and he does it successfully with Arlene,

Hoyt Fortenberry – Jason’s best friend, he has an overbearing mother. After a relationship with a human woman his mother approves of goes bad, he develops a love for Jessica. That relationship, though, is threatened by Jason and his raging hormones,

Steve Newlin – A religious zealot who organizes a war against vampires,

Sam Merlotte – The owner of Merlotte’s, he has managed to hide the fact that he is a shapeshifter from everyone for years. He falls in love with a werewolf and then a pro-supernatural activist,

Holly Cleary – A local witch who pops up,

Alcide Herveaux – A werewolf who rejects the violent nature of the pack mentality of the local pack. He works for Eric Northman and does favors for the vampire sheriff. He and Sookie become involved the more Sookie falls out of favor with Bill and Eric,

Pam De Beaufort – Eric Northman’s progeny, she is a deeply sarcastic former prostitute who reluctantly assists Eric in rescuing Sookie and getting involved in whatever danger she puts Eric in,

Jessica Hamby – A human girl who comes from a very conservative family and sheltered household, she is turned by Bill as punishment against Bill when he kills another vampire. Suddenly reckless, empowered, and vampire, she takes time to calm down and become a useful member of vampire society. Groomed by Bill to be a smarter, more human-considerate, vampire, she develops relationships with Hoyt and Jason,

Eric Northman – The vampire sheriff of the Louisiana Territory, he has long enjoyed being an elite life form, with little consideration for humans. When Sookie comes into his life via Bill, he has to turn against some of the most powerful, genocidal vampires on Earth. In the process, he develops a romance with Sookie,

and Bill Compton – The relatively young vampire intrigues Sookie and he becomes protective of her when an anti-vampire zealot threatens him and Sookie. Forced to do things he disagrees with, like turning Jessica, he argues in favor of peace between humans and vampires. His love for Sookie puts him in constant danger and puts him in the crosshairs of the Vampire Authority at a time when religious fundamentalists take it over!

True Blood stars Anna Paquin and Stephen Moyer and their initial on-screen chemistry made their off-camera relationship entirely viable. Performances by people like Ryan Kwanten (who should be able to play George W. Bush for the rest of his career), Nelsan Ellis (who plays Lafayette as an utterly convincing chameleon who adapts to every situation and relationship), and Rutina Wesley (Tara), start out wonderful before the plot turns their characters into filler. Ellis, especially, starts with a wonderful part in True Blood before the series loses focus for the character and he is eventually relegated to such a minor part that it’s almost forced keeping him around.

Such is the bane of True Blood The Complete Series; so much of the potential that it began with is diluted and lost as the series progresses.

For other works that are or were on HBO, please be sure to check out my reviews of:
Game Change
Veep - Season 1
Game Of Thrones - Season 4
Girls - Season 1
Carnivale
Rome
Extras
Six Feet Under
Sex & The City - Season Three
Da Ali G Show
Jim Henson's The Storyteller

4/10

For other television episode, season and series reviews, please visit my Television Review Index Page!

© 2015 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Death Of The Supernatural Soap Opera: True Blood Season Seven Disappoints!

The Good: Decent-enough acting
The Bad: Ridiculous plot direction, Poor character arcs, Erratic special effects
The Basics: The final season of True Blood takes a disappointing turn for the series, making it a virtually unwatchable end to the story of Sookie Stackhouse and Bill Compton.


Over the course of a series, how a television show will end is always a big consideration for the writers and executive producers. The audacious shows have big endings, the shows that did not begin with a firm goal often fizzle out. True Blood is definitely the latter.

The seeds of destruction for True Blood were built into the sixth season finale, “Radioactive” (reviewed here!) when the penultimate season ended with a six month leap forward in the True Blood timeline. The move forward would not have been so troubling had True Blood not already done a narrative skip forward seasons before and the climactic events were ridiculous teases. The death of Eric Northman at long range, not seen clearly was a suspension of disbelief that no fan in their right mind bought; the sudden appearance of (essentially) zombie vampires was a left turn that made no rational sense (given how the vampires in the sixth season reacted to Hepatitis V infections at the Governor’s compound, six months after the infection broke out, all of the infected would be long dead).

The seventh season opens up immediately where the sixth left off, where a town mixer where Mayor Sam Merlotte has pitched pairing humans and healthy vampires for mutual protection, is surrounded by Hepatitis V-infected vampires. In the slaughter that follows, a few of the townsfolk are abducted by the invading vampires and Tara is killed. As Sookie, Jason and Alcide investigate the nearby town of Saint Alice and discover that the town has been wiped out by the Hep V-infected vampires, fears in Bon Temps grow. To try to bring down the villains, Sookie uses herself as bait while the townspeople rally against the vampires and other supernatural beings around Bon Temps. When Alcide is killed, Sookie is emotionally adrift.

Meanwhile, Pam goes in search of Eric and finds him alive in Europe. Unfortunately, Eric is infected with Hep-V and is very slowly dying of the disease. Goaded by Pam, Eric returns to Louisiana and goes on a hunt for Sarah Newlin. The search for Sarah Newlin turns from an opportunity for Eric to get revenge on the woman who started the outbreak to a business opportunity he can exploit. Together, Pam and Eric negotiate to produce a new product for vampires that will treat Hepatitis V, but not cure it (making them rich). The storylines converge when Bill gets infected with Hep V and refuses treatment for it, causing Sookie to freak out.

The final season of True Blood is erratic, melodramatic and defies what semblance of reason existed in the earlier seasons of the supernatural drama. One of the strengths of True Blood in its initial concept was exploring the way the real world would interact with supernatural creatures. Throughout the seasons, the addition of more and more supernatural beings and more preposterous situations has gutted the metaphoric bent that made the series clever and any sense of realism. The seventh season is like a soap opera in the character relationships as the show strains to resolve all the dangling character arcs and a series of plot contrivances that are ridiculous. Amid episodes where Sookie loses more people in her life, True Blood struggles to make viewers care about what is going on with Lafayette, Arlene and Sam. Most of the beloved characters from True Blood are treated as afterthoughts in this season; Tara is even killed off off-screen, robbing viewers of a reasonable catharsis.

