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Today Dwimordene asked in which episode I had seen The Last Supper on black velvet that I mentioned in Sookie’s Sojourn. I love it when y’all call me on what I write because it always forces me to dig deeper and I invariably find buried treasure. That’s not to say I’m always right, just that y’all force me to hone and refine my ideas.

So I went searching for the photo of the Fangtasia set that showed The Last Supper front and center. I couldn’t find it, but I did run across this one, which convinced me that I hadn’t been hallucinating. You can see the bottom half of the painting up and to the left of the beer taps.

In this picture I also noticed the bust of Christ centered on the shelf over the taps. That’s…odd. Then I noticed the six bottles to the left of Jesus. And the light canister and six bottles to the right. Hmm…twelve vessels filled with spirits flanking Jesus, the light of the world? Could this be a second, more abstract Last Supper? Notice how the negative space between the bust and the bottle to the left echoes the negative space in the original between Christ and the figure on his left, the beloved desciple.

Notice how the simple plate and meager offering that Ginger holds out to Sookie could have been lifted right from the table in the painting?

Anyhoo, I kept searching, and eventually I found a better image of the painting.

Even though Bill’s head is obscuring the central figure, this is closer to what I recall. We don’t have a complete view of the second Last Supper in this view, either, but what we do have is intriguing. In this image there is a mixture of both bottles and cans to the left of the bust, but the number remains six, matched no doubt by six more on the other side.

Unfortunately I am technologically inept, but it is worthwhile to follow this link and click on the image to view it in high resolution. After you have taken in the full horror of the Last Supper on black velvet with colored twinkle lights, look at the V logo on the bottle of blood next to the bust. It too suggests the V shaped negative space between Jesus and John in Da Vinci’s original.

If you are a Dan Brown aficionado, which I am not, this bottled and canned Last Supper becomes even more suggestive. Brown popularized the idea that Leonardo secretly painted Mary Magdalen into the Last Supper where the apostle John should be. Frankly this is a load of caca because this is exactly how John was traditionally depicted, as an effeminate young man with long hair, but notice the connections between the Magdalen and Sookie. She was linked with Mary Magdalen when she washed Eric’s feet in DTTW. Brown claims that Mary Magdalen was a vessel for the holy blood of Jesus because she carried his child in her womb, and Sookie carries Eric’s healing blood in her veins. There is also a bit of green hanging directly over this bottle, and in the Sookieverse green is the color of life.

Reader Trixie alerted me that the image I was looking for could be found in the On the Set video that was released yesterday. Eric isn’t the only thing that got a makeover for the new season. Compare the bar below to the one form previous seasons. Fangtasia has gone upscale.

Gone are the two Last Suppers. They have been integrated and improved. The painting has been replaced by a more tasteful one, and it is centered over the bar where the bottled and canned Last Supper had been previously.

Now it corresponds directly with the snake that is mounted in the same spot over the bar at Merlotte’s making the same point that the s3 cast poster does.

In Christian mythology, Paradise was lost because of the Fall of the Virgin to the seduction of the Snake in the Garden. The only way it can be regained is through the Elixir of Life, the blood of Christ. In the allegory at the core of True Blood, Sam represents the first Adam, the one who lost Eve to the seductive powers of that deceitful and destructive snake, Bill. Eric is the second Adam, the Christ, whose blood will triumph over the snake and heal all wounds.

The setting of the cast poster for s3 is readily identifiable as after the Falll. What is not so apparent are the allusions to Da Vinci’s Last Supper, but they are there.* If fact, the poster is a representation of DaVinci’s masterpiece. Compare the composition of the poster to the original. The fallen tree trunk represents the table, which is symbolic of an altar. Eric is center in the composition and, like Jesus, has his arms outstretched. Sookie is in the place of the beloved disciple, and her reclining position provides the same V shaped negative space between her and Eric that I mentioned earlier. Like Judas, Bill is the only character to rest his arm unmannerly on the altar. The position of other cast members corresponds to the Last Supper.

Happily, it is now clear that AB intends to make the Christian symbolism overt this season, and I won’t have to suffer any more  intelligent people telling me I’m nuts to equate Eric with Christ. This is going to be a great season!

*Gigi and all the contributors at Sookieverse blog identified the similarities of the cast poster to The Last Supper.