True Blood/Headscratchers

WARNING: MANY MANY SPOILERS FOLLOW
Book and show.


 * Spoiler alert! Okay, so in the season 3 finale of True Blood Bill really wants to kill Eric. So, what does he do? He throws him into a hole. He puts a pair of handcuffs on Eric's wrists and throws him into a hole...a hole that even a human can escape from.....WHAT?!?! NO! BILL! Don't just leave! You do realize that Eric is a fucking vampire, right?! He can climb out in like 0.00001 seconds! Hell, he can FLY out if he wants to!!! ARE YOU AN IDIOT?!
 * The simple answer is Eric couldn't escape since the silver handcuffs immobilized him and prevented the use of any of his powers. He didn't escape on his own, he escaped by calling Pam, hence why she was complaining about getting cement out of her hair later on. Basically, it would have worked if Reuben the assassin had been able to kill Pam before she could save Eric.
 * But that doesn't make sense! If silver immobilizes vampires instead of just harming them then how was Bill able to hold them in the first place? He wasn't wearing gloves or anything. It just seems like an Ass Pull.
 * Bill was able to hold on to them because two scenes earlier he specifically grabbed the latex gloves (he also used Cooter's glove in the first episode of season three to escape from the werewolves). So no, it's not really an Ass Pull as much as it is Bill knowing what he was doing. He clearly has a darker side to him that we might not always see, but we do know that he can be cold and calculating when he needs to be.
 * Why did the vampires "come out of the coffin" anyway? Ooh, I want property. That's no good reason to give up anonymity and free food. Not to mention they had all the rights they're now lobbying for before, when everyone thought they were just pale-skinned humans.
 * Because, in the modern world, hiding the fact that you don't age,live entirely off of human blood and can only go out at night would be nearly impossible, at least not without constantly moving and changeing your name and making sure that no one ever took a picture of you and eliminating any paper trail that any of your legal or financial transactions might leave and not forming any connections to any of the people around you (so they wouldn't look for you after you dissapeared) and finding a way to make money that wouldn't require you to actually hold down a job or have interactions with other people on too regular of a basis and making sure that you don't have any noticeable affect on the world around you. Really, living as a vampire while concealing the fact that you're a vampire would only be easy for someone who was incredibly wealthy before becoming a vampire and was somehow able to maintain that wealth for the rest of eternity, otherwise your only option would be to live as a friendless, unemployed nomad and never be anything more than a passive observer of the world around you. The Vampires Are Rich trope exists for a reason.
 * Yeah. All they had to do was change their social security number every 60 yrs, and they could be part of society just fine. What hiding are we talking about. Besides, if they want to be excepted they can't act like lawless savages. Maybe that kind of action works with the kind of cops they have in Bon Temps. But I'll tell you what, if they were in Boston every vampire in that series would be in jail. Bill for killing Sookie's Uncle and that couple that tried to drain him, Eric for killing those people who attacked the coven which attacked the bar. If people that had to do with vampires disappeared most cops around here would know it was probably them. They would find evidence or plant it. Either way. And if a person got a job in a vampire owned bar and suddenly started being forgetful and acting odd, their friends would alert the police, who would get a doctor to do a cat scan and Fangtasia would have so many law suits they couldn't handle it. And if people that sued them ended up disappeared or just affected mentally then I think the Feds would be brught in. In any case, their activities would certainly be looked at as much as any business like that. Not less. No normal cop would be like "Their just doing their own thing. Lets not jump to conclusions... lalala". When bad things occur it is a cops job to jump to conclusions. What would the guys from CSI say?
 * Why does no law enforcement agency seem to be interested in what vampires do? No one talks about the fact that they totally have their own government and follow their own laws, not ours! When the Mafia did that, they were exposed and sent to jail. Instead of screaming about "They are sinners and spawn of Satan" You'd think a more moderate group would have come up objecting to the fatc that they kill humans if they break vampire laws, like drinking V. Which human law probably punishes with a hundred dollar fine.
 * Also, why do the vampires scream and holler about humans treating them badly, while the vampire hierarchy is such that older vampires can pretty much do whatever they want to the younger ones. And if the sheriff of your territory wants you to bark like a dog and give him your house for a week you do it, no questions. If vampires are such whinny PC modernists, you would think they would take care of the unfairness among themselves first.
 * It's not really that confusing, if you are a memeber of a particulat institution you don't have a problem taking orders from those who rank above you in that institution because you believe that their authority over you is legitimate and necessary to preserve the structure of the institution and ensure its proper functioning, but you wouldn't want someone from a separate institution to come over and start bossing you around, because their authority is not the authority that you recognize. It's a lot like how the people of India did not like being subjugated by the British, but most of them had no problem with the social restricitons imposed by the Hindu Caste System. People tend to be less bothered by opression that comes from within (that is familiar) and is based on a set of principles and morals in which they genuinely believe, than they are by opression that comes from an external source (is foreign) and is based on the morals and beliefs of a society to which they do not belong.
 * It's also implied that there is an older social structure (that is based solely one age, which gives older vampires authority over younger ones) existed before the "Authority" (which is only a few hundred years old) and is more accepted (especially by older vampires) than the Feudal structure created by the "Authority," that's why Russell Edgington has a problem with the aforementioned social structure, because it doesn't make sense to him and is not the one that vampires had traditionally adhered to.
 * Fridge Brilliance: It's much easier to envoke humans' sympathies, not only because vampires in general seem pretty lacking in compassion, but also because there are more humans and easier to reach a large audience through human-controlled media. Go to the vampire higher-ups ans complain that they're treating you unfairly -- at best they won't care, at worst they get insulted and punish you for insolence. But go on TV and complain about how humans treat you unfairly, and the humans might actually listen.
 * And the show needs to decide weather the vampires are indeed decent people who you do not have to fear more then an average human, in which case it makes sense to treat them like fellow citizens, or if they are indeed dangerous and willing to mess around with peoples minds and memories and even kill people themselves rather then turning them in to the legally elected law like a good human would do. But the show shows the vampires to be dangerous monsters, who kill humans for breaking vampire laws, and keep people as pets, and even kill humans if it is very convenient, not to mention messes with human minds if a vampire secret is revealed. But then expects us to think that only a lunatic would treat the idea of equal citizenship for vampires as a bad idea. Sorry, but either they are dangerous, and need to be kept away from society, or they are not more dangerous then a human and should be included. How is they are more dangerous but should be included work? Not well.
 * In the show the point is repeatedly stresses that there is just as much variation among vampires as there is among humans, so they range from harmless to extremely dangerous (just like humans.) We're shown more of the dangerous ones because the show deals heavily with vampire politics, which is shown to be just as murky and corrupt as human politics and, really, the show would be very boring if it only ever showed harmless vampires leading uneventful lives and not bothering anyone (though it is adequately indicated that vampires are perfectly capable of doing so and many of them do, those ones just aren't shown much because they're not as entertaining.) Plus, since the show is meant to be in a (semi) realistic setting and makes liberal use of social allegory and symbolism, having an entire group of people who are all evil by their very nature would have serious Unfortunate Implications (i.e. seeming to condone racism.)
 * Maybe it's a mix of both? just like real life.
 * Except that there are pretty much no "nice" vampires, at least from a human perspective. By the end of Season 4 every single vampire on the show has bitten, glamored or raped somebody at some point and just generally proven themselves to be corrupt. One could make the argument that they can't really control themselves which doesn't change the fact that people are very justified in their fear, yet the show makes them look like a parody of right-wing heteronormative crusaders.
 * In the books, they came out because the were just sick of hiding, and True Blood gave them the perfect excuse. (Bloodsuckers exist, but now we don't have to eat you because of the artificial stuff). That humanity was stupid enough to buy the "It's a virus" excuse was a bonus.
 * It would also sound likely that the modern technology and organized society would make it increasingly difficult for the vampires to hide, and they didn't want to end up as blood-drinking hobos or actively searched fugitives.
 * Again it is still bad writing, because if there are other reasons that vampires needed to come out, like the government was going to start taking peoples temperature before giving them passports or something, we, the audience, the only ones who will ever hear this story are not made aware of them. All we are told is that they were sick of hiding. That's true in the books as well. They are sick of having to operate in the dark, whatever that means is the only reason they came out according to this story.
 * I don't think it's bad writing as much as it's not important. The whole premise of the show (and presumably book) is "let's say vampires exist and are a out of the coffin. How would that turn out ?". Ultimately, the reason they came out in the first place is irrelevant. They did. Now what ? That's the interesting part.
 * Profit would have been a good motivator, and a believable one. Whoever invented True Blood would make a fortune selling it. No competition, plus the added pressure that people KNOW you are a vampire now, so killing humans * should* be more difficult... thus making your need for the blood substitute greater. Anyway it makes more sense to this troper than "they were just tired of the masquerade."
 * It turns out it's all par of a plan by The Authority..


