True Blood Season 5 "Everything Is At Stake" Promo

True Blood: Soul of Fire

I thought last night's episode wasn't bad, but it wasn't great either.  Just when we thought that all of the ties were wrapped up, Marnie invaded Layette's body. I guess with two more episodes still to go, it wouldn't do to have her so easily conquered.  So let's start at the beginning shall we?

When we last left off, Bill, Eric, Pam and Jessica had gathered in front of goddess emporium all dressed in black ready to finally kick some witch ass.  As they gear up to fire on the emporium, Jason jumps in front of them and tells them not to fire, which is met with a round of fucking Sookie from the vampires.  I found myself saying, finally and giggling out loud.  The writers have to know that Sookie's version of spunky agency is irritating at best; however, I didn't like the fact that Pam reduced her to a slit in a sun dress.  Just having the characters say fucking Sookie was enough, there was certainly no need to reduce her in this manner.

When Marnie demands a sacrifice to secure Sookies life, Pam disobeys both Bill and Eric and shoots off the RPG.  This  pisses Eric off, but Pam tells him that she is not worth his life.  I have to say that I agree with Pam.  I get that Sookie is fae, but is that really enough to have someone over a thousand years old happily give up his life for her?  I am tired of the men on this show fawning all over her.  At HBO in the inside the show section, the writers let us know that the rift between Eric and Pam will continue into the next season.  I simply do not understand Eric choosing Sookie over Pam.

Back inside, Marnie kills one of her captives, which allows Jesus and Laffyette the opportunity to drag  the body into the bathroom to plan a magical assault on Marnie.  While this is going on, Marnie looks into the blood and sees her own death.  She attempts to prevent this by having everyone form a circle. The complete circle causes the vamps to be drawn towards the force field ( couldn't they have spent some money on some kind of special effect? The scene itself looked ridiculous) but Sookie uses her mystical fae powers to bring an end to this.  Marnie rewards her by encircling her in fire.

True Blood: Burning Down the House

 

Last night was a bit of relief after last week.  I was actually beginning to wonder why I continued to watch this show. It was a relief that this episode had less obvious fail. 

Sookie was irritating as usual this week.  She stops Eric from killing Bill my a magical burst of fairy power but later tells him that she still loves Bill and never promised to his.  Okay, here we go again with the ongoing triangle.  I know I should be caught up in this, but the truth is I am just plain tired of it.  Perhaps, it's because Sookie gets on my last nerve.  

Bill gets into it with Nan because she is only concerned about she is going to spin what happened at the hotel rather than actively proactively to fight Antonia.  Finally, he decides to blow up the emporium.  I have mentioned previously that it makes absolutely no sense that the vampires have been so passive.  Antonia has the potential to be deadly but she is no king Russel and the vamps acted far more proactively when he was a threat. I have to say that I am with Bill on this one.

Speaking of Antonia, it turns out that Marnie is the one in control and is using Antonia's power to exact her revenge.  I find this to be very convoluted.  From almost the beginning of the season, we have repeatedly watched the replay of Antonia being savagely raped and then murdered by vampires to establish causation for actions and yet when it is revealed that Marnie is the one truly in control we are given no reason beyond the fact that she has hurt fee fees. Ummm really?  Don't we deserve a little bit better than that? 

True Blood: Nobody Leaves

 

Let's do something a little different this week.  Let's discuss last night episode by character/plot.  Last night's episode began with Alcide carrying Sookie away from the battle.  Sookie is taken from him by Bill.  Bill tries to give her his blood, while Alcide asks, "does she even have a pulse?"  Can we just say right now that there was no suspense to this. Of course the minute that Sookie wakes up she barely thanks Alcide and proceeds to make plans with Bill to get Eric. In the first sensible thing that Alcide has done in a long time he tells her that he is done and walks out of the house.  

Unfortunately for Alcide, Debbie is awake when he gets home.  She pretends to sleep but you can see the tension all over her.  (BTW, thank you Alan Ball for the naked shot of my fav werewolf)  As Alcide snuggles up to Debbie, her eyes go yellow.  It's clear to me that Alcide needs to just take his fine behind away from both Sookie and Debbie.  Could any man really be that slow to catch on?

