True Blood - Episode 4.10 - Burning Down the House - Review

With only two episodes to go the fourth season of True Blood is winding down, and in true True Blood fashion the action is ramping up. Now I have a habit of starting off these reviews with the things that I disagreed with in the episode, but I’m going to break that pattern today. There was nothing in this episode that outright pissed me off; I have a lot of mixed feelings about the Sookie/Eric/Bill triangle which I will get into later, and there seemed to be far too much of Terry/Andy action but I’m going to trust that Alan Ball and co. know what they’re doing. To say that this was an eventful episode would be putting it lightly, so this week I’m going to keep the intro short and jump right into the breakdown.

We finally have hit our first major character death this season, and I never thought that I would say this, but I think I’m going to miss Tommy Mickens. Since the acquisition of his new skinwalking powers his storylines have been refreshing and hilarious, and there were so many possibilities in the future for other skinwalking adventures. But alas, skinwalking has a price apparently. Tommy definitely appeared to be getting sicker and sicker each time he shifted, oh and getting the shit beat out of you by four beefy biker dudes doesn’t help. Oh Tommy, at first I didn’t care about you or your crazy white trash parents, but in the end I was sorry to see you go. Your death also triggered some serious repercussions for Sam and Alcide, the results of which I think will carry on over to next season.

So Alcide was firmly against the ass-kicking, enough to the point that later on he holds one of the ass-kickers so that Sam can throw some payback punches. This paired with the Debbie/Marcus scene pretty much solidifies his demise from the Shreveport pack, which he had belonged to for approximately 3 days? Record timing I’m sure. His only ally is now Sam, and they both now have a shit ton of werewolves mad at them. My guess is Alcide is going to have to challenge Marcus as pack leader, I can’t see any other good solution to this that doesn’t end in a total blood bath. Then again this is True Blood; a total blood bath wouldn’t be a first.

I really liked Andy the first three seasons! He was a good pair with Jason, and had plenty of hilarious dialogue. But this season he’s been nothing but a drag. It is nice to see a storyline that is more grounded and realistic than the usual life-or-death-end-of-the-world fare that Sookie seems wrapped up in the past couple of seasons, but there has just been too much focus on Andy and little to no payoff. And now Terry has been dragged in to it! Terry is my favorite minor male character, and it was nice getting to hear some of his backstory, but still the whole Andy/Terry mess felt like it took up way too much time. Like I said in the intro, I’m hoping that there’s a plan to tie this in to some other main plot so that the time spent in previous episodes will feel worth it, although I have racked my brain trying to imagine scenarios and I am coming up blank.

I’m only going to briefly mention Debbie here, and my minor gripe with her character development. Essentially she has gone in two days from loving Alcide to presumably cheating on him with Marcus. All because he didn’t come home that night, which Marcus could have easily explained to her but chose not to. I guess explaining that her boyfriend was trying to save the guy you just beat to death would have killed the mood. Now we get it that she’s kinda borderline psycho, but cheating on Alcide when just an episode or two ago she was declaring her love for him feels rushed. Now they did introduce a new grievance, she wants kids and he doesn’t because they might be werewolves, an interesting rationale that for once was pulled directly from the books. Well sort of, in the books Debbie was a shifter but its close enough. If she does get pregnant by Marcus, well then expect baby daddy drama on the horizon, although I’m still hoping that she doesn’t make it out of this season alive.

In this episode we took an interesting twist with AntoMarnia, one that I completely was not expecting. All along we were led to believe that Antonia was the crazed-vampire-genocide spirit that was merely possessing poor Marnie, and that maybe she really didn’t want to take part in any of this. Well after Antonia saw the dead and injured humans at the festival she decided that she wanted out. In an absolutely brilliant scene that totally gave me goose bumps, Antonia leaves Marnie and they have a nice little chat about their latest antics and whether or not they were justified. We find out that Antonia used to be a healer, and only learned necromancy to save lives, and I’m guessing they fared better than Marnie’s pet bird. Despite Antonia’s initial protests, it really didn’t take Marnie too long to re-convince Antonia that what they were doing was a good thing, including the human casualties. After all, they were just traitors. And AntoMarnia was reborn.

