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True Blood, season one
Jun. 4th, 2009 07:04 amSo I watched the first season of True Blood, and to be honest? Not that great. In case you didn't know, it's about a telepathic waitress (yes, really) named Sookie Stackhouse (yes, really) who falls in love with a vampire, and their lives are complicated by this serial killer going around. Also, vampires have just "come out of the coffin" (and if you think that is too twee and hamfisted, just wait), so there's all kinds of racial tension.
The problem is that the serial killer is the focus of the first season and he's never that involving or interesting. Even when he Strikes Close To Home, he never seems as big a deal to Sookie as Lilly's killer was to Veronica Mars. And after all this build-up, it turns out he's just a serial killer. He doesn't even get a big monologue about why he's doing what he does. He just hates women. Not that compelling.
Of course, there's this much more compelling villain played by Lizzie Caplan, who fancies herself a humanitarian, sort of a limousine liberal supervillain who claims the moral high ground by dint of "having a minuscule carbon footprint." She's very fun to watch and has an interesting philosophy, so of course she's downplayed in favor of the serial killer who hates women. Very disappointing.
Another thing is that the show seems weirdly fascinated by Sookie's brother Jason, who is basically just this himbo. Homer Simpson with a six-pack, only Homer's funny and endearing. Jason has this arc about accepting vampires, but it never really goes anywhere, and even if it did, you probably wouldn't care... he's either a guy who's dumb as a box of hammers or he's a guy who accepts vampires who's dumb as a box of hammers. And the camera seems inordinately fascinated with his junk. Like, it'll always be juuuust above his junk or there'll be a sheet that juuuuust covers it. Okay, either show me or don't, I don't care either way, but I know what one looks like. Unless you're planning on revealing he's part Cthulu, there's just no need to plan a minigolf course around it or whatever.
What I did like was the storyline about the integration of the vampire and human societies. For example, there's an episode where the lead vampire Bill talks with a Civil War historical society because, you know, he was in the war. And that stuff is much more interesting than some serial killer.
The problem is that for all the Bryan Singeresque "look, the vampires are totally gay people!", you never really feel for them. Except for one or two of them, they're all a bunch of rapists and murderers, and there's even an episode where you meet the vampire leaders and they're all "oh, we're only going along with the humans for politics, we really think we're better than them and that we should be able to eat them whenever we want to." So it's hard to feel sorry about the humans persecuting them when they obviously have it coming.
As for the romance, not so much. The only reason Sookie is with Bill is because she can't hear his thoughts (and she can't date normal guys because she can hear how they wanna do her when they're on dates. Which, you know, if your problem with dating is that guys want to do you... you think she'd get used to it, all I'm saying), so it's less "meant to be" than "lack of options". Plus, there's this thing where he's out of town for five days and she's jumping on a new guy. I just don't see the point. It seems like a long way to go to say "look, she's losing her virginity and he's biting her, visual metaphor, ha!"
Also, it takes a really long time for Sookie to think to use her power to find the killer. Like, she's telepathic. How hard can it be? "Are you the killer?" No. "Are you the killer?" No. "Are you the killer?" Yes. Shit!
The problem is that the serial killer is the focus of the first season and he's never that involving or interesting. Even when he Strikes Close To Home, he never seems as big a deal to Sookie as Lilly's killer was to Veronica Mars. And after all this build-up, it turns out he's just a serial killer. He doesn't even get a big monologue about why he's doing what he does. He just hates women. Not that compelling.
Of course, there's this much more compelling villain played by Lizzie Caplan, who fancies herself a humanitarian, sort of a limousine liberal supervillain who claims the moral high ground by dint of "having a minuscule carbon footprint." She's very fun to watch and has an interesting philosophy, so of course she's downplayed in favor of the serial killer who hates women. Very disappointing.
Another thing is that the show seems weirdly fascinated by Sookie's brother Jason, who is basically just this himbo. Homer Simpson with a six-pack, only Homer's funny and endearing. Jason has this arc about accepting vampires, but it never really goes anywhere, and even if it did, you probably wouldn't care... he's either a guy who's dumb as a box of hammers or he's a guy who accepts vampires who's dumb as a box of hammers. And the camera seems inordinately fascinated with his junk. Like, it'll always be juuuust above his junk or there'll be a sheet that juuuuust covers it. Okay, either show me or don't, I don't care either way, but I know what one looks like. Unless you're planning on revealing he's part Cthulu, there's just no need to plan a minigolf course around it or whatever.
What I did like was the storyline about the integration of the vampire and human societies. For example, there's an episode where the lead vampire Bill talks with a Civil War historical society because, you know, he was in the war. And that stuff is much more interesting than some serial killer.
The problem is that for all the Bryan Singeresque "look, the vampires are totally gay people!", you never really feel for them. Except for one or two of them, they're all a bunch of rapists and murderers, and there's even an episode where you meet the vampire leaders and they're all "oh, we're only going along with the humans for politics, we really think we're better than them and that we should be able to eat them whenever we want to." So it's hard to feel sorry about the humans persecuting them when they obviously have it coming.
As for the romance, not so much. The only reason Sookie is with Bill is because she can't hear his thoughts (and she can't date normal guys because she can hear how they wanna do her when they're on dates. Which, you know, if your problem with dating is that guys want to do you... you think she'd get used to it, all I'm saying), so it's less "meant to be" than "lack of options". Plus, there's this thing where he's out of town for five days and she's jumping on a new guy. I just don't see the point. It seems like a long way to go to say "look, she's losing her virginity and he's biting her, visual metaphor, ha!"
Also, it takes a really long time for Sookie to think to use her power to find the killer. Like, she's telepathic. How hard can it be? "Are you the killer?" No. "Are you the killer?" No. "Are you the killer?" Yes. Shit!