Nevertheless, the show has characters who fans have grown to love over the prior six years and the final season of True Blood finds them thus:

Sookie Stackhouse – After the death of her closest friend, she and Jason try to save the rest of Bon Temps. Discovering how widespread the carnage in the world goes, she becomes more ambivalent toward vampirekind. But, when Alcide dies and she finds herself alone again, she turns toward Bill and discovers she still loves him,

Bill Compton – After championing vampire rights and trying to make amends for his time possessed by Lilith, he drifts. When he is infected with Hepatitis V, he makes the difficult decision to finally die and be at peace, a decision Sookie cannot understand,

Jason Stackhouse – His relationship with an ancient vampire having progressed, he finds himself giving into all of Violet’s desires. But when he Violet goes crazy, he is rescued by the least likely person. In the aftermath, he steps aside so Hoyt and Jessica may resume their romance and he befriends Hoyt’s girlfriend, though he takes a stab at not sleeping with her,

Andy Bellefleur – The sheriff of Bon Temps struggles to protect his remaining daughter and he goes hunting for Holly when she is captured by the Hep V-infected vampires. Desperate to protect both his love and his daughter, he has to turn to Jessica for assistance. When Sam’s girlfriend give him an ultimatum, it is Andy who must take charge of Bon Temps,

Eric Northman – Having managed to survive nearly being burnt alive when his immunity to the sun expired, he finds himself infected with Hepatitis V through his own carelessness. He goes to hunt down Sarah Newlin until he learns that she possesses the cure that will save his life. Teaming with the inventors of Tru Blood who were ruined by the outbreak of Hep-V, he goes into business exploiting the outbreak Newlin caused,

Pam De Beaufort – Bound to Eric, she experiences a loss when Tara is killed and she is angered when Eric appears ready to give up. After goading Eric into returning to the United States, she teams up with him to hunt Sarah Newlin,

Jessica Hamby – Feeling horrible for slaughtering most of Andy’s family, she vows to protect his remaining daughter. When she succeeds in stopping the Hep V-infected vampires from taking the half-fairy daughter of Andy, she is captured by a vengeful Violet. When she is rescued, she begins to find herself drawn back to Hoyt,

Arlene – Captured during the raid on her new bar (formerly Merlotte’s), she appeals to the humanity in one of the remaining Hep V-infected vampires. Upon being rescued, she allows herself to get seduced by a vampire herself,

Sam Merlotte – Almost an afterthought this season, he tries to protect Nicole (who is pregnant with his baby), but fails horribly. Despite coming to her rescue, she loathes remaining in Bon Temps, forcing the mayor to make a difficult choice,

Lafayette – Also a virtual afterthought, he helps Lettie Mae search for Tara’s ghost. He get involved with Jessica’s prison boyfriend and nearly breaks her heart. After that, he just hangs out in Bon Temps until the end,

Alcide – Happy dating Sookie, he tries to protect her. In the battle with the Hep V-infected vampires and townspeople, he pays the ultimate price,

and Tara – Before she has a chance to grow or develop, she is killed, which sets her mother on a drug-riddled trip to follow her ghost.

Any number of issues arise with the characters in season seven of True Blood. In order to draw out the relationship between Jason and Violet, her initial characterization has to be obliterated. In a similar fashion, Eric Northman becoming infected with Hep-V only jives if one forgets how careful he has been and how smart his character is. Moreover, for a character who evolved beyond his absolutism and vengeful qualities in the past, the way he degenerates into a completely avaricious vampire for his final arc is disappointing.

True Blood in its final season robs its performers of any big moments. Outside of the last two episodes when Deborah Ann Woll is given a genuine romance to play off Jim Parrack and Anna Paquin and Stephen Moyer are given the chance to infuse their love back into their characters, the season is devoid of great performances. Instead, the actors plod through their final ten episodes in a location once magical, now full of death.

For more information on this season, please visit my reviews of the individual episodes:
“Jesus Gonna Be Here”
“I Found You Here”
”Fire In The Hole”
“Death Is Not The End”
“Lost Cause”
”Karma”
“May Be The Last Time”
“Almost Home”
”Love Is To Die”
“Thank You”

2/10

For other television episode and movie reviews, please visit my Television Review Index Page!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Penultimate True Blood: “Love Is To Die” Has One Good Arc As It Cuts Ties!

The Good: Good acting between Jim Parrack and Deborah Ann Woll, Moments of character
The Bad: Light on plot, Blasé character moments, Mostly unexceptional performances
The Basics: “Love Is To Die” moves True Blood much closer to its end; without leaving a compelling hook for fans to come back for the finale.


With only two episodes of True Blood left, the penultimate episode works very hard to frame how the series will end. True Blood’s “Love Is To Die” sets up a finale that is likely to be less bang and more “fade away.” The way the second-to-last episode feeds into the finale is actually somewhat unsurprising; the seventh and final season of True Blood has been a lot of fizzling out and the cramped cast has struggled to find a compelling story to tell. In fact, given how serialized the show is, it is almost surprising that “Love Is To Die” bothers with a “previously on” montage at the beginning of the episode.

“Love Is To Die” picks up where “Almost Home” (reviewed here!) ended and it continues the trend of the last few episodes of cutting ties for the characters. In fact, given the tone of most of “Love Is To Die,” the finale is almost unnecessary. There is a “ho-hum,” “this place is becoming a ghost town” attitude toward Bon Temps that the show feels like it is just waiting out the clock at this point. In discussing “Love Is To Die,” it is not possible to discuss where the characters are without (potentially) spoiling prior events from the season.

With Bill refusing to drink Sarah Newlin’s blood and be cured of the Hep-V infection that is ravishing his body, both Jessica and Sookie are furious at Bill Compton. After Bill renounces his ties to Jessica, she turns to Pam and Sookie finds herself in Eric’s arms. Sookie and Jessica visit Sam’s house where they find it abandoned and two letters waiting for them. Sookie’s letter explains to her exactly why he and Nicole have abandoned Bon Temps; the letter Sam left for Andy is simply his resignation as mayor. As Bellefleur’s, Jessica makes peace with James and LaFayette. Hoyt and Bridgette fight, largely because Bridgette is jealous of Jessica. Things get worse for their relationship when Jessica shows up. Bridgette gives Hoyt an ultimatum and Hoyt follows the vampire out into the night. Jessica and Hoyt reconcile and Jessica tells Hoyt their story.

While the bulk of the remaining town has dinner together at Bellefleur’s, Eric visits Bill Compton (who has returned to his mansion). There, Eric tries to convince Bill to take the cure and live on for Sookie. When Jason tries to rescue Bridgette from Hoyt’s house, he gets knocked out and she ends up rescuing him (though he helps book her a ticket back to Anchorage). Pam restores Sarah Newlin to her traditional look in preparation to sell her to the highest bidders (billing her as potentially the highest paid trollop in history). As the party at Bellefleur’s breaks up, Eric approaches Sookie to try to explain why Bill is allowing himself to die. Sookie returns home to attend to Bill as he dies. At Fangtasia, Eric almost fucks Ginger and he descends to the basement where Gus Jr. has Pam captured. Forced to be honest to save her life, Eric tells Gus Jr. where Sookie lives.

