The True Blood Season Finale 2 sucked!Is the above statement an accurate portrayal of of the episode?
or?
A Clever play on words about a vampire show?
Here's the problem. The way that the producer and writers of True Blood are organizing their show is very unique. This unique manner in which they are running their show doesn't really gel with the manner in which most other shows are run. That being said, True Blood's finale isn't completely as awful as everyone else seems to think it is. I feel that it's just misunderstood.
True Blood's unique vision can only be understood when compared to another TV show that follows a more conventional operation. Let's take a look at The Office's Season 2 finale.
The last thing we see in the finale is Jim walking up to Pam and kissing her on the lips. End of Show. Then when Season 3 starts, Jim is in Stamford, Pam has no ring on her finger, and it takes a little bit before the issue of Jim and Pam is even addressed. There is clearly a huge time gap between the two episodes and that's okay. When a show runs this way, the finale can be just that: A finale. Most of the story lines come to a close and give a clean slate for the next season.
True Blood is the opposite. The end of season one has Renee defeated, Bill sacrificing himself for Sookie, Sam resenting Sookie for choosing Bill, Andy Belfour sliding deeper into a drunken stuopr, Maryanne mysteriously showing up, and Layfette missing. Not too mention a dead body in Andy Belfour's car. End of episode.
The climax of this episode is the confrontation between Renee vs. Sam/Sookie/Bill. This happens at the end of the first half hour. The writers spend the rest of the episode ramping up for the next season and setting up most of the major plot hooks. This is risky because True Blood is such an action packed show, that we anticipate an even crazier finale. So in some ways we do not get the action packed finale we expect because the True Blood finales are actually more like two episodes in one.
But like The Office this is still okay and here is why: True Blood is running itself like one long movie. When the first episode of Season 2 starts, there is no time delay; it literally starts the moment after Season 1 ends. We just jump right back into the action. There is no time wasted trying to start the drama, because it's already been started for us in the finale. We've been waiting for a number of months for the start of the new season. During the run of the season we've had weekly episodes, so it's not like a four month wait for a brand new episode. In this manner it is the season premiere as opposed to the season finale that we are more ready and willing to sink our fangs into.
It's kinda like when we were in high school and we'd be watching a movie and then the bell would ring and the teacher would turn off the TV. When we came back the next day we picked up right where we left off. That's what the True Blood seasons are more akin too.
That being said however...Season 2's finale did have some...issues. Maryanne the Maenad was way too powerful an opponent when compared to the prejudice vampire hating Renee. Maryanne was a descendant of the Gods essentially and Renee was just a guy with a temper. Therefore the stage could have been set for an epic duel as opposed to an epic bull. The build up to that very creepy finale was amazing but the finale confrontation did not measure up. Sookie's powers were used only to knock over a statue and Maryanne seemed to give in just a little too quickly.
So over all, we should back off a little bit for thinking that the second half of the episode was not action packed, but those who feel that the Maenad confrontation was lack-luster are justified.
Oh...and the last misstep....there was far too little of this guy:
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