Writer: Raelle Tucker
Grade: A+
The first scene in this episode was one I’d already seen in a spoiler clip. At the time, I thought it was another example of Sookie acting like a whiny twit, but in context, I was more sympathetic to her than to Bill. Getting out of the car in the middle of the night and stomping off into the woods in a snit was almost as dumb as taking Jessica to see her family, but Bill was being a dick, and she was trapped in the car with him—I’m not sure I wouldn’t have done the same, safety issues be damned.
It’s worth pointing out that Bill’s words about Jessica’s violent nature and lack of control are somewhat unreliable simply because Bill loathes his own vampire impulses, for the most part. He imagines the worst in her because he sees himself as a monster. It’s not just that he’s been a bad “daddy” to her by not sitting her down and calmly explaining some important points about her transformation, by bossing her around, by leaving her alone and unsupervised (all examples of shitty parenting), but more importantly, he’s teaching her to hate herself just as much as her own father did when she was alive. Jessica’s little sister has a “problem with hair” (probably referring to superstitious beliefs about redheads being touched by the Devil), whereas Jessica has a problem with fangs.
And of course, when Jessica has an opportunity to have her first wild vampire night out on the town, what does she do? She dolls herself up and goes to Merlotte’s to have a Tru Blood, meets a nice boy, and doesn’t eat him. And Hoyt does for her what Bill can’t—he accepts her, encourages her, tells her that she’s beautiful and natural and shouldn’t be ashamed of who and what she is. Hoyt may be a bit old for her in terms of age, but in terms of maturity and experience, I’m not squicked by them at all. He gave her exactly what she needed.
(In my personal opinion, Raelle Tucker was touched by a fucking goddess of some kind in writing this episode, because these particular layers and themes were set in place beautifully. I mean, certain aspects of any show can unintentionally take on a life of their own and have viewers making connections, but this is one of those cases where the layers seem intentional and carefully constructed by the writer, so kudos to her.)
I’m also happy to say that I found Sookie likable once again, for the most part. I was mildly annoyed by her rant that Bill better not have known about Lafayette or she’d never forgive him, because that was a little on the accusatory and ungrateful side considering everything that just went down. The thing is, though, this is a perfect example of where the show consistently fails with Sookie’s characterization. If you stop to think about it, her state of near-constant suspicion and her willingness to make accusations at Bill are caused by her telepathic powers. She’s always been able to yank unsavory secrets right out of people’s heads, but she can’t do that with Bill. That’s new for her, and it throws her off. Being able to read minds means she doesn’t have much practice at trying to figure out whether someone is lying to her, thus she’s not exactly subtle about trying to get the info she lacks.
The thing is, though, it took me three viewings to work all of that out. I’m still learning how to read Sookie, and I’m willing to put some effort in, but I don’t think it should take that much thought and effort to understand Sookie Stackhouse. The writers and directors need to find more ways to showcase her telepathy and emphasize how it affects her relationships with others. Simply allowing Sookie to talk about her own feelings every once in a while might help viewers keep these things in mind while watching. Or imagine if Sookie not only apologized to another character for one of her more unreasonable moments, but also gave something resembling an explanation for her behavior? As it is, I have to stop and think about a given scene for five minutes in order to work out whether Sookie is acting in a way that’s understandable or acting like a brat.
I really am enjoying her more this season than last season, though, so hopefully I won’t feel the need to make these useless rants about Sookie’s characterization for much longer.
Surprisingly, I was quite moved by Jason telling his story at the group meeting, and everything that followed. He acknowledged that Bill is good to Sookie and that Eddie was a “nice person.” He had the sense to reject Sarah’s argument that Eddie “wasn’t a person” and point out that “My Gran and my girlfriend were murdered by my best friend just ‘cause he had a problem with vampires. And he was a person.” Then he let Sarah talk him right back around into believing the FotS nonsense again, because he’s Jason Stackhouse. The Fellowship of the Sun is like Amy all over again. Jason’s gut instincts about right and wrong are usually correct, but he's been told that he's an idiot and a fuck up for most of his life, so he has no faith in himself. It's very easy for others to convince him that he’s wrong and that they're right and have his best interests in mind.