“Love Is To Die” is a mediocre episode that continues the trend of writing out characters to the series in thoroughly underwhelming ways. Earlier in the season, Tara died off camera and her arc in the season had her existing as a ghost to essentially further the unlikable character of Lettie Mae. Sam is similarly written out with an off-camera departure, which is incredibly unsatisfying for viewers who have stuck with the series so long. It is somewhat ridiculous to make Sam mayor only to have him have only one tiny arc! Sam’s big character arc was over at the end of the prior season when he proposed the pairing of humans and vampires for protection. This season, he has been a non-entity and his promotion to mayor has had less impact than Andy Bellefleur wanting to marry Holly! One of the essential characters at the beginning of the series, Sam has faded to not at all a presence by “Love Is To Die.”

The scene between Hoyt and Bridgette is more melodramatic and like a soap opera than it is realistic and compelling. Far more interesting in “Love Is To Die” is how much time the episode devotes to Jessica and Hoyt. Hoyt was a supporting character at the outset of True Blood and his arc with Jessica was a good one for the seasons they were involved. “Love Is To Die” capitalizes on the on-screen chemistry that Jim Parrack and Deborah Ann Woll have. Boosted by the scene where Jason tells Bridgette about his childhood with Hoyt and the relationship Hoyt and Jessica had before. More than any other relationship in True Blood, “Love Is To Die” frames Jessica and Hoyt as the great love story of the series.

This late in the story, the burgeoning relationship between Jason and Bridgette seems somewhat forced. In fact, not since Star Trek: Voyager contrived a relationship between Chakotay and Seven Of Nine in the final few episodes has a relationship seemed so forced on television near its end. At least the almost-sex scene between Ginger and Eric is treated with appropriate ridiculousness.

“Love Is To Die” is an episode where virtually nothing happens; the characters are realigned, but there are no stellar events to make one want to bother with the finale.

For other penultimate episodes to television series’, please visit my reviews of:
“The Dogs Of War” - Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
“Parallel Lives” - VR.5
“Episode 28” - Twin Peaks

[Knowing that single episodes are an inefficient way to get episodes, it's worth looking into True Blood - The Complete Sevent Season on DVD or Blu-Ray, which is also a better economical choice than buying individual episodes. Read my review of the final season of the supernatural show here!
Thanks!]

4/10

For other television episode and movie reviews, please visit my Television Review Index Page!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Sookie Plays Crappy Marriage Counselor In “Death Is Not The End.”

The Good: Good continuity, Character realism, Competent acting
The Bad: Nothing extraordinary in terms of plot development, Somewhat ridiculous writing for Sookie
The Basics: “Death Is Not The End” brings closure to several characters while bringing other loose ends from True Blood to a close in sensible, though not extraordinary, ways.


True Blood used to be a smart television series that did a lot of credit to HBO by taking a pulp book series and making it into a decent and very adult television show with enough social allegory to be smarter than the soap opera it appeared to be on the surface. During its heyday, True Blood’s worst episodes were the ones where nothing exceptional happened; episodes that bridged significant episodes in order to simply rearrange the characters. In the rocky seventh season, the first true glimpse of the prior greatness came in the fourth episode: “Death Is Not The End.” While the episode has a ridiculous trend toward dialogue from Sookie that seems more at home in the daytime television self-help programming than on HBO show, there is a decent return to allegory when Jessica’s grief-based starvation is treated as an eating disorder!

“Death Is Not The End” devotes a great deal of time reacting to the events of “Fire In The Hole” (reviewed here!) and because of the episode’s preoccupation with the climax of that episode, “Death Is Not The End” cannot be reasonably discussed without referencing events from the prior episode. That said, “Death Is The End” is a plot-necessary episode that fills the day after one horrifying attack on the True Blood heroes with characters grappling with the repercussions of their actions and that plays well.

Opening with Sookie calling Jackson to let Alcide’s father know of Alcide’s death, Jason makes a similar call to Hoyt Fortenberry. Jason is shaken because Hoyt still has no memory of him and Sookie is unsettled when Jackson tells her that Alcide was happiest when she was in love with him. As Eric and Pam fly back from Europe to Shreveport, so Eric may see Willa before he dies, they recall how Eric was named Sheriff of the Shreveport vampires and given a small, depressing, video store to run. Back in Bon Temps, Sookie makes a foolish promise to Arlene’s children that she will help find Arlene and to that end, Sookie, Sam, and Jason visit Holly, who has no memory of where she was captured and held. Using her fairy mind-reading abilities, Sookie helps Holly remember that she was being held in the basement of Fangtasia. With Andy refusing to leave Holly, Sam heads off to Fangtasia and Jason pulls a gun on him to get him to turn around.

Jessica refuses to eat, but is coaxed by James and Lafayette to feed. After exploring the origins of Fangtasia, which was ironically created by Ginger after the vampires come out of the coffin in 2006, Eric and Pam arrive at Bill’s house. There, Eric summons the angry Willa. Together, they storm Fangtasia to rescue the three surviving women.

The richness of “Death Is Not The End” comes in the time the episode spends on developing the backstory for Pam and Eric. The continuation of the flashbacks from “Fire In The Hole” allows for the return of actor Zeljko Ivanek as The Magister. The scene with him turning the video store over to Pam and Eric is hilarious and off-putting. The introduction of Ginger to Pam and Eric’s life is similarly treated with a tongue-in-cheek humor that balances well against the darkness and melodrama of most of the rest of “Death Is Not The End.”

The darkness in the episode comes from the current state of Eric, who is dying of from Hep-V, the various characters’ reactions to the deaths that have permeated the prior episodes and James and Bill confronting Jessica about her not feeding. While Jessica not feeding is deeply related to her killing three fairy children in the prior season, she has also avoided feeding to try to keep safe from Hepatitis-V. The conversation that LaFayette has with Jessica is very much akin to the common therapies used to get individuals with body distortion issues to start (or stop) eating again. The allegory of the eating disorder for the vampire is well-presented and actress Deborah Ann Woll and actor Nelsan Ellis play off one another perfectly to sell the scene.

Unfortunately, “Death Is Not The End” has a somewhat ridiculous presentation of its protagonist. Sookie Stackhouse pops up with some of the least-memorable or interesting supplemental characters talking like a daytime talk show host. While she manages to get through the phone call with Jackson without spouting banal clichés, the conversation with Arlene’s children is deeply unsatisfying. Every line she spouts in that scene is a form of melodramatic psychobabble that sounds unlike anything that her character has ever said and it is pretty cringeworthy. Following that ridiculous scene up with a scene where she basically forces Holly to relive her rape (again, allegory, as the vampires tortured and fed off her) before spouting generic platitudes about what women want makes for a roller coaster between the ridiculous and offensive. No matter how wonderful it is for the show to bring its focus back to Sookie Stackhouse, the use of her in this episode is pretty lousy.

On the acting front, Carrie Preston gives a strong performance as Arlene as her character is drained near death. Sure, she mostly has to stay still and react to voices, but Preston makes the moments riveting to watch. The other decent performances come from Alexander Skarsgard and Kristin Bauer van Straten. Finally given the snark fans love about Pam, Kristin Bauer van Straten is able to loosen Pam back up and steal what could seem like dry, expositional flashbacks away from Skarsgard whose purpose in at least one of the flashbacks is simply to stand there looking good.

