True Blood: There is Darkness in Us |
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| Written by April Yorke |
| Monday, 21 June 2010 20:21 |
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In last night's True Blood, "Beautifully Broken," several amazing things happened: the king of Mississippi rode a horse, someone finally made eyes at Lafayette, Godric was back, Sam met his parents, Bill killed Lorena, and Sookie invited Eric in. All that and sexy James Frain? Damn, show. There really is nothing like it on television. Bill's on a Horse The episode opens with Bill biting the ear clean off one of the werewolves, which immediately reverts to human form (so, in case of injury or death). It's down to Bill, dripping with blood, and one other wolf. Bill, I'll have you know, is keeping up his hot streak from "Bad Blood." Of course, some fox hunting dude shows up to interrupt our fun. Bill bows to his majesty, Russell Edgington (a delightfully dry Denis O'Hare), King of Mississippi. Turns out that those wolves abducted Bill on the King's behalf, and, while Bill's carrying on about state lines (still obsessed!), the King kills the wounded wolf with a silver bullet and leaves the other to ponder his fate before ordering Bill to get on the damn horse already. At the King's mansion, Bill gets to play sleepover in a room with silver doors before he hears the King's proposal over the most hilarious vampire dinner (chilled carbonated blood with a hint of citrus to start, blood bisque with rose petals, then a palate cleansing blood sorbet with mint, and Bill wears a tux). Seems the King wants to a) marry Queen Sophie-Anne to amalgamate their kingdoms and b) make Bill sheriff of Mississippi's Area 2. I wish I had this bit of dialogue to show you in full because there is so much information to parse here: Bill used to live in Mississippi; Bill moved to Bon Temps at the Queen's behest; though he is devoted to her now, his wooing of Sookie may not have been on the up-and-up; Bill is an up-and-coming young vampire (hee! I sometimes forget that Bill is young in vampire years); everyone in the show thinks Bill's obsession with state lines is as ridiculous as I do. Bill's not inclined to acquiesce to the King's request and even makes a show of fangs when the King suggests that they use Sookie to manipulate Bill. The whole thing goes awry when Lorena shows up (also in a riding outfit). She barely gets out a "I told you we'd meet again" before Bill whips a kerosene lamp at her retreating form. Lorena goes up in flames and hopefully stays dead forever. I love it! Bill is so badass this season. Hello, Jesus Lafayette breaks down the door to his bathroom and forces Tara to start spitting out the pills she was downing. Lettie Mae is, of course, shocked to learn that Tara would do such a thing, but Lafayette is done with this moron. He drags Tara off to the hospital, but she convinces him en route that such a trip would mean permanent residence in the loony bin if she tries to explain about zombies and maenads. Point taken, Lafayette takes her to . . . a loony bin. Tara's screaming about how she can't be committed against her will, she knows her rights (which, you certainly can be involuntarily committed, but it usually requires a hearing), but it turns out that they are there to see Lafayette's mom (Alfre Woodard), who wastes no time being homophobic and racist in addition to crazy. The orderly, Jesus, takes his sweet time giving Lafayette the eye. And it's about damn time! Whoo, get some, Lafayette! Anyway, Tara realizes that Lafayette is worried that she'll go crazy, too, because they both have darkness in them thanks to their crazy-ass moms. Tara is going to try to pull herself together, but she's still under Lafayette watch for now. Hello, Godric! It's everyone's favourite diminutive Celtic Eric-Maker! Sookie and Jessica bring the Operation Werewolf rune clue to Fangtasia. After Pam and Jessica go to the bathroom to "stare at [them]selves in the mirror" (I want to be Pam when I grow up), Eric explains to Sookie that Operation Werewolf is a lot older than the Nazis and epically more dangerous than she could imagine. She's pretty wigged for Bill and starts crying right in front of Eric (her love for Bill is making poor Eric feel disturbingly human), and she compares it to his love for Godric. Y'all know that that is a misstep. In any case, Eric warns Sookie that she sells herself short when she thinks of herself as only human. Also, thanks to the werewolves, he's really going to have to for serious this time look into Bill's disappearance, even as he points out that it would be better for Eric in myriad ways for Bill to stay gone. I suppose it goes without saying that Alexander Skarsgård is the best actor on this show, but he is killing me this season. The combination of his new-found love for Sookie and the consequences feeding his blood to highly strung out peeps Sookie and Lafayette is clearing starting to get to him, and Skarsgård now plays Eric with this edge of hysteria that is clearly bewildering to Eric. Anyway, all this talk about Nazis and