True Blood Season 5 Watch: Episode 2 - Authority Always Wins

With the Season 5 premiere of True Blood doing a fine job of bringing us back to Bon Temps to catch us up on those loose ends left by Season 4, tonight's episode took the story forward, delivering on a number of promises made between seasons in the way of new characters. Among them, Law & Order's Christopher Meloni as Roman, Hell On Wheels' Christopher Heyerdahl as Dieter Braun, and Spartacus' Peter Mensah as Kibwe, and the return of a certain lunatic vampire.

"I will never forgive either of you!"
She speaks! It took Tara all episode to do it, but she did manage to talk, and the words she said were likely to be the very words neither Sookie nor Lafayette wanted to hear, though something tells me both expected them. Tara hates vampires, so of course she wouldn't want to be one. Sookie said that last Sunday night, and Lafayette seemed to accept it tonight when he was about to stake Tara while she slept. Of course, he didn't go through with it.

The mess started in Sookie's house, where Pam left Tara, ordering her to stay put and not bite Sookie or Lafayette. Leaving a hungry and distressed Tara in Sookie's house was like setting a blood-thirsty tornado loose in there. It's a wonder that house hasn't collapsed under the weight of all the drama that's gone on there over the course of the series. Babysitting Tara proved to be a tricky endeavor, especially when factoring things like blood and a dark place to sleep.

Sookie's attempts to get Tara down in the cubby before sunrise involved a trip to a store full of vampire-defense weapons. I know there really wasn't much of a point in taking time to show us Sookie shopping around this Fang Depot-type establishment, but I do sort of love that the show takes time to show us places like this. In a world where vampires are real, it does sort of make sense that there might be creepy little stores out there dedicated entirely to vampire defense weapons and home security systems. That's how Tara came to be misted in the face by a spray of silver on her way out of the house. And that's the last we saw of her. She may be off to find Pam.

Authority
Eric, Nora and Bill were taken to an underground secret Authority lair where they were interrogated, tortured and nearly given the true-death treatment. Just as there would be little anti-vampire hardware stores in this reality, so too are there high-tech vampire facilities where baby-eating vamps might be imprisoned and tortured with UV lights, and potential anti-main streamers like Bill and Eric would be hooked up to lethal injection chairs where silver is pumped into their arms.

What did we learn about the Authority tonight? Well, apparently there's a sect of Vampires (vampyrs?) who believe God created Lilith before he created Adam and Eve, and that she/it was truly created in God's vampiric image. Adam and Eve were apparently just her food. An interesting take on the story of the woman who may or may not have been Adam's first wife. Based on their evident love of ritual and eucharistic-type blood drinking, it seems these Authority people are religious types, but it's also clear that mainstreaming is a big priority. Between Nan's death and everything else that's gone on in Bon Temps, the some of Authority vampires think Bill and Eric are a threat to mainstreaming and should therefore be killed.

I'd be lying if I said I thought Bill and Eric were going to be killed. In fact, I would have been especially shocked if either were. But I was curious to see how they would get out of this little situation. As it turned out, they used Russell as their bargaining chip. Nan assured the Authority that Russell was dead. Bill and Eric told them otherwise. Russell is out and if there's ever a threat to mainstreaming, it's him. So it seems the Authority may keep Bill and Eric alive if only to use them as bait to catch Russell.

And speaking of Russell, we got our first glimpse of him tonight! He looks like road-kill, but it appears a steady diet of people may be doing the trick to bring him back to full strength.

Everyone else

Jason apparently slept with some kid's mom and broke up his parent's marriage. This bit of drama, which included the kid attacking Jason, who had been enjoying a tiny juice-box and a bit of TV at the sheriff's station, seemed to come out of nowhere and definitely felt unfinished. We'll have to wait and see where it goes.

Speaking of unfinished, Pam started flashing back to her human days. She apparently ran some kind of brothel in San Francisco during the early part of the 20th' century. She was nearly killed by some Jack the Ripper wannabe when Eric saved her. We never got to see him turn her, so this may be the start of a series of flashbacks. I'd love to see more of this story, and I'm hoping it eventually leads to the first time Pam was a maker.

Things are clearly not right with Terry. He's talking in his sleep and having fire-induced war flashbacks. Arlene went to talk to Patrick, which led Terry to admit to Patrick that the guy he's looking for isn't dead. It looks like the two of them are going to track him down, so there's more of that to com.

Jessica was still throwing parties tonight, but was interrupted by Steve Newlin, who offered to buy Jason from her. At first it seemed like she was going to "sell" the rights to Jason over to the man, but then she made it clear that she was just having fun with him. So Jessica does have enough heart not to let Newlin sink his fangs into her friend. Good for her! On the downside, Newlin broke the news to Jessica that her father isn't the king anymore. How does he know that, though? Has word gotten around so fast? Or does he have inside information? Curious…

Hoyt's back living with his mother. Maxine did the supportive-mom thing by pretending to be mad at Jason when he came by to offer his place to Hoyt. Then she quietly promised Jason a pie for helping break her son and Jessica up. Cute.

Alcide refused to participate in the custom of eating the old pack leader. While the rest of the pack feasted on Marcus, he also refused to take on the role of pack master even though technically, he's inherited it. He isn't the only one who inherited something. Until tonight, it was undetermined whether Luna's daughter Emma would be a shifter or a wolf. Marcus' mother came by the house to see Emma and seemed confident that the little girl would be a wolf like her daddy. Sure enough, Luna found Emma changed into a wolf later on the in the episode. Of course, right now she has no one to help her with the situation since she threw Martha and Sam out. Maybe she'll turn to Alcide for guidance? She seems adamant that Emma not be a part of her father's old pack, and seeing as Alcide seems to be leaning in a similar direction for himself, maybe he'll be a surrogate packmaster/father for the little cub?

Finally, in what might be huge news, Andy proved he's seriously off the V when he found a vial of the stuff in Debbie's abandoned truck and - after initially pocketing it - he handed it over to Jason.

And that wraps it up for the week. On a completely random note, did the little kid at the Authority remind anyone else of the Anointed One from Buffy the Vampire Slayer? Wonder if this means Spike's on the way...