by Osterby
Season 1
Episode 1, Strange Love
Commentary by Alan Ball
- Nan Flanagan is the Ann Coulter or Dana Perino of vampires
- Wanted teeth on vampires to be like rattlesnakes
- Title sequence shows that humans need to have transcendent experience
- Sookie’s wardrobe has a sort of 1950’s glamour
- When Sookie reads people’s thoughts look for hidden nuggets in the beginning and end of the thoughts
- Score: Avoids electronic music, use old historical musical instruments
- Bill is drawn to Sookie because she reminds him of women he knew when he was a young man, and now he’s used to women throwing themselves at him, so she’s different
- Sookie’s mind reading: When she needs to be able to hear someone, she touches them.
- AB feels Sookie and Bill’s gothic romance is the heart of the series
- Anna feels Bill’s words in her vagina
Episode 2, The First Taste
Commentary by Anna Paquin and Scott Winant, Director
- When Bill gives Sookie blood for the first time, a sensual moment, transfusion, first intercourse
- Plot point removed when Sookie goes to the Ratts trailer, the fairy thing
- Freak accident of the Newlins, was that Bill’s Fault?
- Green and white dress is an epic Sookie outfit
- Bill remembers his mortal life when he’s with Sookie
- Bill is such a gentleman
- Anna and Sookie are one and the same.
- When Tara is talking to Jane Bodehouse over the bar she is actually talking to her mother – Lettie Mae
Episode 4, Escape From Dragon House
Commentary by Brian Breckner, Writer and Michael Lehmann, Director
- If you take too much vampire blood, it has serious side effects
- Vampire blood is like a combination of ecstasy, Viagra and crystal meth
- Eric is the George Sanders of vampires
- When vampires glamour, no blinking
- Sookie likes to out people for their racism
- Eric’s power is quiet and still
- Pam – It’s like every day is Halloween
- Sam has inexplicable amounts of money
Episode 5, Sparks Fly Out
Commentary by Stephen Moyer and Ban Minahan, Director
- Vampire blood effects people in different ways, Sookie had lost nearly all her blood, so Sookie has increased libido but does not react in a hallucinogenic way. It depends on the vampire the blood comes from.
- V-Keys in on the person’s temperament, Jason is a sex addict so it effects him differently.
- Bill makes difficult decision to kill boy in the field
- You Enter the flashback through Bill and Exit through Jason, shows a blood connection in a way between Bill and Jason, now that Jason has taken the V.
- Season is setting up that Sam opened his business in Bon Temps because of his complete love for Sookie, he has to let her go and be who she is.
- BC mourns for his human life
- Sam has duality, a benevolent force with magical powers of uncontrollable force, a rage behind him. Really doesn’t like vampires
- We have a good idea that Bill is innocent of the murders of Maudette and Dawn
- Bill has problems with authority figures
- The iron toaster is representative of Bill’s last meal as a human
- Lorena’s tough the night she makes Bill is the first touch Bill has had from a woman in 2-3 years, he is emotionally at war, tries to fight it, he’s pushed to the limit starving in every way.
- Bill’s a principled person with beliefs and convictions and didn’t want to be a vampire
- Bill is physically incapable of staying when he see his family after he is turned. Lorena magnetically draws him back
- Sookie seems to be watched by what seems to be Sam. Sam watches very carefully
Episode 7, Burning House of Love
Commentary by Marco Siega, Director
- The first time Sookie has sex in her life, Bill actually has feelings for Sookie, feeling re-awakened in Bill because Sookie isn’t afraid of him.
- Sookie shares intimate moment with Bill in tub-Bill realizes what she has done for him
- Another first for Bill-showing Sookie where he rests for the day
- Eric is a sort of King of Vampires
- Assigns Credo-Nothing is real, everything is permitted. Hashish –would justify what they are about to do, gives them permission.
Episode 11, To Love is to Bury
Commentary by Nancy Oliver, Writer/Director
- V-Trips no consistency to them, developed them as they were shot
- First time Eric loosens up a bit
- Sookie’s relationship with Sam is relaxed, close, warm, relaxing
- Bill’s relationship with Sookie is passionate, dramatic, frought
Osterby, thanks for this huge undertaking! These commentaries certainly deserve a fresh look. I had forgotten the comment about Jason and Bill being linked through the blood. The implication is that Jason was getting high on Bill’s blood. This certainly supports the idea that Bill had a deal with the Rattrays.
[Vampire blood effects people in different ways, Sookie had lost nearly all her blood, so Sookie has increased libido but does not react in a hallucinogenic way. It depends on the vampire the blood comes from.]
OH, Please… depends on the vampire, or depends on their plot? This is lame, meh!!!!!
But it is canon. How many times has CH said the same thing?
