True Blood Episode Recap: "Everybody Wants to Rule the World"

Joe Manganiello | Photo Credits: HBO

First up, sorry for missing last week's episode. As I mentioned, I was out in L.A. at the fall TV previews and watching it live was impossible. Glad to be back though!

On this week's episode of True Blood, the vampire war has begun, and it only took nine episodes to get there! Unfortunately, there are a few traitors in our midst, so when it's time to choose sides, there are a few surprises. In more promising news, the writers have obviously been reading my recaps, because they decided to streamline a whole bunch of plotlines into one this week. Loose ends were tied, and just a few cogent narrative threads remains. Well done, writers! I knew you could do it!

VAMPIRES DECLARE WAR!

Let the games begin! Salome & Co. take Bill's advice and blow up a TruBlood factory in Houston, thus starting a war on the mainstreamers. Interestingly, it's Eric who is all: Um, what the hell is going on here? He's also the only one who appears to understand — though this information is delivered with some subtlety — that the vial of "Lilith's blood" is not what Salome says it is, and is perhaps some kind of mind-control serum that has turned Nora and Bill against him.

What's that? Bill? Yes, it appears that Bill is, as Eric puts it, having some sort of religious crisis, and he's starting to believe Salome's version of events. At the very least, he's skeptical about mainstreaming, which, when you consider the character's history, is really a substantial shift. As with most things in the world of True Blood, the tipping point comes via a hot romp in the sack, in which he alternately imagines that he is bonking — and feeding upon — Sookie, Salome and Lilith. Salome reports that she has chosen Bill to be "her Adam." So... mind's made up! Bill's a bad guy now. Eric finds out the hard way when Bill double-crosses him (and sweet Molly) and reveals their plan for escape.

As the episode ends, news reports tell us that TruBlood factories in Japan and Kuwait have been attacked, so this war has just gone global, y'all!

ALCIDE, ALONE AGAIN, NATURALLY

Alcide tried his damnedest to defeat J.D. to become the packmaster, but he's no match for J.D.'s V-enhanced strength. Fortunately, Martha intervenes just as Alcide is about to get his head smashed by a rock. Instead, J.D.'s first act as packmaster is to abjure Alcide. Dejected, he has a wistful flashback to when his father (guest star Robert Patrick), a former packmaster, first inducted him and Debbie. In his last scene, he enters his dad's rundown trailer, presumably to ask him for help.

THE GOOD MAN

Arlene and Holly ask Lafayette to help contact the spirit of the dead Iraqi woman to find out how to break the curse of Ifrit. Laf sees their request as a way to possibly make some extra cash, so he agrees, but while he's faking some medium-type stuff for the crowd, the woman actually contacts him and she reports that the only way to break the curse is that either Terry or Patrick has to kill the other. Because Terry is a good man, he decides to offer Patrick "a fair fight," fully acknowledging to Arlene that this means that he could die.

Patrick has other ideas. He takes Arlene hostage and forces Terry to sacrifice himself to save his family. Just as it appears that Terry is ready to accept his fate, Arlene stabs Patrick in the neck with a hair chopstick, a struggle over the gun ensues and ultimately, Terry kills Patrick to save his family. I don't know about you guys, but I was genuinely shocked by this development. Thank God Ifrit shows up and takes away the body because Andy and Jason had enough to do this week (see below) without having to deal with another murder investigation.

"THE DRAGON"

Who is "The Dragon," you ask? Well, the short answer is Sweetie Des Arts (guest star Jennifer Hasty), who is also the square-dancing champion of Louisiana and the love of Sheriff Bud Dearborn's life, but that's not important right now.

Remember the unfortunately nicknamed "Obamas," the masked murderers who are killing supes? Well, these boneheaded thugs have apparently modeled themselves after the Ku Klux Klan, so their leader is called "the dragon." Last week when Luna-as-Sam said she smelled a big woman, I had a feeling that one of my favorite characters, Maxine Fortenberry, would be revealed to be the dragon. (But then again, I didn't read the books, in which Sweetie played the same role.)

Let's stop for a second and recognize that this plotline involved the participation of Sookie, Andy, Jason, Luna, Sam, Hoyt and Jessica. Has that ever happened on True Blood? So many narrative threads woven together — and relatively logically!

Let's see if I can put all the pieces together. Sookie went to see Sheriff Dearborn because her dead grandmother (who Lafayette contacted for her) led her to believe that he had information about the vampire who killed her parents. He didn't, but Sweetie appeared to, if the frying pan with which she knocked out Sookie was any indication. Jason and Andy's investigation into the Obamas led them to the pig farm once owned by Jason's 5th grade teacher, Bud's late wife, and to the conclusion that Bud was actually recruiting the Obamas when he was still sheriff. Luna and Sam shifted into flies and overheard Jason and Andy connecting the dots. The Obamas kidnapped Hoyt for failing to kill Jessica and prove his loyalty to their cause.

Just as it looked like Sweetie was going to feed Sookie (a known supe) and Hoyt (a known traitor) to the pigs for their crimes, Sam revealed himself to have shifted into one of the pigs and saved Sookie. Cue Andy, Jason and the cavalry to arrive to arrest the Obamas. Phew. I'm glad that all that's over with.

Now all we have to do over the next three episodes is stop a vampire war and figure out who killed the Stackhouses, which is a much tidier narrative plate to clear. I, for one, am ready for it all.

PLUS:

-Did anyone else catch the quick glimpse of the Sears portrait studio-style snap of Pam and Eric over her desk? Do we actually believe that Eric posed for that?

-Russell and the Rev. Steve Newlin are, like, totally going to hook up, right? This week, Russell got his intended his first pet: Emma. (Eek!)

-Oh yeah, Sam and Luna said the "L" word to each other, and it was actually kind of cute, in a Tracy-Hepburn kind of a way.

THE THREE BEST THINGS LAFAYETTE SAID

-"I ain't Whoopi Goldberg in Ghost. I am way prettier." and "Dead folk, why you gotta be so cryptic? It ain't cute."

both said to the various spirits currently occupying Sookie's bedroom

-"Bitch, stop texting me or I will eat you."

— what he reports that Tara texted to him

What did you think of "Everybody Wants to Rule the World"? (Outro cover of the Tears for Fears song by — seriously — Care Bears on Fire.) What do you think is going to happen in these last three episodes? Give me your theories in the comments section!