“Death Is Not The End” might be the only proof so far that True Blood is not dead yet and that the show has a fighting chance to recover from its rocky start to its final season. With the storyline refocusing and giving Eric and Pam a solid mission while the rest of Bon Temps falls back, there is potential going forward that had been mortgaged since late in the prior season.

For other works with Lauren Bowles, please check out my reviews of:
The Starving Games
Hall Pass
Dance Flick
Ghost World

[Knowing that single episodes are an inefficient way to get episodes, it's worth looking into True Blood - The Complete Sevent Season on DVD or Blu-Ray, which is also a better economical choice than buying individual episodes. Read my review of the final season of the supernatural show here!
Thanks!]

6.5/10

For other television reviews, please check out my Television Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Entering The Final Season, True Blood Declares That “Jesus Gonna Be Here” . . . But It’s Not Gonna Be Good!

The Good: Not much . . . Hints of character and plot development?
The Bad: A lot of stiff acting, Flooded with characters viewers are unlikely to care about, Fundamentally altered characters, Nonsensical anticlimaxes
The Basics: The final season of True Blood starts as one of the worst episodes of the series with “Jesus Gonna Be Here” . . . which is a fractured start.


Happy True Blood Finale Premiere Night! The seventh and final season of True Blood has begun and the hype surrounding the season premiere was that a major character would be biting the dust early in the episode. To be honest, it was tough for me – even as a True Blood fan – to get excited about “Jesus Gonna Be Here.” The reason for my lack of excitement is simple: the sixth season ended on an odd downbeat that seemed to further shift the show away from characters I actually care about and set the television series on a more violent than romantic course for its final season.

Picking up where “Radioactive” (reviewed here!) left off, “Jesus Gonna Be Here” starts the seventh season off with violence, carnage and death and those who got into True Blood for the raw, exotic eroticism of True Blood will find it completely mortgaged by the opening of the new season. For those who have not seen the sixth season finale, it is absolutely impossible to discuss “Jesus Gonna Be Here” without revealing how the prior episode ended. In concert with the imprisoned vampires getting their freedom, the sixth season climaxed with several characters going their own separate ways and a gap in the narrative that leaped the story ahead several months. In the reordered alliances, Sookie and Alcide are romantically involved and the new mayor of Bon Temps, Sam Merlott, has a plan to save the human townspeople of Bon Temps: pair with vampires who will feed upon, but not turn, their human companions. “Jesus Gonna Be Here” begins at the same moment the sixth season ended, with Bellefleur’s (formerly Merlotte’s) surrounded by Hep-V infected vampires, which seemed akin to True Blood adding psychotic zombie vampires to their supernatural mix.

“Jesus Gonna Be Here” opens with the attack on Bellefleur’s, which results in a number of deaths and the Hep-V vampires abducting Arlene, Holly, and the pregnant Nicole. In the scuffle, Tara is (apparently) killed, which leaves Sookie shocked enough to walk home unprotected. With the Hep-V infected vampires leaving as abruptly as they came, Bon Temp’s new “one vampire, one human” program is put to its first test. That arrangement is compromised when Sam’s political rival sees him revert to human form from dog form when he chased after Nicole. As Bill Compton and Sheriff Andy look for the kidnapped humans, Sookie complains to Alcide about how her mental defenses are down and she can hear the entire town’s hateful thoughts against her. She pushes Alcide away.

Elsewhere, Pam hunts for her maker, who was last seen bursting into flames on a snowy European mountaintop and Jessica stands guard for Adilyn Bellefleur. Jessica’s guard duty quickly leads to a standoff between herself and a Hep-V vampire who wants the fairy’s blood. In shock, Lafayette gets to know Jessica’s boyfriend and Jason consummates his relationship with the old vampire Violet. As dawn breaks, Bill and Andy find a vampire nest, but the prisoners of the Hep-V vampires find themselves in dire peril in the old Fangtasia building.

“Anticlimactic” is the word that best describes “Jesus Gonna Be Here.” “Jesus Gonna Be Here” is loaded with moments that make very little dramatic sense and while there are problems with the script, this episode is a real black mark on Stephen Moyer’s directing career. Moyer misses a ton of important opportunities and it is impossible to believe that true True Blood fans will not feel cheated by his decisions. Chief among them is Tara’s death, which occurs off-camera. Tara is seen defending her mother, then her blood-covered mother declares Tara died in the fight. This senseless act of killing off a character the producers bothered to save after a pretty gruesome on-camera death in a prior season is made worse by how Pam shows no reaction to the alleged death (or the supposed death of Eric).

At this point, True Blood is overloaded with characters and, like the last few seasons of Glee, those new characters are not adding anything compelling to the mix. So, time devoted in “Jesus Gonna Be Here” to Jessica’s boyfriend, Jason Stackhouse and Violet (who bears almost no resemblance to the pious, cocktease, vampire introduced last season, and the introduction of Sam’s new adversary are all a waste of time. The time devoted to glossing over these new minor characters diminishes what little time is given to Sookie Stackhouse, which seems troublesome considering that True Blood is based upon the Sookie Stackhouse novel series.

The result on the character front is that Sookie is given little to do that does not seem like she is presenting her emotional conflict in a melodramatic, soap operatic way. Anna Paquin cries to camera and is stiff in her presentation, which robs the episode of most of the episode’s emotional resonance to Tara’s death. While Paquin might flub her presentation, at least she is given the moments to try to emote. Sam Trammell is not given the chance to truly react to Nicole’s capture and why Sam (the character) does not chase after his abducted lover with a fast, powerful animal is one of the many moments that makes the episode seem like the producers are phoning the show in.

Reflecting on “Jesus Gonna Be Here,” the episode has elements that are “necessary evil” moments of plot movement, but there is a bright moment of entertainment in the episode. That scene features Pam playing Russian roulette and Kristin Bauer Van Straten nails the scene with her character’s typical dark humor. Even Jessica’s scenes with Adilyn seem more stiff than emotionally conflicted.

“Jesus Gonna Be Here” does not do what a good season premiere ought to; it leaves the viewer entirely ambivalent as to whether or not they might want to tune into True Blood again and the sense that best days for the show are far, far behind.

For other works in the True Blood franchise, please be sure to check out my reviews of:
True Blood - Season 1
True Blood All Together Now
True Blood - Season 2
True Blood - Season 3
True Blood - Season 4
True Blood Where Were You?
True Blood The French Quarter
True Blood - Season 5
True Blood - Season 6

[Knowing that single episodes are an inefficient way to get episodes, it's worth looking into True Blood - The Complete Sevent Season on DVD or Blu-Ray, which is also a better economical choice than buying individual episodes. Read my review of the final season of the supernatural show here!
Thanks!]

