The Invention Of Roses

Recapped by Jacob Clifton · Aired 07-08-2012 · S05E05

Jason and Andy wake up naked on their various home couches, Jason rocked by the revelation that his parents were killed by vampires (which connects with his sexual abuse stuff in a bizarre, awful dream) and Andy unfazed as usual... Even when Sam admits that he's a shapeshifter and that's why his buds are dead. Which, on that note, only Emma seems to survive the major shooting spree that takes out both Sam and Luna, which seems to me to be perpetrated by the Fellowship, who -- based on their "generic African-American presidential-looking" masks -- one must admit are probably feeling a little wayward at this point.

Alcide and Sookie's lovefest is interrupted by A) her barfing and B) the Boys showing up, since Alcide and Sookie are actually the main point of the Russell storyline. They spend the whole episode -- this was cool in effect but I can't figure out how to say how cool it was -- sorta remote-controlling this one contractor employee of Alcide's who was glamoured into letting Russell free. Probably this was Salome, although the show cutely thinks it's Nora -- whose terrorist hardcoreness continues to make her one of the coolest people this show has ever come up with -- but either case, the episode ends up unexpectedly with Sookie and her three boyfriends, plus Doug, uncovering the still-very-ratsucking Russell... Who abruptly turns the tables on all of them in a way that is not entirely clear.

...I just want to talk about Tara! Okay, so what else happened. Jason and Andy investigate the shifter thing and talk their Cassandra way out of even caring about faeries, as per, and Sam and Luna get shot, I already said that. I guess that's what was going on there. Everybody says that stuff is just whatever, but it really is a huge part of the show and the episode was divided up in a pretty equitable way, really, so now ... No wait.

Terry and Dude get tied up by Ellers, and ... okay, remember our talk about how stories get back-burnered? This is an example. Every episode so far, there's been basically more of the same shit, the same flashbacks and whatever. Blah blah Iraq My Lai. That's not because it's unimportant, exactly, it's because it doesn't matter yet, so every episode by every writer has an obligatory scene moving this along.

In this case, Terry himself saw one of their victims curse them with an ifrit, which if you aren't familiar with ceremonial or high magick, which you probably are at this point, is basically a Fire Elemental, shoggoth, pet-that-isn't, magickally speaking. Like, imagine the brooms from that Mickey Mouse cartoon, but if it were elementally a spirit of fire and not water, and was interested in killing this whole squad and everybody they love, even Arlene. Mindless -- which is new for this show -- and all about one thing, fucking everything up. Like if Sookie were made of fire, I guess.

Oh, and Lafayette is having similar probs where he has demon face and even his momma gets a visitation from Jesus's disembodied head telling her secret things about how Lafayette is in big trubs. I forgot this part until just now because it's not that amazing, but he is dealing with his sudden demon face, and trouncing on all of Jesus's iconography in his demon face tantrums, and now has to deal with Mommy.

Anyway, Ellers dies and Terry remembers (?) how he totally saw the ifrit rise from the flames after he personally -- that's important -- "death checked" A.K.A. "murdered" this one Iraqi lady who was just alive enough to remember her "curse Terry with an ifrit" skillz. None of which is interesting yet -- that's more of a Third Act thing, as usual with Terry and Arlene -- because...

TARA AND PAM! ARE SO AWESOME!

Tonight's episode was written by Angela Robinson, who happens to be black, and happens to be a lesbian, and happens to have written D.E.B.S., which is like my favorite movie ever. (I love it so much I remember when I watched it with my BFF/future father of my padawan, it became his and his in-a-months'-time wife's fave, and every time we got in the car "A Little Respect" would play, which is a total magic psychic reference to that movie.)

Anyway, what that means in practice is that all the privilege stuff from that first episode that drove me fucking crazy gets hogtied and backwards-fucked, even more than it did in the brilliant third episode, because we're in a safe space that is created by a brilliant black gay woman who knows where the exits are, and is a good writer on top of it. And if you didn't notice a difference, that's even better, because that's how privilege works. And that's why we need wonderful women like Raelle Tucker and Angela Robinson, because even when they're not trying, they're doing it.

So the whole question is, how is the Tara/Pam thing going to work? Because on the one hand, they need each other and love each other and I need a daughter and you need a mother and Godric's Line and all that stuff -- but on the other hand, they are both assholes. Well, how that works out is Jessica.

Do you remember how I got about Godric's suicide? That's how prepared I am to talk about this scene, where Princess Baby tells Three-Day-Old Baby (in the midst of her fifteenth racism breakdown, even) exactly how it is. It's a lesbian coming-out, it's a "sorry you died" coming out, it's a vampire thing... God, it's everything. Everything this show would be about, if this show were actually about vampires, Jess covers. Everything this show is actually about, because this show is about what it's like to be a person, Jess covers. You're looking at five pages of the recap, minimum. I cried real tears. Fat ones. Not of blood, because I'm not a vampire*, but it touched me in a Godric way.

...And then comes Hoyt, looking like a fangbang for real (*although if, because holy shit, somehow bright purple just brings out more of the Hoyt in our boy) and pulls out every stop and pushes every button, and you can see Tara thinking, "Man, if this were S1 you'd totally be just as good as Jason," and she takes him in the WC. And who's there? Jessica. So immediately Big Sis and Little Sis get into it, and that's the cliffhanger for them. But I don't give a shit. Tara, Jessica and Pam in a three-way momma/sister fight? That's so much hotter than sex. It's so good. It literally is so good.

And the whole time the Authority is piling pressure on the Boys, or wondering if there's a third problem in their ranks after the previously surprising Little Drew or the ongoing awesome shock that is fantastic Nora, you just keep thinking, "This is very interesting. But man, did I always think Tara should be the best fucking thing this show ever did. And now she is. Again, always, finally, forever."

