S1 E1 Strange Love

It has been two years since the invention of the synthetic plasma TruBlood that has allowed vampires to make their presence known to mankind. In the small town of Bon Temps, Louisiana, 25-year-old waitress Sookie Stackhouse struggles with being telepathic and not being able to control hearing the thoughts of everyone she sees. That is until 173-year-old vampire Bill Compton walks into Merlotte's bar where Sookie works.

She is immediately drawn to him, and so are Mac and Denise Rattray, a couple of local thugs who later attack Bill with silver and try to drain his blood so that they can sell it on the black market. But Sookie rescues him and drives the Rattrays away, after which she learns that not only is Bill equally interested in her, but that she cannot read his thoughts as his brain is technically dead. Meanwhile, Sookie’s hard-talking best friend Tara Thornton is fired from her job when she mouths off to her boss and a customer and Sam Merlotte hires her as the new bartender.

Meanwhile, Sookie’s brother Jason Stackhouse has a sexual interlude with a young woman named Maudette Pickens, who enjoys rough sex with vampires. She shows Jason a videotape of her with a bald-headed, tattooed vampire and later she videotapes them having rough sex. The next day, Jason is arrested by Sheriff Bud Dearborne and Detective Andy Bellefleur for murder of Maudette, who was killed the night before.

Sookie’s grandmother Adele asks if Sookie thinks she can get the vampire Bill to speak at her Descendants of the Glorious Dead meeting. And at Merlotte’s that night, Bill agrees to meet her in the parking lot after work to discuss the favor. Sookie gets into a heated argument with Sam and Tara, who believe that getting involved with a vampire could be very dangerous and Sookie tells them both to stay out of her life. After work Sookie and Sam make amends with one another and alone in the parking lot, Sookie is suddenly and savagely attacked by the Rattrays, out for revenge.

So, I am rewatching True Blood Season One again for the umpteenth time.

Though Season Three was wonderful and Season Two's Vampire arc was excellent, nothing compraes to the simple beauty of Season One.

Perhaps it was because Season One was so uncluttered, unfettered by far too many sub plots and far too many characters. There is a quality that comes across that is sublimely unselfconscious, natural. Even now after we have discovered that with Alan Ball's twist on the story concerning Bill, the rescue of Sookie from the Rattrays still rings sincerely of gentlemanly heroism...Bleh for Alan Ball...

But I love the first time Bill and Sookie meet. Her giddiness. I have to be honest, if I met so lovely a creature I would be a blithering idiot, the same shit eating grin on my face and the 'OMG UR so Cute!!!' squee...

I also got to realize how much I miss Lafayette. I loved his joi de vivre. I think that would be something Eric must have appreciated about the cook...they have the same sort of personality. Of course Eric has had some centuries to perfect it, but it is there..

And I also realized how much I really miss Gran. Seeing Adele Stackhouse fixing biscuits and sausage and gossiping with Everlee Mason made my heart ache and some vague promise we would see Adele in some sort of dream sequence or flash back during second or third season but that was not to be....

I too liked the first episode. Compared to now, it was remarkably uncluttered and simple, but beautiful in its own way because of that very fact.

I always look at a first episode as doing the ground setting for the characters. You have to know them and even care about what happens to them a bit in order to want to see the next episode.

I was drawn to the show, knowing it was about vampires, but more in that it was about a telepath who wasnt a doormat and who could hold her own. To me, the vampires were revolving characters around her. I loved the overall normalcy of the life Sookie tried to lead up until she met Bill. I credit Gran for that to a great deal.

I miss Gran too and often wonder if things would have gone the way they did if she had still been around, and what her take on this fairy thing would have been. Most of all, I miss the house being clean, since by the end of S3, its still a nightmare.

Bill is a great counterpart to her in this episode, engaging, but also reticient as well. He played a fine balance to keep her on the hook. I honestly do think he was intrigued by her and impressed by her lack of fear of him. The beating is all the more reprehensible , knowing as we do that it was all set up. Little did we know, that Eric would have competition in the Bad Boy Dept. At this point, he still looked to be like who he said he was and with no ulterior purposes at all. It was a nice dream while it lasted, but now its out in the open, so hopefully things can go forward.

Jason was still busy being QB1, a title he no longer holds by S3, but one he sure lived to the fullest. He embodied the dumb jock with nothing in his brain but women and having fun. The way he was with Gran tho, showed the promise of more from him. I am not too into the whole Hotshot thing going on, but perhaps it will be his turning point where he can deliver more of what Gran taught him growing up.