2/10

For other television reviews, please check out my Television Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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A Season Of Stumbles: True Blood - Season Six Reveals An Underwhelming Adversary.

The Good: Moments of character, Moments of performance, Moments of menace
The Bad: Entirely bloated cast, Unimpressive villain, Short, Underdeveloped plots
The Basics: The sixth season of True Blood illustrates the problem of continuing a show with an expanding cast as it loses resonance and presents a much built-up enemy in a lackluster way.


I like long stories when it comes to television shows. I like long arcs and character development that takes its time reaching an organic position that shows real growth. In the case of True Blood, the show has had some long arcs, but has largely been plot-based with storylines jerking characters all around the map. Instead of being moved forward by the main characters, far too often, the villains throw up roadblocks or create the movement that pulls the protagonists toward action. In the fifth season of True Blood (reviewed here!), it was the rise of the Authority and a fundamentalist sect within it that pulled Eric and Bill into a conflict that they struggled to escape from.

The sixth season of True Blood returns the focus of the show to Sookie, but it has two fundamental problems with keeping the Sookie storyline engaging and truly compelling. The first is that, as the fifth season heavily alluded to his coming, the murderer of the Stackhouse parents, Warlow, rears his head . . . and it is anything but ugly or murderous. After exceptional build-up as an ethereal, creepy, badass, Warlow pops up as a too-cute romantic interest for Sookie and his arc in the season is nauseating.

The other fundamental issue with the sixth season of True Blood is that at this point there are so many diverging storylines going on that almost none of them are actually developed well. Given that the sixth season of True Blood has only ten episodes, the plotlines spreading the characters out in multiple different directions does not allow any of them to get the attention they deserve. The season moves fast, but at this point, True Blood is mostly pulp and it lacks the resonance of the deeper themes from the earlier seasons.

The sixth season picks up immediately where the fifth season ended as Eric Northman and Sookie Stackhouse run out of the Authority headquarters. They are pursued by Bill, who has been possessed by the spirit of Lilith. As the bloodbath follows the pair, Bill begins to regain control. As he retreats to his estate, where Jessica ministers to him, Bill has a vision of a white room in which most of the vampires he knows will see the sun and be destroyed. To prevent that calamity, he kidnaps the inventor of TruBlood in an attempt to make a fairy blood equivalent of TruBlood that will protect his friends. The white room Bill saw in his vision is quickly revealed as Eric, Pam, and Tara are captured by the Governor, who has set up a vampire concentration camp where his people perform perverse experiments on vampires.

While the Governor is imposing his curfew and setting up a biological plague that will wipe out the vampire population, Sookie is on the outside . . . with Warlow. After the appearance of her fairy grandfather, Sookie falls in with Warlow, who romances her and explains his complicated existence as a vampire fairy to her. In attempting to aid Bill, Jessica inadvertently slaughters three of Sheriff Bellefleur’s half-fairy daughters before she, too, is captured by the Governor’s forces. Struggling with the way he saved Arlene’s life in the prior season, Terry once more becomes twitchy and he organizes a way to free himself from the pain of wrestling with the consequences of his actions. Outside Bon Temps, Sam falls for a young woman who wants to help the supernatural creatures who have not made their existence known to the world when she is attacked by werewolves in Alcide’s pack. Alcide, for his part, shows up to take over his pack and learn pretty quickly that being pack master is not what he truly wants.

After all of the hype and prophecy surrounding Warlow, his revelation in the sixth season as a man who can come to claim Sookie is underwhelming when Warlow appears and starts to romance Sookie. The romance in the season is thin and cheap; starting with Sookie picking up a wounded stranger at the side of the road, the revelation that he is Warlow comes quick. The thin ploy mirrors the simplistic romance that follows and Warlow lacks the gravitas that he was rumored to have before appearing.

In fact, it is not until late in the season, when Warlow resists the idea of dating Sookie that there is any real menace. But that’s the problem with so much in this penultimate season of True Blood; the positive developments for the season come too late and the payoffs are disappointing. From prophecies that strangely do not include the methods needed to make them come true (Bill is absent from his own vision so that when the events in the white room come to a head, they do not match his vision at all) to an overall plot that troublingly mirrors the prior season (the Governor is dispatched and replaced at virtually the same position in the season as the head of the Authority was last season!), the sixth season of True Blood feels much more formulaic than fresh.

On the performance front, True Blood Season Six is a mediocre use of decent talent. Anna Paquin and her new co-star, Robert Kazinsky (Warlow), have absolutely no on-screen chemistry, which guts the viability of their relationship. While Robert Patrick is added to the main cast as Jackson Herveaux, Jackson barely appears in the season and does not have a truly substantive role until the final episode where he predictably acts as an accessory to Joe Manganiello’s Alcide.

Some of the season’s best moments come from the second string performers. Anna Camp illustrates a truly incredible ability to play the villain as Sarah Newlin takes charge of the enemies of the vampires. Todd Lowe shows yet again just how powerful he can play loss and confusion as Terry Bellefleur. Similarly, Carrie Preston is given the chance to play grief as Arlene in a remarkable way that she has not been given the opportunity to previously.

Still, the moments of decency are not enough to outweigh the plodding plot and lack of payoff for the season’s few big moments. Beloved characters (like Lafayette and even Sam) are largely neglected, previously added cast members, like Lauren Bowles as Holly, are not given the chance to grow and develop and the season is a poor payout to those who have invested a lot in the show leading up to it.

For more information on the specific episodes contained in the sixth season of True Blood, be sure to check out my reviews of each of the episodes in the boxed set. They are:
"Who Are You, Really?"
"The Sun"
"You're No Good"
"At Last"
"Fuck The Pain Away"
"Don't You Feel Me"
"In The Evening"
"Dead Meat"
"Life Matters"
"Radioactive"

3.5/10

For other television reviews, please check out my Television Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2013 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Ending On The Anticlimax, The Sixth Season Finale Of True Blood Is Anything But “Radioactive!”

The Good: ? The special effects, Plot movement
The Bad: Creates huge plot holes, Anticlimactic, Nothing spectacular on the acting front, Huge time gap used to explain away dramatic character changes.
The Basics: Ending unremarkably, “Radioactive” caps off True Blood’s sixth season poorly and sets up an immediate bloodbath for Season Seven.


Season finales fascinate me. I love endings and season finales represent the best chance a show has to hook its audience for the future. With (sometimes) years between seasons of premium cable shows, the season finale has a responsibility to create strong consumer desire during the show’s absence. Unfortunately, this year has been marred by rather uninspired finales of some of the most popular cable shows, like Game Of Thrones (Season Three reviewed here!) and The Walking Dead (Season Three reviewed here!). So, as the shortened season of True Blood reached its finale with “Radioactive” after the scene the season had apparently been building to the whole time already been reached, it was somewhat predictable that “Radioactive” would be somewhat anticlimactic.

