"True Blood" (1.06) recaplet: Intercourse with the vampire

This week's episode of True Blood opens with Sookie standing over the stiff, bloody corpse of her Gran...who's dead.*

Before she can react, Bill rushes in to hold and comfort her, but we then see an animal-eye view of something creeping up the steps and approaching the door. Whatever it is lets out a soft growl, and Bill goes into switchfang mode. Oh, but wait, it's just Sam coming to check on Sookie!

Okay, sometime soon the show is going to have to either confirm our suspicions about Sam, or stop teasing us.

*And why is it that all of these people walk around barefoot? They're just asking to step on a rusty nail, or possum poop, or the blood-soaked remains of their elderly kin.

After the credits, Sam tries to console Sookie, but she's too preoccupied with trying to block out the thoughts of Sheriff Bud and Andy, who have arrived to investigate along with the Coroner, and that strange little coroner's assistant.

Sitting on the porch, Sam tries to get up the nerve to finally say "Ry Rove Ru", but Sookie isn't having it, and asks him to "fetch" Bill for her. Sam and Bill have a medium-hot measuring contest about who's better for her, and Bill tells him that this isn't the time for Sam to "mark his territory". Okay, okay ... we get it.

Sam Trammell, Anna Paquin

Back in the kitchen with Gran, the good ole boys are conversing about who could have done it, and Andy suspects Jason, while Bud thinks that Gran's association with Bill might have ruffled a few feathers around town. They try to get under Bill's skin by suggesting that Gran, Maudette, and Dawn all had one thing in common ... they were all "vampire friendly", and are shocked to hear that Bill agrees. Bill believes that all three were targeted because of their association with vamps, but Gran wasn't the intended target ... Sookie was.

As they're bringing Gran's body out of the house, Sookie "reads" that the coroner's assistant was actually one of the goth guys at the vampire bar (which we've known for a couple of episodes), and she asks the sheriff if it's okay for her to clean up the kitchen. Silly old Gran left a mess, what with a sink full of dirty dishes, a bag of trash needing to be taken out, and a few gallons of blood coagulating on the floor.

After the police leave, Bill has to reluctantly make his exit as well, since dawn is coming (not the murdered girl, but the actual dawn), and leaves Sookie with Sam. She asks him to help her clean up, and says something to the effect of "Gran would want us to clean up her blood, and also check on the pot roast she had in the oven".

At Gran's wake the next morning, the door opens, and we get a POV shot of a tuna cheese casserole floating into the house. My first thought was "Wow, Sam is one hell of a shapeshifter!", then we see that Sam was the one who opened the door. Turns out it was brought in by Hoyt's mother, who I guess is officially the town snoop.

Rutina Wesley, Nelsan Ellis, Anna Paquin

As people make their way in to pay their respects, Sookie finds that she can't concentrate well enough to block out anyone's thoughts, and soon all of the voices drive her to have a public mini-breakdown involving one of Gran's pecan pies. The only way this scene could have been better would be if she had thrown the pie on the floor and, through clenched fists, shouted "Damn, Damn, Damn!" ala Florida on Good Times.

Tara and Lafayette take her upstairs, and they have a great scene together, as they convince her to forget about the circling buzzards downstairs. Lafayette gives her a valium "just in case", and Sookie tells Tara that she doesn't know how she would have gotten through all of this without Bill.

Meanwhile, Jason shows up for work at the road crew site, and meets up with the bewildered Hoyt and Rene. They realize that he has no idea what's happened, and have to break the news to him (Sookie tried to contact him the night before, but he and his naked buns were passed out with a female pair of naked buns ... seriously, that's all we see ... and he ended up throwing his cell phone through a window).

How will Bill console Sookie? Will we find out who's been murdering people? And what does Jason do that pretty much kills my big pants for him? Find out after the break!

As Tara and Sookie are talking in her bedroom, Jason pulls up in his truck, rushes upstairs, slams open the door, and slaps Sookie across the face, blaming her for their Gran's death. As he screams at her for hanging around with Bill, Tara jumps up and reads him the riot act, saying that Bill was there for her while Jason wasn't, and that she "doesn't even know" him anymore.

