‘True Blood: The Complete Sixth Season’ DVD Review
It always feels strange when we know that a TV show is coming to an end. Much like with Dexter and its final season we know season seven of True Blood is the conclusion of the tale of Sookie Stackhouse and Bill the Vampire, but will we miss them? In preparation for the start of the new season, True Blood: The Complete Sixth Season is being released on DVD and Blu-ray and I guess the question to be answered in this review has to be if season six leads us into the final season on a high, or did it show signs of a show nearing a natural death? Or a true death as the vamps would call it.
True Blood: The Complete Sixth Season begins where the last ended, with Bill seemingly a Vampire God, Alcide a new pack master and Warlow seemingly ready to claim Sookie as his. With the humans also going to war on the vampires and imprisoning many on “The Farm” both characters from the past and new even more dangerous adversaries arriving, Sookie’s life is as complicated as ever.
One of the most noticeable things about season six of True Blood is that the strength of the show comes out when focus is taken away from Sookie Stackhouse (Anna Paquin) and we get to see the other characters flourish. It’s not a negative comment against Paquin herself, more the shortfalls of the Sookie character, especially after all the previous seasons in which we’ve grown accustomed to her story arcs. Sookie is a selfish character and no matter how much danger her friends are in she still appears to take hours, if not days to make any progress in her actions that she needs to take. The new love interest in her life Ben (Rob Kazinsky) may be a very complicated individual that brings chaos into her life, but when her friends are in real danger, you would think she could get her priorities a little straighter and actually act? The world does not revolve around Sookie Stackhouse, no matter how much she things it does.
The strength of True Blood in truth is shown by the less prominent characters like Jason (Ryan Kwaten), Sam (Sam Trammell) and Terry (Todd Lowe) and this is because they actually take action in their lives, though for Terry it’s more tragic than others. I don’t want to go into too much details about Terry, but his story is the most human in the show and really steals focus in the later episodes. I won’t spoil that though because if you’ve not seen it you really don’t want me to go over the plot. Sam’s encounters with the werewolves and Jason’s new adventures with the vampires are other highlights of the season because of the likability of these characters. It’s also refreshing for them to have meatier storylines too.
The battle between vampire and human is a constant struggle in True Blood and it comes as no surprise that we’d get to the point where the humans had an edge, be it for all the wrong reasons. “The Farm” is an interesting twist and the power play between characters like Eric (Alexander Skarsgård), Pam (Kristin Bauer van Straten), Truman Burrell (Arliss Howard) and the returning Sarah Newllin (Anna Camp) progresses the vampire storyline in ways that save it from becoming stale. The changes in the show will be interesting, especially as we move into the final season with the idea of Hep-V and outlaw vampires. Hopefully True Blood will conclude with a bang and plenty of blood.
True Blood: The Complete Sixth Season for the most part is a strong season but it does seem to struggle slightly as it reaches the final few episodes. There is a feel that the show is dragging itself out a bit to fill the time it has left, and has a little too much filler especially around Sookie. Once it get back into its stride though and starts the rush to the grand finale there is definitely an improvement in the pace of the story telling and the teasers created for the final season do keep the audiences interest, creating anticipation for the conclusion of the show. Hopefully in season seven we’ll stick to more important tales that don’t include a new “big bad” for Sookie to hump. Even though True Blood was the show that brought sex back to vampires its real strength is found when they keep their clothes on and get to the more important parts of telling a story. On a final note, I do have to reveal one wish I do have, could we have more Rutger Hauer? He may not be in season six enough for my taste but for the time he appears he steals the show. Knowing my luck he won’t be in the final season at all.
True Blood: The Complete Sixth Season is available on DVD and Blu-ray from June 2nd 2014
