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Alan Ball, feminism, mass media, metanarrative, misogyny, Narrative, perception management, Southern Vampire Mysteries, True Blood Fandom
You have no idea what I’m talking about, I’m sure. But don’t worry… you will …Lester Burnham, American Beauty
In and out of the True Blood online universe people are dissatisfied with Alan Ball’s interpretation of Charlaine Harris’s Sookie Stackhouse novels. The reaction of on-and offline viewers has ranged from perplexed to enraged in the wake of the season 4 finale. Many online have elected to disconnect from the show, at least emotionally. Far fewer fans are discussing True Blood this hiatus than in past seasons. More than two months on from the finale the atmosphere has settled into apathy and weary mockery, and this among neutral bloggers as well as formerly ardent fans. We’ll have to wait for June 2012 to see if this foul mood translates into anemic ratings.
This is about more than just angry rhetoric coming from disgruntled obsessives. A few formerly supportive reviewers have turned on Mr. Ball and some have resorted to full blown mockery of the fundamental worth of the show.
All of the complaints are valid. I’ll say it again: All of the complaints are valid. The misogynistic portrayal of female characters, the lack of logic and consistency, the plot holes, lax continuity in both story and characterization, and the overwhelming sense of disorientation have coalesced into one pissed off fandom, which was fueled in no small part by outright character assassinations of fan favorites Pam and Eric. The consensus is these characters were torn down so that a greedy, power mad, murdering psychopath of a character could be glorified and made to seem relatively harmless.
I’ve said this until I’m blue in the face but this is just what happens when greedy power mad murdering psychopaths seize control of the narrative. [call it what you will but YES, True Blood is a mind fuck/screw/puzzle film and this usually involves a twisted, complicated narrative mode ala Fight Club] They feed us bullshit that doesn’t make any sense and they shove their fascist ideology down our throats. Black is white, white is black, war is peace, workers are the ones waging class warfare on the rich, the 1%, who control the narrative through the corporate media, are just a bunch of good ol’ boys. To prop themselves up the 1% must trump up villains du jour to terrify you into thinking the Overlords of our Overclass are the lesser evil. Compared to Osama bin Laden and his hordes of swarthy ‘terrists’, Dick Cheney, George H.W. Bush, and their Cabal of Robber Barons are virtuous avenging angels who are forced to torture and rape and maim and kill and exploit in their heroic–and expensive– crusade to protect us. To keep us safe. Safe from entities that they themselves funded and controlled to begin with.
True Blood fans, is any of this sounding the least bit familiar?
In our dominate cultural narratives past crimes of the REAL murdering psychopaths in power are whitewashed and their sins skillfully projected onto their enemies via propaganda organs that they own.
Rank murders can occur right inside the halls of power but are never widely reported, if at all, much less prosecuted.
Given some of the above [and much more scattered throughout this website and the whole wide internet, plus your local library] I would like to ask those intimately familiar with the show, how does True Blood’s narrative mode differ from the reality that should be slapping us in the face every day if weren’t so skillfully hidden and papered over?
You unhappy True Blood fans are assuming the show is too far from reality and I say it gets a little too uncomfortably close to reflecting just exactly what the fuck is going on here. Is it any wonder Alan Ball routinely refuses to have a frank discussion of his show’s core themes and steadfastly denies a deeper meaning? Think for a moment how ridiculously illogical it is for an Oscar winner to deny the importance or value of his own work. He’s either an idiot or a paragon of self-restraint.
Now take a good look around. Murdering psychopaths who exploit the powerless favor soap opera tropes to tell the story of our culture and society. Treacly, degrading mush, trashy, amoral slop or glittery, often disturbing fluff is shoved down our throats to distract us from the real issues that confront us.
Still not ringing a bell?
In our male dominated culture women are treated like dirt, portrayed as grasping lunatics, strong, independent females are subverted and ridiculed while compliant little living dolls dressed up like porn stars are held up as examples to our young women.
But you know all this, don’t you? You see it every day. You probably complain about media garbage to your friends and neighbors, spouses, kids, and coworkers. If you are like me and my family, there are strict limits on what the kids can watch, listen to, or view online.
