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True Blood: I Don't Wanna Know

Sam: "Bill asked me to look after you while he was away."
Sookie: "Did he ask you to do it buck naked?"

A vampire tribunal seems to be a cross between a kangaroo court and the Inquisition. It was a good thing Eric backed Bill's story. (Reluctantly).

Bill is the stereotypical self-loathing hero vampire of fiction, like Louis in Interview with the Vampire or Angel on Buffy. He's never made another vampire, probably because he's not happy being one himself. But it was poor Jessica the teenage church-goer who got the ultimate punishment, and she did nothing to deserve it. The Magister wouldn't let Bill glamour her, which was downright cruel. And since biting is so sexual on this show, Bill was sort of forced to rape Jessica in front of an audience. And they were all turned on by it. Fangs everywhere.

The Magister mentioned that Bill had "decreased our numbers at an important time in our history." I assume he meant coming out of the coffin. How many vampires are there?

Sam's reveal was quite funny and done so well that it didn't seem silly. I particularly liked how they showed the transformation. No prosthetics and long, drawn-out, gooey-looking morphing; just pop, he's a dog, and pop, he's a man again. Works for me.

We learned a lot about Sam. He was adopted, and his family just abandoned him when they found out he was a dog. (At least they didn't take him to the pound.) Sam said there were probably tens of thousands of shape shifters, including werewolves. That shape-shifting is hereditary. That he can do a bird, but "flyin's hard." That he needs an animal as an imprint, which is why his brother the dog is hanging around Merlotte's. Um. About that naked woman and the boar that Tara nearly hit with her car...

I'd be a lot more tired of the demon exorcism thing by now if I didn't like Tara so much. Every adult child of an alcoholic has poison oozing out of their pores, and shame on "Miss Jeanette" for making a fool of Tara. That scene where Tara was chasing Jeanette around the drug store and ripping off her wig was pretty funny. But this whole plot line was really sad, too. I'm glad it's over.

Eddie's demise was also sad. Eddie tried to manipulate Amy, and it seemed to work. Then he tried to manipulate Jason, and it seemed to work. And then it all backfired on him. What a mess. It occurred to me during this episode that most vampires see humans as cattle, and Amy was doing the same thing with Eddie. Except she's an organic vegan. Right.

The murder plot is thickening. Andy Bellefleur is sure it's Sam, but we certainly know for sure now that it wasn't him since he just rescued Sookie. Terry Bellefleur practically has a sign on him saying he's the murderer. And there was a scene where Jason told a couple of people that he met Amy at Fangtasia, and that just jumped out at me. If Amy is the next victim (and frankly, I hope she is) we may have narrowed down the murderer pool.

The murderer was definitely at Rene's and Arlene's engagement party. Sookie probably should have been listening in as much as she could. Her "gift" doesn't seem so out of control these days; we're not getting that muddle of mental voices that Sookie was hearing at the start of the series. Have we just accepted that she's more successful at shutting them out at times? Or is it inconvenient to the plot just now?

We have vampires and shapeshifters now, and Sam said there was a lot more out there. Humans usually don't have the ability to read minds. Not that I know of, anyway. What is Sookie, anyway? Is she human?

Bits and pieces:

-- Eric has a last name: Northman. Or maybe it's a description. And he now thinks Sookie is a valuable commodity.

-- The vampire "Magister" was played by Zeljko Ivanek, who was a recent guest star on Heroes. I liked his character a lot better here. Much scarier. I could really believe he misses the Inquisition.

-- The naked scary-looking woman with the boar was played by Michelle Forbes of Star Trek and Battlestar Galactica fame. I'm assuming she didn't just stop by to do a brief nude scene, and we're going to see more of her. Pun intended.

-- The vampire who made you is apparently called your maker, not your sire. At least it's a non-sexist term.

-- The penalty for stealing another vampire's human pet is defanging. That actually gave Bill claiming Sookie as "his" some teeth, pun intended. He really was protecting her as best he could.

-- Why are werewolves so nasty if Sam is so nice?

-- Shapeshifters haven't "come out" yet. Would you say they were still in the doghouse, then?

Quotes:

Sam: "I'm not the killer. I swear. I'm a shapeshifter."
Sookie: "Shut the fuck up!"
I thought this was particularly funny because Sookie never swears.

Sookie: "Werewolves exist, too? What else is there?"
Sam: "More than you can imagine."

Sookie: "Life is just getting too weird too fast." You think?

Another good episode. Two to go! I'm going to make it before the premiere of season two!

Billie
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Billie Doux loves good television and spends way too much time writing about it.

10 comments:

  1. Hi Billie,

    something I've wondered about for a while: when you speculate about plot points (like who's next in this one), is it because the plot in the books is substantially different, or do you just fake it to provide us with the full mystery entertainment value?

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  2. That's a good question. This first season hasn't been exactly like the first book, and I've been limiting my own speculation to stuff that I honestly don't know. The character of Amy isn't in the books, by the way.

    When I saw the first season and realized after a few episodes (four, I think) that I was going to have to review it, I started taking notes of my initial reactions during each episode. So I guess that means I don't "fake it"; I talk about what hit me the first time I saw the episode, whether I turned out to be wrong or not.

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  3. Really good. The tribunal scenes were pretty creepy and I felt sorry for Bill. Also, the reveal of Sam was pretty damn funny.

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  4. I agree that the murderer was at the party. I'll tell you what jumped out at me -- Arlene talking about how good Rene is to her and her kids. What makes me more convinced is the thick accent -- and how it seemed to slip a bit when Jason attacked him under the tree.

    Of course, I could just be looking too hard.

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  5. I just googled something and this was the SECOND RESULT!!!! Then I got all excited and had to come over here to tell you all about it.

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  6. "tara true blood adult child of an alcoholic." Told you it was random. I was looking for which episode that quote came from. Which wasn't this one but you had the line in there about Tara. :)

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  7. Google puts us near the top of the search result for anything, and it makes me happy. :)

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  8. Ladies and gents, I rest my case :

    "Billie Doux | TV Reviews and Articles

    www.billiedoux.com/‎

    Billie Doux and her guest writers review the best of television and the occasional book or movie."

    ohhhh, this one is cute :

    "Billie Doux reviews the TV series 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' while wearing stylish yet affordable boots."

    About 175 000 results in 0.22 seconds. So 175 000 times : "hey ! you guts (and galls) rock !"

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  9. guts ??!!?? Chris, were you paying attention ? I meant guys. Duh !

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