Don’t know, Renne, but from Canon I never understood that that vampire blood affect people in different ways. In fact, I always have understand that the way the blood affetcs (its effects) are the same, but the INTENSITY of that effects depends on the age of the vampire. That, in the case of blood that’s been drink directly from the vampire. But I think TB isn’t making any difference between the concepts of this kind vampire blood with the V (which has completely different effects), after I hear that the werewolf that attacked Eric at Sookie’s house called V the blood of Eric as soon as he noticed that Eric was wounded.
Gigi, the conversation between Laffy and Jason establishes that on TB V affects people in different ways. He told Jason he felt Eddie’s strength when he took his V but that Jason may get ‘another part of him’.
Also, I think if a person is injured and drinks directly from the vampire HEALING will be the only effect. Someone taking the blood directly from the vamp when they are not injured will result in a drug-like effect. Both the were-bitch and ‘creepy biker’ felt Eric’s strength and were able to temporarily overpower him. It is my intuition that if a person is injured taking V from a vial would also have a healing effect.
I agree that TB isn’t distinguishing between fresh blood and V, but that always seemed to be for CH’s expediency rather than logic’s sake to me, so I don’t mind the change.
Here’s what CH says on her website:
Q. What’s the deal with the blood bond? Why do some people go crazy when they drink the blood of drained vampires? Why doesn’t Sookie get high when she takes blood from Bill or Eric?
A. Here goes: everything’s variable when it comes to vampire blood being ingested by humans. There is no formula that says, for example, that 2 ounces of vamp blood will make every blood junkie go nuts. Vampire blood is like any other street drug in that respect. The variables include the age of the blood (how long it’s been out of the vampire), the age of the vampire, and the mental condition and previous drug use of the imbiber. Blood taken straight from the vampire does not necessarily make the drinker high, unless he or she is already an addict. A blood bond may be formed when a vampire and a human exchange blood, though often it takes more than once. It also may depend on the emotional bond existing between them.
When CH says that everything is variable, that squares with my impression from the books. In my next read through, I’ll try to pinpoint exactly how I got that impression. It doesn’t look like it’s from DUD.
IDK, I’ve had some wild experiences with a family member taking (legal) psychoactive drugs and being affected differently than most other people, so it doesn’t seem all that odd to me.
Yes girls, I understand what you are trying to say and you are completely right (and actually a while ago I think it was to bobsgran who asked here for the difference and I answered it (according to CH). But my point is that in the show they haven’t been clear establishing a difference between what is V and it’s effects vs. what is the vapire blood that is drink straight from the vampire and its effects. THAT differentiation isn’t clear, especially because the were at Sookie’s called Eric’s blood “V” at the moment he saw him bleeding from the shot.
And I would like to know, I need to know, to understand the show, if for them both concepts are the same or not. I need to know this to understand the dynamic of a BB between a human and a vampire. And because if the werewolf was true about Eric’s blood calling it V, then I would need to ask if people that buy V will have the same effects of those that drink vamp blood and make bonds with a vamp….
LOL, I hope that you understand the logic behind my point hahaha.
LOL! Now I get it, and it would be nice to get some specifics, especially how it relates to the BB. With Sam knowing some much about Bill’s real condition in his dream, it looks like consuming vamp blood creates a 2 way link. I would think that would be added incentive for drainers to make sure they kill their victim.
And don’t forget, the maker of the donor vamp also seems to have at least a tenuous link to the human recipient, ie your theory about Lorena invading Sookie’s dream in IWRU. Not only that but Jason’s hieroglyph exam could have come from Eddie’s maker. In the meta sense, of course the exam was a message to the audience, but within the logic of the show hieroglyphs had to have come from an ancient being. Was Russell Eddie’s maker?
I was amazed at all the references by different commenters regaring Hoyt and Maxine’s scenes having a Tennessee Williams feel.
Yes, that’s certainly striking, and worth exploring. Olivia did mistake Bill for Stanley.
On the same note of Southern angst, The Joanne Woodward and Macbeth references make me think of Faulker’s Sound and Fury. The stream of conscious narrative tells the story of the once aristocratic Compson family. One of the narrators is mentally ill.
The title of the novel is taken from Macbeth’s soliloquy in act 5, scene 5 of William Shakespeare’s Macbeth:
“Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.”
It seems to have all the TW hallmarks–claustrophobic, dysfunctional family relationships hiding the truth behind a thin veneer of decaying Southern gentility.
To quote Sunny. “Wheels within wheels.”
The Wickerman comment is right on target. It’s one of those ground breaking cult classics AB seems to like and the speech explaining how the sacrifice was chosen sounds like MA’s explanation to Sookie about Sam coming to her as a virgin. From wikipedia:
Summerisle reveals to an astounded Howie that the entire mystery was an elaborate hoax conspired by the islanders to bring Howie to them. Howie, not Rowan, is the intended sacrifice, and the islanders believe his death will restore the fertility of their orchards. Lord Summerisle and his followers explain to Howie that he is the ideal sacrifice because he came to them of his own free will; as a virgin.
Rowan was used as bait to bring Howie to the island the way MA used Sookie to bring Sam.