...Until week, when they bone her again. But somehow I trust th... No, I'll say it. I trust this season. Between the third and tonight's fifth episode (of 13, so I'm not really jumping the gun), I haven't been this excited about a season overall in a long time. Yes, Book Five people, there will be more shootings. But for now, Sam and Luna are both dying on a lawn, which already makes the shooting part more awesome. Glad to see him, and glad to see their storylines back where they belong! I actually missed old Luna!

See you week, when Russell gets on up out of bed, Jessica and Tara fight over Hoyt for like five seconds before Pam nails them both, and Sookie continues to take care of everything. You have a week to understand why -- in this house, at least -- D.E.B.S. by a hair replaced Romy & Michelle in the Cruel Intentions/Mean Girls rewatch trifecta. Worth it.

PREVIOUSLY

Alcide's man Doug was glamoured during Russell's release, to what end we don't know but can guess, and more moles were discovered in the highest ranks of the Authority. Sam reconnected with his Shifter friends for a second, but then they got shot in their heads; Patrick and Terry found Ellers in some kind of anti-monster hideout. A fellow faerie told Jason that his parents were killed by vampires, and Pam taught Tara about eating people. And as the Boys watched from outside, regrettably, Sookie finally put the moves on Alcide.

LOL OUTSIDE

Eric: "This is boring. Watching that girl climb a werewolf is boring now that I don't have amnesia."
Bill: "Would that Ah could catch a fleeting case of that affliction."
Eric: "Seriously, aren't we supposed to be looking for Russell?"
Bill: "Perhaps we should consider using his prey as our own bait, since he's bound to come looking for her anon."
Eric: "You mean, Let's pretend to be selfish about it, but really the plan is just to stick as close to her as possible, like always?"
Bill: "Ah just want you to think Ah am cool, Sherriff Northman. It is an uphill battle."

Alcide: "Sookie, I weigh about fourteen of you and we've had the same amount to drink. Now, I've seen Veronica Mars, so I know what date rape is..."
Sookie: "Hush, puppy."

Alcide gets naked enough that it's not a total waste, but then Sookie barfs all over him... Just in time for the Boys to show up in the doorframe, kind of amazed at the knowledge that Shrieking Fangbanger was apparently the best possible version of Sookie Stackhouse.

LAFAYETTE

Is still flipping out over his Demon Face issues, and ends up wrecking shop on Jesus's Santeria shrine in a particularly destructive way -- mostly because all the icons are still Wonderfallsing all over him. In a bizarre about-face, this happens:

Lafayette: "Are you there, God? It's me, Lafayette. And hooker, I am tired of this shit."
God: "Oh, life is suffering, bitch."
Lafayette: "Compared to other people on this show, I have only done things that were culturally negative, not ethically so! Drug-dealing, but that's it!"
God: "No, your stupid ass still blames yourself for Jesus dying, just like dumb-ass Sookie does about Debbie Pelt."
Lafayette: "This is still too much! Self-control is not my forte!"
God: "Why do you think we're here?"

By Jacob Clifton

He continues talking about his life as a good person and asking God for a sign, while simultaneously smashing God into little bits on his living room carpet. So yeah, Lala's doing great.

Lafayette: "Jesus? My dead boyfriend one, not the... Listen, I know you didn't show up before, when your body disappeared from my hand chair and Sookie wouldn't stop bugging me, but I could really use a sign right now that you are available for a chat, or just to like hold my hand for a second."

God: "You see your footprints all over my iconography? Notice how there's only one set?"

ELLER

Forces Patrick and Terry to tie each other up at gunpoint, asking if anything followed them there. At some point when they're both tied down, it begins to dawn on them that they probably should not have come here. Well, at least one person is interested in this storyline.

JASON

Has an inception situation where he dreams of himself, in little-kid sleepover pajamas, giggling at breakfast with Li'l Sookie and generally having a ball. Of course, their parents immediately start bleeding from neck bites, into their cereal, and then just in case that was too on-the-nose, Mama Stackhouse finally shows interest in her kids by offering Jason a beej. It's a bit much, altogether, although the music is a nice touch: Just like Bill's music with Lorena always felt like his music with Sookie played backwards in a dark mirror, the Stackhouse music always sounds like Gran, transposed, and here it's twisted again; makes it just that much more awful and weird.

JASON & ANDY

Wake up in the nude, having somehow gotten home and passed out after being faerie-blasted at the conclusion of last night's revelry. Over at Camp Bellefleur, Arlene yells at Andy about how his phone is going to wake up the baby, and continues to scream until she wakes up the baby. God, how I hate her. Anyway, Rosie is calling both of them to the scene of a crime.

RUSSELL HUNT

Bill: "But don't you remember that time we grossly overpowered Tara's mental blocks to get her out of the Maryann cult?"
Sookie: "That was a special case. I'm not sure I could just walk over to Alcide's guy Doug and unglamour him. And btw, why are you just now approaching me about this?"
Alcide: "Vampire bullshit is the bullshittiest bullshit."
Eric: "Uh, werewolf bullshit is ten times stupider than vampire bullshit. Check the tape."
Bill: "Depending on how well the Fanguinistas are taking care of him, he could be on his way right now to eat Sookie. All up. So it's not really a favor-favor..."

Alcide: "Vampire bullshit is the bullshittiest bullshit."
Eric: "Uh, werewolf bullshit is ten times stupider than vampire bullshit. Check the tape."
Bill: "Depending on how well the Fanguinistas are taking care of him, he could be on his way right now to eat Sookie. All up. So it's not really a favor-favor..."

Alcide: "Why didn't you just kill him when you had the shot?"
Eric: "I don't want to talk about Godric right now, but I will make the Godric face."

Alcide and Eric get into a grump-fight, and a still-drunk Sookie chills out and laughs, watching them through her hands. The only thing she can hear is a sound like dogs barking at each other, which is not only hilarious but astute: The only person whose thoughts she can even slightly hear are Alcide's. So if you turn off your hungover ears because they're being annoying, that metaphorical sound is all you would literally hear.

