The first two seasons of Alan Ball's Southern Gothic series True Blood were a wicked mix of horror, comedy and copious amounts of sex. The third season had more than its share of great moments but too many plots started confusing fans and alienating reviewers.
Unfortunately that trend continues in the HBO series' fourth season, with an overabundance of plot plus yet another suitor for Sookie weighing down this otherwise entertaining show.
Warner Home Video Presents HBO's True Blood The Complete Fourth Season on Blu-Ray
Sookie (Anna Paquin) returns from Faerie to discover that a year has passed in Bon Temps. Her brother Jason (Ryan Kwanten) is now a cop, former undead fiancé Bill Compton (Stephen Moyer) is the vampire King of Louisiana, Tara's run off to New Orleans and Eric Northman (Alexander Skarsgard) has bought her house.
Jason gets more than he bargained for with a were-panther clan, Sheriff Andy Bellefleur (Chris Bauer) is hooked on V, Hoyt (Jim Parrack) and Jessica (Deborah Ann Woll) are having relationship troubles, Sam's wooing another shifter while fighting with his brother Tommy, Jesus (Kevin Alejandro) tries to get Lafayette (Nelsan Ellis) involved in magic, a mysterious witch (Fiona Shaw) appears to have a vendetta against vampires and . . . aw crap, I just lost my place.
So far, this show features (take a deep breath) vampires, werewolves, shifters, faeries, were-panthers, ghosts, demons and witches. This season is technically about the witches (cue Donovan's 'Season of the Witch' over the soundtrack) but there are so many plots and races flying around that audiences can be forgiven for wondering what the hell is going on. In addition, fans and Alan Ball were so impressed with Joe Manganiello's immense . . . acting talent that his werewolf character Alcide returned as another character smitten with Sookie. Unfortunately, it appears Ball doesn't know what to do with Alcide and the other werewolves as they are easily the most boring element of the show.
The annoying part is, after clearing through the underbrush, True Blood is still a fine show. The dialogue still pops and Ball's team of writers are smart enough to mess with TV's conventions in a way that keeps it watchable. However, they are so busy trying to give each character something to do that no plots get enough time to develop as they should.
True Blood The Complete Fourth Season Blu-Ray Extras
Kudos to HBO and WHV for once again loading in the extras. There's a seamless viewing option if you want to watch the whole season without seeing the credit sequences again and again. Six episodes get audio commentaries (at one point, Stephen Moyer compares actor Dane DeHaan to a young Leonardo DiCaprio) but all the episodes get a behind-the-scenes featurette and the 'Enhanced Viewing' option which features pop-up facts and commentary from characters such as Pam, Jason, Crystal and Arlene.
'True Blood: The Final Touches' discusses the post-production process while 'True Bloodlines' examines the characters' relationships . . . something Portia Bellefleur (Courtney Ford) should have checked before she seduced Bill.
True Blood Season 4 Still Entertains but the Cracks Are Beginning to Show
While I still enjoyed this Blu-Ray, True Blood's dip in quality is starting to become a slow decline. Hopefully the return of Season 3 villain Russell Edgington (Denis O'Hare) in Season 5 will give this series the kick in the keister it so needs. But this show needs to prune a lot of plots if it wants to return to its former greatness.
True Blood The Complete Fourth Season Blu-Ray gets a 4/5.
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