True Blood Recap: “Gone, Gone, Gone”

by Sarabeth Pollock:

True Blood Recap: “Gone, Gone, Gone”
Original Air Date (HBO): Sunday August 12, 2012
Season 5 Episode 10

Good evening, Fang Nation.  Did you notice that a few of our Bon Temps friends were missing this week?  Now that Ifrit is gone, we didn’t see Terry and Arlene at all, and more notably missing was our favorite werewolf, Alcide, and his delectable washboard abs.  Sigh.

We start tonight with breaking news: Vampire Crisis, Night 3.  Thank goodness the networks have given a name to the crisis.  (Here in San Diego, any time we get rain we immediately go to “Storm Watch”)  Tru Blood factories all over the globe have been destroyed, which has led to a shortage in the supply chain, and that has led to a fifty percent increase in vampire attacks on humans.  Hmm.  Steve Newlin is on the air, calling for calm.  The American Vampire League is already working with the Department of Homeland Security.  They’re on it, people.  It’s all going to be okay.

Sookie sits down with her Chinese take-out.  “Shut up!” she yells at the television before turning it off.  Over her shoulder we see a shadow on her front porch.  There’s a knock at the door, and she slowly moves to open it, gun in hand.  It’s the coroner, Mike Spencer.  He’s here about the body, he tells her.  It’s an odd sequence that makes you think it’s a dream, and that perhaps he’s there about Debbie Pelt (oh yeah, Debbie’s body is somewhere out there, isn’t it?)…but then he reveals that it’s Sookie’s body he is after.  She shoots him, but he’s a vampire now and the bullet does nothing.  He lunges and pins her down, biting her leg.  “I always liked you!” he announces.  Sookie rifles around for a weapon, finds her wooden chopsticks, and plunges them into his back.  He explodes, as expected, making yet another mess in Gran’s living room.  “Fuck!” Sookie shouts in frustration.

Molly is led into the Authority meeting room.  She’s wearing a bra and iStake, the device that she designed.  Salome and Bill offer her another chance to accept Lilith, but Molly knows that she will be killed anyway.  Molly takes this opportunity to say that destroying the world based on a book that is thousands of years old is the very opposite of what it means to evolve.  Again, I say hmm.  Bill indicates that the chancellors have agreed that she shall receive the True Death, and he activates the “execute” app on his phone.  Poor Molly becomes a pile of bloody goo.  This sends Steve into an excited frenzy—he has never seen a vampire get staked before.  Russell shares in his excitement, but Salome chastises both of them and offers a prayer in Lilith’s name.  Impatient, Russell believes that they should go out and feed.  Salome says that Steve needs to prepare for his next news conference, but Russell challenges her, asserting the authority of a three thousand year-old vampire in perhaps a harbinger of what is to come.  Not only is he hungry, but doesn’t Lilith want them to feast?  Isn’t that what this whole thing is about?  He and Steve leave, discussing what kind of cuisine they might dine on.

Maxine drives Hoyt home from the hospital.  She tells him she sold half of her doll collection to pay for a new bed for him (it’s a California king, and it’s a nice bed even though she doesn’t like the state it’s named after).  He can’t possible return to his house after all of this.  Besides, Jessica was at the hospital and Maxine doesn’t want her around.   Hoyt will move back into her house.  But Hoyt doesn’t want to.  He has decided that he wants to go work on an oil rig in Alaska, which will put him far, far away from the craziness in Bon Temps.

At Fangtasia, Tara and a dazed-though-sarcastic-and-suspicious Pam watch Elijah count money from the night’s take.  Elijah is a Vampire Armand look-alike from Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles, and he’s a petulant asshole, too.  He isn’t happy with the money that’s coming in, and when Tara tries to explain that it’s because their human clientele is staying away, he dismisses her and suggests they do like another vampire bar where they use repurposed peep show booths so that humans can stick an appendage into the opening and the vampire inside has thirty seconds to suck.  How is Pam managing to pay the employees?  Tara explains that she isn’t.  Pam wants to keep things the old fashioned way (just like Blockbuster Video, Elijah sighs), but that isn’t good enough.  Elijah hands out their cut from the night, and before they leave, he announces that the Authority has proclaimed that there needs to be thirty new vampires in Area Five by the end of the year, or else he has the power to seize Pam’s assets, which includes her progeny.