Sookie: "Sorry for laughing, it's just that this show is ridiculous. I pick one of you idiots, the world ends. I pick the other one, the world ends. I pick the right one, I barf on his six-pack. There is no right choice, there is just my life. So yeah, a minute after we all break up with each other, I got all three hot boyfriends up in my shit talking about Oh, a three thousand-year-old vampire druid is on his way over here to suck your blood. Which: Fine, must be Sunday. Right? So come on. Get your shit. Let's boot and rally, let's find Russell, let's rush face-first into the jaws of death. Fuck it."

The screen door is still ripped out from Tara's zooming monster breakdown the other night, so she even gets to toss a "thanks, Tara" over her shoulder as she climbs through. Attagirl. Everybody on this show thinks that one more thing is going to do it and everything will be perfect, so they keep doing the most awful dumb things to make that happen. Like Lafayette begging to God to come take God away. Just say fuck it. Just do the Stackhouse and get over it. Rock and roll, deal with it.

FANGTASIA!

Pam: "...You actually look halfway decent."
Tara, who certainly does: "If I wanted to look like a drag queen, I would've raided Lafayette's closet."

What she looks like is Ragged Robin during her Dark Phoenix/Kissing Mister Quimper period, which is to say she looks awesome and slightly uncomfortable. She looks, also, bummed out to have moved from one bartending position to another. One of the terrible things about life after death is that often, you still have to make money. Just ask Kelly Link or Bryan Fuller.

By Jacob Clifton

Pam: "Fangtasia!'s mine now, and we're understaffed, so make yourself useful."
Tara: "So basically I'm your slave? The more things change, the more they fucking stay the same."
Pam: "I am of another time and don't understand the undertones of what you are saying."

Various vampers and fangbangers starting hitting on Tara immediately, so you know it's only a matter of time until... There it is. She bites into a cute blonde girl, dragging her hilariously over the bar and then dropping her on her head when Pam snatches Tara away and holds her, about halfway up the wall, by the throat.

Blonde: "So I guess I'll be looking for another outlet for my self-destructive tendencies."
Pam: "Repeat after me. I will never, ever, ever fucking feed in public where people can see me and report me to the goddamn authorities [or the Authority, more importantly]."
Tara: "I thought I was supposed to eat people! You made me eat people!"
Pam: "Listen close. I saved your fucking life, and lent you some truly exquisite clothes. But if you do anything to mess with Fangtasia!, I will silver you and stick you in a coffin to rot until the millennium. Understand?"
Tara: "No! My constant oppression! ...But yes."

HERVEAUX

Sookie: "Would you mind terribly if I took a little peek inside your head?"

Nice manners, Sook. And Doug obliges.

But also, this danger she's in just gets more and more overdetermined, doesn't it? Like, the show has played it pretty close -- ever since Maryann and Queen Sophie Anne -- that it's about her blood, about how anybody who knows she is/there are faerie has to be killed to prevent her death/a genocide. But just like in S1 and in the books, there's also the fact of her telepathy itself. She can't read vampires, which is why she's still alive, but she can read their human familiars just fine... And if it gets out that she can fuck with glamours -- which is, if you think about it, the #1 survival adaptation vampires have, it's basically the codes to the entire universe in terms of how things work in real life -- that's more dangerous than anything else she could possibly do. So she's good food and a dangerous wild card, both at the same time. Isn't that interesting?

By Jacob Clifton

That night, Doug was eating nachos when a lady came into the office, glamoured him, forced him to help her dig up Russell -- with her vampire hands! -- and carry him out of there and to a safe spot somewhere else.

Sookie: "Wait! She has a necklace. A pendant, like a spider or... A bat?"
Boys: "As will be confirmed in the scene, that's a thing that Authority ladies wear."
Bill: "So, and Ah know Ah've asked you this a dozen times, but are you absolutely sure you didn't tell yer Fanguinista girlfriend/sister that we buried Russell alive?"
Eric: "Again, no."
(Every time Bill mentions Nora, his voice gets really shrill and extreme to make sure Sookie can hear him talking about Nora, because he is a child.)
Bill: "Ah do not believe you. You told me that you and Nora, your girlfriend/sister you never told any of us about, share everything. Every thang. Because you love each other so very much, and she is the one true mate of yore existence, and no mortal or fae woman could ever compare."
Eric: "You're a dork. She saved both our lives. She may be a terrorist and religious fundamentalist, but she also loved me enough to do that, and probably died for it. So pull your ass together."

Sookie: "What're y'all talkin' about?"
Boys: "Nothing."

AUTHORITY

Baby Eater taunts Nora in her cell, because the show is not done proving me super wrong about the awesomeness of Nora, who is swiftly becoming the most awesome person on the show. And the whole time, she's in this intense religious posture on the floor that makes what she's saying somehow carry real weight; it's the kind of composed, fluid, supplicant shot that was the best thing about Antonia last year.

Baby Eater: "Chancellor Drew is dead! You served him up like a lamb to slaughter! Drew is goo, Drew is goo..."
Nora: "We will rise up. The warriors of Lilith are coming for you. Coming for all of you. Your nights of sacrilege are numbered, Roman!"

Diedrich turns on the UV halos at this point, overhead, so they are quickly concerned with other things. But it's a nice little moment.

By Jacob Clifton

Upstairs, the Authority is hilariously bitching about the Boys' inability to get anything done, from what the GPS is saying. Of course, there's no way for them to know what's really going on -- that they've inducted the faerie-sleuthing powers of their ex-girlfriend and her werewolf beau to solve the murder as quickly as possible -- which is good, for several reasons and more all the time, but also brings up the question of why they didn't just actually install mics in those S&M getups along with the rest of it.

Whining Authoritarians: "They dawdled about Bon Temps! Visited the home of a local waitress! Went to the Kwik-E-Mart for a jumbo coffee and box of Nutter Butters! Traveled by van to a parking facility in Shreveport!"