 * I want to know how Sookie goes from being so prim that she is a virgin who won't let her co workers swear to grinding her hips into Bill one show, and kissing Sam on the next show, to being attracted to Eric possibly within a years time? No one goes from a shy virgin to having more than one lover a year. No way.
 * I did. Sometimes it just takes one to get you jump started.
 * Read the Anita Blake series... it's waaaay worse there.
 * (1) she's not a virgin by choice, she just can't close the deal with human men because she can hear all their thoughts, which takes her out of the mood; (2) the show is pretty subtle about when the characters are high on vamp and/or fae blood, but it's pretty consistent.


 * "You have killed another vampire, which is a horrible crime among us. Hmmm.... You know what would be worse than being locked in a coffin with silver while you slowly go insane? Being forced to suck on a pretty teenaged redhead in order to turn her into a vampire, which she herself will greatly prefer to her human life. Yep, that'll be a horrible punishment, all right."
 * Because at that point in the story Bill was still doing the whole "being a vampire is a terrible curse that I wouldn't wish on anyone" tortured-vampire thing.I'm glad he seems to have gotten over that in season 4.
 * They had no way of knowing she'd enjoy better than her human life. She was crying and begging that they let her go. Bill pretty much loves humans taking away the life of an innocent human child, and forcing them into a vampire life, which is a Fate Worse Than Death in Bill's eyes, was a pretty horrible punishment for him.
 * They were not trying to punish her. And they do think being a vampire is a gift. They all say so. So in their eyes they were asking Bill to give the teenager a gift. I agree. Thats nonsense. Even if Bill did do a silly "Oh no, anything but biting the pretty girl" routine. That just made it more silly.
 * I always took it as failed gambit of sorts. The sheriff seemed intrigued by Sookie's ability, and while not wanting to jeopardize that situation still needs to punish Bill. It seems that the Vampire society makes the sire of a new vampire responsible for their progeny. And they were probably thinking Sookie would react poorly when she found out about it, further punishing Bill.
 * Very doubtful. First of all, having some girl slightly mad at you is NOT in any way worse then being driven painfully insane in isolation. Not even close. Second, the only person that was aware of the personal dilemma was Eric and he had no say in the punishment, and the Magister didn't know much about the personalities of any of those involved. All he was told by Eric was that Bill protected this human. He had no idea why. Only that Longshadow was stealing from Eric and that was bad. He couldn't know if Sookie would even be mad if Bill had other girls. Its pretty obvious that in vampire society the kept humans don't get much of a vote. He had no clue that Sookie is psychic, so he would figure Bill could whammy her into liking anything. Now Eric was happy with the punishment, but he had no influence over what it was.
 * I think Bill explained it, it's not much of a punishment, but they knew it would fuck with his mind cause he wants to mainstream, and this was an innocent girl. But yeah, Bill said that since he killed one, he had to create a new vampire.
 * Yeah, Bill explained that it wasn't much of a punishment, exactly, that it was just something that would bother him and needed to be done anyway. What Bill did not explain is why after saying he commited a terrible vampire crime he was being given this lenient punishment. Especially when the Magister says "I could put you in a silver wrapped coffin... but I want to do something even worse!..." and then gives him the non punishment.
 * If they needed a new vampire and wanted to punish Bill, they could have put Bill into a coffin for fifteen years, which is amore fitting punishment(come on, some dude bit a human that belonged to another and they tore out his fangs. They said killing a vampire was like an awful crime, and humans were not even important enough to be mentioned!!), and some other vampire would be very happy to bite the cute redhead.
 * I think we are missing the point! Bill committed one of the worst crimes of vampire kind, even with, to a vampire, slightly mitigating circumstances like saving a human. They first consider putting him in silver and letting him rot. Then change it to force him into siring a beautiful woman, which would bother his conscience. Surely inexplicably kinder! If there are reasons that can be invented for why they did it, it is still bad writing, because we, the audience and the only ones who will know this story were not made aware of any.
 * They didn't say the punishment was worse. The Magister's actual words were: "I'm feeling a bit... creative." Given that Eric, Bill's sheriff, had effectively put in a plea for mitigation (to the tune of: he's obedient when it counts... and yeah, Longshadow kind of deserved it) -- they were clearly going for the soft option.
 * Right. The normal punishment for an unprovoked murder is a silver coffin. The Magister agreed there were mitigating circumstances (Longshadow was stealing from Eric and Bill acted in defense of his "property") so he agreed to be lenient and force Bill to do a kind of "community service" by replenishing their numbers and saddling him with the responsibility of a newborn.
 * To sum up: In Vampire society, stealing from another vampire is frowned upon and stealing from your Sheriff is punishable by death. Longshadow did both. It’s implied that Bill wasn't really punished for killing Longshadow because Eric could have killed him for "attacking his wealth" anyway. Bill was, however, responsible for creating a new vampire in Eric's territory to replace the one that was lost.
 * If Maryann is such a huge threat, why doesn't Sam tell Tara the truth about her? We know he doesn't want her to out him as a shapeshifter, but if Maryann is really this evil monster they're making her out to be, you'd think he'd be more concerned about letting Tara know what she really is than about keeping his little secret.
 * Does Sam even know what Maryann is? As far as i know, he's just being skittish. He got a bad feeling about the woman when he was 17 (and rightly so), he still has a bad feeling about the woman (and rightly so), but he DID steal $100k+ from her, and only knows her from the (hour, two hours?) he spent in her house stealing things and sexing her up. What exactly is he supposed to say to Tara?
 * He may not have known exactly what she was (at least, not until recently when Daphne told him about her true nature) but he still knows she has secret motives and dangerous supernatural powers. He could tell her that, instead of just vaguely telling Tara that she's shady. It also could've helped if he told Tara about the ritual Maryann held at Sookie's house, since Tara's memory was obviously wiped of the event.
 * What on earth possessed Bill to tell a random store clerk that he has a "daughter" named Jessica, and that by the way, he's a vampire, right when TV is filled with transmissions about a missing girl named Jessica? He's spent over a hundred years keeping himself out of trouble, for crying out loud! This troper hasn't watched far enough to know if there's any consequences to this, but if there isn't, then there damn well should be.
 * The store clerk was probably smart enough to know that there was more than one "Jessica" in the world. She'd just assume it was a coincidence.
 * It's still pretty big coincidence, and people have been questioned by the police for less.
 * No, they haven't, I don't recall a single incident in which a child was kidnapped and everyone who mentioned the name of the kidnapped child in a public place was then rounded up by the police. They don't suspect people just for having children with the same names as kidnapped children, that would be a HUGE waste of time and resources, and since this woman doesn't know Bill (and so wouldn't know that he doesn't actually have a daughter) she would have no reason to think it's suspicious that he has a child named Jessica... that's not even an unusual name.
 * It'd be easy enough to glamour her into forgetting. And she obviously doesn't think much of it.
 * Why did they have to go and make Maryann an Anvilicious example of paganism Gone Horribly Wrong? I mean, sure, she's unlikeably evil, but they could have at least downplayed her religion having anything to do with that since, you know, this is 2009 and most people realize now that sex is not evil. Since this troper shares so many of Maryann's beliefs, it, well, Just Bugs Me.
 * It's not the sex that's the evil part of her religion, it's the fact that she embraces complete madness and believes in acting on instinct instead of rational thought, e.g. cutting people's hearts out, controlling their minds and emotions and ripping wild animals apart with her bare hands.
 * You know, exactly like the mythological Maenads...
 * Yeah, just like them except about a million differences. Maeneds were human handmaidens of Pan. They did go nuts and tear people up, but they didn't have claws, nor god like powers themselves.
