“True Blood” Back for 6th Season

BY VICTORIA KRUKENKAMP
ASST. COPY EDITOR IN CHIEF

HBO’s hit show “True Blood” will return on Sunday, June 16, 2013, at 9 PM for its sixth season, which promises to be full of its trademark plot twists and cliffhanger endings.

The show, which is the latest masterpiece from creator Alan Ball, follows the over the top adventures of telepathic waitress Sookie Stackhouse, played by Anna Paquin, and all of her supernatural friends in the mythical Bon Temps, Louisiana.

As with most HBO series, the show gives fans only a taste of blood with a mere 12 one-hour long episodes per year, but rumors abound that this year there will only be 10 one-hour long episodes for fans to feast on.

This is possibly due to 30-year-old Paquin’s recent addition of twins to her family.  Paquin and her co-star Stephen
Moyer, who plays Bill Compton, welcomed a boy and a girl in early September 2012.

“True Blood” is based off the “Sookie Stackhouse Novels” by Charlaine Harris, who just released the thirteenth and final installment to the novel series on Tuesday, May 7, 2013, despite many fan protestations.

Not to worry fans! Harris has already announced a release set for October 29, 2013, of a fourteenth book for the series entitled “After Dead,” which will give readers a chance to explore what happens to their favorite characters in the future, or at least what has happened to Sookie and crew after the thirteenth book wrapped up.

Up until season 5, fans of both the book series and the show could fairly well follow the plot of the show as one book for each season, at least for the main character Sookie and her love interests Bill, Eric (Alexander Skarsgard), and Alcide (Joe Manganiello).

But season 5 left the plot of the books for the most part, and left fans wondering how the writers could bring it back around.

Fans of the “Sookie Stackhouse Novels” have met the shows deviation from the books with mixed reviews.

Keeping characters like the flamboyant Lafayette Reynolds (Nelsan Ellis), who was killed at the end of book one, “Dead Until Dark,” and adding characters like the “baby-vamp” Jessica Hamby (Deborah Ann Woll), who doesn’t exist in the books at all, has been a hit with fans.

Yet the season 5 finale, which technically ended with the death and re-birth of Sookie’s main love interest, Bill, has been received as the show deviating a little too much from the books.

If Alan Ball and the team of “True Blood” writers are able to wrap season 6 back around to the plot of book six, “Definitely Dead,” fans can expect a new supernatural love interest for Sookie, some risky adventures in New Orleans, and a few consequences from the murder of werewolf Debbie Pelt at the end of season 4, which Sookie committed in self-defense.

“True Blood” has a large cult following of fans that are hungry for its return.

New episodes mean social gatherings, as many fans get together for themed premiere parties with food and drink related to the show, and then every week after that to watch as a group as the episodes progress.

HBO builds excitement for the show’s annual premiere with a targeted advertising campaign that releases short clips from the upcoming season, as well as behind the scenes looks on the set, all of which are focused on its catch phrase, “Waiting Sucks.”

The June 16, 2013, premiere of HBO’s “True Blood,” an episode entitled “Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood,” promises to be an action-packed adventure that will leave fans counting down the minutes until the next new episode begins.

Email Victoria at:
vkrukenkam@live.esu.edu