So why do consumers of media get the shit end of the stick when there are innumerable venues with access to so much money, time, talent, and potential to produce quality entertainment? WHY does the current state of popular culture seem determined to produce insidious brain rot rather than spend the effort to create art that feeds our souls and enlightens us?
Where did all the art go? Yes it’s out there but you have to dig for it. They don’t make it easy for you to obtain clarity and luxuriate in mind-expanding beauty. Ugliness keeps us on edge, insecure, and suspicious of our fellow man. Traumas are regularly introduced to keep us off balance, confused, and compliant with the demands of the dominant ideology. What are the demands? Shut up, lie back, and enjoy it. Whatever ‘it’ happens to be this year. Yesterday they might have wanted to use our hands and backs, today they might want our blood. Already they can grab your house out from under you, send your kids/friends off to be cannon-fodder-for-profit, incarcerate you for profit, and even legally snatch your young children to make a profit. And all this while trafficking in humans and covering up child rape, to name just the tip of the iceberg. This bunch are nothing if not consummate multi-taskers.
Of course relating this to True Blood is difficult because we haven’t actually seen the OTBB [One True Big Bad] Bill Compton doing something unambiguously evil. Just going by the narrative he’s not so bad, right? Certainly not as bad as evil old Eric Northman, or Maryann Forrester, or Russell Edgington, or poor crazy Marnie, or whatever the Big Bad du season is next year. But digging further, we find many examples of Bill’s murderous romps and penchant for berserk mayhem, [as in life, what we do know can be extrapolated into exponentially worse deeds] it just isn’t trotted out and kept in the forefront of the minds of the viewers. You have to do that for yourself, because as we should have learned by now The Powers That Be do love a memory hole.
True Blood is just giving you what you get everyday. It’s easy to understand why you’re complaining about Sookie and her infuriating cluelessness, her constant victimhood, and her compliant attitude in the face of extreme abuse. You might well ask when she’s going to get a clue and stand up tall against the forces bent on sucking her dry.
We might well ask the same thing of you, dear reader.
It is good to rail against stupidity and trashy tropes on tv. It is good to demand logic and continuity, to declare that even fictional murders should be investigated, to cry out in rage when victims beg forgiveness of their abusers, to wonder why criminal conspirators don’t get arrested, and to mourn the dearth of truth and beauty. Now if we could just translate this into real demands we might get somewhere.
I’m not going to sit here and predict that Mr. Ball will ever allow True Blood to ‘come out of the shadows’ so to speak and give us some truth . All I ask is that it stop taking the narrative position of our overlords a give us a more clear-eyed narrative pov. I get it, I do. Every day in the real world we are bombarded with lies and propaganda from on high and True Blood has constructed a meta narrative to illustrate this point. But having it permeate our entertainment beggars our patience and will cause us to drift away, as we should if this depressing state of affairs continues.
Is it too much to ask of the Oscar winning screenwriter and his creative team of highly skilled professionals that they give us something we can truly root for? Something that will uplift and enlighten us? If this idea, this hope, for an unveiling, a ‘great revelation’ of deeper truths, hasn’t been the plan along then True Blood has been a futile exercise in exploitative titillation and I have wasted a lot of time poring over it, searching for meaning.
But I don’t believe I’ve wasted a moment. Yes Virginia, there is a puppetmaster.
perfect article, yes, there was really a big rage amongst the true blood fans about this season, it was just awful and AB has managed to destroy certain characters to propp up bill, its just a shame that AB and his writers don´t seem to care at all what the fans think and they will probably continue to shove their bill agenda down our throats…
and maybe you should send this post to HBO or on their true blood facebook side or something like this, the writers should just finally read what their viewers or what fans of the novels think about the show, do the writers only read the two hardcore bill fansites, bill is not even that popular but still they shove him down our throats to the extent that it ruins the whole show…
hi tint, thanks for commenting.
If my hits are anything to go by, HBO sees my stuff. I trust they know what they are doing, WE just have to have patience and believe these folks are professional artists who want to make a statement. The story isn’t played out yet,- there is still plenty of time for them to make their case.
For three seasons I went along with the conspiracy that TB really was popcorn for smart people and that the bad writing and characterisation was leading up to some big reveal that would knock the TB world and all it’s fans on it’s axis and send us spinning.
After season four I don’t care.