 * The point the other troper was trying to make is that mythological maenads performed the same "evil" practices as Maryann (killing and rending people and animals, devouring human flesh, etc.), not that Maryann herself was an accurate depiction of mythological maenads. Besides, maybe in this series, the maenads made up similar falsehoods about themselves as the vampires did and weren't really human after all. When Daphne explained what maenads were according to the Greeks, she added "but they're really a lot more than that."
 * Yeah, just like them. More than one person was torn apart and devoured by the maenads in some of the darker, pre-Hellenic myths.
 * More nitpicking; why didn't Maryann just sacrifice Sam earlier? Perhaps when she first came to the bar? She could have controlled everyone's minds right then and he would've been an easy target. Why did she wait until now to give Bacchus his offering? Also, why doesn't Sam make more use of his powers? He could have easily escaped the mob without Jason or Andy's help if he'd just stayed in the form of a fly.
 * We don't know what Maryann wants with Sam or with Tara. I think we need to see where that goes. perhaps her plans changed regarding sam, she could have killed him when she knew him before so presumably she wanted to let him live. He needs a model to turn. So he would need to find a fly. Besides, I don't think he can turn into a fly. A bird, sure, but he probably needs to stay within some bounds like warm blooded things.
 * He turned into a fly last episode and this week's episode. And I think he only needs a model when he changes into a particular animal for the first time, because he's transformed into a dog several times when the real dog wasn't even around.
 * He was probably holding out on transforming because he didn't want to out himself. He finally did it though once it was either outing himself or dying. As for Maryann, she probably didn't have that much power yet. Notice how her orgies got progressively larger and more out of control. First it was just making everybody in the bar dance, then the people at the party were getting kind of wild, but were still somewhat lucid. And now she can instantly take control of them at a simple whim. She didn't mind control the whole bar back then simply because she couldn't.
 * How is it everyone in Bon Temps could dismiss the effects of Maryann's influence when the entire freaking town was in a state of disrepair? I mean it's one thing if they had only acted weird, but it would be pretty hard to just ignore "FUCK AUTHORITY" scrawled across an entire wall of the police station.
 * The way Tara acted in "Frenzy" really bothers me. I know she loves Eggs, but realistically speaking, would she actually resort to emotional manipulation to get her mother to hold her closest childhood friend and her own cousin at gunpoint just to save someone she knew for a few weeks at most? That seemed to cross the line five times over.
 * Being stuck in the mind control mode was a horrible experience, and she did what she had to do to save the person she loves. If anything, it was Lettie Mae who was acting unrealistically. She may not be a pleasant person, but she doesn't seem the kind to hold a gun to Sookie and Lafayette, the latter would be her nephew (I think).
 * It depends on what flavor of cousin Tara and Lafayette are, but if they are first cousins, then Lettie Mae is indeed his aunt.
 * Lafayette explicitly called her "auntie" when she was trying to get the shotgun from him.
 * The why she did it made sense to me, but it's the hows of it that made me want to grab all these characters and shake them until their teeth rattled. Having already established that Marryann is way out of her league, Tara runs right back into the lion's den without so much as two seconds of actual planning going into it.
 * Just how is the Fellowship of the Sun not on the national list of terrorist organizations after arranging a suicide bombing, and then gloating about it on TV?! Yeah, it was aimed against vampires - who still are legally citizens, and many humans were harmed in any case, not to mention that such vigilantism even against dangerous criminals is highly frowned upon and heavily punished against by the government.
 * Probably because it would undermine the Strawman Political if reality intruded here. In real life, these people would either be in jail or on every FBI watchlist ever invented. In the show, they have to still be a threat. This bugs me, too.
 * The KKK still exists, and have the legal right in the United States to hold rallies and spread their message because of the first amendment, despite the fact that throughout their existence they have killed more than a few minorities. The church never admitted to planning the bombing, just that they are pleased with the end result, which is no more than what their real life counterparts (The Westboro Baptist Church) said about even more horrific events such as 9/11 and the shooting at Virgina Tech.
 * Ever notice how HOURS of time just seem to pass, with no good reason and nothing really happening, until night (or day, whichever is required) comes? Sookie will go over to her Gran's house, lie on the floor with the creepie zombified coroner during the daytime, and stay just like that for hours until night falls and Vampire Bill can come. Seems to happen A LOT this season.
 * There are a lot of weird pacing things with this show, the build-up is always ridiculously bigger than the climax--problems that have been building up the entire season are resolved in minutes.
 * Weird pacing does not begin to describe some of the episodes. The prime example is probably the season 4 finale which anticlimactically resolves the main plot of the season about a third of the way through and then spends that rest of the episode dropping bombshells on the viewer left and right.
 * Okay, so was Amy really a psycho? Or was she just unnaturally cruel?
 * All of her behavior points to her being a narcissistic sociopath (which entails being "unnaturally cruel"), I think the show indicated that strongly enough. Going as far as to have a psychiatrist randomly show up and diagnose her would have been over-kill and an Ass Pull.
 * I guess we'll never know. This troper is very disappointed, and wanted to know more about Amy.
 * Has the show addressed the issue of turning new Vampires without clear consent of the individual? Most of the vampires in the show seem to have been turned way before the Revelation, making it moot, but what about Jessica? If they weren't glamoured, I bet her parents would have gone crazy trying to search for their daughter; and when they did find her, try and punish the individuals involved. Do human authorities pretty much not care about these kind of turnings?
 * Very good question that hasn't really been answered in the show or the books. Granted, turning people (with or without consent) into vampires isn't a common plot point. The only two examples I can think of are Jessica, as you mentioned, and Don't Bill and Jessica go back to her family? They had been looking for her, and IIRC, they were too scared to want anything to do with her. "Okay, you're a vampire. Now geddahellouttaourhouse." Plus it's hinted that her dad was abusive. Really, you've got the chance to live forever, and you choose to go back to that?
 * That's why it was on the down-low; because it is illegal in that world to turn someone against their will. If Jessica's parents could produce their daughter as a vampire, show proof of her age and the date she was turned and proof of who turned her, and they could have Bill jailed/executed. Bill didn't want to turn her because it was illegal and akin to murder and what was done to him. She was his punishment to Bill, and also a way for the vampire leaders to have something on him. It's like a mobster telling a guy to shoot someone, then keeping proof as insurance they won't ever testify or betray them. The books go over the concept, but Jessica isn't a character so the practical ramifications are not addressed; they are in the show so you have to watch both to get it.
 * Okay I'm not sure if this has been discussed yet but the fact that Jason comes under the influence of mind control in the season 2 finale. I mean, they just earlier stated that Sookie is immune to this, because she's not completely human(presumably fairy like in the books) so you'd think her brother would also not be completely human and be immune as well. Either Jason and Sookie are half siblings or the writers forgot the fact they should both be immune.
 * Continuity issue is probably the best answer. Or maybe they'll make Sookie's powers into something completely different.
 * Its perfectly logical for Sookie to have supernatural genes that she inherited but Jason didnt: its just like one sibling needing spectacles and the other having perfect eyesight. Both her parents were entirely mundane, though her grandfather apparently had some mind-reading ability.
 * It may only be in the books, but Jason does have a bit of the fairy genes. It is speculated in the books that this is why he constantly has women (and gay men) in a puddle at his feet. Sookie gets the mind-reading ability and the ability to attract supes, but "normal" people don't seem to like her much. Jason gets away with murder among the humans (almost literally). He is supposed to have inherited this from their father. Sookie always resented the fact that her mother loved him so much that he was always her priority, and she gains a measure of peace when she realizes this was due to his fairy blood.