There is also talk in the movie about the magical properties of hares. I wonder if that’s what MA carried in the morning after the last orgy.
It was a sort of rabbit. In the commentaries, they said MF is a vegan, and the rabbit was made by a Peta approved company as to not offend MF’s lifestyle.
sorry, it was a sort of rabit
OK. It looks like hares are pretty much the same as jack rabbits, which is what I would have called MA’s prey.
I couldn’t find much in the way of magic, but there is a lot of folklore and mythology tie in that could be relevant to MA.
*Because of its fertility (one doe can produce 42 young a year), the hare is an emblem of fertility, abundance, sexuality, lust, rampant growth and excess. It became the emblem of gods and goddesses such as Venus, Aphrodite, and Cupid. Philostratus said the most suitable sacrifice to Aphrodite was the hare as ‘it possesses her gift of fertility in a superlative degree’. Pliny the Elder prescribed its meat as a cure for female sterility and reported that if you ate a hare your body would be sexually attractive for nine days.
*The genitals were used in aphrodisiac potions.
*The hare was sacred in many ancient European traditions which associate it with moon deities and the deities of the hunt. In earliest times killing and eating the hare was taboo. In Kerry, Ireland, it is said that eating a hare was like eating your grandmother. This restriction was lifted at Beltane (Celts) and the festival of Ostara (Anglo-Saxons), when a ritual hare-hunt would take place.
Which version of The Wicker Man have you seen?
Neither. LOL! I’m a total wuss when it comes to horror movies. Psycho is about my limit. I looked up info about the original movie in wikipedia.
The original version is brilliant, it’s well worth watching, a real classic.
I’ve never seen Salo by Pasolini and I was advised not to by a friend who’s a film buff. From what he told me about it and how it made him feel I think it was good advice. I’ve seen some of his other films, he’s an important and influential film maker.
It’s interesting that AB seems to have seen it though as it’s still very controversial.
Thanks for the recommendation. It sounds intriguing. I think I’ll add it to my queue.
I definitely won’t be watching Salo, but the themes and some of the plot elements are explored in TB. Comparing SA’s poolside lineup to this is REALLY ominous.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sal%C3%B2,_or_the_120_Days_of_Sodom
Oh anna, I has spelled Salo as Salo to begin, I shouldm’t second guess myself.
I’ll fix that.
Oh Renee! In season 1 ep 2, Bill is ‘such’ a gentleman, not ‘suck’ a gentleman….Freudian slip??? See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freudian_slip
ROTFL! Are you SURE you want me to change it?
Me too…..I was laughing so had I was crying!!!
oops hard…lmao
You know I think I read these things before I send em off to cyber space…it must be a disease…typosis…
I don’t know what it is, but things that look fine to me suddenly are full of glaring typos once they are published.
I make typos all the time. I re-read what I write but they still slip through.
Yep, the Marquis de Sade wrote some quite depraved stuff and Salo was the most extreme. It does seem rather ominous but it is TV and since the film and book have both been banned at times it’s unlikely they’ll take it too far. Just throw in a visual reference or two for those in the know & then point it out to the rest of us.
There is no way they can get close to the graphic nature of that film, but just comparing it to what is going on at SA’s puts her in a very dark light and will probably have implications for the human trafficking theme, which may bust out into a storyline in a future season.
Hey Osterby,
I’m brain dead at the moment. What is SFP?
“AW looked forward to the SFP scene the most.”
If you’re interested in reading more about the ideas and politics behind Pasolin’s version of Salo there’s a good article here
http://www.bfi.org.uk/features/salo/foreword.html
I’d forgotten that his motive was supposed to be political as was de Sade’s. I’d already come to the conclusion that one of the main themes this season is political extremism and considering that they are referencing Pasolini in relation to QSA I’ll have a think about what else there might be. Since there’s already been an oblique reference to the Fascists and they’ve now introduced Nazis there might be some other allusions.
SFP is what SVB calls the ‘Stupid Fucking Proposal’.
I knew the Marquis de Sade would enter into this somewhere, in fact I poked around trying to find a connection the other night.
SFP! ROTFL!
What made you think of him?
Anna it was Pam’s background of Isabel in the character perspectives. Pam said Isabel had been turned by her French lover. It seems that the vampires of TB have been written as having many identities, mostly famous people. De Sade, sort of fit.
Osterby, glad I was able to make the connection. Is there anyone else that you think might fit into things but can’t find a connection to?
Once again don’t know if this has been brought up and I could be totally off but I just noticed something that has me extra confused and I’m not sure where to put this but quick question.
I heard they had some problems S1 but at any point did anyone on TB mention not being able to be film at certain locations and them having to improvise. If not, someone were either reeeaaally sloppy or someone’s screwing with the narrative more than we thought.
There was a lot of trouble with the pilot wtih the writers strike, but I don’t recall anything about locations. What have you found?
One moment there’s a few caps.