Unfortunately, the episode becomes ridiculous after further contemplation and is so full of plot holes that it is likely to make even the diehard fans cringe in frustration. “Radioactive” caps off a season where big character deaths were promised and it is impossible to discuss the episode without mentioning the two significant character deaths within the episode (because they open up two huge cans of worms that are worth discussing). But the promised “big deaths” before “Radioactive” have been unfortunately disappointing. After all, the Governor was not around long enough to become a significant character, Terry Bellefleur’s arc had pretty much run its course the prior season, and Steve Newlin had become more of a distraction than an integral character. Oh, and Nora was replaced with Willa this season much the way Data (who was far more important to Star Trek: The Next Generation than Nora ever was to True Blood) was ultimately replaced by B-4, so there’s not a lot to look forward to in that character in the future. So, “Radioactive” claims to pay off the big character death that was promised before the season began.

It fails.

What “Radioactive” does is reestablish Warlow as a villain. Warlow has spent most of the sixth season of True Blood doing anything but menacing Sookie. Instead, he wants to make her his bride and create another vampire/fairy hybrid who will live forever and, presumably, be disgusted by who they are (I’m not sure the writers really thought that one through; Warlow is disgusted by being a vampire, so why would he want to make Sookie one when the fairies seem virtually immortal themselves?!). In “Radioactive,” Warlow has lost his patience and, in the process, reasserts himself as a villain willing to kill, rape and do other unpleasant things to get what he wants.

Opening with a ton more vampires out in the sun following the demise of the Governor’s camp than were seen at the end of “Life Matters” (reviewed here!), the vampire population is celebrating the end of their incarceration. The sheer number of vampires out in the sun makes no sense. Eric had left and Bill was near death from being drained and there was no rational reason to give any more of the vampires who had been imprisoned any of the fairy blood. So, the numbers make no sense right off the bat, but there is a virtual orgy of vampires out in the sun, frolicking and celebrating their freedom.

The orgy comes on the heels of Terry’s funeral, which is how Sookie and Alcide learn of the victory of Eric and Bill at the Governor’s camp. Sookie and Jason are reunited and Sookie forgets to tell Jason that their mutual friend, Terry Bellefleur is dead and half the town just came from his funeral. Given how close Jason is with Andy, Terry’s cousin, this only reinforces the idea that the writers are sloppy and/or Sookie is the most self-centered female protagonist on television today. Sookie goes to visit Warlow on the fairy plane and discovers that he will not date her; he wants to marry her that very night, by force if necessary. Pam tells Tara that she is going after Eric and she flies off to do just that. Bill, who is now largely powerless, is convinced by Jessica to go save Sookie.

Using Adilyn, Bill, Jason, and Violet transfer to the fairy plane where they begin a fight against Warlow. They rescue Sookie and the entire group makes it back to our world where a last-second visitor saves Sookie and gives Jason the ability to stake Warlow. In killing Warlow, his magical blood diminishes and all those who were using his blood to survive suddenly lose the special powers granted by it. This has unfortunate results for one vampire who is out sunning himself at the time, but the others apparently survive unharmed. Six months later, Bill has published a memoir about the creation of Hep-V and the death of the Governor, Sam has been elected mayor of Bon Temps and he and Arlene (who now owns the old Merlotte’s, now Bellefleur’s) hatch a plan to keep the people of Bon Temps safe from roving vampire gangs that have descended upon Lousiana. After pitching the idea of a symbiotic relationship between vampires and humans, they encourage the residents of Bon Temps to pair up with vampires for protection and feeding to their mutual advantage. But, their attempt at peaceful co-existence is immediately threatened . . .

So, why is “Radioactive” so anticlimactic and disappointing? First, there is no genuine character development. The characters continue along being who they are until the six month gap, which is used as an excuse to completely reinvent many of the characters. That’s not development, it’s a course correction.

Second, “Radioactive” includes several continuity problems and implies several huge ones to come. Chief among them is the power of fairy blood. Fairy blood has never been a permanent savior for vampires, though in the sixth season it is treated like it is. When Eric and Russell Edgington used Sookie’s blood in prior seasons, they were only able to spend time in the sun for a few minutes before the effects wore off then they burned to a crisp. While Warlow’s blood is, presumably, much more powerful, there was nothing in the show that indicated it would indefinitely allow vampires to remain in the sun.

The new nemesis, bands of roving Hep-V infected vampires makes no sense either. Nora was virtually paralyzed by Hep-V and she didn’t live more than two days after being infected. Are we truly to believe that Eric, who has long fought to save vampires, and Bill, who enjoyed godlike powers for the season and attained mythic status among vampires, would not have wiped out every Hep-V infected vampire in the Governor’s camp?! The only way to save the majority would have been to wipe out that infected minority of vampires, so it makes sense. (Come to think of it, where the hell did all those vampires come from at the beginning of the episode – Sarah Newlin had all the vampires that wouldn’t drink the infected True Blood rounded up in the prior episode and Nora’s death clearly established that fairy blood was not a cure for Hep-V?!) That means that for “Radioactive” to work, we have to believe that Eric selfishly flew off to vacation, as opposed to destroying every last infected shipment of True Blood he could find. Because the only shipment of infected True Blood we saw get out went to Honolulu. Sorry, crappy writers, but Hawaii is both incredibly sunny and an island. Hep-V infected vampires would not stand a chance there. Humans, hunker down for two nights and the problem dies out. Seriously, it’s that easy given how fast Hep-V was shown to work for the rest of the season. So, the idea that the U.S. would be terrorized for months by roving bands of young vampires who should die in less than two days and who would be in excruciating pain for the rest of their brief life makes no sense whatsoever. It is a continuity issue of such proportions that it almost dwarfs the other continuity problems in the episode (and beyond).

With the death of Warlow and the subsequent main character death, we are asked to buy a new premise: glamours only work for the duration of the life of the vampire. [Sorry, but I have to spoil it before big problem #3!] Eric’s apparent death is the only reason that Alcide would be able to date Sookie in the six months later sequence. After all, in the fifth season (reviewed here!), Eric punitively glamoured Alcide to make him feel utter sexual revulsion for Sookie following their adventure in recovering Russell. Why is this a problem? It means that for every vampire who dies, all their glamours come undone. If that is true, it becomes virtually impossible for the seventh season to have a more important character than . . . Ginger.

GINGER?!

Yup, Ginger. Ginger is the little skeletal bloodsack who has been around Eric and Pam for the worst carnage in Fangtasia and their solution all along has been to simply glamour her. In fact, she has been glamoured so many times that she is virtually an idiot now. But if all of Eric’s glamours come undone, she has a vast supply of intelligence for vampire activities and would, presumably, have the werewithall restored to use it. If Pam, who was out searching the world for Eric at the time of Warlow’s death, died off-camera, at the same time, Ginger would basically become a genius on vampire activities, mannerisms, and crimes.

