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Ball’s also not one to let his characters rest on their laurels, particularly Stephen Moyer’s Bill Compton, who at some point during his 173 years became a fan of Tuvan throat singing quite by accident when Moyer suggested that Bill should be worldly and adventurous in his cultural tastes. The result is a precious scene in which Sookie recoils from Bill’s music as a mother might squirm at the sound of thrash metal coming from her son’s bedroom. It’s these layers of experience that deepen our connection to each character as we find ourselves, perhaps surprisingly, relating to people we’d otherwise never cross paths with.

At the end of the day, though, Ball is here to entertain us. Responding to a statement he once made that True Blood is “popcorn for smart people,” he defends, “I’m not saying [the show] is shallow; I’m saying it’s really entertaining. Part of that entertainment is the emotional connection . . . [W]ithout that, the show couldn’t exist.” Music, film, food, sex. These are the social traditions that keep us connected to people over time as friends. Even when things get dark, as they often do in True Blood, everything about this world — from Merlotte’s Bar and Grill, to Gran’s kitchen, to Bill’s estate, to Lafayette’s living room, to Eric’s office at Fangtasia — is chockfull of personality, spirit, and lived-in history, the sort of stories and tchotchkes we’d want to poke through if we actually knew these characters. Ball makes us want to spend time with humans and demons alike; we get to know each one from a safe distance while letting them into our homes — onto our couches and into our beds — giving us a rise and a good scare.

Alan Ball models a tasty and refreshing bottle of Tru Blood at Comic-Con. (Eileen Rivera, www.BiteClubShow.com)

Anna Paquin (Sookie Stackhouse)

“I love my job, but this is an extra specially, amazingly personal job to me because I wanted it so bad, and worked so hard to be cast. There’s nothing I won’t do to make it better or more real.”

— Anna Paquin

“It’s beautiful to watch [Anna act] because she just channels her inner self out with such ease.”

— Sam Trammell

“Hey, you just shut your nasty mouth, mister! You might be a vampire, but when you talk to me, you will talk to me like the lady that I am!”

— Sookie Stackhouse

Anna Helene Paquin was born on July 24, 1982, in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, the youngest of three children. When she was four, her family moved back to her mother’s native New Zealand where she attended the Raphael House Rudolf Steiner School, taking up a number of artistic and athletic hobbies, including the viola, cello, piano, gymnastics, ballet, and swimming.

While most actors wait a lifetime for a role that will win them the Oscar, Paquin came to it early, and quite by accident. Paquin had no plans to pursue acting, but, in 1991, director Jane Campion placed an ad in a local newspaper looking to cast a young girl in her next feature film, The Piano. Paquin’s sister, Katya, decided to audition, and so Paquin tagged along, performing a monologue that so impressed Campion she chose Anna from among the 5,000 other candidates to portray Flora, the daughter of a mute pianist played by Holly Hunter. Campion would later recall, “It is rare to find someone so young with such an instinct for performance.” In 1994, at the tender age of 11, a memorably gobsmacked Paquin took to the podium to accept the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. Hunter won Best Actress, and Campion won for Best Original Screenplay, making The Piano one of the most awarded films of the year. Paquin went on to appear in Fly Away Home and Franco Zeffirelli’s Jane Eyre, amassing an impressive resumé for someone so young.

Following the divorce of her parents in 1995, Paquin, then 16, relocated with her mother to Los Angeles where she continued to act while completing her secondary education at Windward School. During those years, she had roles in such films as Amistad (1997), Hurlyburly