And yet, Sarah Newlin’s sincerity and pain and fervent prayer almost moved me to tears. As vile as most of what they’re preaching is, they have valid motivations behind it. There wasn’t a hint of satire in that entire sequence, and Anna Camp just plain nailed her performance.
The later dinner scene with the pudding jokes and Rev. Newlin’s “Hating evil is really loving good” was something entirely different, though. Rev. Newlin’s argument emphasized the fact that though both of the Newlins lost people they loved, they are scapegoating vampires because they need someone to blame for the missing people in their lives. There is absolutely no proof that vampires killed Sarah’s sister or had anything to do with the car crash that killed Steve Newlin’s parents and little sister. (Though if I recall correctly, Bill also didn’t give Sookie a straight answer about whether or not vamps were involved in that crash.)
I’m still not completely mesmerized by the Tara/Eggs/Maryann/Sam/whoever-the-fuck-else storyline, but at least Tara is being handled well in that she’s becoming suspicious early on, rather than being painfully oblivious for most of the season and giving viewers a reason to yell at the TV.
As for Eric, he completely owned this episode. He was equal parts dickish boss and daddy to Pam. He was unnecessarily kind to Bill. He flirted with both Lafayette and Sookie. And most importantly, he expertly manipulated the shit out of every single person he interacted with in this episode. Remember that “Poorly played” comment he aimed at Bill in the previous episode? Not a throwaway line. Eric knows how to play chess with real live people.
I found myself asking logical questions like: How did Ginger even know Lafayette’s name? More importantly, how did she know he was Sookie’s friend? Why did Eric leave Ginger there with Sookie, without glamoring her to forget about Lafayette, when he knows that Sookie can read minds? And hell, why didn’t he move Lafayette to a different location, for the same reason? The answer to all of those questions is: because Eric set Sookie up to find Lafayette, as a poster named Marquis Carabas pointed out on the TWoP boards.
Eric found a way to use Ginger, his dumbest employee, to his own advantage. He innocently told Ginger to make sure not to let Sookie find out that her friend Lafayette was in the basement, knowing damn well that poor Ginger was sure to fuck up and clue Sookie in. The point being that once Sookie found out, she’d be willing to bargain for Lafayette’s release. So not only did Eric manipulate Sookie into going to Dallas of her own free will, he also found a way to free Lafayette without diminishing his authority with Pam and Chow, and Sookie and Bill still think he’s a total badass. I thought I loved Eric before, but this expert manipulation just rocketed him to a whole new level of awesome.
There was also something odd going on with Eric’s eyes. They were heavily featured through close-ups, which I found to be a weird directorial choice. Initially, I assumed it was to emphasize the fact that Eric has emotions, period, which didn’t tell me anything about him that I hadn’t already figured out by the end of the Tribunal storyline last season. However, a TWoP poster named Tara Blue found out that Skarsgård was wearing special contacts, and that the intention of the close-ups was to indirectly clue viewers in to that fact that Eric is waking up from a long nap, in a sense. (Late edit: This info is a little questionable, but it's not doing any harm if it's not true, so I'll leave it.) There’s a new monster that he’s never heard of, Godric’s disappeared, Sookie and Bill are doing their schmoopy routine right under his nose, etc.
There were a few moments where I thought the close-ups worked particularly well. When Eric sees Sookie and Bill's blood-sharing intimacy, because it was noteworthy that he wasn't disgusted. Right after he snarls at her that he doesn't respond well to threats, because the man can ACT and you can literally see Eric's anger fade. And the final shot of him in the episode, when he and Sookie exchange looks, because he was damn near sparkling at her whilst also looking quite smug. That look packs quite a punch when you combine the idea that Eric's feeling more alive than he has for a while with the theory that Eric played Sookie for a sucker using Lafayette as bait.