Creepy Debbie shows up at Sookie's place the next day with flowers, claiming to want to help Sookie.  Right after telling Debbie that she cannot forget the fact that she tried to kill her, Sookie listens to her thoughts and decides to trust her. Obviously, Debbie would only think what she wanted Sookie to know.  So thelma and louise head off to Goddess Emporium, where Debbie rats her out immediately.  Tara holds a gun on Sookie, and tells her how stupid she is for showing up, but I guess the idea of some good ole fashioned spunky agency was too much for Sookie to avoid.  Tara tells Sookie where Bill is and Sookie charges Tara and escapes.  One would think she would have clued in then that Debbie is up to no good, but Sookie jumps into Debbies truck. It's also worth mentioning that she showed no concern for the fact that Tara was being held prisoner and so her main target to help as Bill. Why is Tara even friends with this woman?

True Blood: Cold Grey Light of Dawn

 

The very end of last night's episode left me screaming noooooo at my television.  Alan Ball, you sir are a supreme tease.  With Jason stopped by Bill's security will he manage to get away long enough to pull Jessica inside the house?  There are a lot of characters that I think are extraneous to the show but Jessica is certainly not one of them, though I could do without the Hoyt, Jason, Jessica love triangle.

Last night we got a lot of Eric and Sookie getting it on in various positions.  I wonder if Sookie has enough peas for her yahoo palace after that much shagging.  I don't know about you but the whole Eric mooning over Sookie thing has gotten old.  I love bad ass, take no prisoners Viking, and not the musty I don't want my memories back because you may not love me anymore Eric. Perhaps Sookie just brings the musty out in men.

When we last left Tara she was in the middle of a huge fight with Pam.  Fortunately for Tara, humans arrive and start taking pictures, causing Pam to leave.  After sending her girlfriend away Tara wonders along the road until she is stopped by Marni/Antonia and asked to join the coven.  As I watched Tara chanting in the circle I could not help but wonder if this is going to be her last season.  There have been rumors that someone big is going to die this season, and now that Tara has aligned herself in a real way against the vampires, I fear it might just be her.

True Blood: I Wish I Was The Moon

 

Spoilers Ahead

My nickname for last night's episode is rapepoloza.  In just under an hour Ball managed to use rape twice to advance the plot.  The first occurred in a flashback sequence of Luis feeding on the witch Antonia.  After his maker points out that she is not afraid of him, and that fear makes the blood sweeter, Luis viciously rapes Antonia.  The second occurs when Tommy manages to shift into Sam Merlott.  When Luna shows up at Sam's door, she bares her breasts and Tommy appearing to be Sam, has sex with her.  Luna thought that she was consenting to sex with Sam, not his brother Tommy, and that makes this scene rape by deception.  How many times is Ball going to use rape as a plot device this season?  It is bad enough that he has appropriated an event like the Spanish Inquisition and blamed it on vampires, instead of the Catholic Church, when so many women, Jews, and Muslims died, but the idea that rape can be simply used as a tool is horrific and belies the seriousness of the offense. 

 This episode Bill finally confronted Sookie about the fact that she was hiding Eric.  She rightfully told him off when he dared to bring up her deceit, saying "you have a hell of a nerve lecturing me about lying." What I did find interesting is that in the physical battle between Eric and Bill, clearly Eric came out on top because of his age.  This makes me wonder how it is that vampires so much older than Bill so easily come to heel at his command.  We saw this last season with Sophie-Ann and Eric.  It does not make sense that all of these weak vampires end up in the position of Kings and Queens. Sookie saved Bill's life by telling Eric to stop and letting him know that Bill was the king.  Bill of course took advantage of this and had Eric imprisoned and sentenced to the true death.  When Sookie suggested that he was only imprisoning Eric out of jealousy he answered saying, "believe it or not my entire existence does not revolve around what, or who, is between your legs."  I didn't expect Bill to release Eric but I knew when I saw the spike her certainly was not going to kill him.

In a holding cell together Pam tried desperately to reconnect with Eric, but he clearly wanted nothing to do with the vampire that he used to be.  I have begun to wonder if this new Eric, or should I say Eric sans his memories, is what Eric was like when he was human. Is it the vampire nature that brings out the killer instinct? 

True Blood - and why I can't get behind all this pro-GBL praise

 
Ok, I love True Blood. No, really. I watch it every week as soon as I can and never regret doing so (well hardly ever).

But I see so much jumping and squeeing about it being the bestest thing ever for all its GBL portrayals and I have to hmmm... because I'm not going there.

Oh, don't get me wrong, it's better than most. Where most programmes rarely have any of us portrayed at all – and if we do we have maybe 1 token, stereotyped insert. True Blood with Lafayette, Jesus, Pam, Tara, Naomi, Nan Flannigan, Russel Edgington, Talbot, Sophie-Ann and even Eddie had a whole stable full of GBL people. It's immense and really really rare outside of niche shows that are meant to distinctly target us.