I’ve spent too long dissecting the nuances and looking for clues as to where AB is actually going. There is no pay off. There’s no satisfaction in looking for something that will remain hidden. Four years is long enough to waste my life asking questions I’ll never get the answers to.
I applaud anyone who continues to look for clues and prove, without a doubt that TB is a colossal mindfuck. But I just don’t have the energy for it anymore.
I understnand jan, and I don’t fault you for it. If there is one main criticism I have of TB, it is that the mind-fuck overstayed it’s welcome.
Most definitely. I was very excited after the finale of S3, I was so sure we would get answers, so sure that Sookie would wake up, so sure that the narrative would level and enable viewers to watch an omniscient POV rather than the fatally flawed 3PPOV.
But, hey, more fool me.
The more AB milks this mindfuck, the more viewers are going to leave. Perhaps that’s his reasoning behind S5 being his last at the helm – either he’s going to answer everything and he’ll have to go into hiding from the 6 Bill fanatics that will stalk and kill him OR the execs at HBO will let the door smack him on the ass on his way out for continuing the ruse.
He’s got a lot of ‘splainin’ to do, that’s for sure.
Well you certainly connected all the dots for me. Great post sunny. And yes to everyone who said it is tiresome to watch what we know is a train wreck. That train wreck is what we are fed daily as you pointed out. People don’t like to hear they are being duped whether it’s fiction or real life.
I really, really hope that some answers and truths will come in S5. Either way, I’ll still be watching the train wreck, but sadly there may be nowhere to discuss it if more people bail out.
Thanks BG. Yes, it is tiresome. It’s tiresome to watch, it’s tiresome to try and convince people there is more to the picture than meets the eye. Some relief and satisfaction would be welcome, for once.
Wow, applause, applause! And viva la revolution! I believe you are spot on, as usual Sunny. I’ll need to go back to read all of the links but it makes me think of something that SM said of season 5 in that the big bad would be more of an omnipresence. I am wondering if TB will continue down the current path. I can’t think of a more dangerous omnipresence than complacency. I think we have only seen the beginning of it with season 4.
I know that even though I feel confused and frustrated over a damn TV show, I’m not one to give up or quit seeking truth in any area of life. Could AB be so bold to hold off for one big-assed slap to the face at series end? Of course, season 5 could be HIS last season, so I’m hopeful for something sooner.
Thanks lucasa!
“SM said of season 5 in that the big bad would be more of an omnipresence.”
Yes, I think with the Authority coming in full force [today's casting call] we can look for an ‘all seeing eye’ type elite power to be put on full display.
“Could AB be so bold to hold off for one big-assed slap to the face at series end?”
God I hope not. That is WAAAAY too long to wait for a payoff.
With all the links you provided to real life issues, I was thinking maybe we should be looking at events of the past year truth or otherwise to get a clue of what may happen in S5. Just a thought.
I should have added “in the past year in various media”
A good thought, BG. The Penn State scandal could figure in.
http://www.whale.to/b/pedophocracy.html
..with Hunter, the groundwork has already been laid.
On the good side, as we discussed some time ago maybe OWS will come into it somehow. Also the Arab Spring. Revolution is in the air. Viva la Revolution!
In retrospect, I”m beginning to quite like S4, it certainly has set the cat among the pigeons.
Maybe it’s not so much a question of searching for meaning, but of actually asking questions, if that makes sense.
Makes perfect sense to me.
Wow, Sunny….wow! Yeah, what you said. Great post. Did you reach into my brain and pluck out my thoughts?
I have thought for a long time now that TB is just a reflection of our society and I have found the series and the fandom absolutely fascinating. It is almost like Alan Ball plucks a string and the factions of the fandom all start singing their tunes. I don’t for one minute believe that Alan Ball doesn’t know what he is doing.
Team brilliant, team incompetent…team books, team True Blood…team Eric, team Bill…team Edward, team Jake…team left, team right…team democrat, team republican…team gay, team straight…team butter, team margarine…we all pick our teams, don’t we?
I started out on team Ball…I’m still on team Ball. Perhaps this social experiment is really meant to force the viewer to open our eyes, look within ourselves and make our own decisions on what we chose to accept . True Blood is but a metaphor.