Andy says it’s fortunate that Sookie didn’t order pizza as he scoops up some bloody evidence of Mike Spencer’s attack.  There have been so many vampire attacks that there isn’t much he can do, but they both remark that he would have loved this kind of crime scene.  Sookie isn’t surprised to hear how creepy he was, after all, this is the man who wanted to suck her toes.  Andy tells her that he used to keep his porn in the same file as his autopsy photos on his computer.  Looks like he won’t be missed too much.

Back at the Authority headquarters in New Orleans, Bill takes a drop of Lilith’s blood from the vial.  He stands there reverently, looking like a Catholic priest at mass.  I wonder how it came to be decided that he could so easily access Lilith’s blood.  I guess he passed Salome’s test in her bedchamber in last week’s episode.  (I’m going to allow myself a slight digression about Salome for a moment.  Last week she was talking about having John the Baptist’s head and possessing Lilith’s blood, both of which gave her a lot of power.  When I was 17 I won tickets to the opera for writing an essay about the importance of the arts.  The opera I saw was Salome, and that was in 1997 and I haven’t been back to the opera since then.  The woman playing Salome was in real life the sister to the actress playing her mother, and during the course of the production she does the Dance of the Seven Veils, in which she does a strip tease for her father.  There was something infinitely creepy about going to the opera as a seventeen year old, with tickets won through a school sponsored essay contest, in which a woman strips naked in front of her father (and her real-life sister), during which all of the horny old men in the audience seemed to lean closer with their opera glasses to get a better look.  Truth be told, it was a bit of a True Blood moment.  It seriously fit the bill of something straight out of Bon Temps, or, in this case, Salome’s boudoir last week.  Only in our case, Salome is a vampire and she’s doing the dance for Bill Compton.  I much prefer this True Blood version.  I feel better having shared this.  End of digression.)  Eric is escorted into the room and is forced to kneel at Bill’s feet.  He looks like he’s had a rough couple of days.  Bill tells Eric that he and Nora can’t keep him safe forever.  The chancellors already want him dead, and death is the punishment for all other non-believers.  Bill wants to help save him because Eric saved Bill’s life.  Eric steadfastly refuses the blood, so Nora offers to drink the blood with him.  They take Lilith’s blood; Bill leaves and watches the conversion on a television monitor.  Sure enough, both Eric and Nora have a vision, only it’s Godric that appears to them.  Godric says that Lilith is a “godless god,” and that he has evolved beyond all of this madness.  Eric tells Godric that Nora is lost, and Nora seems to be as shocked as Eric was initially to see her maker, but she still believes she is doing the right thing.  Then Lilith appears.  She is still bloody and naked, of course, and she rips Godric’s neck open.  Eric cries, and Nora has a strange expression on her face.  I’m not sure what she is thinking, but she is very clearly thinking about what she saw.  Bill sighs in relief.  “Praise Lilith,” he whispers.

At the local frat house, Russell and Steve dance to Katy Perry’s “Teenage Dream.”  It’s a surreal moment when Russell is at his very best.  He’s not worried about Lilith.  He tells Steve about the possibility for vampires to walk in the sunlight.  As the camera pans away from their close-up, Russell bites Steve and Steve grabs Russell’s butt and breathes his name in ecstasy.  We also see the bodies of the frat boys on the ground as they dance around.

Jessica arrives at Merlotte’s, which sends many of the human patrons out of the bar.  One customer at the bar starts to pull his gun out, but Sam gets there faster and points a gun at his head.  Another anti-vamp patron gets his gun, and he is greeted by a shotgun-wielding Lafayette.  Sam asks if Jessica is hungry and offers up two dinner specials, seeing how they don’t have any more Tru Blood, and Jessica plays along before ultimately letting them go.  Jason walks into one of the guys as he’s leaving, spilling fries all over the place.  He sees Sam keeping the peace at the bar, and then he sees Jessica.  She is there to meet someone.  Her guards are all gone because they stopped paying them.  As they talk, Hoyt walks in to see her.

Back at Fangtasia, Pam tells Tara that she won’t tolerate being forced to procreate.  Tara agrees, but it seems like she doesn’t want to give up the bar.  Pam explains that the bar means nothing, it’s just a building, and they don’t need it.