There was so much Sookie drama in this episode that I think I’m going to have to break it up into two sections. Let’s first start with the conclusion of the now bloody Festival of Tolerance. Sookie, apparently because she still loves Bill, summons a new wave of Faerie/Kamehameha energy to stop Zombie Eric. Let’s see who gets that reference, and if I’m not the only one who thought this please let me know in the comments. As I predicted, Faerie power broke the spell on Eric, but here’s where it gets messy. He remembers everything. Everything! This is a huge deviation from the books, where Eric gets his memory back without retaining the times he spent as an amnesiac. Sookie decides to not tell him exactly what went on while she babysat him, thus dragging out their relationship even further while making room for other love interests. Well apparently the TV series doesn’t want tension filled route and instead are going for upping the drama as much as possible. Also Sookie deciding that she still loves Bill is ridiculous, I just want to smack her and tell her to fucking choose already. Also I’m not that fond of Bill, in the books he’s kind of a scumbag-asshole-stalker-who-attempts-to-redeem-himself-later, and although that’s not quite the same in the TV show my feelings definitely carry over. In the books Sookie is finished with Bill by the end of the third book, and that’s it. We’re eleven books in at this point, and they are still friends. Complicated friends to be sure, but friends. After four seasons of dueling vampire drama I am very ready for Sookie to leave the dead behind and move on to warmer pastures, or even jungles.

So what the hell is it with Sookie deciding to head on over to Moon Goddess Emporium with a half-baked and generally reckless plan? This would be the third time this season, and it definitely didn’t end well either. Yes, let’s go to the place that’s about to get blown up in a few hours and try to un-trap the people that are trapped in there, but then get trapped in ourselves. At least Jason made it our alive; I’m guessing he’ll be the one to let Bill know that Sookie ruined his plan to bomb the place to smithereens. That’ll be a fun conversation. I’ve been holding out hope that somehow at the end of this season the Faeries are going to return to kick some ass, Claude or maybe even Claudette, which would then facilitate the storyline from the books where they move to Louisiana, but at this point I think it’s a long shot in hell. I am willing to bet though that while Sookie is trapped AntoMarnia and her are going to have some interesting discussions about what Sookie is and how she broke the Zombia/Amnesia spell.

Also trapped in Moon Goddess are my two favorite brujos. Normally I’ve been kind of ambivalent toward Jesus, but that’s all changed in this episode. The demon mask was a great teaser, and I’m now pretty excited about what this demon living within means for his character and the possibly impact on the show. He also seems to be a good liar, as evidenced with his conversation with Marnie, which is a bonus because all the other humans on the show seem to suck at it. This discussion that he had with Marnie was my favorite moment of the show, Fiona Shaw did an amazing job at portraying just how twisted Marnie had become, and the added effect of her smiling so wide constantly to show how happy she was came across as deliciously creepy. Also worth noting, Marnie was very interested in bringing Lafayette back into the fold, saying that his power would help. Help what, extend the range of your Resurrection spell? Or something more sinister? Hopefully we’ll get to find out.

And that leaves us with our cliffhanger for the episode. I love it when TB veers into camp, and it definitely did that with the A-Team throwback sequence. Black van? Check. Heavy weapons? Check. Bad Asses on a Mission to Kick Ass? Check. Slow Motion? Fuck yeah. Right down to the corny walk-in-a-line-and-then-freeze-frame, I loved every second of it. And how ironic is it that these super powerful vampires have to use rocket launchers and flamethrowers? I can’t wait to see them kick some ass, but thanks to Sookie’s good intentions that might not happen. I’m with Jessica on this one; I want to see some shit get killed. 

