TV: True Blood

I just finished up the first episode of HBO's new series True Blood. If you read my blog much, you might already know about my interest in vampire lore and how different creative minds choose to portray the different aspects of legend. Anyone who has watched Six Feet Under knows that Alan Ball seems to have some sort of morbid fascination with death, but how about with the undead. His new series is quite interesting, in my opinion.

True Blood takes place in a small southern town, at a time when vampires are known and living among humans (but still not quite accepted by all). But Sookie Stackhouse (Anna Paquin) and the other locals have never seen one in person before, until Bill (Stephen Moyer) arrives at the local diner. Did I mention Sookie has the gift of hearing people's thoughts (a la Edward Cullen) but can't read Bill (a la Bella Swan...).

There is a lot to like about the show, or what I have seen so far. Paquin is a good actress, and pretty likable as the sweet and somewhat naive Sookie. She has great chemistry with Bill. Ball sticks with the general vampire legend, including only coming out at night, fangs, etc.

There were some things that were not so great. What in the world were some of those accents? While I liked the idea of Tara (played by Rutina Wesley), her accent was very forced. Having lived in several different places in the South (while getting by with very little accent), I just was appalled at some of the poorly done southern accents.

As is usual, the vampire stories are over-sexed. I wonder what the vampire obsession with sex is. Because they are immortal, are they just bored with normal stuff? Is it the power? I don't know. But having watched Six Feet Under, I knew there would be some pretty raunchy sex scenes in this, and they delivered on that expectation very early on. I can't help but feel like I am seeing WAY too much of that. Yes, there are people who don't need to see all that.

I do plan to watch another episode and see where the story goes. I was rather drawn in by the plot and the characters. Let's hope it doesn't disappoint.