Hoyt explains that he wants to move to Alaska.  Bon Temps is just a place where his mom smothers him, his girlfriend slept with his best friend, and a bunch of Barack Obamas tried to kill him.  Neither Jessica nor Jason wants him to leave.  Hoyt has clearly been thinking about his exodus from Bon Temps.  He wants Jessica to glamour him into forgetting about her and Jason.  He wants her to make the hurt go away.  This was a moment that rivaled the earlier scene when Eric released Pam.  These three have shared so much, and the emotion was tangible as they pondered a future apart.  Jessica agrees to do it.  She tells Hoyt that he is a good man with a huge heart, and from this point forward he won’t remember her or Jason.  He’ll go to Alaska to start a new life, and someday he’ll meet a girl and make her the happiest in the world.  She will also be his first love.  Finally, she tells him to count to ten.  At the end they will be gone, and he’ll order a burger and a beer and won’t have a care in the world.  They get up as he starts to count.  “I love you, Bubba,” Jason says softly.  Jessica says goodbye.  They leave, and Hoyt reaches ten and asks for a waitress.

Jason goes to Sookie’s house to vent to his sister.  Sookie reasons that by forgetting about what happened, Hoyt, in a way, forgave Jason.  Jason ponders this, but he turns his attention to the mystery of their parents’ death.  If only the universe functioned in a way to make the search easier, he muses.   Sookie says the box under the bed yielded a bunch of junk, which piques Jason’s interest.  She’s not looking at it like a police officer.  He moves the bed and finds a hollow spot under the floorboard.  Underneath there is a box…and inside the box, a scroll.

Sam gets on the phone with Steve Newlin’s office, claiming he’s from a magazine.  He heard Steve has a new puppy and wants to get details.  Steve is too busy for an interview, unfortunately.  Luna is incredibly frustrated that no news stations want to cover Emma’s disappearance.  She tells Sam that she wants to expose shifters and Weres, as if that will somehow get Emma back.  Sam points out that Steve is due to debate Congressman David Finch that night in New Orleans.  Perhaps they can find her there.  (Thank goodness for Sam’s frequent flyer miles!)

Sookie and Jason meet with Professor Kannell at the local university.  (Jason ponders how someone could read all of those books on the shelf, while Sookie points out that he wrote most of them)  Kannell says that no one in his department can decipher anything, and at best they have an elaborate hoax on their hands.  The vellum is quite old, but the characters don’t repeat, which suggests that they cannot be part of a language.  Not a human language, anyway.  Hmm.

Holly meets Andy for dinner at Merlotte’s.  The place is empty because humans won’t venture out at night anymore, but Holly doesn’t have to worry since she’s eating with the Sheriff.  Lafayette brings out a meal fit for a king.  It’s clear he has been bored because the food isn’t burned.  In fact, once they taste it Andy tells him that he loves him.  Lafayette smiles and promises that their dessert will be “flaming.”

Jessica is alone at Bill’s mansion, and she’s having flashbacks of her time with Hoyt.  Suddenly, a group of guards come in and tell her that she has to leave with them.  She pops her fangs and refuses, and so the commander, having expected her to be difficult, holds up her phone.  Bill commands her to go with them.  She relents.

At the news studio, Steve engages in a lively tete-a-tete with David Finch, who suggests that there is more going on than the AVL wants to admit.  “Like a shadow government?” Steve scoffs.  Humans kill more people than vampires, he points out.  Finch counters that it won’t be that way for long, not as long as the Tru Blood supply continues to dwindle.  Back in New Orleans, Russell clutches Puppy Emma in his arms and coos that “daddy is on TV.”  Kibwe looks like he wants to vomit.  Russell ignores him and tells Puppy Emma that he thinks Steve is dashing.”  The rest of the Authority gang joins them, leading in a newly-repentant Eric Northman.  He has asked for forgiveness, they announce.  Eric admits that he now sees what was clear, that he had been worshipping Godric as a false god.  But Lilith has destroyed him, and now he understands that everyone must obey Lilith.  In a twist, Eric gives thanks to Russell for his mercy, and conversely he grants Russell forgiveness for slaughtering Eric’s Viking family.  They are brothers now.  He seals it all with a kiss to Russell’s hand.  This all seems to me to be a bunch of foreshadowing.