 * What is up with this overly complicated turning process? Maybe I'm ill-informed, I haven't watched every episode, but appparently, one has to be bitten and almost sucked dry, then taste the blood of the vampire who's is turning them, and THEN they have to be buried together?! I mean, what's up with the burying? It's obvious why it has to be like that, because otherwise, neither the "fang bangers" nor the "vampire blood as a drug" storylines would work, and Sookie would have been turned into a vampire a dozen times. Still, it's weird.
 * It's not all that complicated, they just added one more step to the commonly used Blood Exchange Method. I just assumed the whole being buried together thing was a tradition that vampires observed, not a vital part of the process.
 * The "turnee" needs to have their blood completely replaced by the vampires, then buried. I don't think that being buried with the maker is compulsory, but I think it's preferred to have the parent vampire present at the first awakening, then to have a young, confused, and out of control vampire wake up for the first time.


 * If vampires are supposed to be allegories for homosexuals and HIV and all that, what are werewolves supposed to be? Or for that matter, everything else on the show. It bugs me because usually on a show that has a group of magical people be an allegory for something, the other groups of magical people are also allegories for something else as well, because what would be the point of only making one of those groups an allegory for something and just having the rest of them around because they're cool and stretch their CG budget?
 * The parallels drawn between vampires and homosexual are not the whole point of the series, nor are the vampires meant to be perfect allegories of homosexuals.
 * Werewolves would be what they always are: allegories for unrestrained, animalistic sexual desire; maeneads are an allegory for hedonism and over-excess; shapeshifers (not weres) represent survile, passive-aggressiveness and a desperation to belong; faeries represent the tendency to keep one's head down and hide, thereby embodying the quote of "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." The FOS members represent the dying morality as it desperately and forcefully fights to hold on to outdated values.
 * The fact that vampires are such an obvious allegory for homosexuality ("God hates fangs," etc) troubles me. While it lends a contemporary vibe to the conflict and gives us a sense of the vampires' place in society, it also undermines gay rights and equality. Characters like Sookie claim vampires are just like everyone else, but they are explicitly shown as being violent, able and willing to glamour people and placing little value on human life. While Bill tries harder than other vampires to live "normally," it seems like an effort to be something other than his natural state. Equating gays--whom people fear because of a perceived threat to "morals" and Christian ideology--with vampires--who pose an actual physical threat--causes problems. If characters' fear of vampires was shown to be completely unfounded, it would be another story. I don't think the creators are intentionally including the message "gays are dangerous" (Eddie is an especially nice subversion of this), but it does stray slightly into Unfortunate Implications territory.
 * Actually, that's exactly why the allegory works. Because there are decent vampires, and there are bad ones, and even the good ones are not perfect. Just like humans. Vampires are no different than humans, in that regards. The same goes for gay people and straight ones. There are good and bad among both. Not So Different.
 * Except that the show shows us way, way more of the dark underbelly of vampire society. We've seen maybe one other main-streaming, minding-his-own-business vampire (the poor guy Jason and Amy kidnapped and drained) but over 36 episodes of the secret, drug-dealing, quasi-feudal Vampire Mafia being not very nice people. Who have now been revealed to have a secret ruling council with a sinister hidden agenda. The "Fangs=Fags" (excuse me) Aesop hasn't just been broken, it's been shredded into little pieces and stomped all over.
 * Yeah, it kind of bothers me when fans say that the vampires in this show are just as capable of good and evil as humans. The show makes it explicitly clear that the majority of vampires are sociopaths, and the ones who aren't are portrayed as unusual. Even the "good" vampires like Jessica and Bill are murderers, with Eddie being the only truly pacifistic vampire we've seen in the show's run. And even he may have killed someone offscreen for all we know.
 * If the werewolves are supposed to be the big evil powerful villains, why have they consistently failed to present even a nominal threat to anybody, especially Sookie? In every scene where some werewolves try to hurt anyone, they're almost immediately killed in the most anticlimactic way possible. Yes, they're hopped up on blood and headed by the Vampire King of Mississippi (Try keeping a straight face after saying something like that), but you'd think that something so vulnerable to being shot or punched in the face would have something to not make every fight an immediate Curb Stomp Battle.
 * The werewolves are never depicted as "big evil powerful villains", the worst ones we see are just pawns to more powerful vampires and the rest are no worse than normal people. In the books (and the show to a lesser extent) their depicted as more of a disenfranchised minority group (similar to Native Americans) than a dark, sinister threat to humanity.
 * They're presented as a threat by Eric, who even at a 1000 years old seems to be overpowered by them at some points. Conversely, we see Bill manhandling 4 of them and coming out on top with only 1 escaping. Upon rewatching it again, I thought it counted as a moment of Fridge Brilliance on the writer's part. Everyone is curbstomping werewolves (even 2 month old Jessica seems to have an easier time with them than Eric) and calling them utter idiots except Eric, the same person who saw his family murdered by them. While he would never admit it, it could be that he has a mental block that prevents him from using his full potential against them because he probably feels self-loathing and weakness that he wasn't able to stop them before. Everyone else seems to rightfully look at them as lowly Mooks.