So, why aren't I leaping for joy and backflipping over True Blood's GBL representations? Because quantity does not equal quality. Just having a GBL character – or having a gazillion GBL characters – doesn't make a show a wonderful font of equality. The quality of those portrayals matter – the stereotypes, the tropes upheld also matter. And there's such a lot problems with the portrayals that many of them annoy me, frustrate me and generally do not get shiny gold stars.

True Blood: Me And The Devil

 

Am I the only who thought that True Blood was absolutely awesome last night?  Okay, first let's start with Tommy committing parenticide.  I know that it was violent but honestly it really gave me a sense of relief.  I really, really, really, did not want to see Joe-Lee in those yellow drawers again.  The story line with Sam's parents was irrelevant last season, and I am so glad that it was nipped in the bud early in this season.  From this event, we also learned that Sam is a murderer twice over.  I am unsure of where this dark side is leading to, because Ball created a back story for Sam, that is completely the opposite of the books.

Arlene and Terry decide to have their home blessed to scare away the evil. I for one am sick of the sins of the father routine that they have been using with the baby.  I was also upset to see that the house was blessed with sage, because this is a direct appropriation from First Nations culture. When we consider the harm that Christianity has done to Native Americans, this appropriation was absolutely horrible.  If that were not enough, Arlene called Lettie Mae and her new husband, "you people."  When they asked what she meant, she answered that she was referring to their religion.  Their easy acceptance of Arlene's response made them look ridiculous.  I really think that Ball could have taken this scene so much further, but maybe this is a sign that at least in the case of Arlene, he intends to follow the books and have her involved in a religious anti-vampire cult he decided to let it go.  

There Tara sat on the couch pouring her heart out to Sookie, and yet in Sookie's basement Eric was asleep for the day.  I am so glad that Tara told Sookie off. With the exception of organizing Egg's funeral, what has Sookie ever done for Tara?  This is a one sided relationship if ever I saw one.  Instead of going after Tara, Sookie stayed to soothe Eric.  As much as I love my kick ass Nordic vampire, the truth of the matter is that he has done terrible things to Sookie and her friends.  When she said to him that she always saw good in Eric, I have to admit that I gagged.  It's amazing what one can convince oneself of when hormones are involved.  I will say that I appreciated the kiss between Sookie and Eric, as well as Eric's low hanging shorts.  You're a tease Allan Ball, a super tease.

True Blood: I'm Alive And On Fire

Last nights episode was much less painful to watch, though it started with Jason still being tied to the bed being gang raped.  As I listened to the people from Hot Shot refer to the men in their community as uncle daddy, and brother husband, I have to say that I was very upset.  I understand that the whole point behind wanting Jason was to interject fresh blood into their DNA, but I really feel that Ball's approach stigmatized these people in a way that Charlaine Harris did not.  Believe me, it absolutely pains me to praise Harris for anything after reading her Aurora Teagarden mysteries. Not only did Felton drug Jason and set him up to be gang raped, he sent in the young Becky to participate, proving that they are so backward, that they don't even care about the women of their community.  I want to watch True Blood, not a remake of Deliverance.

I thought that the flashback to the Spanish Inquisition was great.  I wonder how many viewing this realized that what they were watching, was essentially a re-enactment of a war on women.  I know that Ball is linking vampires to this witch's death, but we have yet to hear the whole story.  It is clear that Marlee is in way over her head.  She cannot control the spirit, she cannot force it to answer her, and when the spirit does appear, she cannot control what it does.

It was sweet to watch Eric play in the sun.  I also have to say, I don't understand why Ball couldn't have the camera drop just a few inches when Alcide was changing and when Eric was in the water. That is what I call a serious tease. When Sookie turns to Alcide and says, "stop making that noise," it cracked me up.  Watching Eric mourn the loss of daylight really gave me a sense of his loss. Though he is over 1000 years old, and has seen things that I could only dream about, to do that he had to give up simple pleasures like going for a swim on a hot summer day. I guess there is a cost for everything. Tenderness is something the old Eric would never have exhibited, and it is this vulnerability that is drawing Sookie in.  In some ways, she is still very much a sexual conquest to him, and in others, she is a mother figure.

True Blood: If You Love Me, Why Am I Dyin?

I just loved night's episode and it's going to be hard for me to write about it without coming off like a complete fanpoodle.  The opening scene where Sookie broke Eric's nose and he called her Snookie had me cracking up. For me, Skaarsgard made this entire episode.  The sweet vulnerability that he showed was absolutely magnificent and if I didn't have a huge crush on him before, it certainly would exist after last night. Aren't low cut hip hugging jeans a God/Goddess send? I am looking forward to an entire season of this new Eric. How could you not love the mischievous boy that he played?

