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'True Blood' withdrawals begin, finale calls for reflection

By April MacIntyre Sep 12, 2010, 22:28 GMT

Hearts ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ for James Frain - HBO\'s "True Blood" Season 3 Los Angeles Premiere - Arrivals - ArcLight Cinerama Dome - Hollywood, CA. USA © Albert L. Ortega / PR Photos

The last episode in the rollicking swampcooler known as "True Blood," airs tonight.

HBO's sanguine potboiler of high camp dramedy served up Southern Gothic style was a humdinger this season, punctuated by brilliant guest stars that made the series an sexy escapist Sunday night romp in the bayou.

Now we have to put our vamps to bed and wait until another year, and with so many questions.

Will Sookie (Anna Paquin) keep her magical fairie blood? Will Pam (Kristin Bauer) keep delivering the snark? Baby vamp Jessica (Deborah Ann Woll), the night shift gal at Merlotte's gifted with the most glorious head of natural red hair in all of television, will the premature fanger stay with Hoyt (Jim Parrack)? 

Same for our Lafayette (Nelsan Ellis), who loves his crazy mama (Alfre Woodard) and his cousin, the tortured Tara (Rutina Wesley) who sports the most ripped arms next to Jason Stackhouse (Ryan Kwanten) on the series.  Lafayette is the heart of the series for me.

Speaking of ripped, our reigning hunks of Bon Temps include Eric (Alexander Skarsgard) and earthy wolf-man Alcide (Joe Manganiello), who we lucky fans got to see partially naked this season.

Queen Sophie Anne (Evan Rachel Woods) and Bill (Stephen Moyer) were both a bit of a wet noodle this season, with Bill telling Snookie half-truths and nearly draining her dry in the truck, and Sophie-Anne buckling fast and hard under King Russell's demands.

Merlotte's saw new waitress Holly Cleary (Lauren Bowles) introduced, a whole new type, a bonafide Wiccan. And then poor demon-plagued Sam, (Sam Trammell) will he find peace from his dodgy past of thievery and murder?  Are we saddled with the icky Mickens for yet another season? I still have post traumatic-stress disorder from seeing Joe Lee (Cooper Huckabee) walking around in his stretched out tighty whities.

Then there is Sookie's kin, cousin Hadley, (Lindsey Haun) the skittish and scared ex lover of Queen Sophie-Anne and mother to a son who possesses Sookie's mind-reading skills. Where will Ball and company take us with that dangling thread?

Which brings me to the star standout guest players of this season:

James Frain, of "The Tudors" fame who just stole the show as Franklin, the psychotic codependent kidnapping vamp obsessed with Tara.  He perished too soon in my opinion.  And the King, (Denis O'Hare) resplendent as the elder vamp Russell Edgington, grieving his lover Talbot's (Theo Alexander) true death at the hands of Eric.  

Another shout out for the imperious Magister (Zelijko Ivanek), who made Eric nearly wet himself, and Nan Flanagan (Jessica Tuck) who gave Pam a run for her money in the bitch department.

Debbie Pelt (Brit Morgan) gets kudos for the best zinger of the season, wailing to Russell, "they killed my Cooter," and that very grimy werewolf Cooter (Grant Bowler) was a walking PSA for all kids to see what havoc drugs will play with you. 

Another player of note is Claudine (Lara Pulver) the faerie who reveals to Sookie who she is, and also to Bill in a dream like watery sequence.

The series has taken us to the edge with Sookie's realization of who she is and why they (vampires) are attracted to her. She considers a new life without Bill – or vamps and Tara and Sam satisfy a long-brewing passion. Sookie's dim, erstwhile brother Jason is flirting with disaster once again with shifter (and shifty) Crystal and her trash relatives.

And our Lafayette, the Jennifer Aniston of True Blood, is dating Jesus, who just may be some sort of horrible south-of-the-border demon.  Sookie is captured by King Russell, and now the fate of our heroine waitress is hanging in the balance. After dining on Sookie's blood, Russell is lured into the light by crafty Eric, whose exact feelings for Sookie, and Pam, are an enigma.  Scandinavians keep their emotional cards close to their chests.

Who did it for you this season? Did it top the MaryAnne the Maenad storyline prior? For those who have read the Harris novels (I have not) that the series is adapted from by Alan Ball, who will you miss?  What do you predict will be the focus of next season?