 * Wait, so Eric can write a will openly mentioning "The Final Death" and his "Progery" Pam and still be legally binding? So what are the American Vampire League exactly fighting for when it seems that the law already considers them citizens?
 * There's no guarantee that the will Eric was making out would be legally binding. That said, it's clear that vampires do have to have some legal standing given that they do own property, run businesses, and do get by in modern society.
 * The show went over this last season. Vampires can inherit property--and so Bill now legally owns that house. It's sort of like a cross between women and gays at this point--they don't have all their rights, and there's no ERA, but most of the basic stuff is intact. Life, liberty, property.
 * If that was one of Talbot's favorite paintings, why was it hanging in a museum rather than in Russel's dining room? During all the years they spent together, Russel never felt the need to pull a Nothing Hill (only with a lot more dead security guards) on him?
 * He wanted more people to see the painting. The other stuff he got was trophy or magpie, but he genuinely enjoyed the painting.
 * EVERYTHING in Jason's plotline in the season 3 finale. For starters, since when was Felton on V? Before we had seen him say that it was evil, and refused to sell it. Also, him killing Calvin was totally unnecessary for couple of very important reasons. 1: If someone had never read the books, but had been watching the series, they wouldn't be upset at all by his death, as in the series he was seemingly a near Complete Monster who hadn't done one thing that made him deserving of sympathy. 2: If someone HAD read the books, they would probably be upset by his complete change in personality. In the books he was an honorable man trying to do his best for his family. He was HAPPY to have Crystal dating Jason, because he knew that the inbreeding in Hotshot would do them in eventually. In the show, he wanted Crystal to bear Felton's kids, to "Keep their bloodline pure".
 * Felton became addicted to V after trying the V that Lafeyette gave him to sell for Eric. He didn't necessarily hate V, he just hated vampires.
 * This troper saw Felton's swerve into Complete Monster territory to being the result of a really, really bad V trip- he wasn't the most stable of people in the first place, and after his first taste of the stuff this troper assumed he saw 1) his supply being threatened and 2) Crystal being taken from him and just wigged out.
 * And Crystal leaving JASON in charge of Hotshot? Really Crystal? There are praying mantises that would make a better patriarch than Jason, and they have their heads chewed off after mating. Jason is a vanilla human with a history in law enforcement being left in charge of a community of meth-dealing werepanthers. HOW IN THE HELL IS HE EXPECTED TO DO THAT? I mean, doesn't it seem like there would be at least one mi-intelligent experienced person in Hotshot who would have made an infinitely better leader than Jason? The only experiences he's had with them besides thumping Crystal is a couple of hostile staredowns with their former alpha, and arresting one of their dudes. Not the type of person I would trust if I were an inbred hillbilly on the wrong side of the law.
 * I don't think she thought it anyway near through. It was pulling that out of her ass, or Felton shooting Jason then and there. Defusing the immediate situation was more immediately important to her than the well-being of the clan in the long term. Besides, if there is somebody in the Hotshot crowd who's smarter and more fit to the task than Jason (not that high a bar...) then he'll just take the leadership later anyway. The key point here is later, when the insane scary angry motherfucker hopped up on V and toting a shotgun is good and gone.
 * I personally believe that a lot of Jasons development over the previous seasons, especially his training with the fellowship, set him up for an important role.
 * Turns out to have been a pretty good call: Jason has been taking care of Hotshot for the past year, well enough for some of the younger weres to try and defy Felton by cutting Jason's bindings. Hell, one of them was licking his wounds, even.
 * How is it that Jesus didn't know about V's healing powers when he saw it working on Calvin? He is a nurse who works with mentally disturbed people and comes from a mystical bloodline. And it's not like it's insider knowledge anyway. By all appearances, V is a major narcotic and would get approximately a fuckton of media attention. You even hear the DEA douchebag mentioning advanced healing as one of the things that V would be used for. Yeah, not buying that Jesus wouldn't know it.
 * Going off of memory, so I could be wrong, but it could be that Jesus was more so shocked at how effectively and quickly the vampire blood had worked, not of its healing properties. Like the difference between someone who hears how PCP can make you numb to pain, and someone who sees the pictures of someone on PCP tearing out their internal organs. And in this universe, most of the information people seem to know about vampires does come from secondhand accounts, so it's not so crazy to think that Jesus hadn't known it was able to bring someone moments away from dying back to full life.


 * For some reason, fangs in True Blood are on the lateral incisors rather than the canines and they just feel way too close together - especially on people with big mouths. I thought I would get accustomed to it as the series progressed, but every time Bill or someone else bares their fangs I end up picturing a walrus. It just looks so [[media:vface_319.JPG|ridiculous]].
 * Standard vampire bite marks are too close together for it to be canines. Seriously, if you press your teeth into two things, and mark one with where your canines fell and the other with where those teeth fell, the latter looks closer to a vampire bite. So you have one of three options: 1)Change the teeth, 2)Change the bite marks, or 3)have them not match up. They chose to make the bite marks look "right" rather than the traditional teeth.
 * Word of God (on the DVD commentary) states that the vampire teeth were inspired by the fangs of a particular snake (which breed I cannot recall), which is why they extend and retract the way they do.


 * Minor on the surface, but as effin' cool as Godric is, his presence seems to create some sort of nitpicky continuity black hole in the series even if True Blood is considered to be totally independent of the SVM novels (which it isn't, yet). First and foremost, when Lorena (I think) mentions that Bill probably won't want to see her since it's been such a long time, Eric immediately implies his undying loyalty to Godric despite not having seen him in "over seventy years". In season three, the two were clearly kicking asses and taking names during World War II, which means that Eric is either bad at math or, being as old as he is, has lost all concept of time anyway. It may or may not also throw a wrench in Pam's timeline since (to my recollection) she has yet to be released, and despite being made in the early 1900's, appears to know little to nothing about Russell's pack of werewolves.
 * You mean he's a LITTLE off in his numbers? There is no reason not to believe that True Blood is taking place right now in 2010. World War 2 was fought between 1939 and -45, so if the flash back was at the beginning of the war, it very well could have been over seventy years (by a few months). Granted, it's more likely that it was sixty years ago give or take, but when you've been alive for centuries, I can easily forgive that sixty years or seventy years is like you getting on my case for saying I've been waiting here for an hour and it turns out it was only forty-five minutes.
 * It's also possible that Eric intends to not only refer to the immediate past (the time since seeing Godric during WWII), but is making a more general point based on other periods of separation (in 1000 years, there's been plenty of time to go their separate ways for a while before meeting up again). So it's possible that a more accurate statement would be, "I've gone much longer than 70 years without seeing my Maker, and it's been almost that long since I last saw him, but I've always stayed loyal to him." Eric may simply have stated his point using a simpler (but technically inaccurate) statement, because Lorena doesn't need the more detailed version.
 * Why does Sam have a dog-like hightened sense of smell? I get that he usually shifts into dogginess, but he can shift into anything at all, so why does he only have dog-like attributes? Is the hightened sense of smell the reason why he prefers shifting in being a dog, or is it a consequence of it?
 * Probably the latter.
 * Because he's a shifter, which means he's not technically human, and shifters have stronger senses than humans.
 * How does Merlotte's even stay in business? Waitresses die left and right, and Sam is constantly having some sort of drama and/or treating his cutomers/employees like crap, many of whom only show up for work when they feel like it. Yet that place is always hopping with customers. What the hell?
 * It's the only bar/grill for miles. And the reason people keep dying there is because it is Bon Temps. People die horribly everywhere in that down.
 * "treating his customers/empoyees like crap" - only very partly true. Prior to season three, I'd say Sam Merlotte is the kindest man walking around in Bontemps, protective of his employes, patient, understanding, good manners. And attacking one out of three vampires who strolled in to harrass the customers in Season 1. He honestly tried to help his younger brother who was being the pure, platonic case of asshat in return. Sam turned jerk only after days if not weeks of taking sh*t from his younger brother. Everybody else would probably have snapped a lot earlier.
 * Why haven't other supernaturals come into public eye? OK, vampires were hesitant to, but that's because they survive by biting people, often killing them. But they came into the public eye once the invention of True Blood meant they no longer have to feed on humans (even though they don't drink it and just kill people anyway, but that's beside the point for now). Werewolves and shapeshifters have no such dependence on human suffering, so what's their motive for remaining a secret?
 * In the books, Alcide explains to Sookie that shifters are reluctant to "come out" because they are (as a whole) not as wealthy as vampires (which would put them at a disadvantage) and because people would be so freaked out by the whole human to animal transformation thing that they would view them as being more animal than human and use that as an excuse to deny them human rights.


 * After Amy dies in season 1, Jason no longer suffers from V withdrawals. But a few episodes ago he was wigging out and hallucinating. Did he suddenly grow an immunity or did it just not kick in until after he got out of jail and the series skipped ahead a few weeks?


 * Arlene gets Holly to attempt a magic miscarriage during Season 3 because she doesn't believe in abortion. But what's the difference between a doctor with a machine and a witch casting a spell? Or between that potion and a fifth of vodka? Plot-wise, I understand that an actual abortion would have ended things rather definitively, whereas Holly's spell had a chance of failure, but it could have used some better in-story justification.
 * It's a MAGICAL abortion, and that's a key difference from a scientific one, which Arlene no doubt believes to be evil. Thing is, Arlene can't marry that belief along with the one that makes her think the baby is evil and needs to die, and the difference is enough of a loophole in her morals to allow herself to go through with it.
 * It's meant to be an illustration of her ignorance and hypocrisy, it's not a REAL abortion, so it doesn't count.
 * Another explanation, she doesn't think she can go to the clinic. There are only a few places to get an abortion in Louisiana, and there is a 24-hour waiting period, which means two trips to the doctor, and facing the protesters outside of the clinic. Something she could do at home, alone, may seem much less intimidating.