...Which, how is that not exactly what they should be doing? There'd be no point in concealing, at this point, the location of Mississippi's former incarceration, so why is this a sticking point? Must be the Nutter Butters. Which also, how did they know that. Credit cards, I guess. Vampire ones. I wish there was a vampire The Wire, first of all because it would be so much easier if your bad guys were only awake half the day to do their crimes, but mostly because I wish everything was vampires all the time and all TV shows had vampires. Mark my words, this is a trend that is about to take off.*

Authority: "Please notify Mr. Compton and Mr. Northman that the Guardian has instructed that they have until dawn to find Russell Edgington or they will be terminated."
Molly: "Check. Am I still adorable? Also check."

*(Speaking of, though, have you been picking up this mermaid vibe lately? All week long, everywhere I go, random mermaids. How long has this been going on? Start your YA pitches now, because mermaids are about to hit or I'm behind the curve and are already hitting.)

Roman: "Chancellor Drew was a great man... I thought he was a great man, we drafted the VRA together. He was deeply committed to mainstreaming. How could he lose his way? How could I not see it?"

Roman and Salome dig on that crystal philter with the Lilith Blood in it, and then it turns out that's not even really Lilith's blood, just some whatever blood.

Roman: "It's like transubstantiation..."
Salome: "Yeah, like how many bajillion people have died over the centuries because of a stupid fight about whether or not magic cardboard bread is really magic or just mostly magic. People who concretize faith that way really get my goat. Like, why does it matter that evolution is real? It clearly is a fact of the universe, it's not hurting anybody and it wouldn't even if it weren't true."
Roman: "And why are atheists so stupid about it too? It's like watching a fight between two second-graders about how old you have to be for a driver's license. When you don't know anything about a subject, everything's up for debate."
Salome: "And yet millions of intelligent people manage to reconcile their faith with reality, every single day."
Roman: "And don't get shit for it, because they know to shut the fuck up about it. So then all that's left is this pathetic conversation between morons and autistics about shit like dinosaurs and Santa Claus."
Salome: "Well, and us. Talking about how superior we are in another room."
Roman: "Doesn't mean we're wrong. Either way, it just seems like a lot of wasted energy."
Salome: "Speaking of, this conversation."

Salome: "And yet millions of intelligent people manage to reconcile their faith with reality, every single day."
Roman: "And don't get shit for it, because they know to shut the fuck up about it. So then all that's left is this pathetic conversation between morons and autistics about shit like dinosaurs and Santa Claus."
Salome: "Well, and us. Talking about how superior we are in another room."
Roman: "Doesn't mean we're wrong. Either way, it just seems like a lot of wasted energy."
Salome: "Speaking of, this conversation."

Roman: "Right, so we're two Chancellors down, and you're clearly a spy, or revving me up for some third reason..."
Salome: "You know how I've been saying you should toss some deterrent action their way and scare them to death? Flip that and reverse it. Now I think you should pander."
Roman: "No way! Those fuckos will take everything, refuse to read a single word of anything in front of them, and still end up flying planes into the IRS building."
Salome: "Or you throw a broad-band bone to the entire religious base, whether they're nutsacks or terrorists or moderates. Also known as being a responsible leader, of course, but in this exact political moment also a canny move."
Roman: "Well okay, but only because I can't see that you are clearly working an agenda here."

ELLER

Terry looks around Eller's insane compound, covered in pictures of everything on fire, having just been kidnapped and tied down by him, and pulls this Brainy Smurf nonsense:

Terry: "Well, there's no denying it. Eller's the firebug."

Thanks for catching us up, Terry. I can't wait for your sudden revelation in about ten years that you married the worst human being on the planet. Eller comes back down to give them more crazy eyes, and they beg him to chill. But chill, he will not.

By Jacob Clifton

Eller: "Maybe if I kill you, it'll forgive me?"
Patrick: "Probably not? Also, what?"
Eller: "It's also not me doing this, if you hadn't figured that out. I was sleeping on Kessler's couch when I got back from the war -- because you know how I'm batshit crazy? -- and when I woke up, their house was on fire, and the monster of fire chased them down the hall on purpose and killed them, and then it came looking for me."
Patrick: "Well, none of that is true. But how did you get away?"
Eller: "I jumped out the window, man. And it stared at me, through the window!"
Patrick: "Oh, it's one of those scary monsters you escape through the window. Got it."
Eller: "And then I looked it up on Google!"
Patrick: "Oh, for fuck's sake."

I was thinking it would be a djinn, but actually it's an ifrit, which makes a lot more sense. If you weren't raised by witches, or D&D players, you might not immediately know what that is, but basically it's -- in real life -- an elemental spirit, like gnomes and naiads, that you call up like an egregore to do stuff for you. Like Ariel in Tempest was an Air spirit in this same way. Now, in the show, basically it's the same thing, but crossed with the whole racist gypsy trope where right before you shoot a lady, she says some foreigner talk and then you are fucked.

FLASHBACK

Terry suddenly remembers how there was this lady in a pile of bodies who wasn't quiet dead, so Patrick ordered him to "dead check" her a bunch of times -- so you see, Terry's not really to blame -- and finally he shot her, but not before she said a bunch of foreigner nonsense and cursed him and his future bitch wife and their serial killer baby. I guess you could forget this part, if you had major PTSD like Terry does, but the part of his flashback is when it gets real dumb, because he totally saw the ifrit coming out of the fire of the lady who was on fire, and it looked at him, and it was like,

"Terry Bellefleur, I am going to come to kill your family in Season Four, but your family will be saved by a voodoo ghost lady who will have become attached to your son because of a doll that a gay couple found in their house. Not a real gay couple, this redheaded vampire and a giant, but basically their story will be a more realistic gay-couple story than the actual gay couple, who will trade demon faces and magic powers and eventually stab each other. Anyway, that's what's going to happen. You can tell from how you just shot a lady and she said foreign talk at you and then a demon appeared and looked at you and told you all of this. You're going to feel pretty crazy in your mind from this point forward, but just at least don't forget that I told you this, okay?"

