True Blood Rant *SPOILER ALERT*

Wall of text... I know. But hey, use your brain today and read!

As long as it isn't Twilight that you read.

Alright, so I confess: I love to read. Yeah, I know that it isn't the "popular" thing to do in the modern age, but I love books. I've been reading at least one book constantly since I was old enough to read full sentences coherently... and when a friend of mine gave me Dead Until Dark back when I was a sophomore in high school, I was thrilled! The book really caught me in a way many books had, including more illustrious books like The Lord of the Rings series that I read in a month, The Dark Tower Series, The Chronicles of Narnia, and more than I can even count. Yes, I know that all of those books are so vastly different from each other that to compare them is a very horrible idea... but still; I'd grown up loving these books and here came another that I was so excited about I read the entire book in one night.

I read the books that followed in the series as quickly as I could, granted that they only came out one at a time over the course of the last 8 years... But it really is my favorite ongoing book series: The Southern Vampire Series. This book series really did have everything I wanted from it: action, mystery, comedy, romance, you name it! Well, except some things... but still. I love this series.

So imagine my surprise when I found that HBO was going to make a TV series based on the books. I was optimistic, for sure, especially since the writer, Charlaine Harris, was involved. Then they cast Anna Paquin as Sookie. Ok, sure. I'll take it. Couldn't be too bad. Then a bunch of people I'd never heard of were cast... I let it slide. Nothing I can say about people I have no knowledge of.

And this is not to even mention that I can't watch it on TV, since I don't have HBO.

Ah, but the glory of the internet. I didn't even really think about the series at all until during Thanksgiving break I listened to Leon talk about it briefly on LEOG 17... and I decided to check it out via the interwebs.

Ended up watching the last four episodes first (not sure why, it just happened that way)... And I didn't really complain very vocally. Sure there were things I didn't like... but I figured I'd let them slide since I hadn't seen most of the episodes.

And then Monday I watched the rest of them.

You know, it's in moments like this that I do wish that I were a vampire... mostly so I could kill someone viciously. There are so many things that I'm upset about in regards to the series that it's starting to remind me of fucking ERAGON! I hate that movie.

Alright, let me go through the motions. These will go from minor complaints to what really makes me mad.

1. Location of the fangs. Sure, this isn't a really big deal, but they aren't where the canines are... which is the logical place for them to be. Sure, it might be easier for actors to speak around them in that location, so I let it slide... at least a little.

2. The accents. Why does everyone have a different accent? They're all from the same place... But I let this slide too, since actors apparently can't mimic perfect Southern accents... again, not a huge deal.

3. The exclusion of some minor characters. I know that my favorite minor characters, like Bubba (vampire Elvis), shouldn't be that big of a deal, but it is to me, especially since he plays a part in later books that would be hard to replace without changing things entirely. This also goes along with the addition of needless characters, like Amy, the girl that sleeps with Jason for a while before being murdered.

4. The attitude of the townsfolk. Ok, so I'm sure that some of them were mean in their thoughts and who knows what, but come on. These things are barely mentioned in the books. This also goes for the change in the attitude of every one of Sookie's friends in relation to Bill; they may not have been really fond of him, but they didn't really dislike him and even Arlene did her best to be happy for Sookie.

5. The repurposing of minor characters. Maryann, for instance, was not a "woman" posing as a rich social worker, helping Tara Thornton out while having some secret agenda against Sam Merlotte. She was Calipso, a maenad (beserker nymph) who came to the Northern Louisiana area, attacked Sookie in a way of sending Eric Northman a message, and later "helped" solve the mystery of Lafayette's death... by way of gruesomely killing the murderers and those involved. Sam's only involvement was having sex with her. So, changing characters pisses me off.

6. Changing/adding of story points.
-Sam and Tara didn't sleep together, hell Tara was barely even present in the first book!
-Bill having to play maker as punishment for killing Long Shadow, especially since it was Eric who killed him in the book and all he had to do was pay compensation to Long Shadow's maker... which came back to bite him in the ass in one of the later books. So much for that part of the story arc!
-Jason didn't drink vampire blood, nor did he join the Fellowship of the Sun. Vampire blood was barely mentioned as a drug in the books; it was only an issue at the beginning with relation to Sookie saving Bill from the Rattrays.
Gawd, there are so many differences that I want to shake Mrs. Harris (the author) and try to figure out what she was thinking, letting them butcher her series so badly.

7. Making the series not just about Sookie Stackhouse. THIS. This right here is what makes me the most angry. The books are told entirely from Sookie's point of view, since the books are about her and strictly her. Everyone else is a minor or supporting character and most their problems are not addressed in a major way and most definitely not from their point of view.

I wouldn't harp on the series so much if it weren't supposed to be based off the book series, I really wouldn't. But it is, and these problems are the reasons I have come to really almost hate it.

Overall, I just don't like the series as much as I'd hoped to. Maybe I'll give it one more chance next season, but I'm kind of doubting it.

I guess that, at the end of the day... At least it isn't Twilight. Which does make me happy.

I do recommend the books though! There are currently eight of them, which I'm linking so you guys can buy them, if you want. Personally, I have them all in hardcover, but the paperbacks are cheaper. Also, there's another book coming out this May, which I am very excited about.
Dead Until Dark
Living Dead in Dallas
Club Dead
Dead to the World
Dead as a Doornail
Definitely Dead
All Together Dead
From Dead to Worse
And you can preoder Dead and Gone here as well!