That leads us to the third huge problem with “Radioactive;” suspension of disbelief. “Radioactive” seems to be following in the tradition of the third season finale of The Walking Dead which made it almost impossible to deny that Andrea was killed. However, almost immediately after the episode aired, people started asking if Laurie Holden was coming back for season four and the actress played it coy. In order for Andrea to come back, the show would require a suspension of disbelief well outside the strongly realistic tone set by the series. “Radioactive” creates an implies suspension of disbelief on two fronts. First, writer Kate Barnow and director Scott Winant ask the viewer to believe that Eric is killed. One second, he is reading high atop a vast mountaintop in Sweden, the next Warlow is killed and he begins to cook. But Winant pans away while Eric is on fire and we are not granted the boon or catharsis of seeing him finished off. So, for “Radioactive,” we are asked to suspend our disbelief that the fan-favorite character of Eric Northman would die an inglorious death that is not shown.

. . .and it leads us to a suspension of disbelief for Season Seven that seems to be far too much to bear. Eric will be found alive or Pam will, against all odds, find his remains. I’m betting on the former. In fact, the setting virtually writes itself. Eric is last seen on a high, snow-covered peak. Place your bets now. My bet is this: if Eric is not actually dead, what happened is simple. Eric begins to burn up high atop the mountain when the heat from his burning body melts the snow. It melts the snow at his feet and he sinks down and – lo and behold! – he is above a cave exit or vent, so his burning corpse falls out of the sunlight and into a dark cave. It is there that Pam will find him (I’m betting he’ll have a long, scraggly beard) in the next season. An even cheaper resolution would be that the second after the camera panned off Eric, a flaming Pam literally falls out of the sky and the force of the two flaming vampires plunging down into the snow puts them at a depth at which they are out of direct sunlight and where they recover after a brief time. Do either of those ideas sound ridiculous? Well, they are. But, they fit the available scenarios based on how the pieces were placed in “Radioactive” and the rather troubling direction from Winant.

If you’re going to kill a character, do it. But don’t chicken out. Today’s audiences are too smart not to notice that the pile of blood and bones that marks the true death is absent from a scene when they are watching intently.

So . . . ridiculous suspensions of belief, poorly constructed villains and set-up, lousy character reinvention, “Radioactive” is a disappointment for the smart audience and almost enough to make one swear off the seventh season.

For other works in the True Blood franchise, please be sure to check out my reviews of:
True Blood - Season 1
True Blood All Together Now
True Blood - Season 2
True Blood - Season 3
True Blood - Season 4
True Blood Where Were You?

[For a much better value, check out True Blood Season 6 on Blu-Ray and DVD. The penultimate season is reviewed here! Check it out!]

4/10

For other television reviews, please check out my Television Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2013 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Plot Rules The Penultimate Episode Where “Life Matters!”

The Good: The plot progresses, A decent farewell to a dead character
The Bad: Nothing exceptional on the performance front, No real character development, Baffling plot discontinuities
The Basics: In the sixth season’s penultimate episode, “Life Matters,” Bill’s vision is more or less realized with consequences more absurd than incredible.


With any serialized television series that effectively employs foreshadowing as a plot technique or in working to develop serious, long, character arcs, there comes a time when the foreshadowing has to pay off. In the sixth season of True Blood, the show has been steadily building to what appears to be the death of several important characters in a white room in the Governor’s compound. Bill saw a vision of the untimely death of most of the credited vampires in “Who Are You, Really?” (reviewed here!) and viewers have been hanging on to see if that would be the last shot of the season or if the consequences of those (potential) deaths would be dealt with.

Rather smartly, the writers and producers of True Blood went with the latter option and with the penultimate episode, “Life Matters,” viewers get to witness Bill’s vision in real time. And “Life Matters” is pretty much worth it. That said, late in the episode, director Romeo Tirone makes some absolutely baffling choices with extras that gut the emotional resonance of the season’s big plot arc. Because this is a late-in-the-season episode, it is impossible to discuss “Life Matters” without revealing some key aspects of where “Dead Meat” (reviewed here!) left off. Consider that a spoiler alert.

Opening with Sookie and Bill arriving in the fairy realm to find Warlow largely exsanguinated byEric, Sookie vows to keep her word to Warlow and remains with him after launching Bill back into the real world. There, Bill finds himself arriving late to the jailbreak Eric has incited at the Governor’s compound. While Sookie attends Terry’s funeral, Eric frees the vampires in search of Pam, Willa, and the others Bill saw in the white room meeting the sun. Minutes behind him, Bill finds vampires tormenting back at their tormentors. When Eric finds Jason Stackhouse still alive in the female gen pop cell, he has a very different experience than he did after freeing the male gen pop (where he confirmed that the inmates of the camp have been infected with Hep V).

Guided by Jason, Eric finds his way to where his friends and progeny are being kept. Meanwhile, Sarah Newlin manages to escape the carnage (how? Every other vampire has been able to hear heartbeats and smell living humans!) and she runs outside to make Bill’s vision come to light. As the sun enters the white room, Eric and Bill’s paths converge and . . . the long-awaited event occurs in a slightly different way than previously visualized and with an anticlimax that has a casualty that is truly hard to give a damn about. Spliced in between the action at the Governor’s camp is Terry Bellefleur’s funeral, which is where Sookie and the rest of the main cast finds closure and spends their time.

“Life Matters” has some really odd discontinuities. Foremost among them is that Eric has come to care about vampirekind, yet releases a ton of infected vampires out into the facility. While it was night moments ago – Eric bit Adilyn at night to enter Warlow’s realm – but apparently lingered there the whole night? This makes no rational sense as if Eric truly wanted to save everyone, night time would be the best time to open the cages.

But, more importantly, “Life Matters” has a resolution that makes absolutely no sense. Eric frees a number of vampires who are infected with Hep-V when the humane thing would be to kill them. Eric has seen firsthand just how gruesome their deaths will be and given that no cure for the disease was found in the episode, there are a number of infected vampires who are about to die pretty horribly in the genera vampire population. But as baffling are the sheer number of vampires seen in the sun at the climax of the episode. Either they are infected with Hep-V, but Eric fed them anyway or . . . well, they couldn’t have fed on anyone else because those who did were seen doing so . . .

The scenes that focus on Terry’s funeral are good, though they allow Sookie to make even the tragedy of his death partly about her. The plotline is a fitting exit for Terry and the flashbacks are nice; even Sookie’s revelation of her telepathic nature is not trumped by her revealing that Terry was in love with Arlene from the moment he first saw her.

