Truly, Madly, Deadly_ The Unofficial True Blood Companion - Becca Wilcott [54]
The flashback scene in which Bill visits his home one last time is extremely powerful. The magnetic pull Lorena has on him is palpable, and we’re reminded of Lafayette instructing Jason to take the vampire juice deep inside him. Lorena too is a pusher, hooking Bill in so that he can never be without her. When Lorena growls, “You are mine” as Bill feeds, we are reminded that, to Bill’s mind, he wasn’t claiming Sookie as his directly, he was only declaring it to others to protect her. In stark contrast to Sam, whose method of protection has only been to try to restrict Sookie’s thoughts or movements, Bill has always respected Sookie’s wishes.
As Bud and Andy interview Bill about the deaths of Maudette and Dawn, we can see his frustrations bubbling up. We know he has feelings about authorities. With Sookie possibly dating Sam and his family long behind him, Bill plays up his dark side, trying on for size what it feels like to be what everyone expects of him. Yet, after they leave, even the strength of a vampire cannot destroy the toaster iron he kept from Lorena’s cottage, as if to suggest that his eternal fate is as unyielding and permanent as the tie to his maker.
Stephen Moyer delivers a remarkable performance in the most subtly terrifying episode this season. And we get to see more of Jim Parrack as Hoyt Fortenberry who, in his late 20s, idolizes Bill like a young boy would Evil Knievel or a monster truck driver. He thinks Bill is cool and shows signs of being the first mortal other than Gran to sympathize with vampires.
The fireplace in Bill Compton’s home, where he spends many a pensive night reading and reflecting. (Jodi Ross, courtesy of The Vault www.trueblood-online.com)
Highlight: Terry [to Bill]: “They don’t understand, man. None of ’em will ever understand. You stay sharp, brother.”
Nightcap: In the scene where Nelsan Ellis prepares to fight the “AIDS burger” customer, he pulls off Lafayette’s clip-on earrings, a detail he says he carried over from his own childhood when his sisters would take off their earrings when they prepared for trouble.
Relationship Crypt Falls: Sam’s so uncomfortable in his own skin he doesn’t know how to perform in situations that call for the greatest sincerity, not explosive reactions showing worse impulse control than an excitable vampire. Sookie, for her own part, accepted an invitation from a man she doesn’t feel any passion for. In thinking with her head and not her heart, she may have crowded her own thoughts with so many excuses that she couldn’t see from the start that if things didn’t go well, Sam would lash out. And Jason, who finally sees Tara as a worthy companion, only does so through the filtered lens of V, the beer goggles of Bon Temps. Not a great night for lovers in True Blood.
Paging Dr. Creepy: You know when you’re shredding a carrot and it gets near the end and you chip a bit of your nail on the grater? That’s how I feel every time a vampire rips his wrist open, or, in this case, slits her own neck so that a dying mortal can feed. It’s never like the movies in which the person simply clamps his or her mouth over the open wound, barely slipping a drop. In True Blood, it’s like a molten lava chocolate fountain, their tongues darting around like a kid trying to catch snowflakes on the first day of winter.
Location, Location, Location: Crawdad’s Restaurant (where Sookie and Sam have their date) is actually a Mexican restaurant called Poncho’s Place, located in the small town of Piru, California, just blocks from the location used for the Descendants of the Glorious Dead meeting. That was filmed in a real church, the United Methodist Church, built in 1888 by Piru’s founder David C. Cook. The church contains a pipe organ built during the Civil War in 1862.
Encore: When Jason talks to Tara at Merlotte’s, we hear “Sparks