 * Am I the only one who finds Ms.Stackhouse to be rather unhappy towards men for no reason whatsoever? I know this series is extremely progressive than most others, but everything I've been exposed to this series comes down to either a Double Standard complaint against men and how 'stupid' they are or that men can't actually control their impulses, which is also stupid and contrived. Can anyone shed a light on how this is okay for a series which seems to actually be a really good progressive and character-heavy series...when its okay to depreciate and insult men not only on base impluses, but that men are stupid? Yeah, that's the way to draw in a Periphery Demographic.
 * What are you talking about? There has been no shortage of female villains or sympathetic men in the series. As for the men she does distrust--namely Bill and Eric--I'd say she's pretty damn justified in how she feels.
 * Really? Okay...why don't we break it down. Bill has made his intentions very clear onto the fact of how much he loves Sookie, and has proven himself to be The Chessmaster in terms of doing that and quite fairly so. Due to the situation Sookie is in as the only fairy, she cannot afford to be stupid and turn against every possible form of help. I'm not saying she has to be a liability and weak-willed, but I am saying that she's not taking her situation with any sense of realism; bloodsuckers see her as the greatest meal ever. Bill-from where I've been watching-is a good man who used deception and coercion to bad ends, yes, but to serve a goal. I don't see that as wrong. I find Sookie's anger and distrust of men to be unfounded.
 * That's just it, the deception and coercion. Their entire relationship was based on a lie. Sookie's life has been a whirlwind of chaos ever since Bill walked into it, only for her to find out it was all because her blood is Vampire Sunscreen. It's not unlike someone feigning love because their partner has money. She has every right to feel used and wonder if it was all a lie. She doesn't hate men, it's vampires she's sick of. And by the way, where do Sam and Alcide fit into Sookie's "anger and distrust of men"? They're both proven themselves to be decent guys (Sam's drunken tantrum in the third season notwithstanding) whom she has shown interest in dating. And of course there's her brother and grandfather.
 * Ah, then there's the problem. Since Eric and Bill are so prominent as the main male characters, they really get in the way. My head is less scratchy, but the overall image that men have in this series doesn't bode very well. There is some premise of the men being dumb and stupid when we're talking about normal humans, not to mention that the girls either are better than them, or smarter than them. I realize this is the south and that the hick mentality is pretty high, but that's even more hurtful than what appeared to be a hatred against men.
 * What. The. Hell. Are. You. Talking. About. WHEN are men portrayed as more stupid than women on this show? Especially when THE MAIN HEROINE is often considered the stupidest one in the gang, and that's including her comically-braindead brother. Tara, Jessica, and Arlene don't strike me as Mensa material either. There's plenty of ditziness among both genders, but you have it in your head that True Blood is on some kind of Straw Feminist Misandry kick that I just plain don't see.
 * I haven't observed her to be irrationally hostile towards men, she's hostile towards them after she's been given a reason to be. I don't see how disstrusting someone after they've wronged you is a Double Standard. She treats Jason like an idiot because he' is an idiot, she no longer trusts Bill because she found out he was lying to her the entire time she's known him, she doesn't trust Eric becuase no one with a brain in their head would, and she gets angry with Sam after finding out that he had been keeping a HUGE secret from her throughout their entire friendship (but eventually gets over it). She has no problem with Hoyt, Terry, Lafeyette, or Alcide, and is generally friendly towards men she doesn't know unless they are impolite. Plus, Arlene and Hoyt's mom are women and they're both depicted in a far less than flattering light and there is a healthy proliferation of evil and/or untrustworthy women in the show as well as women who are generally ignorant, shallow and self-centered.
 * Fair enough. Clearly since watching this with my grandmother and her making general positive remarks to Sookie's attacks against the men, I came to the wrong conclusion. Thanks for that.


 * Why didn't Sam invite Tommy to his little shapeshifter meetup? Hanging out with others like him--besides his sorry excuse for a mother--could help Tommy just as much as it's helped Sam.
 * Because he doesn't trust him. Tommy has shown a willingness to steal from Sam, and consequently Sam has shown a willingness to shoot his own brother, something that he regrets. Not the kind of person you'd want to introduce to your new friends.
 * So if the vampire King of Mississippi is three thousand years old, why does he have a British-y name and a Southern accent?
 * It seems that vampires are in the habit of changing their names and adopting the local accent of wherever they settle, to avoid unwanted attention. Pam and Eric are European too, but have adapted American accents to fit in.


 * Tara disappears for a year, doesn't contact anyone from Bon Temps at all, and Lafayette can reach her with one text message? If she didn't want to be found you'd think that she'd change her phone number at least.
 * It's entirely possible she stayed in touch with him and told him to keep this to himself. If there's anyone in Bon Temps she'd still talk to, it'd be him.
 * I would love to see Sookie spend some time experimenting with her powers. Her light thing showed itself entirely accidentally at first, but then she actually focused it and used it to break the handcuffs binding Erik and Russel. Since then, however, she hasn't seemed to give her powers a second thought.
 * She probably hasn't. I imagine she wants to forget all about her powers and try to live a normal life as best as she can. Of course it'd be smarter to cultivate her abilities in order to defend herself, but this is Sookie we're talking about.