Jason: "...Whatever, let's talk about me. Andy, do you remember when we came back from that fairy club?"
Andy: "That is hate speech. I don't really care, but you never know who's listening."
Jason: "That's ... not the same thing as not being a bigot. It's the opposite, in fact. But in this case it's unnecessary for you to have even said that, because it was an actual fairy club, of faeries. Like how I'm half-faerie..."
Andy: "I always kinda figured. Also, is that why everybody wants to sleep with you all the time?"
Jason: "Until four episodes ago it was. Now I'm just a victim."

Andy: "Wait, so I fucked a faerie?"
Jason: "If you fucked one of the girls or boys at that club, then yes."
Andy: "Fuck it. I don't care if those ladies are fairies or leprechauns or frickin' Ewoks. I got a good thing starting up with Holly, and I ain't gonna let Maurella and her sexy fairy friends mess it up for me. So I'm gonna steer clear of that place. And also don't talk about it."

Remember in S2 when Andy was the only one who noticed Maryann and he was all, "I saw a pig!" all the time? I think shit like this is why. You can look him in the face and say, "I am half fae," and he'll just be like, "I want one of those fried chicken sandwiches where the bread is more fried chicken, do they still make those?" Case in point:

Sam: "We were just supposed to have dinner, but when I got here, Emory and Suzanne were dead on my porch. I've known them about a year, and they're very nice boring people who certainly should not be inspiring sniper behavior."
Andy: "Anything else? Anything weird?"
Sam: "Well... We're shifters?"
Andy: "All of you?"

Meaning, I guess, that Andy knows what shapeshifters are -- does he? -- and that he's all "whatever" about Sam being one, even though half the time he's up Sam's ass about... Oh no, he knows this because of the Maryann thing, when Jason and Andy pretended that Sam was God and then he turned into a fly and then into a bull.

I do, I still love this show. I still can't quite believe -- and this season, I maintain, is the best since S2 so far -- that I got to write that sentence, as my actual job. People talk about how this show is just mindless garbage, and sometimes I agree with them, but that's what makes the awesome parts so much awesomer: None of the dumb people that would say that are going to notice either way.

"Remember that one time, you might not remember because things like this happen so much, but remember that one time they made the whole town believe that Sam was God, and then he pulled a lady's heart out of her chest?"

Never mind, I thought this was the second of the three coming-out scenes, but it's just Andy letting us know that he still remembers shapeshifters and how they do. Still, he's just like, "That sucks that your friends you like to turn into horses with got shot at point-blank range at the same time. It is also a little suspicious."

FANGTASIA!

Aww, it's still so good. So you've got Jessica -- who, by the way, looks like she's about to put a hex on the popular kids, total Craft 1996 vibe -- who is the... Vampire daughter of the ex-boyfriend of Tara's ex-best friend and quasi-sister, making her Tara's step-niece but also older sister, because of vampire times. And then too, though, Jessica was the most sheltered person that ever lived, like, her father protected her to the extent that it was abusive, while Tara was -- have you heard? -- the most abused person that has ever lived. Protected by nobody, ever. And it drove both of them crazy, in more or less socially sanctioned ways.

And then Jessica became a vampire (FYI, this week's babyvamp-jess is required reading) and everything flipped over: She and Bill have one of the best relationships on the show, she's a thousand times closer to integrating her shit than anybody else, and she seems to be the only person who can ever play with fire without getting burned by it. Like, even Eric couldn't manage that, when it came down to it; not even Godric's ghost could help there.

And on the other hand you've got Tara, who is so familiar with being out of control that every season has been another way for her to force control on herself: First by killing the possum and the black-eyed girl, then running to the Mommy Maryann that act invoked, then falling into the vampire-boyfriend trap with Franklin, then by becoming Toni -- a completely separate, way less fucked-up person. And nothing helped, not even Antonia, and eventually she died. I maintain that this show gives you a lot of options for fucking yourself over, and very few for getting clean again, but what I can't do is think of a single undead person on this show for whom death wasn't a good thing.

You'll never know about the roads you don't travel, I suppose, but that cuts both ways: All we ever know about are the ones where we do. And anybody who has been jerked out of their complacent patterns of self-destruction, whether by injury or sudden self-knowledge or death, has been given a second chance to become who they were meant to be. If you're intent on making this show "mindless garbage," I guess the obvious gay metaphor is enough: It always has been, for people like you. But Jessica and Tara, maybe even Sookie -- and, irksomely, now Jason -- are defined in a lot of ways by the fact that they were denied a childhood. But as anybody who has gone through this particular thing they are talking about in this scene can tell you, the best thing to a healthy childhood is learning to live your adulthood with a little grace.

Jessica, tentative, orders a Tru Blood cocktail -- "two parts O-, one part B+" -- and Tara makes it for her, just as wary. She thinks about it for awhile before she says anything; this scene reminded me so much of when she met Hoyt, just her certainty that it's a conversation worth having and at the same time being very, very careful.

Jessica: "Hey. Are you okay?"
Tara: "Hmph. Trade you Makers."
Jessica: "Pam is ... not so bad. She'll probably let you feed off of a human, Bill made me drink nothing but Tru Blood forever..."

True enough. Tara has nothing to say to that, so she says nothing. She's already so grateful you can taste it.

Jessica: "Hey. I'm sorry this happened to you. If you didn't want it to."

She's so comfortable now, in her skin, in the limits and how to test them, you can forget where she came from. Locked in a car trunk after the sun went down; pulled out and murdered, screaming, under the harsh Magister lights. Dead before she lived. "I'm sorry this happened," Jessica says, "If you didn't want it to."

Jessica: "I know how awful, and scary, and lonely it can be... The hardest part is that nobody gets you. Like Pam, and Eric and Bill, they're all just so ... old. And then humans, even if they love you, or... I mean, if they try..."

