Switch to the mobile version of this page.

Arkansas Times

Rock Candy

« A better way to Walmart | Tuesday To-Do: Temple Grandin »

Monday, July 26, 2010

True Blood True Blood: Love hurts

Posted by Lindsey Millar on Mon, Jul 26, 2010 at 4:14 PM

Running late: Love's never hurt quite like it did last night in TV land. Don Draper's a submissive — as in, the one who gets smacked in a dominant-submissive relationship — who, judging from the cut and hair color of his call girl, might have designs on letting Joan wallop him a bit. Meanwhile, on "True Blood" that familiar S&M formula for love is all out of whack.

Sookie still loves Bill, even though he betrayed her with Lorena, who also still loves Bill — and cries tears of blood to prove it — but must torture him grotesquely. Sam, despite his recent show of brotherly love, can't pull Tommy away from his terrible parents; and Tommy, as predicted, loves them enough that he subjugates himself to dog fights. And Franklin, who barely counts since he's so off his rocker, loves Tara enough to let her bite him before he makes her his vampire bride. Later, she bludgeons him with a mace.

Similarly but more on the periphery: Jesus tells Lafayette that he doesn't know who his father is because he's the product of rape, which leads Lafayette to say, "Maybe I can relate to you." Crystal, still dry humping Jason in the swamp, throws him on the ground, which inspires him to say, "Don't hurt me. Or do." Which freaks Crystal out moments before she sniffs the air and arches her back and runs away. Like a woodland creature.

Creator Alan Ball wrote last night's episode, which marked the halfway point of the 12 episode season. Next episode, I'm betting the ascendant arc for most of our characters starts, slowly but surely. Then, for the finale, Ball returns to make everything go to hell again.

Random thoughts:

*The lottery ticket scene with the Queen of Louisiana was great.

*I'd forgotten how utterly obfuscating "Mad Men's" scenes from next week are. All they really offer is: These people will have dialogue next week. On the other hand, "True Blood's" condense all the action, often with spoilers, into its teasers. They're always better than the episodes themselves.

Tags: Don Draper, Alan Ball, "Mad Men, " "True Blood"

        
Tweet
Share

Comments (2)

Showing 1-2 of 2

Add a comment

Subscribe to this thread:

By Email

With RSS

Showing 1-2 of 2

More by Lindsey Millar

Programming note

We usually post our most recent issue online Tuesday night. Even though cost considerations recently forced us to change printers, which moved the date the print edition hits the street from Wednesday to Thursday, we're planning to keep our web schedule the same.
- by Lindsey Millar
- Feb 26, 2013
Bell hints at legislative response to license plate scanner

The LRPD is using a license plate scanner, which captures license plate and GPS data. Rep. Nate Bell isn't happy about it.
- by Lindsey Millar
- Mar 3, 2013
More »