She's right. Jason is acting more and more incoherently, and as he leaves, he ends up tossing Andy against the truck like a rag doll for insinuating that he had somethng to do with his Gran's death.

Back inside, Sookie decides that maybe she will try that valium after all, and Tara tells the wake party that it's time for everyone to go home. As she and Lafayette are trying to decide what to do with the grief buffet, we get a shot of Sookie sleeping, as a pair of hands reach out and start choking her. At first, I was convinced it was Sam, because the choker's sleeves were blue, and Sam was wearing a blue shirt, but after closer inspection, it's definitely a different shirt.

Sookie calls out for Bill, and we get a reaction shot of him, deep under the floorboards of his house, as he wakes up, but realizes there's nothing he can do to help her until the sun sets (and I've often wondered ... sleeping in hot and cramped quarters like that, do you think vampires ever get Bat Wing?).

As Tara and Lafayette are cleaning up, the sun finally sets, and we see Bill speeding through the front door and up the steps, like he's in a Benny Hill skit. He rushes to Sookie's side, and worriedly tries to rouse her. She wakes up and groggily asks "what's the matter", and he breathes a sigh of relief and says "nothing, it was just a dream".

So, it if was a dream, was he imagining that it was Sam who was killing Sookie? Hmmm. Later, as he's standing outside the house, that dog walks up to keep guard beside him.

At Gran's funeral, Sookie is mortified when old Uncle Bartlett rolls up in a wheelchair, and tells him "you haven't been part of this family in a long time". Okay, did I miss something? Obviously, there's some horrible secret involving Uncle Bartlett that we just haven't learned yet.

Sookie reads her eulogy for Adele, but once again is distracted by all the voices, and eventually screams at everyone "Just shut the f*ck up!" and runs away from the funeral. The only way this scene could have been any better would be if had started blubbering "No! No! No! It's not supposed to happen this way! I'm supposed to go first. I've always been ready to go first! I-I don't think I can take this! I-I don't think I can take this! I-I just wanna hit somebody 'til they feel as bad as I do! I just wanna hit something! I wanna hit it hard!"

As she runs off, Jason runs after her, and apologizes for slapping her, but she's livid that he invited evil old uncle Bartlett, and refuses to forgive him.

Back at the funeral, Lafayette and Tara are appalled when her mother gets up and decides to speak about Adele. What could have been embarrassing turns out to be poignant, as she talks about how Adele took care of Tara when she couldn't, and how grateful she'll always be for that.

Tara isn't buying any of it, however, and confronts her mother about assaulting her the last time they were together. Her mother apologizes, but says it wasn't her fault, because it was a "demon" inside her that made her do all those crazy things. She needs Tara's help to get the demon out, but it's going to cost a lot of money. Wait a minute ... she's saying "the devil made me do it"? Oh ... My ... God, she's been possessed by Geraldine from the Flip Wilson Show!

Rutina Wesley, Adina Porter

Sookie is wandering through the old graveyard when she comes across the grave for "William Compton", and later, Sam drives her home. She's in no mood to be around anyone, though, and asks to be alone. Frustrated, he and Tara decide to relieve some of their tension ... at her apartment.

The rest of the episode is all sex, as Tara and Sam get together (though she leaves afterwards to go home to be with her mother), Jason and some blonde bimbo ...

... and Bill and Sookie.

That's right, Sookie puts on a flowing nightgown, and runs over to Bill's house (i guess flannel pajamas wouldn't look as sexy). They finally succumb to their pass- OH MY EFFING GOD! ANNA PAQUIN'S BREASTS!

Okay, I'm sufficiently recovered ... they finally succumb to their passion and make love, and the episode ends with Sookie telling Bill to bite her neck, and Bill happily obliging.

Well, this is an interesting turn of events. What will this mean for their relationship, and how will it affect Sookie physically? What the hell is going on with Jason, and is Tara's mother really possessed by a demon? In next week's promo, we see Bill's vampire fiends again, as well as another look inside Fangtasia. Join us back here for all the fun!