SPOILER -- Antonia apparently never aimed at being a powerful witch, just a healer. So, less training, less predictable abilites as a mortal. As a vengeful spirit in a somewhat power hungry witch supported by varying wiccas is a different story.
 * Is there any benefit to being a werecreature over a shifter in this universe? Both races' animal forms are about equal in physical prowess to a normal specimen. If anything, weres seem weaker since they're more emotionally-charged and are limited to a single animal.
 * When Joe-Lee collared Tommy from behind, was there some kind of voodoo in that collar that kept him from just turning into a fly and getting out of there?
 * Tommy probably couldn't concentrate because he was choking and Joe-Lee kept stomping on him.
 * Regarding Double Standard Rape Female On Male - apparently Alan Ball and David Petrarca feel that Jason really did deserve it! WHAT.
 * YMMV, but isn't that a bit much for being a horndog? Granted, he treated women like sex objects, but he never raped anyone.
 * Yes he has. I believe it was in the first season that Jason claimed that he continued having sex with a woman after she had passed out. If your partner is no longer capable of giving consent, that is legally and morally rape. However that still does not mean Jason "had it coming." No one deserves to be raped ever.
 * Citation Needed!
 * Consent can be withdrawn at any time. If intercourse continues, it becomes rape. Since intoxicated/unconscious people cannot consent to really anything (and the woman would have to have been pretty intoxicated to pass out that quickly), an individual losing consciousness would logically qualify as withdrawing consent. But as I've already said, that still does not mean that Jason deserved to be raped himself.
 * I wasn't questionning the legality so much as the event in question. Found it, btw: Season 2, Frenzy.
 * If Antonia was powerful enough to make all vampires in the area walk into the sunlight, why didn't she act against them sooner?
 * It seems the spell is so powerful it requires multiple casters to chant in a circle. She needed to gather a group, first.
 * On a related note, the circumstances of her original death make less and less sense as the 4th season goes on. In one episode she mind controls 3 vampires just by waving her hand, with no help from anyone. If she is that powerful, and can control the dead that easily, the flashback scene where she is gang raped by vampires makes absolutely no sense.
 * And before someone else says it, yes, she was tied up in the flashback. This just raises further questions:
 * (1) Who tied her up if vampires can't get within 20 feet of her without potentially falling under her spell?
 * (2) She is shown to be able to cast spells just by thinking the incantations with no physical movements, so why would tying her up make her powerless?
 * If you're talking about the scene where Sookie read her mind, I think she was just planning out the incantation for the fog spell in her head. She still had to vocally say it for it to work. The original point still stands, of how she got captured in the first place if she's so powerful.
 * After thinking about this, I am working under the assumption that they used glamoured / helpful humans to tie her up (which is the only thing that makes any sense). This implys they knew, quite well, what kind of a threat she was. Yet, they still kept her in a prison with other witches, and still chose to rub their victory in via gang rape. Sounds to me like they got exactly what they deserved.
 * So, to summarize, Antonia forgot she had powers until it was too late and the vampires forgot she was a threat once they had her captured.
 * It's even worse than you think: SHE CAN APPARENTLY TELEPORT HERSELF. AND OTHERS.
 * I thought all of the above abilities she has now are simply because she's a spirit, part of the energy but straddling the veil of life and death, and POSSESSING another connected human. Marnie's not powerful, but the boost has to help Antonia a lot. The two of them work as one, but it's still Marnie's body, leaving Antonia even more free to focus her energy. Most supernatural mythology consistently has spirits gaining strength from their hatred, and she's had hundreds of years to hone, focus, and channel her pain until she was summoned and given invitation to possess. She might NOT have had the power to control vampires, teleport, or the rest like she can now, it's only because of a 24/7 partnership with Marnie and her need for revenge that's giving her the boost.
 * I'm generally assuming that magical powers are slightly fluctuating depending on the situation the witch/half-fairy/whatever is in, comparable to physical strength in humans. In this show, Sookey can sometimes shoot light out of her hand when she's really pissed of or in a corner, but she can't do it at will whenever she feels like it. (Would make stuff too easy anyway.) According to her fairy godmother, Sookie already used magical powers right in the first episode when going at one of Bill's attackers with a chain.
 * While we're on the subject of Antonia, why did she announce her presence to the vampires after possessing Marnie, then get pissy when her Resurrection spell didn't work? Did she think they wouldn't take steps to protect themselves?
 * Antonia is in firm possession of the Villain Ball. She seems to know she is the bad guy, and behaves accordingly. If she didn't get pissy and antagonize almost everyone that was, originally, on her side then we might forget she is supposed to be the bad guy. And we can't have that, can we?
 * Or if she was too smart--had she simply killed Louis and Glasses Girl and made her escape, then gathered the witches for her spell, vampires would have actually met the sun.
 * Early in "Cold Grey Light of Dawn," we see Eric and Sookie rutting in the woods, just as we left off last episode. When it cuts back to them, they're still going at it as they burst through the door of her house. Um...were they having sex during the entire walk back?
 * Well, considering Eric's super-speed it's possible that he just picked her up and raced all the way back.
 * Where were Jesus and Jessica during the big Vampires vs Wiccans throwdown? Jesus made a big deal about going to Mexico to gain power to protect himself and Lafayette, and surely Jess would realize that the continued survival of herself and her species would be more important than brooding over getting dumped by two men she thought would be fawning over her.
 * IIRC, Jesus and Lafayette were a little misguided after Eric and Pam tried to attack Marnie. They were worried about Eric's retaliation, not even knowing that he lost his memory and was not a threat to them. At this point, them going to Mexico just seems like an excuse to set up Lafayette as some sort of medium and have him  As for Jessica, Bill was probably concerned after she almost just died and commanded her to stay home. Remember, Bill didn't even want Sookie and Eric to come along, but as Jessica's maker he has more control over her.
 * Does Merlotte's have more employees than we see? Sometimes I wonder how the place manages to stay open. In "Let's Get Out of Here," the following people are all absent from work: Sookie, Holly, Jessica, Arlene, Terry, Lafayette and indeed Sam himself (who has a lot of time on his hands, considering that he operates a business and at this point just had one of his properties burn to the ground). Nonetheless, when Marcus goes into Merlotte's the place is running, though the only person present is Tommy, who is there not to work but to leave Sam a note.
 * Yeah, just the fact that the only two cooks in the place (Terry and Lafayette) weren't there is cause for eyebrow raising. Maybe the townspeople just have nothing better to do than hang out there all day? Even if nobody is waiting on them.
 * There are other people working there (I vaguely remember a burly black cook once and a busboy or two). How they put up with everyone else leaving every other night is beyond me.
 * The black cook's name is John, I believe. Lafayette mentions him in the first episode if memory serves.
 * So where is Crystal in all this? The last we see of her is her telling Jason she'll see him at the full moon, but with that bit of redneck folklore out of the way, she's still no where to be found. They've sort of just dropped her story arc in favor of him humping Jessica.
 * You say that like it's a bad thing. Love triangles aren't the freshest plot in the world, but I'll take that over squalid, incestuous, drug-dealing, rape-happy, child-abusing redneck werepanthers who Did Not Do the Research on their own creation myth any day. I'll be one happy troper if we never see Hotshot again.
 * True enough, and Crystal is the only character on the show to make Tara or Sam seem fascinating by comparison. But it does dismay me some the lack of real fallout to the rape plotline, or the fact that Jason seems to have forgotten all about the children he spent a year as the primary caregiver for.
 * I agree on lack of rape fallout. And though Crystal and her dead husband were pretty repulsive, I really want to know what happens to the young girl who freed Jason and the other kids, too.
 * I suspect that the problem is too huge to believably solve it in a few episodes because it would demand a lot of character development and either an entire personality transplant for Crystal or beheading (I'd cheer for the last. Sad backstory excuses only so much, and unconcerned multiply rape is not among that). As for Jason dealing with rape and the fate of those children, interestingly enough, Hoyd tried to talk to him about it and Jason (again, realistically) avoided the whole thing. There's Jason in a nutshell: something went horribly wrong, let's quickly start some new fresh grand scheme to give sense and importance to his life. He's really developed, but it makes sense that with something as horrible as multiple rape he falls back into the tried and untrue pattern of "let's forget about it quickly". And some "surprise, the werepanther infection works, it just takes longer" in a later season wouldn't be that bad at all. If just because panthers look awesome. Less fun but more likely: what of Jason's children? That was what the whole horrible action was about, getting women pregnant. I'd think it likely that it worked in at least one case. There's really a bunch of loose ends in that one.
 * Not if she's every bit as sterile as Felton, that's always a risk with incest. I wouldn't put it past the werepanthers to be too stupid to look into that.
 * An old one, but still puzzling. Eric describes Godric as "He is twice as old as I am and very powerful. There are none above him in the new world." But Russell Edgington, at 3,000, is 50% older and only one state away, so he is hardly an unknown entity.
 * Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think Eric knew Russell had settled in Mississippi before the third season, let alone became King. He himself had only been in America for a few decades. If he did know Russell, he didn't know that was the same man who killed his human family, since he didn't get a good look at his face at the time.
 * Is there possibly some wriggle room to suggest that "above him" may not strictly refer to age? Especially when we consider that Eric sees Godric through rose-tinted glasses.
 * I assumed he was just biased, kind of how most little kids like to think that theyr father is the biggest, strongest, smartest man in the world. I thought it was kind of cute.
 * Is Marnie the only one in her coven over the age of 40?
 * Holly doesn't look that young. Given that she has children, it's a strong possibility she could be in her forties.
 * After the end of the showdown at Moongoddess, Bill and Eric are both guilty of murder and witness tampering (glamouring almost everybody to forget the murders). Even if you look at these events purely through the lens of what's legal and what's not (rather than whether it was all justified or not), Jason knows everything that happened, and he's a cop. Doesn't he have a duty to report this?
 * Eh, Jason seems pretty inclined to protect people breaking the law. Remember he warned Crystal about the raid on Hotshot? And was he ever given authorization to basically run the place after she left? All of those children probably should have been taken in by the state. And he never reported Andy for being a V addict. He's a pretty terrible cop, once you think about it.
 * He wouldn't be the first cop torn between duty and loyalty.
 * He also agreed not to tell anyone about Jessica killing one of Bill's guards. In his defense, she was under Antonia's spell at the time so he couldn't really fault her for it. Still, the casual manner in which he and Bill discuss sweeping the issue under the rug seems a little... discomforting.
 * Jason just knows how things work. Honestly Bill could and probably SHOULD have just glamored Jason just to be safe but he chose not to because Jason is part of the Team. Yes Jason is a horrible cop but really the answer here is that no good would come of it. As for Bill he hasn't shown a great deal of caring for humans save for one argument with his maker.
 * This show constantly has an annoying habit of not doing the research. The way "Samhain" was pronounced in the season finale indicated that no one even googled the word (it's pronounced "SOW-when"). It's just like season two where everyone was mispronouncing the word "maenad" and Maryann's incantation used "lo, lo" rather than "io, io".
 * Let's say Marnie--in Lafayette's body--succeeds in killing Bill and Eric. And Then What Her coven thinks her a bigger threat than the vampires, and the vampires think she's the biggest threat in Louisiana. It wouldn't be long before the two sides joined together to bring her down. Bringing her back as a ghost really accomplished nothing more than Deus Angst Machina for Lala by way of killing Jesus.
 * What could Bill and Eric have done? Marnie's already dead, it's not like they could kill her again. It's never specifically stated that killing Lafayette would get rid of Marnie, either. Marnie cut up Lafayette and there's no reason to believe she couldn't still control his body if he was shot or something. By killing Bill and Eric, she gets revenge on the vampires who killed her in the first place.
 * Marnie even said so herself when Bill pointed out that killing them wouldn't change anything. "I'm already dead, vampire, thanks to you. I have nothing left to lose." She was just angry and wanted them dead out of spite, not to further some larger goal.
 * I always assumed that the mooks in the riot gear that guarded Nan Flanagan were also vampires, and able to protect Nan from other vampires. But as we saw in the finale, they weren't. They were just humans that Eric was able to decapitate the lot of in the blink of an eye. (The clincher: they didn't turn into puddles of goo when they died.) So if they aren't any match for vampires, then why does the Authority bother hiring them?
 * There are plenty of reasons why it makes sense for elite vampires to have humans defending them... they lack the vampires' many weaknesses. However, as we see, they are vulnerable in other ways. What exactly allows Eric to kill them all before they lift a finger when Sophie-Anne, faced with a parallel scenario, did not even bother trying?
 * Why did Drew's ghost continue to affect the Cajun accent when he spoke to Arlene from beyond the grave? And, if he really did care for Arlene, why didn't he bother to offer at least some kind of apology for committing violence against her neighbors/friends/co-workers?
 * Can't answer the first question but, as to the second one, I think he was more concerned with warning her about the impending danger than with redeeming himself in her eyes, since that probably would have been a futile effort any way and he didn't know how much time he had, he decided to tell her what he felt was the most important at the moment.
 * I suppose the simple answer to the accent query is that she only knew him as Rene, and with that accent, so he's providing a bit of postmortem continuity. Remember that the point was made that he was very good at separating out his different selves, hence Sookie's inability to catch on to his secret identity; this may actually speak to your second question too. Rene really did love Arlene, but still thinks that killing those women was the right thing to do.
 * How did Marnie get Eric and Bill tied up? There's two of them and they're a lot stronger than she is and she no longer has the ability to control vampires, since that ability was never her's to begin with (she just had it because Antonia had it and they were sharing a body), I can't think of any way that she could have captured them.
 * We never really learned what exactly was the extent of Jesus's "demon power," so it wouldn't be out of the realm of possibility that she could move herself and other objects magically. Perhaps she blitzed them with silver or performed some other spell.
 * If Jesus' demon power was so awesome, how could he not save himself from getting tied up?
 * Marnie was possessing Lafayette's body at the time, so Jesus was probably hoping that if he did what she told him, then she would set Lafayette free.
 * Marnie has been my favorite character all season. I feel that she was the first truly sympathetic antagonist the show has had, and I really felt for her when it was revealed that she was doing what she did because she'd been oppressed and mistreated all her life. So I found her characterization to be an interesting commentary on the consequences of bullying. However, it also bothers me that they chose to make Marnie the one who was willingly committing all those murders and atrocities because it came off as a convenient way to have her killed off without making the vampires look like the bad guys. I think it would have been more interesting if Marnie's homicidal rage was toned down just a tad so that the moral ambiguity of the vampires' treatment of her and her coven could be called into question rather than just acknowledged every once in a while. Thoughts?
 * Agreed. It wouldn't be surprising if the vampires suffer Aesop Amnesia in the fifth season, continuing to bully humans even though Marnie and her coven came close to killing them all.
 * I doubt the vampires ever learned anything in the first place. Most of them were totally in favor of killing Marnie (even before she became an active threat) and they probably think her power just proves that they were right about her. Which is stupid in my opinion because they are the ones who provoked her. Before Eric came along trying to force her to disband her coven, she had no desire to harm anyone.
 * What was Marnie planning by studying necromancy and using her dead bird as a guinea pig? She was overjoyed to find out it worked and wanted to move on to a human body before Eric got involved. However, she admitted under Glamour that she had no intention of using it against vampires. So what was she originally planning?
 * Marnie suffers from a massive inferiority complex, and she feels that her powers have caused her nothing but misery all her life. They made her into a neurotic "freak" and didn't do anything to benefit her at all. So being able to do something as huge as revive the dead made her feel like her gift finally meant something. It made her feel powerful. Plus, Jesus points out that Marnie talked to the dead because they were her only friends. Maybe bringing the dead back to life was her way of trying to surround herself with companions.
 * A massive inferiority complex indeed, since she had a coven full of people who loved and respected her.
 * Where's Kitch Maynard? I understand with whole time skip it would be near impossible to fit him in, but to just drop that little Friday Night Lights esque story line bugs me.
 * How does anyone keep anything from Sookie? Her power has been shown to pretty all-encompassing yet somehow the extremely obvious mystery of the first season and Sam's secret eluded her. It doesn't really make any sense.
 * Sookie trained herself to block out most of the noise. She could've found out Sam's secret if she had dug, but she had no real reason to. Sam was her employer and he had the hots for her, so I have a feeling she spent a long time blocking out his thoughts in particular.
 * The effect of vampire blood on humans seems pretty inconsistent and extremely plot-driven. A single drop has very powerful (and very addictive) hallucinogenic effects, but is otherwise not dangerous. An entire vial of it apparently does not have hallucinogenic effects to speak of, but can have serious overdose effects (including things like pathological priapism). Ok, so far so good. However, seemingly copious amounts of it, like amounts equivalent to tens of vials, have no ill-effect at all, but on the contrary can quickly heal a mortally wounded person, with no dangerous side-effects (other than forming a supernatural bond with the vampire), such as priapism or addiction. In fact, in some cases even smaller amounts of blood seem to be innocuous and have healing properties if it's used to heal somebody. In fact, it almost looks like the blood "knows" what it's being used for and acts accordingly: If it's used for recreational hallucinogenic use, it acts as such (and causes addiction), but if it's used to cure someone, then it just cures the person and has no hallucinogenic nor addictive properties.
 * Also, if one single drop is enough for a daily fix, one could assume that an entire vial would last for months. (This plot device would make a lot more sense if the amount needed for hallucinogenic effects would be an entire vial, or more.)