As always, thanks for reading and please comment if I messed something up, or if you have anything to add! I love reading theories and hearing what you guys have to say. Until next week!

Random Thoughts:

• Love how Nan staked that guy with a pencil, which has to be my favorite vampire staking method yet.
• I didn’t mention it in the review, but I’m guessing it will be important later, but Nan seeing Faerie Sookie in action doesn’t bode well for Bill. Remember in the first episode of the season, where Nan asks Bill if there was anything special to Sookie, and Bill says no, and Nan reminds him that Sophie Ann lied to her and not to make the same mistake? There are bigger issues to deal with right now, but I’m guessing it will come up again later.
• Jason talking about his friendship with Hoyt was adorable, it kind of makes me want Jason to forget about Jessica and stand by Hoyt. How long do you think before Jason cracks and tells Hoyt?
• Ewwww. The whole time that Tommy was vomiting in Alcide’s car the only thing I could think about was that mess. Don’t even try to clean it up Alcide, just nuke that car from orbit and move on.
• I refuse to believe that glamour squads could fix that mess. Wasn’t it broadcast on live TV? And blogged about? That’s a shit ton of glamouring.
• Nan keeps talking about the factions fighting in the AVL/Authority, I wonder if we’ll ever get to see or hear any more about this? Could be interesting.
• Did I mention yet how fucking happy I am to have regular Eric back? Although he did manage to retain some of his softer side, but I’ll live.
• When Pam is reunited with Eric she drops the sarcasm and puts on a cutesy, which I found hilarious. Also hilarious, the look she gave Sookie, which made it to the screenshot for this episode.
• Sam’s attempts at comforting poor Tommy were amazingly touching. He was quite the asshole last season, but now he’s almost a saint.
• I’m starting to think that Hoyt is regretting dumping Jessica. Too late now.
• I’m going to miss the silver chains in the dungeon scenes; they’re getting to be my favorite parts of these last few episodes.
• Man, those other so-called witches are stupid. Yeah, keep touching the doorknobs, by the end of the season no one will have any hands left in there.
• I’m guessing the filming for Jesus going through the invisible wall must have been pretty funny to watch, but it looks pretty cool with the special effects and the sound effects.
• My boyfriend seems to think that Terry leaving Andy behind to walk is going to result in something big happening next episode, but I’m not so sure of that. What do you guys think?

Favorite Quotes:

• “We have to help these poor people! Bill, IMAGE.”
• “Fucking humans. I’m going to go find somebody to eat.”
• “I am not going to die in a Wiccan shit store with them, I refuse!”
• “You shoulda been there! It was a blood bath! And we sorta won!”
• “Come on robots!”
• “Marnie, is anything wrong?” “Yes. Nooooo. No. Yes.”
• “I have put my soul at risk to destroy the night beasts for you!”
• “What’s the deal with your little dairy maid and her lightening trick?”
• “God I hate her!”
• “Lovable isn’t he?”
• “There ain’t no heaven. And hell’s a dog fight.”
• “There’s a safety cap. I think.”
• “He drank eleven of my beers! Pass out and started farting. Continuously!”
• “For a year after the marines you lived up there like an insane squirrel!”
• “You kept the family off my back even when I thought you were an Iraqi insurgent.”
• “No drugs for me. Except for anti-psychotics.”
• “If she would have goddamn let her parakeet rest in peace, then Eric Northman and Bill Compton wouldn’t be marching on Moon Goddess to blow up my fucking cousin.”
• “I don’t care what happens as long as I get to kill shit!”
• “Why not? I’m the law! And I can lie. I can fight. I can run like the fucking wind!”
• “What the fucks that thing on his head?” “It’s uh… Latin thang.”
• “You don’t remember nothing, you were a baby, stupid!”
• “I wasn’t too old for socks!”
• “It’s marvelous, they’ll do anything I want. They’ll slaughter their friends, kill each other. Eat chocolate, go to the beach!”
• “Men without souls do not cry.”