Watching the relationship between Jessica and Bill was really very sweet and served to remind the viewer that Bill can care about someone beyond his special Sook-eh.  He has come a long way from the vampire who first tried to pawn Jessica off on Eric.  He took the time to give Jessica advice which he certainly did not follow in his relationship, which is to tell the truth.  Unfortunately for Hoyt, truth did not mean dealing with the consequences of the hurt.

Outside of my fanpoodling and sqweeing about how hot Eric is, I did catch the overarching theme in last nights episode - intimate partner violence.  Normally when we think of domestic violence, we think of it as a crime perpetrated by a man against a woman.  Even though women have been to known to be the perpetrators/aggressors, this is something that is rarely explored in the media.  It is further under reported, because the victim faces dealing with emasculinization from the people who are supposed to help him, and there are very limited resources in existence to deal with battered and abused men. It was an absolute violation of Hoyt's person to be glamored. He knew that Jessica was trying to do this to him and he closed his eyes and said to her, "don't you dare", but she went ahead and did this anyway. This was a selfish act born completely out of power.  Even though Jessica's facial expression indicated that she was disturbed by her action she still chose to violate Hoyt.

True Blood: You Smell Like Dinner

Last week, at the end of episode one, like many others, I did the mad dash to HBO to watch episode two, only to discover that it was and in fact still is, restricted to residents of the 50 states.  HBO has no problem accepting my subscriber fee that I pay every month, but somehow, I was not entitled, like every other fan, to get a sneak peek. Yeah, I am still bitter as hell over that one.  I had to spend the week carefully avoiding spoilers, because I didn't want last nights episode ruined for me.

Okay, rant off my chest, let's dig in shall we?  Last nights episode really made up for the crappy start last week.  I must admit that I was worried when I saw the terrible sci-fi effects in the first episode.  I am always the type that thinks when it comes to urban fantasy, more is better, and so I was really worried that we would be subjected to more cheap effects.  Here's the deal HBO, True Blood is making y'all a killing, and since you already got off way to cheap on the wolves, as far as I am concerned, you need to spend some money and do some actual special effects. (okay, so I lied, I had one more rant in me) Back on topic now.

There were several things going on this episode and rather than do a recap, I thought I would just talk about what I loved, what made no sense, and what I outright hated.  Pam once again stole the show for me, though she really did not have a huge part to play in the episode.  When she stopped Jessica from intervening in Hoyt's fight saying, "that technology has taken all of the fun out of being a vampire," because someone was recording made me laugh. My other favourite Pam line came when Sookie approached her to enlist her help in getting Eric to sell her back her home.  Pam looked dead pan at Sookie and said, "Did I miss something?  Are we girls now?  Did we join a book club and read some queer chick lit memoir and so now we're bonded together by estrogen, or sisterhood, or some other feminist drivel?"How can that possibly be beat?  Sookie's problem is that she is used to being able to bend people to her will and Pam is one of the few that consistently puts herself first, and no amount batting eyelashes will change that.  Only Pam could be that cool in the ugliest red dress under creation.

The other scene I liked also involved Sookie, except this time it included Jessica. After struggling to get together with Hoyt last season Jessica is quickly finding out domestic bliss is not everything she thought it might be.  Not only must Jessica adjust to her vampire nature, at 17 years old and coming from a Christian conservative family, Jessica has never had any freedom.  Hoyt may have seemed like a valid escape at first but now he is slowly becoming dead weight around her neck.  After he refuses to drink her blood to help him heal, she tells him that she is going to get him some Advil for the pain and instead heads straight to Fangtasia to hunt. After hearing Jessica drinking blood, Sookie being Sookie i.e. a woman that does not what is and is not her business decides to intervene.  After explaining to Sookie how much she hurts Bill, Jessica tells her, "stop acting like my step mom. I hated it before and I like it even less now. Just go away. This ain't got nothing to do with you. I can eat who I want."  And there you have it folks, twice in one night Sookie got told off and I loved it.  As much as love True Blood, Sookie is one of the least empathetic heroines I have come across in a long time.  Not even the talented Alan Ball, can undo the horror of Charlaine Harris.

Fangs for the Fantasy Podcast! - Episode 21

This week we talk about the return of TRUE BLOOD! AT LAAAAST

We also discuss Black Dust Mambo by Adrian Phoenix as well as swipes at Anita Blake and plans for next week when we will be reading Storm Front by Jim Butcher and Changeling by Yasmine Galenorn