When you surrender up your sight to see the new world, whether it's a religious conversion or a sexual revelation or this, born out of blood, it feels like dying. That's true; change feels like dying because it is. And there's a way in which the old world will never come back around, and you will always been out of step with its easy rhythms. And then, too, there's the rest of the world still has to mourn you, the idea, the future of you. To put their dreams for you back on the shelf without damaging them, so they can see you as you are and not through the fuzzy dream.

By Jacob Clifton

Jessica: "Hey. I'm sorry this happened to you. If you didn't want it to."

There, too, you have a perspective that's hard to share: That watching people do this, forget about the future they were imagining for you, can show you the ways you, we, do this to everybody else. You don't meet boys, let's say, as they really are: You meet them through the haze of what you want from them, or what you're afraid they'll do, or what they're going to want from you. You meet your best friend's parents through a double-haze of future disappointment, terror, teenage shame. We spend very little time looking at one another, even those of us who have been through this one before.

It's all Jessica's really saying: You see me as a human child, below you, or you see me as an elder vampire, above you, either way I want you to see me. I want you to look at me, right now, and what I'm trying to tell you, which is that we have so much more in common than otherwise. Which is of course true of every person and every other person, but that wall's so tall so much of the time we tend to forget altogether that it's possible to scale. Which is what makes friendship such a powerful kind of magic.

Tara: "I've been feeling ... fresh out of friends lately."
Jessica: "I get on one level that you dumped your two closest friends for turning you into a monster, but I spent the last four episodes at the most unendingly boring frat party ever devised. I have never had friends. I have had Hoyt and I've had Bill, but they needed things from me. I am learning to be friends with Jason Stackhouse, but that is an incredibly delicate proposition even when he's not having three separate identity crises at once. Compared to Jason -- and how many times in your life could anybody say your name in the same sentence as this word -- you're pretty easy, Tara Thornton."

Tara: "It's fucked up!"
Jessica, firmly: "...No."

Tara does pull back, that time -- she thought Jessica was safe -- but Jessica knows that, too. She gets sad for a moment, before launching back into it again. Yes, and, as the improvisers say.

"Listen. I put myself through a lot of grief -- and, oh God, a ton of blood tears -- before I realized that these feelings are not bad. They're awesome. I mean, at least they can be."

And the kicker, having monitored Tara for signs of bolting every step of the way, "Either way, they're part of who we are now. And I feel like I am just now starting to figure out what it even means, to be a vampire."

Jessica: "Have you fed on a human yet? How was it?"
Tara: "It was all right..."
Jessica: "Yeah, no. How fucking great is it."
Tara: "Very. It is really fucking great."
Jessica: "Better than sex."
Tara: "...Yeah, actually. Huh."
Jessica: "You should try feeding and fucking at the same time!"
Tara: "Uhhhh still on Day 3 over here?"
Jessica: "Of course, sorry. But I mean, it's not just about the feeding, and the sex, and the power..."

Dar Williams says it like this: One day you will realize how lucky you are, because every person in their natural state is like East Berlin: You have this Wall, and all you know about the free world is their fireworks and the sound of their radios. But then the Wall comes down, and you see the punchline of the joke, which is that all those people are stumbling around, bumping into shit just like you, and most of all they are calling out, just like you, to be known. That every connection you are brave enough to make, within yourself, pays out tenfold in the connections you can make to everybody else. That loneliness is the biggest lie of all, because it's the first and last thing that unites every single one of us, so any victory over it means a collective shout for all of us.

For me, it was more like... Do you know this thing about The Sailor's Choice? If you wear too many clothes, they'll drag you down and you die. But if you start taking things off, you'll freeze to death. So you're stuck in the middle of the ocean, and way above you everybody else is having a great time, everything is just right, and down below you everything is dark and you don't know what's down there, but you know it's bad.

By Jacob Clifton

And one day the pressure from up there is so heavy that you either kill yourself or you swim down, down past everything, every single No, and you get to the bottom. Where everything is too large to even talk to, and just swims by with its own gravity. Unconcerned and uninterested and deeply, deeply loving. Not too nice, not too mean. And there is something very special and very private and very beautiful down there, where things are hot and sweaty and scary and red.

And if you can grab that thing, maybe grab some other things while you're down there, the world flips itself over -- it was designed just for you, just to do this one simple thing -- and you're swimming toward the light. And maybe it takes a while, maybe it doesn't, but eventually you reach the surface, and the light is on the water, shining, and you realize that you are beautiful, and that you get to say Yes, finally. Yes, and. That nobody is actually watching you to make sure you follow orders and keep saying No.

And it makes a bit of a splash, and the world will continue to break your heart afterwards, and you will eventually realize that nothing has really changed besides you, besides everything, and if it's the gay thing or something on that level, maybe it will cure your chronic ailments like it did mine. Whatever it is, it's precious and private and none of my business. But on that day, something divine speaks to you, just like on the day you were born the first time, and this is exactly how it feels:

Bill: "My free-form paranoia says even that could have been a part of the plan. Ultimately, we do know for a fact that she's a traitor and a liar, just like her brother..."

Right before Eric can either deck him or call the whaaambulance on both of them, Molly gives a little shout: They have until dawn before they are killed. Getting onto an elevator, she clicks some things on her tablet, and the iStakes start to glow.

Boys: "Yeah. They're glowing all right."
Molly: "Cool, that means we're good to go. Good luck! And if you don't make it, it's been rad serving you. Peace out."

BABCOCK HOSPITAL

The Boys, well-oiled machine that they are, split up the hospital to search.

Bill: "Sookie, we'd like to thank you for getting us this far, but Eric and I will take it from here. You can stay outside with the dog and his security guard."
Sookie: "Fuck you."