I have said before that I’m along for the ride and I still am. I’ll be watching until it ends. I give the man credit. He certainly doesn’t bore me!
What you said, every word.
He certainly doesn’t bore me!
Osterby, even if nothing turns out as we hope, that statement is the bottom line for me too.
Great Post Sunny! Love the connection with TB and our current societal issues. You’re right, the fans frustration with TB can parallel our real world frustration with whats going on now. One being this nationwide and global economic crisis, that I believe was purposely manufactured by the government(s). These “Big Banks” knew they were giving money to people, who couldn’t pay them back….housing and student loans, but still did, just to make a profit, and then in the end, they’re rewarded! While we citizens are left with the downfall of it all, no house, no job….skyrocketing food prices. All because of corporate greed, and to me there is no difference between Democrats and Republicans, in the end they are all working for the same corporation.
Then they have the media in their pockets to feed us lies, like how the economy is recovering when its really not, and selling us the notion that everyone can achieve and have the American Dream.
This is why I no longer watch the scripted 24 hour cable news networks, I get my news from other sources.
I agree with you and think Alan Ball much like our everyday has created an imaginary smoke screen…he’s now increased the viewers frustration level and is leaving it to us in deciphering whats real and what’s not. And like in the real world, there are those who simply prefer to remain oblivious to whats going on, and take everything at face value as opposed to those who want and seek those true answers.
Hi Genie!
While we citizens are left with the downfall of it all, no house, no job….skyrocketing food prices. All because of corporate greed, and to me there is no difference between Democrats and Republicans, in the end they are all working for the same corporation.
Amen sista, AMEN.
Then they have the media in their pockets to feed us lies, like how the economy is recovering when its really not, and selling us the notion that everyone can achieve and have the American Dream.
Seriously, the only reason to watch corporate ‘news’ adverts is with an eye to a Masters degree in Kremlinology. I scour the internet for reliable alternative sources, some of which are linked in my blogroll, so get clickin’ you guys.
I agree with you and think Alan Ball much like our everyday has created an imaginary smoke screen…he’s now increased the viewers frustration level and is leaving it to us in deciphering whats real and what’s not.
I’m convinced this anger was deliberately orchestrated by AB and co.. Well, not exactly that, but I think it was fully expected and prepared for. They knew what they were doing regardless, and I am POSITIVE they know it can’t go on without alienating the audience entirely. He has to turn the steam valve and relieve the pressure, even if he pours it right back on.
IOW, SOMETHING’S GOTTA GIVE. In more ways than one.
They knew what they were doing regardless, and I am POSITIVE they know it can’t go on without alienating the audience entirely. He has to turn the steam valve and relieve the pressure, even if he pours it right back on.
IOW, SOMETHING’S GOTTA GIVE. In more ways than one.
Sunny, Yes they did, and I think the question is will the viewers (especially those ‘Bill Lovers’) be prepared for what comes to light when it all blows up. My guess is its going to be a mix of shock, disbelief and even more anger..but this time the tables will have turned.
Cognitive dissonance will be extreme. I look forward to it.
“These “Big Banks” knew they were giving money to people, who couldn’t pay them back….housing and student loans, but still did, just to make a profit, and then in the end, they’re rewarded!”
This is not the truth. Since I work in the banking industry…I feel the need to let you know I have written many a mortgage in my day. Banks are one of the most highly regulated industries in this country.
The United States Congress is responsible for making the laws that they “Big Banks” must comply to. They are called Regulations. Some of these regulation are very valuable. Anti-descrimination, etc. Some not so much. Let me tell you, If you are a bank and you fail an FDIC audit, which audits to these Regulations, you are no longer a bank. The FDIC will come in and close you down.
Barney Frank and Chris Dodd drew up a Regulation that REQUIRED mortgage lenders to lower the lending standards and to construct loans that REQUIRED lower standards for repayment. This Regulation REQUIRED these “Big Banks” to subsidize mortgage applicants below normal lending standards with down payment funds. This Regulation also REQUIRED these “Big Banks” to lower the lending standard from 80% loan to value to as much as 125% loan to value. And these ‘Big Banks” were REQUIRED to grant loans with no stated income from the applicants.
