True Blood – “Trouble” – review

Finally, FINALLY season 3 is getting somewhere.  Maybe everyone’s problem with the build up is more that, now that the series isn’t new, it isn’t as interesting to watch the problems being set up as it used to be, back when characters and the general situation were still unknown quantities.  Season 3 has been wavering between could get awesome, could prove the show already peaked, and now that we’re five episodes in, the situation has finally started to resolve into the clusterfuck we’ve been expecting all along.  Bill has pledged his troth to the King of Mississippi to keep Sookie safe.  Eric has pinned the V-selling on Bill in his absence and comes to Mississippi to hunt for him.  He finds Bill with the King.  He also finds out the King was the man who had his family slaughtered, on whom he swore vengeance in his dying father’s spreading blood.  Eric sent Sookie to Jackson with a werewolf whose pack leader knows that the vampire supplying the rival pack is the King.  The King wants Sookie as leverage against…well, all the vampires he knows from the Queendom of Louisiana, in one way or another.  Shit just got complicated.    

So, first of all, I LOVE Eric’s storyline.  I have always enjoyed his Viking Norseman hotitude, but I’m loving both getting to see more of his past and also watching him about to be the big savior of this situation (from the point of view of the characters we care about…wider vampire politics are irrelevant to us as an audience, but I am curious to know if, not having a relationship with Sookie and Friends, I would feel the same way about the situation—thoughts?).  All I could think when Eric’s flashback started was, The King of Mississippi just fucked up.  He didn’t realize it, and he ain’t gonna see it coming, but he now has a Viking bent on vengeance on his heels.  Tactical error to leave even one witness alive—classic blunder.  Also tactical error to let the local weres know he’s the vampire Area King, because Sookie knows people and word would have gotten around to Eric that the vampire working with the pack he has such nasty history with was the King.

A couple points on Bill.  First (although it’s not really like it was in doubt) Bill is totally not over Sookie.  When he hears she’s in Jackson he manages to beat the shit out of Cooter and his vamp guard to try and get to her.  Too bad all his urgency couldn’t do anything but (1) tell her he still cares and (2) lead the King’s men right to her.  Second, I find it curious that Bill has been tracking Sookie’s telepathy up her family tree.  I know the King tried to spin it like he’d been doing research on her for the Queen, but…really?  Are we actually supposed to fall for that?  I think it’s meant to be just a sign of the King’s vampire prejudice against humans being something worthy of love.

As to other goings-on… Who the hell is this Crystal Jason’s panting after?  And what is she?  Totally human?  If so, is it just her meth dealer husband/brother/father that makes her think she can’t be running around with Jason?  Or is she some kind of other supernatural thing that either can’t have something to do with a human, or can’t have something to do with a Stackhouse?  Curious.  Also.  Jason rolling up out of his stolen patrol car like he was on one of the romance novel covers I like to make fun of was CLASSIC.

Alcine is totally about to become the new packmaster of the Jackson pack.  I wonder if Debbie will come back to him then?  And if he’ll still want her?

I loved Sam sticking up for his brother and intervening when their dad tried to get violent.  I wonder what Jolie means when he says “I own him.”  Is it just crazy possessive parenting, or does he have some sort of hold over the mother and/or son related to their shifting?  Regardless, I was glad to see Sam stand up for the kid.  It’s obvious no one ever has.  I didn’t like Tommy at first, but he’s grown on me the more he gets away from his parents and under the influence of someone who’s worth following.  His flirting with Jessica was adorable.  If she and Hoyt don’t figure things out, I would enjoy seeing her and Tommy hook up.  He’d be trouble, but, then, she was all about getting into trouble right after she got away from her own parents.  They might actually be good for each other. 

And on the note of good for each other…how adorable was Jesus’s showing up to flirt with Lafayette?  The whole time I was just thinking, Wait, Lafayette can actually blush?   He must REALLY like this dude!  Sadly, I was more interested and anxious about their sexual tension than pretty much any of the others going on right now.  (Well, I mean, think about it:  with Bill and Sookie, either he comes back and they’re sweet and boring again, or he leaves her and I hate the storyline; I’m not into the Eric obsessing over Sookie bit so I can’t even count that, because I don’t want it to go anywhere; Jason I just can’t take seriously; and of course Tara is just a hot mess so it’s hard to ever believe she’s got something good happening…and I am not implying that I think Franklin is any good, lol). 

Speaking of Franklin—obviously, he’s an old friend of Russell.  And he got the lion’s share of good quotes this week:

• “You have no idea how much you’ve hurt me.  I feel like I’ve been staked!” 
• “We need to talk.” / “Don’t say that. Women say that, everything goes black, and I wake up surrounded by body parts!”
• “This one is spectacularly different.  She’s such a fucking disaster—we could be twins! The attraction is…electric.”  / “Franklin, you’re a HUGE freak.”
• “Last time I gave you cash you went to the slots in Biloxi and ended up slaughtering a group of old church ladies.” / “They wouldn’t let me have a turn!”
• “Watch how fast I type ‘motherfucker.’  I’ll delete it so you can watch again.”

The others:

• “I am NOT gonna die because of your shitty girlfriend and a Mississippi pothole!”
• “Oh, heeeeelllll no.  you’re fucking MY wolf, bitch.  In MY house!  I’m’a fuck you up!  I will cut you!”
• “This is what people do, Sam.  They make each other laugh.  They move in together.  They raise kids.  They get fat and grow old together.  It’s normal.  And it’s happening to ME!”  (This one was sentimental not funny.)

So, yeah, great episode.  Had enough reveals to really hook us on the overarching story action, and the cliffhanger with Sookie blasting the werewolf with her WTF-is-that power and the King chortling with glee—and thus falling under the spell of Sookie Obsession as well, no doubt—was well placed.  Can’t wait to see what goes wrong next!

Check out a teaser for next week’s episode!