Ultimately, though, I thought the close-ups were overused to the point where I noticed them and was pulled out of the show. And while I now realize how layered and significant that final look between Eric and Sookie was, I don’t think I ever would have put all of that together as a casual viewer. It took message board reading and passed-on info from (the supremely awesome) Alexander Skarsgård to get me all the way there. Of course, there are much worse things to go overboard with than showcasing the lovely eyes of a beautiful man. (And for all I know, casual viewers wouldn’t even have noticed the close-ups, let alone been pulled out of the show by them. I probably only noticed because Eric intrigues me in a way that has me savoring every little physical detail.)
Eric was also perfectly civil—almost kind, even—in offering Bill Longshadow’s coffin. He had no reason not to be, since he’d probably already come up with his sneaky plan and had every reason to believe it would work. Yet another reason to love the guy. It’s not that Eric is really a super nice guy and is tragically misunderstood. The point is that he’s not as evil as he seems, and he’s very rarely as evil as he could be.
I also loved the moment with Eric mesmerized by Sookie’s shredded back, fangs out and eyes wide. I found that reaction in Eric oddly innocent, part panting lion and part small child staring at cookies he knows he can’t eat. When Jessica’s fangs popped out with Hoyt later in the episode, my mind immediately went back to Eric gazing at Sookie’s back. Both were instinctual reactions rather than actions to be ashamed of.
I have to admit, I mostly hated the slap. On the one hand, it was funny and well-played by both actors—Sookie lost control for a moment and then looked like she might have peed herself when she realized what she’d done. On the other hand, Sookie slapping Eric felt like something out of one of the bad romance novels I read as a tween. Between that and the exchange where she says she loathes him, he says maybe she'll change her mind, she says she prefers cancer, etc., it was feeling a bit like cheeky foreshadowing for some lame human/vampire version of Pride and Prejudice.
Finally, I'm a little ambivalent about all the “who wants to hook up with who” stuff in this episode. Eric wants to do Sookie AND Bill AND Lafayette, but they all think he’s an asshole and kinda gross, plus Sookie and Bill are all into doing each other. Eggs wants to do any attractive female but especially Tara, and she thinks that’s gross. Hoyt and Jessica totally want to do each other, and that’s awesome. Both of the Newlins wanna do Jason, but he’s still in purity mode and mostly oblivious. Sam and Daphne are prolly gonna do it in the near future, but she’s almost a nonentity, so who the fuck knows how that’ll turn out. And damn near the whole town was in various stages of doin’ it at Maryann’s orgy party. I understand that it was an underlying theme of the episode, but by the time Sam and Daphne’s scene rolled around, I was like, “Gah, again?!”
On the whole, though, this was a richly textured episode that I thoroughly enjoyed.
-Assuming that Eric really did set up Ginger to reveal Lafayette to Sookie, I’m not too worried about Ginger’s fate. He'll probably have to go through the motions, but I don't think Eric's going to punish her too badly for doing exactly what he wanted. (And yes, she's in a sad state, but I think the fact that the poor woman is even still alive backs up Bill's defense of Eric to Sookie.)
-It was a nice touch that Jessica wanted to stay at Fangtasia with Bill and Sookie—she really likes Sookie and wanted to be in the loop. I can understand why Bill didn’t want her around, though, especially with Eric in the picture.
-Jessica has good taste in men, considering that she got all googly-eyed pretty much the moment she laid eyes on Hoyt!
-Terry telling off Sam was great. He had every right to be pissed, and Sam’s been acting like a douche this season anyway.
-Jason’s (probably improvised) bump on the head and cute little “ow” got the biggest smile out of me for this ep.
-It was refreshing to hear Sookie talk with Bill about how she used to feel about vampires and how those feelings have progressed through the events we've seen. Viewers need to be let into Sookie's head more often. We don't need Dawson's Creek levels of navel-gazing, but having Sookie express her feelings in detail once every third episode or so would probably be a great help to those viewers who struggle with understanding her character.
Quotes
-Hoyt: “You should try the chicken-fried steak, ‘cause it’s like a chicken and a steak got together and made a baby. A delicious. Crispy. Baby.”
-Steve Newlin: “Hating evil is really loving good.”
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