However, most of these loans were sold by mortgage companies. These loans included interest only loans that offered low payments which never even covered the principal and seldom covered the interest. You may know these as negative amortized loans and they have adjustable rates, which means the rates fluctuate. Some of these loans’ interest rates were determined by the base loan rate called the prime lending rate (3.25% today, it’s published in the Wall Street Journal) and market indexes (margin), such as the LIBOR index. When the prime rate and the indexes rates rose a few years ago, these mortgage holders interest rates rose and so did their payments.
When interest rates rose and homeowner’s began to default, the US Treasury “suggested” (REQUIRED) these “Big Banks” to buy these shady loans.
In late 2007, when the presidential election results were in, and small and large business owners were unsure of President Obama’s business policies. Obama declared he was in favor of re-distribution of wealth, a hike in business taxes, and his first agenda was health care reform. Business owners began to scale back their operations, payrolls and started to lay off employees. In the business world, political uncertainty breeds inaction. The credit markets froze up.
When the big brokerage houses on Wall Street began to fail…the US Treasury “suggested” REQUIRED these “Big Banks” to merge or buy the failing brokerages. Then the US Treasury, to allay fear REQUIRED these “Big Banks” to accept billions of dollars in “Bailout.”
Osterby,
I understand that the reason for the crisis is much bigger and deeper than just the Big Banks, and that the blame extends to the higher ups in government. I know that both Washington and Wall Street, are nothing but a festering cesspool of corruption. Which is why these CRIMINALS (CEO’s AND Government officials) should be put in jail… POINT BLANK PERIOD. From pure greed they in turn have ruined millions of peoples lives, yet have walked away from it all with just a slap on the wrist. How is this fair?
And its become pretty evident that the SEC is no longer interested in protecting its citizens, as they are bought and paid for by these banks.
Its the circle of corruption, that is going to further drive this country into the ground, These people don’t care about the average tax paying citizen, they don’t care how many people are homeless or unemployed, as long as their pockets remain lined with dirty money….they could care less about them. Unfortunately things are never going to change unless a major overhaul is done about the way this country is run. Until then the croocks and liars will always win.
Totally. Congress works for Wall Street, not the other way around. Reps are bought and paid for lackeys. Obama is no better:
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2009/apr2009/pers-a06.shtml
I haven’t come here for a lot of time, and it’s been socking… All those reports on human rights… It’s really crazy, and even conflicting, in a society where its people are more peaceful every century, decade and year after ages of agressiveness and violence… And it comes from just a few handfull of sickheads and humans which don’t seem to be people.
When I talked with someone who had shared words with AB I understood that he Knew and Understood, and it’s very “easy” to see in some seassons, but this covered ideas teachings don’t work if you never, at some point, scream it with literal words and actions, even though that is not standar happening in the real world… And much more in a long series where there has been long enough time to do it and instead has been giving the oposite ideas to those who didn’t understand it. Maybe even encouraging women to let themselves be abused, among others… It just seems so alike to twilight series and its sick ideas for young women, it’s frustrating.
Arg! I can’t get out of my head the human legal slavary, and in developed countries! Legal! Or the Children traffic… And not “just” in other countries but children born with all rights in apparently just countries (sadly we all already know about the problems world wid)… How can we stop some of this sick un human problems if we are creating them at home? I really hope this is not done in the Eropean Union, at least in such rates… It seems unreal, fiction… And we are paying them!
Hi Dwim, it’s so wonderful to hear from you again!
You said: “but this covered ideas teachings don’t work if you never, at some point, scream it with literal words and actions,”
I agree, and it fits with my oft repeated lament that art should be accessible to the masses, most especially True Blood which appeals to a broad audience of ordinary folks rather than the Intelligentsia. I fully believe all will be revealed.
“It just seems so alike to twilight series and its sick ideas for young women, it’s frustrating.”
I understand what you’re saying, but TB is very different from Twilight in that the portrayal of young women on TB is a realistic depiction of how young women ARE rather than telling us what they SHOULD be. We have to stop expecting art to idealize women/gays/blacks etc. While Twilight is propaganda, TB is a mirror held up to society and it’s ugly. It’s not that TB is saying that young women WANT to behave this way, it’s saying young women are intentionally persuaded to behave this way by shit like Twilight.
Nice phrasing.
I hope the really show it. I probably wont come for some time, but see you soon!