“Life Matters” stumbles a bit on the character front. Given Sookie’s assertions at her parents’ graves in the prior episode, it is no surprise she is willing to stay with the wounded Warlow and honor her word to him. Similarly, given how angry Eric was following the death of Nora, it is unsurprising that he would still have issues even after the Governor’s camp is essentially dismantled. Ironically, the character of Terry is fleshed out a bit more, but given that he is dead and not likely to return, it ends up being something of a wash. The surviving characters do not grow or develop in any truly significant ways.

“Life Matters” does live up to the promise of a casualty, though, but it is not one of the major characters and the death is not one likely to change any of the surviving ones (Jason Stackhouse, for example, could have begun a much more interesting potential arc had he become a killer in this episode). Like so much of the sixth season of True Blood, “Life Matters” got where it promised, but did nothing truly extraordinary in getting there or where it leaves the viewer.

[For a much better value, check out True Blood Season 6 on Blu-Ray and DVD. The penultimate season is reviewed here! Check it out!]

For other fantasy movies based on book series’, please visit my reviews of:
The Mortal Instruments: City Of Bones
The Twilight Saga
Beautiful Creatures
Warm Bodies

5/10

For other television reviews, please check out my Television Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2013 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Dividing The Camp Between Those Who Are “Dead Meat” And Those Who Might Survive!

The Good: Decent plot progression, Good character development, Moments of performance
The Bad: Still a little crowded at the expense of coherency.
The Basics: “Dead Meat” continues to progress the True Blood story, enhancing the supernatural plotline with some starkly realistic moments!


One of the consequences of creating heavily-serialized television is that episode by episode, a season might be weaker than the season as a whole. The current season of True Blood has been one of its most erratic, though it is not a bad season. It is, however, virtually impossible to discuss the episodes without revealing some of the details of prior episodes. By the time “Dead Meat” comes up, the show is hip deep in casualties and the season has been leading toward a vampire cataclysm foreseen by Bill in the first episode of the season. Following on the heels of “In The Evening” (reviewed here!), “Dead Meat” brings the viewer closer to the inevitable without leaving the viewer without reason to tune in the next week. In other words, the hand is not tipped yet.

That said, “Dead Meat” effectively moves the plot of True Blood forward and puts the characters where they need to be to either be slaughtered or survive. Given that, the episode smartly redirects the season from conspiracy theories and supernatural moments to present a surprisingly grounded and effective episode.

Following the death of his sister, Eric and Bill verbally duke it out over how Bill failed to save Nora. While Bill implores Eric to join him in trying to save the rest of the vampires still at the Governor’s camp, Eric goads Bill about his failure to bring Warlow to him to save Nora, ostensibly because Sookie was involved. Alcide, having been exposed as a liar, is forced to fight to keep control of the pack and save the life of Nicole. In the Governor’s camp, Jason finds himself as the property of an aggressive medieval Catholic vampire. Sookie rejoins Warlow in the fairy realm where she tries to negotiate with him to help Bill save her friends. Returning to the mortal world, Eric discovers that he can break the spell that has masked Warlow. Jessica and James are recaptured and returned to the general population, where Pam is brought in as well. When True Blood is distributed to the vampires, James saves Steve Newlin’s life.

Alcide decides pack life is not for him and returns Nicole and her mother to Sam. As Violet feeds on Jason, Willa, Pam, Tara, and Jessica work to get him free so they might feed. After Arlene learns the truth about Terry’s death, Adilyn reads her mind and realizes why he might have arranged to be killed. Seeing some of the prisoners are not drinking the TruBlood, Sarah milks Steve Newlin for information and begins rounding up the uninfected vampires in the white room! Back at Merlotte’s, Sookie finally reveals to Sam her fairy power.

“Dead Meat” finally advances the Sam and Alcide plotline in a productive manner. Alcide never seemed like a tool and finally he stands up to the pack and decides he doesn’t want their way of life and that is a refreshing, if predictable, character twist for him. Moreover, San sniffing Nicole when they reunite finally confirms what viewers have reasonably begun to suspect since she was bit; that True Blood is going to finally reveal how werewolves can be created in this universe. The quiet scene between Alcide and Sam as they share a drink is a delightful confirmation that the werewolves and shifters have more in common than divides them. The idea that Sam has gotten Nicole pregnant is an interesting one that foreshadows (if past episodes are any precedent) future potential tragedies.

“Dead Meat” features some of the best acting of the season. The scene between Stephen Moyer and Anna Paquin where they confront one another about Bill’s plan has the two exhibiting absolutely no chemistry. Paquin and Moyer, who are married and have had amazing on-screen chemistry in the past, play the scene as it ought to be played; with absolute loathing. By contrast, when Sookie returns to Merlott’s, Paquin and Trammell have decent chemistry. Paquin’s job in the scene has to add realistic conflict to Trammell’s Sam at a time when Sam is struggling to commit to Nicole. Trammell makes the scene work by appearing reasonably conflicted while still embodying love for Nicole.

Arguably one of the most impressive aspects of “Dead Meat” is the realistic aspect of it. Arlene, Holly, and Andy (with the Bellefleur’s) sit planning the funeral of Terry Bellefleur and the scene would be impressive in any series not affiliated with Alan Ball, who was one of the creators and execs of Six Feet Under (reviewed here!). Despite being familiar to Ball’s fans, the scene which eats up about five minutes of “Dead Meat” presents the realistic complications of surviving a death and it makes the characters of Andy and Arlene even more well-rounded. Amid fairies, werewolves, and vampires, the realistic scene reminds viewers that True Blood is intended to be a realistic drama with a few supernatural elements and it works for that.

That scene helps make Sookie’s subsequent scene, which has Anna Paquin delivering an emotional monologue to the graves of Sookie’s parents, feel realistic and deep instead of whiny and girlish. Paquin delivers a powerful and emotional performance opposite no one else and it reaffirms her talent.

“Dead Meat” affirms that Sarah Newlin is the true villain of the sixth season of True Blood and Anna Camp plays the role with gruesome ferocity. Camp transforms Sarah from a coldblooded, but meek tactician into a desperate zealot who is pushed over the edge. It is Camp who rises to the occasion of taking her character on a journey that is predictable, but the end product of years of hatred Sarah Newlin has embodied. The emotionless way Camp watches as Steve Newlin breaks down in the white room is enough to give enlightened viewers the shivers. Despite the fact that Steve Newlin is a spineless sycophant, as Sarah tortures him and shows no remorse or humanity, Camp accelerates the process by which Sarah becomes one of the most frightening villains True Blood has created and horrifies the viewer.

Ultimately, “Dead Meat” crams a lot of great moments into a short space and leaves the True Blood viewers wanting more!

[For a much better value, check out True Blood Season 6 on Blu-Ray and DVD. The penultimate season is reviewed here! Check it out!]

For other works with Joe Manganiello, please visit my reviews of:
What To Expect When You're Expecting
How I Met Your Mother - Season 2
Spider-man 3
Spider-man

8/10

For other television reviews, please check out my Television Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2013 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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