werewolves throws Eric into a flashback, wherein Eric and Godric posed as SS officers (and I'm pretty sure Godric was wearing the uniform of a higher ranking officer) to try to infiltrate/take down Operation Werewolf. Lady Wolf offers information in exchange for blood, which Eric feeds her despite Godric's "blood is sacred" (echoing the Magister last week). They learn that the werewolf master is a vampire, but Lady Wolf tries to kill Eric, so Godric snaps her neck (just like when he saved Sookie last season). Eric is disappointed that they didn't get more information, but Godric assures him that they will find the vampire in charge. I have a feeling that they did, and said vampire is now the King of Mississippi. There's also some stuff in there with Godric telling Eric that vampires must learn to control their emotions, and I'm sure it's relevant, but really, show? If Eric hadn't figured that out in 900 years, would Godric still be trying to teach him that lesson? Man, they were really in love to have that kind of patience with each other. Anyway, more Godric flashbacks, please! Sam's Shape-shifting Family Sam's snoozing in his truck, but we're denied a window into another Bill-Sam sex dream by Tommy Meckins, who wakes Sam up with the business end of a shotgun. He prods Sam into the Meckins residence at gun point, screaming and hollering about the man who is stalking them. Sam and I are quick to point out that stalking and sleeping are not the same thing, but, more importantly, that Mrs. Meckins (for some reason I cannot seem to remember or figure out this woman's name) really ought to recognize him. Yup, she does. Turns out that Joe Lee was in prison when Momma Meckins had Sam, so she figured he would be better off with the Merlottes who were good people with more money than she. Also, since Joe Lee is human, she also figured there was a chance that Sam wasn't a shifter. Sam confirms that although not rich, the Merlottes were pretty good people for the first 15 years, but, you know, being abandoned twice takes its toll on a guy. Later, Sam tries to bond with Tommy over a car and then a run as dogs (Tommy's default shift is a pit bull), but it's all for naught when Tommy lures Sam into the road and shifts into a bird at the last second, leaving Sam to almost get run over by a truck. Little brat. "Mr. Northman, Would You Like To Come Into My House?" The sentence everyone in the audience wishes to utter comes from Sookie's lips late in the episode. She's sitting at home in the dark with the gun Terry gave her after one of the wolves shows up outside Merlotte's (Sookie still works there? And has scheduled shifts? Actually, aren't they still a waitress short since whoever isn't Arlene or Sookie keeps dying?) when Eric shows up on her porch. Sookie won't let Eric in, so they sit on the porch discussing the werewolves and how Eric is seriously worried for Sookie. She seems touched by his devotion but also warns him that she's still Bill's (engagement ring firmly in place). Eric points out that "'til death do us part" part of the wedding vows will really only apply to her, but he gets wind of some danger before he can press his point. Instead he presses Sookie into the wall and gets his game face on, so Sookie finally invites him in. Yup, there's a werewolf in there. Eric gets ready to attack, and Sookie shoots. Sexy James Frain Lafayette deposits Tara at the bar at Merlotte's to wait out his shift, and she serves a lovely English vampire (a never sexier James Frain) a cold bottle of B+ Tru Blood before heading out back with a huge bottle of Wild Turkey. Later, two drunken rednecks (one of whom was in Boyd's cult on Justified) throw around some racist language while pissing on the spot where Eggs was killed. Tara doesn't take kindly to that and picks a fight. It looks like it might go badly for her for half a moment before James Frain (did we catch his name?) steps in and holds the one in place while Tara beats on him most righteously. James Frain (both names!) pops fang, turned on by Tara's prodigious display. Too bad we know he might only be interested in Tara for her connection with Sookie since the same cowboy boots broke into Bill's place, rustled through his office, and found Bill's super creepy Sookie file, including a family tree with circled names and clippings from Sookie's childhood. It's the second clue of the night that Bill's wooing of Sookie was not on the up-and-up. Also, Earl Stackhouse's name was circled, making wonder if there was some truth to Grams' story of her husband's telepathy. In Other News:
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Comments (2)
How sweet
are all the men on True Blood, seriously? I mean, except for those rednecks, between Hoyt Fortenberry (aw!) and Jason "Santa?!" Stackhouse and Terry learning in anger management class that talking about your feelings is the manly thing to do? I might have to visit the deep south soon. |
| Last Updated on Tuesday, 22 June 2010 09:37 |
[Ed. note: Technical difficulties prevented this post from going up sooner.]
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