TV Review: True Blood – The Complete Seventh Season
3 min read
True Blood meets the true death in the seventh and final season of the sultry vampire series. Opening where season six left off with a swarm of Hep-V infected vampires attacking a vampire/ human mixer at Bellefleur’s (previously Merlotte’s), several people are taken captive by the gang. They are then chained in the basement of Fangtasia to await their inevitable deaths and try to negotiate their freedom from their ravenous captors. With the aid of Sookie’s smarts, Andy, Jason and Sam plan a rescue mission whilst an angry mob of Bon Temps residents retaliate in the only way they know how, by vowing to kill anything that isn’t human, even if it’s their own mayor.
In other news, Sookie and Alcide are loved up and living together, Pam searches the globe for Eric, Sarah Newlin is in hiding and on the run from pretty much everyone, including the Yakuza, and Bill does what he does best, wanders around brooding and pretending he’s not in love with Sookie.
Just about everybody is infected with Hep-V and Jessica is desperately trying to make up for eating the majority of Andy’s brood the previous season by protecting his only surviving faerie daughter; Adilyn.
Hep-V and its effect on humans and vampires alike is a main focus this season as is the demise of various relationships, including the volatile one between the humans and vampires of Bon Temps. But what should have been the saddest demise, Bill and Sookie’s relationship, is sort of…well…meh.
In short, this season is the weakest of all the seasons and at just ten episodes, it is also the shortest. While the season doesn’t completely suck, it doesn’t reach any great heights either.
It’s difficult not to feel short-changed by the convenience of pretty much everything that happens this season, not to mention the massive body count of characters many of which die pretty much as they lived; pointlessly. The biggest death of all though, which in earlier seasons would have caused hysteria, grief and outrage, leaves the audience feeling strangely indifferent. In fact, the entire season provokes this feeling.
It feels like the writers are saying ‘just trust us’ a little too much this season instead of actually crafting a plot that is both organic and satisfying. They seem to have run out of juice. Even Lafayette has lost his spunk. However, the hilarious scene where Ginger finally gets to have sex with Eric probably makes the whole thing worthwhile, as does the almost equally hilarious scene where Andy finds Wade in bed with Adilyn.
Raunchy sex scenes have never been in short supply on this show, but this season the supply has almost run dry. This is also the least violent of all the seasons, the least gory, the least quirky, the least sexy and the least tongue-in-cheek. Hello? True Blood? Are you in there?
After seven years, fans will no doubt expect more than this final season has to offer and will likely be booing the sickly sweet happily-ever-after ending. Rightly so. It’s a disappointing end to what was once a very satisfying series.
Farewell Fangbangers.
