True Blood - Farewell, Adieu, Auf Wiedersehen, Goodbye

Over the years, True Blood has been entertaining. It delivered tons of sex, violence, okay writing, a cast that, for the most part, was fun to watch and a sense of naughty, campy fun. However, the last few years demonstrated writer and actor fatigue. Stories became repetitive - Sookie in danger, Sookie rescued by Bill/Eric/Alcide, Sookie whines about being a freak/unable to love/a danger - and boring. Some of the actors - Alexander Skarsgård, Kristin Bauer van Straten, Ryan Kwanten, Deborah Ann Woll and Carrie Preston - still seemed to be having fun, even when their characters were badly mishandled (Jason in particular). Others, Anna Paquin and Stephen Moyer in particular, seem to have given up. Whether that is because they aren't good actors or because the writers failed to provide them with consistent motivation I'll leave up to the viewers. I will say that, in Paquin's case, it has more to do with the writing. After seven seasons, the writers never managed to make Sookie an interesting, compelling character. She whined a lot, got involved in sick situations (for example, the Warlow relationship) and had a character arc that seemed to consist of "me me me...wait...yep, me me me." By Season Seven, even the writers seemed to have realized this, as the voice of reason (Pam) is consistently and accurately critical of how self-centered Sookie is.

True Blood always had problems with creating interesting villains. Russell Edgington was the most interesting and that's because Denis O'Hare gave a great performance. Last season's Truman Burrell failed as a villain because a) he was too much of caricature and b) because he was basically right about the threat vampires represent. Earlier villains were just as bad, little more than plot-devices. And, the underlying theme - that vampires represent the LGTB community and that True Blood is about the importance of accepting the basic humanity of everyone - makes no sense because the vampires - even the "heroes" - are murderous, bloodthirsty monsters, most of whom see humans as either pets or prey. The analogy, therefore, completely collapses. And, with it the idea of a thematic center to the series. You can't really have heroes who murder dozens, even hundreds, of people, many innocent. There were people who were heroes (I think Sam and Alcide fall into this category) but the Central characters - Bill, Eric and Sookie - are self-centered, massively destructive and, in the case of Bill and Eric, responsible for the deaths of many, many people. You can have anti-heroes - Han Solo, for example, is a great example of someone who starts off with a self-centered, amoral worldview; but, by the end of Return of the Jedi he has changed in a believable way to someone who cares about others. This does not happen in True Blood. In the episode "Karma" Bill murders a lawyer, just because he doesn't like her decision not to help him with a legal matter. This is the act of a killer and villain; but Bill is supposed to be an honorable man (at least, when he isn't being a morose vampire god).

So, how was the last episode? First, by now, I don't care at all about Sookie and Bill. Terrible writing and bad acting have combined to create a complete lack of interest in their storyline. So, every second spent with the seems like a waste of screentime. Bill wants to die so Sookie can have kids? Fucking adopt. The problem with this is that Bill is a killer with faux-morals and Sookie is a self-centered child-woman. While this was okay in the first few seasons as the characters were developing, these remain their defining traits. The scenes with Pam and Eric are, as usual, delightful. I could easily watch a Pam and Eric show. The writers mostly know what to do with them and the actors care about their roles. Jessica and Hoyt's story...sigh...who cares. I like the Jessica character, and Woll as an actor, but that storyline seemed so rushed and Hoyt is such a weak, annoying character whose arc originally ended at an appropriate point, that their hooking back up means nothing. And the wedding; it would be hard to come up with a better way to show how vapid and lacking motivation your characters are. This episode demonstrated all of the worst traits of the show; random stuff happening, characters acting in ways that make no sense, even in the context of a trash-horror series, a few amusing scenes from the actors who are actually good and a lot of stuff that leads the viewer to scratch their heads and wonder how a show that started so strong collapsed so utterly.

Well, at least Bill died. A last minute deus ex Sookie would have made a bad episode (and season) even worse.

Oh, and what was the point of the creepy sister-brother sex talk, where Sookie all-but-tells Jason to have sex with a woman he just met? This is just abusive to the character. It's like the writers want her to seem like the most horrible, inappropriate person possible. Well, good job guys, you succeeded.

Ultimately, all the stylistic blood and sex in the world can't make up for incoherent character motivation, repetitive story lines and the lack of well-constructed plots. True Blood had its moments; but it burned out about 3 years ago.