What is it with our pop culture's obsession with vampires? It seems like lately I can't get away from them. Earlier this year, I was forced by a friend to watch Buffy and Angel. I'm constantly (and against my will) bombarded with the Twilight phenomenon. And now, I've got sucked into the new HBO show, True Blood.
True Blood explores what would happen if, in a world much like our own, vampires really existed and they exposed themselves to the world, and are now trying to integrate themselves with humans by drinking synthetic blood called Tru Blood. The heart of True Blood however is the story of a naive waitress, Sookie Stackhouse, from a small town in Louisiana, who meets the handsome, brooding, Bill Compton, who's, you guessed it, a vampire. It's mostly a love story between a human girl and the vampire who loves her, but because it's not TV, it's HBO, there's plenty of violence and sex to appease everybody!
The reason why I decided to do a post for True Blood is because I have very conflicting thoughts about it, and I had to put them out into the open. On one hand, I've gotten totally sucked into this show. I watched episodes 5-9 over the weekend, and am attempting to catch up on the first four episodes that I missed at the beginning (I'm on episode 3 at the moment). On the other hand, I really don't think this show is that good, heh. It's kind of cheesy and silly and the plots don't really go anywhere and the characters are all filled with cliches and stereotypes and are all kind of annoying. Like, do we really need to see Jason have explicit sex every episode? We get it, he's a slut. While I do appreciate seeing Ryan Kwanten shirtless every episode, it's getting to the point where I just fast forward every time he has a scene, because it's like, been there, done that. You can only shock me so many times, True Blood! When dealing with the vampires, the show is also totally over the top. That vampire staking in episode 9 was so ridiculous, it crossed over into being cartoony, instead of scary.
And yet...I still kind of love it. It's funny because all of the reasons why I think it's a bad show can also be attributed to why I love it. Like, the most cliched and stereotype filled character on the show is probably Sookie's best friend, Tara, yet Tara is just so bitchy and awesome that she's one of my favorite characters. And sometimes the over the topness of it all is kind of amazing. Like when Sookie ran through the cemetery in her long flowy white night gown before flinging herself into the arms of Bill and then having hot vampire sex. That scene was so ridiculous it sort of turned around into being awesome (and hilarious). And while they can all be kind of annoying, I really do love most of the characters. I don't really like Sookie, but I enjoy Bill and his gentlemanly charm. I love Sam, probably more than Bill, and I love that he's really a dog (or whatever is up with that, heh). I also am greatly intrigued by Eric, I find Lafayette hilarious, and I even sort of like Jason, even though he's the biggest screw up ever.
A trailer for ya:
So, I guess the moral of the story is, I'm watching True Blood. You should watch too if your into that sort of thing. I do think it's a show that has lots of different aspects to appeal to all sorts of people: romance, horror, comedy, drama, gore, sex, etc. Just maybe don't take it all that seriously. I know I'm not, and I'm finding that I'm enjoying myself a lot more. :)
Last note about True Blood: You may have noticed that the show has a lot of similarities to Stephenie Meyer's "book" series, Twilight. What with the human girl falling for the vampire guy, and with one of them being able to read minds, but they can't read the other's mind, and the whole love triangle thing with a dog/wolf. But don't let that fool you! The mere fact that Bill doesn't sparkle gives True Blood the definitive edge, but it really is just a million times better than Twilight all around. After I watched True Blood the first time, I breathed a sigh of relief, because I think it was just what I needed to wash the horrible taste in my mouth left over from Twilight. STAY AWAY FROM TWILIGHT, PEOPLE! It will ruin your life!
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