I can honestly say . . .
. . . I've actually watched an episode of Tru Blood, so I can say whether or not I liked it.
WARNING: My review is going behind the cut due to mentions of "adult" content. I'm not going to get overly graphic, but since I have no idea how many underaged readers I have, I feel compelled to put this warning on here.
Someone from Geo's work loaned us the first season of True Blood on DVD. To be honest, I've never had any interest in seeing the show. I remember the ad campaign when it first started, which was really cool, but it's an HBO series, so, meh. I figure it's going to be harder than I particularly like, and probably along the exploitative lines. I've heard there's a lot of graphic sex, which right there puts it on the "sex over substance" measure of my radar.
I've heard the two extremes of recommendation: on the one hand, I've had people tell me I should check it out. Otoh, I've had someone tell me it's nothing but soft porn. Considering the source of each of these recs, I'm not surprised by either of them.
So here's what I thought of it, having actually watched the first ep.
Had I not known that someone was going to ask me, "So what did you think?" I would have turned it off after the first scene.
When a show introduces itself to me with a girl giving a guy a hand job, that sets the tone for the entire series. So, it is going to be sex over substance. And not just sex, but voyeuristic sex. Um, no, thank you.
And there is a lot of voyeuristic sex in this first ep. I realize it's HBO, and that's one of the selling points of the show, but I'm not entirely convinced that the amount of graphic sex is actually necessary for the purposes of the storytelling. Geo, btw, hated it, was offended by it, and will not be watching any eps ever again. As he said, once I could get him past his snarky response, it felt exploitative. Now, maybe that exploitative vibe is what the show is actually going for (and in the particular scene I'm thinking of, I can see that), but it's not something I'm interested in watching episode after episode. (I can maybe sit through it in a movie, if there's a bigger reason I'm watching the movie--MBV, F13--but it's not something I want in every episode of a TV show.) Also, who's being exploited? The characters in the story, or the audience?
I've said before, I'll say again: if a graphic sex scene works to advance the story or is necessary for storytelling reasons, I can go along with that. But when it's showing sex for the sake of showing sex, that feels pointless and exploitative and voyeuristic to me. In this show, it feels like it's showing graphic sex for the sake of showing graphic sex, because it's "edgy," it's "cable," and "ooooh, we can get away with it here."
And if you think it's just the sex that bothered me, you'd be wrong. The language and the violence (particularly when Sookie was getting beaten to a pulp) did not particularly endear the show to me, either.
But, be that as it may, I didn't find any of the characters particularly likable, with the exception of Sookie, simply because she was quite the opposite of her friends. And maybe her boss. The rest of them? No emotional investment established.
I don't really think the premise is particularly original, either. Vampires as a misunderstood portion of society. It seems to have been done before. Just, meh.
But one of the biggest indicators that this won't find a place in our household was the fact that during the scene where they're introducing the bar where Sookie works, going through my mind was "Twin Peaks was an awesome show. Maybe we should pull that out and watch it." For some reason, the bar being a central location of the story reminded me of the diner in Twin Peaks. When one show makes me wish I was watching a different show, that's not a good sign.
The fact that Raelle Tucker is involved kind of makes me think that the writing is good. However, I'm not overly keen on the show overall.
It was kind of fun playing the "Hey! I know them!" game with the actors. Larry (of Larry, Darryl, and Darryl fame), for example. And one of the villains from The Sentinel (whom I knew I recognized but couldn't place until I looked him up). And one of the guest villains from SPN.
I can understand why the show has such a following. The world created here seems to be very detailed. An alternate reality with its own rules and social mores. (And I was very amused by the grandma wanting to invite a vampire to speak about the Civil War to her community group.) And if it weren't for the fact that it's just harder than I like my TV to be, and the fact that it's basically a soap opera, I might be interested.
Geo told me after we finished it that if I wanted to watch any more, I'd be watching by myself. I haven't decided yet. I did watch enough of the second ep to get Sookie out of her predicament, but I sped through a lot of the ep to get there. So I'm not really sure how much more I'll be watching, if any.
I'd rather be watching Dean vs. Dean, which is the next ep in my SPN watching, "The End." (Listened to the commentary yesterday. Might be back with thoughts on that later.)
Regardless, True Blood won't be finding a place on our DVD shelf. With the preparations for bringing a wee one into the house, this is not something I want around. As it is, I know I'll be having to put a lot of my stuff on a top shelf. (This is nothing new, btw. For years, I've been keeping a tally of what needs to be moved out of baby's reach--books, movies, etc. We have a lot of kid-friendly media in the house. We also have a lot of . . . not.)