I love it when we get a writer who actually likes Sookie. It makes her so easy to like:

"First of all, I've seen enough horror movies to know you don't split up when you're in a big scary asylum, and there's a crazed killer on the loose. Second, I think it's fair to say that my microwave fingers and the sun are about the only things around here that seem to have any effect on Russell, so the way I see it, it's me protecting you from him instead of the other way around. Third, I got a headache and I gotta pee something fierce, so I'd just as soon get this over with."

Alcide giggles and follows her, dragging Doug after.

CRIMESCENE

The shifters got gotten by wooden bullets, silver core, which isn't necessary for a shifter to die but probably this is somebody who either A) Hates shifters and just went to the Stake House or whatever to get a bunch of stuff at once, B) Doesn't know the rules about shifters yet, C) Was not hate-criming -- which is a theory with at least two strikes against it now -- or D) Was on the hunt for anything supernatural.

In the books, a similar storyline came about because of some American politics stuff I won't spoil for you, but basically it was A because of D and B. Given what we see at the end of the episode, though, I still don't know how "shifters" could be under such scrutiny on this show, but it does otherwise seem pretty similar. Any case, we know it's a hate crime. Taking out two specific people for no reason, point-blank with anti-supe weapons, basically says so.

By Jacob Clifton

Alcide giggles and follows her, dragging Doug after.

CRIMESCENE

Jason: "You know what's fucked up? All this supernatural shit, these killings? They've been going on for years. Us humans just started paying attention because the vamps came out of the coffin... But before that, the supes had been killing people, making it look all natural, and we've been none the fucking wiser. For example, my parents. The vampires, they've been getting away with this shit forever."
Andy: "Stop talking about your parents and your lame storyline and come look over here at these tire tracks, which I just magically can identify for some reason as BF Goodrich radials."
Jason: "But I'm still grunting dumbly about vamp..."
Andy: "-- Shooter stood right here and boom, shot down those poor people in cold blood."
Jason: "They never had a chance. I know! Just like my parents!"

BABCOCK

Alcide, sniffing: "Wolves have been here."
Bill: "Oooh, good point. I forgot how Russell already had a cult. Now he has two! Two cults! Admittedly, the trashiest werewolves and nuttiest vampires, but that kinda comes with the cult territory."
Doug: "I've never been to New York City. If I die, I will never have made it to..."
Eric, verbatim: "-- New York City smells like pee and the people are rude."

Tara: "Uh, what's with the getup [see?]?"
Hoyt: "It's the Look! For fangbangers."

Tara points out that he's better than being a simple scene fangbanger, and Hoyt points out that until recently she was too good for vampires. At this point, Hoyt tries to get her to bite him. Somehow, she resists. I mean, we're not even vampires -- as far as I know! -- and I would still give it a shot, if it were Hoyt Fortenberry. Even if he is dressed like some hypothetical Killers episode of Glee.*

Tara: "I have known you since we were children, and you look like the emcee in a children's performance of Cabaret. Go home, Hoyt. Even Pam thinks you're too green for this."
Hoyt: "Or maybe not!"

*(And by "even if," of course I mean, "particularly because.")

Tara: "...Or maybe not. Dammit."

BABCOCK

The trail of memories and body parts leads to the Morgue. Even the characters actually on the television show find this a little, as is sometimes said of things, "on the nose."

ELLER

Terry: "Oh my God, I just had a flashback about the ifrit."
Patrick: "Holy shit, is this storyline still happening?"

Eller: "Isn't it funny how flammable and inflammable both mean the same thing? Anyway, this bunker is flame-retardant and there's a sprinkler system. Can't do anything about the demons on the inside, but at least the outsides are retardant."

Terry: "No, like, we're the last three guys from that unit, right? So now we're all together? And I don't care how retardant everything is right now, I bet you dollars to donuts that ifrits don't care."
Patrick: "Wait, now both of you are about this? At first I thought you were just dicking with his broken mind, but... Aw, man. Fuck me."

Terry bounces, so Patrick is forced to subdue Eller and tie him up again. Outside, Terry is lighting a cigarette -- smart -- and Patrick is just totally over his mess.

Terry: "I thought I was hallucinating, and then I guess I just completely forgot the whole incident because of how we murdered a town, but in the final analysis I saw it, too. We killed those people, we can't undo it, now we gotta pay. Pay a ghost smoke monster."
Patrick: "WE WERE ON DRUGS. THIS IS STUPID."

But back inside, here comes the ifrit. And Eller is all tied up. And it's smoke and muscle, fire, dancing.

By Jacob Clifton

Tara: "...Or maybe not. Dammit."

BABCOCK

The trail of memories and body parts leads to the Morgue. Even the characters actually on the television show find this a little, as is sometimes said of things, "on the nose."

ELLER

Terry: "Oh my God, I just had a flashback about the ifrit."
Patrick: "Holy shit, is this storyline still happening?"

Terry bounces, so Patrick is forced to subdue Eller and tie him up again. Outside, Terry is lighting a cigarette -- smart -- and Patrick is just totally over his mess.

But back inside, here comes the ifrit. And Eller is all tied up. And it's smoke and muscle, fire, dancing.

Gandalf: "You shall not pass!"

Too late, Gandalf. Ellers out.

JESUS PROBLEMS

Problem #1: Jesus's head shows up in Lafayette's face, with his mouth sewn shut.
Lafayette: "Eeeee!"

Problem #2: Jesus's head shows up in Lala's mom's face, with his mouth sewn shut.
Ruby Jean: "Jesus, where have you been?"

Luckily, Alfre Woodard is skilled at reading the lip-sewn mumbles of formerly living brujos, so she just chuckles and says hi and promises to tell Lafayette whatever he's mumbling about. I can't remember where she lives now, so I'm not sure if her just throwing back her head and yelling her son's name is Problem #3 because he's all the way over in Bon Temps and she's acting real weird, or if she lives in Lafayette's house now. Which I guess would still be Problem #3, because that bitch is crazy.

