Entertainment

True Blood Season 5 – Episode 9 –Everybody Wants to Rule the World – A Recap and Review
By Kelowna TV buff Andrew Buckley
Read more about Andrew's world at planetkibi.com

Photo: Contributed - HBO

As I sit here in my underwear (in case you were wondering) writing this week’s recap and review for the latest True Blood episode, Everybody Wants to Rule the World, I find myself wondering a couple of things: firstly, why aren’t I wearing pants; secondly, and more importantly, how did I ever doubt the writers and producers of the show?

While I’ve been disappointed in a couple of the minor storylines this season the show has still continued to get better and better.

Yes there are some gaping plot holes (fairies) and no we don’t care about some of the characters (Terry) but it’s still been a great ride going into the second half of the season. This episode rounded out a couple of storylines and threw in some nice twists and turns to keep us thirsty for more.

The main storyline continues to revolve around the Vampire Authority and their desire to take over the world. After Bill’s (Stephen Moyer) suggestion last week their plans begin to take form as they start bombing various True Blood factories around the world making vampires a little worried that they’re going to have to start eating people again. For all intensive purposes and, as revealed in the final scene, Bill appears to have lost his mind and after having crazy hallucinogenic ridden  sex with Salome (Valentina Cervi) he betrays Eric (Alexander Skarsgard) who has been trying his very best to escape. This serves as a nice twist for Bill who has always held the moral high ground but now appears to have surrendered that duty to Eric.

Lafayette (Nelsan Ellis) seems to have put the Mexican voodoo/dead boyfriend/possessed by a blue smurf demon thing behind him and is now embracing his new role as a medium with his own style and finesse. Here we see three stories merging as Sookie (Anna Paquin) discovers that ex-Sheriff Dearborne (William Sanderson) discovered her parent’s bodies and after questioning him she is promptly kidnapped.

Back at the station Sheriff Andy (Chris Bauer) and Jason (Ryan Wanten) figure out that Dearborne is none other than the ‘Dragon’ who’s been leading a group of rubber mask wearing killers who target supernatural people.

With Luna’s (Janina Gavankar) identity crisis over for the time being she and Sam (Sam Trammell) literally turn into flies on the wall to listen in on police business and head out to exact their own revenge on the ‘Dragon’ and his followers.

All three storylines converge on a pig farm where Sookie and Hoyt (Jim Parrack) are being held and about to be fed to pigs by Dearborne. Last week I guessed that Dearborne was the Dragon but apparently I was slightly off as it turns out that his mistress(?), Sweety (yup, that’s her name) is actually the leader of the killers. Sweety holds a vendetta against all supernatural beings as her husband left her for a shape shifter (think of the benefits…). Sam and Luna save Sookie and capture Sweety. Andy guns down Dearborne and they all live happily ever after.

No, probably not.

The fire demon story comes to a pointless end as Patrick (Scott Foley) kidnaps Arlene (Carrie Preston) in order to kill Terry (Todd Lowe) and save his own ass. His plan backfires with Arlene stabbing him in the neck with a hairpin (don’t underestimate redheads) and Terry shoots his former friend. Oh, and the fire demon conveniently shows up like an evil version of Mr. Clean to get rid of the body and clean up the mess.

Pam wins the best line of the night award when Tara attempts to have a heart to heart moment Pam replies, “Just because we drank a bitch together, does not make us Oprah and Gayle.” Fangtasia quickly gets turned upside down, along with Pam’s world, as a new Sheriff is appointed and the decree is given by the local monarch (who I thought was Bill??) that it’s now okay to eat humans again. Yay for vampires! Booo for everyone else.

After getting beat up last week, Alcide (Joe Manganiello) has a flashback to when his father (ex-Terminator, Robert Patrick) lectured him about the importance of being in a pack. He then visits his father who is now a drunk and no longer part of a pack…and then he morphs into a robotic killing machine and tears Alcide apart! Alright, the last part didn’t happen but if it had it would have made these scenes much more interesting.

Back at the barn, Russell (Denis O’Hare) and his new BFF Steve Newlin (Michael McMillian) meet the redneck werewolves and feed them vampire blood establishing that Russell still commands his own werewolf army. They then steal Luna’s daughter who’s currently a cute little werewolf puppy. There’s a pretty good chance that Luna isn’t going to be impressed.

With almost all the storylines merged there should be a lot of blood soaked, werewolf biting, fairy lightning throwing action over the final three episodes!

While I stated earlier that I felt bad for doubting the writers on the show I still have one point to gripe about: I’m having a bit of a problem with the werewolves in True Blood. I like werewolves, I like the mythology behind them and I like how they’ve been represented in other TV and Film properties (Wolf, The Wolfman, Underworld, Game of Thrones, even Twilight…that’s right, I said it!). However the True Blood version of werewolves is a bunch of rednecks hiding in a barn or a big muscle bound guy who feels sorry for himself and continues to get beat up. C’mon True Blood! Get your werewolves in order!

Now, where are my pants?

I give Everybody Wants to Rule the World 9 complete lack of pants out of 10.