So anyway, there ya go. I get the appeal of the show, but it has a lot of extra elements that make it not my thing.
WARNING: My review is going behind the cut due to mentions of "adult" content. I'm not going to get overly graphic, but since I have no idea how many underaged readers I have, I feel compelled to put this warning on here.
Someone from Geo's work loaned us the first season of True Blood on DVD. To be honest, I've never had any interest in seeing the show. I remember the ad campaign when it first started, which was really cool, but it's an HBO series, so, meh. I figure it's going to be harder than I particularly like, and probably along the exploitative lines. I've heard there's a lot of graphic sex, which right there puts it on the "sex over substance" measure of my radar.
I've heard the two extremes of recommendation: on the one hand, I've had people tell me I should check it out. Otoh, I've had someone tell me it's nothing but soft porn. Considering the source of each of these recs, I'm not surprised by either of them.
So here's what I thought of it, having actually watched the first ep.
Had I not known that someone was going to ask me, "So what did you think?" I would have turned it off after the first scene.
When a show introduces itself to me with a girl giving a guy a hand job, that sets the tone for the entire series. So, it is going to be sex over substance. And not just sex, but voyeuristic sex. Um, no, thank you.
And there is a lot of voyeuristic sex in this first ep. I realize it's HBO, and that's one of the selling points of the show, but I'm not entirely convinced that the amount of graphic sex is actually necessary for the purposes of the storytelling. Geo, btw, hated it, was offended by it, and will not be watching any eps ever again. As he said, once I could get him past his snarky response, it felt exploitative. Now, maybe that exploitative vibe is what the show is actually going for (and in the particular scene I'm thinking of, I can see that), but it's not something I'm interested in watching episode after episode. (I can maybe sit through it in a movie, if there's a bigger reason I'm watching the movie--MBV, F13--but it's not something I want in every episode of a TV show.) Also, who's being exploited? The characters in the story, or the audience?
I've said before, I'll say again: if a graphic sex scene works to advance the story or is necessary for storytelling reasons, I can go along with that. But when it's showing sex for the sake of showing sex, that feels pointless and exploitative and voyeuristic to me. In this show, it feels like it's showing graphic sex for the sake of showing graphic sex, because it's "edgy," it's "cable," and "ooooh, we can get away with it here."
And if you think it's just the sex that bothered me, you'd be wrong. The language and the violence (particularly when Sookie was getting beaten to a pulp) did not particularly endear the show to me, either.
But, be that as it may, I didn't find any of the characters particularly likable, with the exception of Sookie, simply because she was quite the opposite of her friends. And maybe her boss. The rest of them? No emotional investment established.
I don't really think the premise is particularly original, either. Vampires as a misunderstood portion of society. It seems to have been done before. Just, meh.
But one of the biggest indicators that this won't find a place in our household was the fact that during the scene where they're introducing the bar where Sookie works, going through my mind was "Twin Peaks was an awesome show. Maybe we should pull that out and watch it." For some reason, the bar being a central location of the story reminded me of the diner in Twin Peaks. When one show makes me wish I was watching a different show, that's not a good sign.
The fact that Raelle Tucker is involved kind of makes me think that the writing is good. However, I'm not overly keen on the show overall.
It was kind of fun playing the "Hey! I know them!" game with the actors. Larry (of Larry, Darryl, and Darryl fame), for example. And one of the villains from The Sentinel (whom I knew I recognized but couldn't place until I looked him up). And one of the guest villains from SPN.
I can understand why the show has such a following. The world created here seems to be very detailed. An alternate reality with its own rules and social mores. (And I was very amused by the grandma wanting to invite a vampire to speak about the Civil War to her community group.) And if it weren't for the fact that it's just harder than I like my TV to be, and the fact that it's basically a soap opera, I might be interested.
Geo told me after we finished it that if I wanted to watch any more, I'd be watching by myself. I haven't decided yet. I did watch enough of the second ep to get Sookie out of her predicament, but I sped through a lot of the ep to get there. So I'm not really sure how much more I'll be watching, if any.
I'd rather be watching Dean vs. Dean, which is the next ep in my SPN watching, "The End." (Listened to the commentary yesterday. Might be back with thoughts on that later.)
Regardless, True Blood won't be finding a place on our DVD shelf. With the preparations for bringing a wee one into the house, this is not something I want around. As it is, I know I'll be having to put a lot of my stuff on a top shelf. (This is nothing new, btw. For years, I've been keeping a tally of what needs to be moved out of baby's reach--books, movies, etc. We have a lot of kid-friendly media in the house. We also have a lot of . . . not.)
So anyway, there ya go. I get the appeal of the show, but it has a lot of extra elements that make it not my thing.