While Steve finishes the interview, a very naked Sam and Luna search his green room.  Emma isn’t there….and suddenly Steve comes in to grab his bag before they return to headquarters.  The bag is a perfect place for a couple of mice to hide.  Just saying.

Jason drives Sookie back from the university.  They see Hoyt driving away from Bon Temps, so Jason pulls him over.  It’s eerie to watch Hoyt talk to Jason as if he has never seen him before.  Hoyt even asks if Jason is related to Sookie Stackhouse.  He doesn’t remember anything they used to do when they were kids (like making up new planets to inhabit).  Jason expresses that he doesn’t want Hoyt to leave, and Hoyt asks if Maxine put him up to this.  Jason sends him on his way.  This was his goodbye.

Jessica arrives in New Orleans.  She isn’t happy.  Bill explains that he tried to keep her out of it but it’s too dangerous for her to be out alone.  They have a room for her there, with everything she could possibly need.  Bill gives her a tour through the sanctuary, which has existed since before Byzantium, and it holds all of their history and secrets.  Jessica is suspicious and asks how Bill came to be one of the people in charge.  He explains that the group has been chosen.  Like, by God?  Bill patiently tells her that it’s not a coincidence that vampires are at the pinnacle of the food chain.  Jessica thinks this all sounds like the Bible study classes her parents made her take.  Bill agrees, but says that she was studying the wrong book.  It’s time to get ready for the coming age.

Tara frantically asks Elijah for his help.  She killed some woman because she doesn’t know anything about “birthing baby vampires.”  That isn’t something that Pam taught her.  Elijah examines the woman and realizes that she’s still alive.  Tara plunges a sword into his chest.  Ginger gasps and realizes that she’s covered in blood and guts.  Pam bursts in and can’t believe the scene in front of her.  Tara wipes the blade off with her fingers.  We’re not running, she purrs in a deadly voice.  We’re not leaving our house.

Steve gets back to HQ and finds that his assistant is very anxious.  It’s about his pet, she says.  Emma walks out, wearing one of Steve’s shirts.  Steve ushers her back into their residence.  Daddy doesn’t like it when you’re human, he tells her.  It’s touching, in a weird way, to realize that he’s trying to protect her from Nigel, the child predator.  No one notices that two mice flee from Steve’s bag on the floor.

The chancellors discuss translating the Vampire Bible into all languages.  It’s not only for the new vampires, Eric points out, but the old ones need a refresher as well.   Russell proposes that they pursue fairy blood, since it allows them to walk in the sun.  If they could harness it, and study it, perhaps they could synthesize it.  The Japanese did it with Tru Blood, after all.  Salome warns him that they are not permitted to walk in the sun, it is forbidden to them.  And fairies are an abomination.  Russell finally throws out his trump card.  He’s over three thousand years old, and he’s not Lilith or the Authority’s lap dog.  The angrier he gets, the stronger his accent gets.  All of a sudden he isn’t a Southern gentleman, he’s a multi-millennia-old vampire.  And he “will have the sun!” he proclaims.  Bill and Eric look at each other.  The game is about to change.

Claude and Claudette examine the scroll.  It’s an older language, older than the two hundred year-old vellum it is printed on.  They find Maurella, a pregnant fairy who is old enough to recognize the language.  With a wave of her hand, the words start to make sense.  The scroll is a contract dating back to 1702, when John Williams Stackhouse made a pact with one M. Warlow that grants him the first female human/fairy heir born in the family.  Do they even have one?  Claude’s expression is sober.

Sookie.

This episode was interesting.  I’m not buying that Eric has pledged his allegiance to Lilith.  If anything, I think he sent a signal to Russell that says he’s on his side.  He’s not going to get caught up in the Lilith madness.  I jumped for joy when Tara slayed Elijah, even though I kind of wanted Elijah to stick around just for the Anne Rice factor.  It is awesome to watch her be so strong.  Pam has done such a great job instilling self-esteem into her.  And I can only imagine what kind of battle is coming our way between the fairies and the vampires.  Is Hoyt gone for good?  What was Alcide doing?  As always, I am eager to hear your thoughts and comments.  With only two episodes left, anything can happen!

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DarkMedia contributor Sarabeth Pollock is an avid writer, reader, and pop culture fan.  Follow her on Twitter at @SarabethPollock and check out her blog at http://sarabethpollock.wordpress.com.

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[Photo Credit: HBO]