'True Blood' boss previews Sookie's 'intense' new romance by Michael Ausiello

According to True Blood creator Alan Ball, whether you’re a fan of Bill and Sookie or Sookie and Eric, season 3 of the HBO hit is sure to make you very unhappy. And, oddly, very happy, too. “Take a look at Joe [Manganiello],” he teases of the hunk he cast as the psychic’s new love interest, the werewolf Alcide. “Do you think [they] have reason to be worried?”

Rhetorical questions aside, the writer is confident that, just as his new hire won him over, he’ll win over viewers. “We were looking for a guy who was big, sexy, decent and heroic, with some darkness,” he says. “And [Manganiello] showed us all of that in the audition.”

In fact, the One Tree Hill alum so impressed the boss that he wasn’t asked to take a chemistry test with leading lady Anna Paquin. “We do that when we have four or five options,” Ball explains, “and in this instance, I felt like Joe was the only one who came close to what the character needed to be.”

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