Wednesday, May 13, 2009

True Blood: Season One Review

Review of Season 1 ( I guess for DVD buyers)

A film review by Don Willmott - Copyright © 2009 Filmcritic.com

Richly populated with a wide variety of unique characters, not to mention a serial killer and lots of sexy vampires, Bon Temps, Louisiana is a decidedly interesting place in which to spend some time. Alan Ball's True Blood may not quite measure up to the triumph of his Six Feet Under, but it's as good a series as any HBO has put on the air since The Sopranos ended, and it's well worth a renewal or two.

Based on a series of novels by Charlaine Harris, True Blood drops us into the weird world of Sookie Stackhouse (the energetic Anna Paquin), a young waitress who has ability to hear people's thoughts, a talent that annoys the hell out of her. In this slightly alternate reality, vampires live among humans, albeit in a fairly segregated fashion. The invention of synthetic blood, the so-called True Blood of the title, means that vampires need not kill humans to feed, so they have been granted civil rights. The problem, though, is that they still prefer the real thing.

When Sookie happens to fall in love with the pale but dashing vampire Bill Compton (Steven Moyer), a 168-year-old Civil War veteran, few people approve. It's not natural, people tell her, as if it was 1960 and she was dating a black man or it was 1980 and she was dating a woman. The allegorical nature of the vampires' plight is obvious, and Ball latches onto his metaphors and runs with them. When a vampire walks into Sookie's restaurant, all heads turn and eyes shoot daggers, as if to say, "Hey, boy, you don't belong here."

Read on

1 comments:

Becky said...

Looks like a fun read! I just love books about vampires! After I finish reading "Forbidden: The Temptation" by Samantha Sommersby, I will have to check it out!