By Jacob Clifton

BABCOCK

A freezer or something, with a bunch of dead and alive people hanging from meathooks, ready to get served up to old King Russell the time he gets hungry. People who no longer wish to be in this room include Doug, as well as a random man who lost a bunch of weight avoiding carbs and has only just begun to live his life. Characteristically, the Boys just leave them hanging there, hollering, because they don't have time for this.

Bill, awesome: "You ready?"
Sookie: "Oh, man. Every time Bill gets awesome, he immediately does something to fuck it up. Please, please stop being awesome. And yes. Yes, I am."

LUNA

Luna: "Oh, for fuck's sa..."
Sam: "I know, but Suzanne and Emory just got shot in the head!"
Luna: "Whatever, I guess you can come in. That's pretty awful."
Sam: "It's so super sad, because they were such wonderful people. Right?"
Luna: "That's stretching it, but..."
Sam: "Oh, poor Luna. Are you desperately sad?"
Luna: "Uh, no? I mean it's fucked up, but I have this werewolf kid I gotta..."
Sam: "Oh, Luna. Poor Luna. Come here. Just come into my arms."
Luna: "Yeah but I'm not like all that bro..."
Sam: "Shh, shh. It's okay. Sam's here now."

In his usual gross way, he's basically petting her hair to shut her up, and just coincidentally each stroke of her hair pushes her head further down into his lap. I don't know, there's just something about the sheer volume of times Sam has ended up getting laid in this circumstance, it's shifty. (So to speak.) Like has he ever gone to somebody's house, or they come to his house, and it hasn't ended in this exact scenario? (Well, or they get shot. That happens a lot too.)

Oh right, so then what happens is that Sam and Luna get shot. Out on the lawn, as Luna's trying to get him and his doggie boner the fuck up out of her house and he's all, "I'ma come check on you tomorrow" and whatever. Emma runs away in the form of a puppy, and then Sam and Luna die! On her lawn! Barfily reaching for each other, as a bunch of anti-fanger type people in masks resembling a certain political figure who's currently in the news drive off in their pickup, yelling about shifters.

By Jacob Clifton

Now, Luna, would be the time to test my skinwalker theory and assume the form of Luna From Ten Minutes Ago, When She Had No Holes In Her Abdomen. I know I have talked a lot of shit about Luna over the years, but she is still one of the few acceptable things about Sam. Especially with Tommy gone.

AUTHORITY

Roman addresses the Authority, with Barb and Dietrich and Salome behind him: "There are traitors in our midst. Those who seek to tear down all that we have built together. Now, as Guardian, I am tasked with not only our political future, but the spiritual salvation of vampires everywhere. The question before us is..."

As Jason stands at his parents' graves and whatever whatever whatever, crying manfully and beautifully, and all, but this better be going somewhere cool because he's already done this cycle like three times already: "...Are we willing to share this world? As vampires, we have committed crimes against humanity, crimes for which we must now atone. The Sanguinistas want to turn the clock backwards, want to murder with impunity. They think of humans as nothing but sustenance."

And the Russell Hunt works its way down toward the Morgue: "So the choice is ours. Do we to return to a time where we skulked in the dark hiding in the shadows? Or are we willing to extend the promise of Lilith and her bountiful mercy to all of humanity? And live as equals?"

And Tara feeds on Hoyt, while in the bathroom stall Jessica bites the blonde from the beginning of the episode: "The Sanguinistas say we are going against our nature, that Lilith commands us to feed. The pinnacle of the food chain..."

Jessica hears Hoyt begging her to stop, and bounces the blonde off the wall -- this poor girl! -- in her haste to get Tara off him, which is a good deed right up until a blood-crazed Tara starts a very zoomy fight with her in earnest, complicated by the Hoyt factor: "...But they are wrong. For if we let our sins flourish, if we are slaves to our bloodlust, if we let our hunger for power surpass our common decency, we doom our souls to damnation."

And Sookie's Slow-Mo Band of Brothers finally makes it to the Morgue -- Bill looking once at Sookie -- where they find a pile of bodies, nearly waist-high, and Eric's fangs pop out, and they rush the room: "So let it be known. We will not cede the floor to the depraved and desperate tyranny of madmen and fanatics. We will not stand by while zealots hijack the righteousness of our cause. We will fight. And let the night cleanse us of our sins, and lead us to victory."

By Jacob Clifton

So I guess that's the religious pandering part? I like it. It's already his party line, I guess, but given by the way the entire Authority drops to their knees in front of the Lilith reliquary, I am guessing this is more formal and explicit. And a pretty great call to action, for any faith or creed or party: If our beliefs are what bind us together, are you really going to let the most insane, tiniest fraction pull the whole tablecloth down on us?

Russell: "Bitches, took you long enou... Sniff sniff. Hey, girl! Let me get a look at you!"
Sookie, verbatim: "Fuck you, you psychotic piece of shit."
Russell: "Hee, hee. Cute."
Eric, patronizing: "Hellooo, old friend. Do you remember me?"

Russell's voice turns to steel when he mentions Talbot; just as Alcide's dropping to the floor behind them, he grins.

"Give it your best shot."

WEEK

Fairy hands, presumably. More of that dreadful Baby Vamp fight, but hopefully it'll turn out okay and not end up some kind of odious "Only a slut would bite my ex-boyfriend" kind of "chicks before dicks/sistas before mistas" nonsense, but we'll see. Sam bleeds out and Luna goes on some kind of dark skinwalking spree against the bigots, maybe but probably not. Probably the other way around, knowing Sam's stupid ass. Um, Hoyt gets kidnapped by more/the same anti-supe teabaggers, Bill continues to be unnerving, Pam is all irritated like usual, and Nora continues to be amazing, most likely.

JACOB CLIFTON is a freelance writer and critic based in Austin, Texas. He currently recaps Bunheads , Pretty Little Liars and True Blood for TWoP. Jacob can be found online at jacobclifton.com, on Twitter, and on Facebook. IRL work appears in BenBella's SmartPop series of anthologies, and novelette "The Commonplace Book" will appear on Tor.com in October 2012.