All 7 ‘True Blood’ Seasons, Ranked
Other fans have offered their thoughts on the best True Blood seasons, and how it’s our turn to stake a place in the discussion!
For those of you who haven’t been glamoured into watching True Blood, the fantasy-horror show follows the humans and nonhumans of Bon Temps, Louisiana, as they adjust to a world in which a synthetic blood beverage has made it possible for vampires to come out of the coffin. But vampire-human relations are tense, and as the Bon Temps residents come to realize, the vamps aren’t the other supernatural beings in town.
Developed by Alan Ball and adapted from novels by Charlaine Harris, True Blood became a hit for HBO, but latter storylines made critics and viewers bare their fangs. Here’s how we’d rank the seven seasons now.
7. Season 7
True Blood ends with a splatter as Sookie (Anna Paquin) stakes Bill (Stephen Moyer) at his urging. For reasons we still don’t understand, Bill chooses death instead of a cure for his Hepatitis V infection. And the series finale’s faux-sentimental final scene depicts Sookie living a happily-ever-after with some faceless rando. And in other unjustified demises, the show kills off Tara (Rutina Wesley) and Alcide (Joe Manganiello) for cheap shocks. True Blood had one of the steepest declines in quality in recent memory, but when Season 7 came in, the air went out.
6. Season 5
The show’s fifth season is probably the unhappiest for its characters and the most taxing for us viewers, especially the endless power struggles within the Vampire Authority. This is also the season in which Tara becomes a vampire, Terry (Todd Lowe) learns he has a death curse, Hoyt (Jim Parrack) falls in with a hate group, Sookie and Jason (Ryan Kwanten) learn a vampire killed their parents, and Bill is resurrected as “Billith.” But at least we have Christopher Meloni chewing scenery as Vampire Authority head Roman Zimojic.
5. Season 6
Season 6, the first True Blood season without Alan Ball, is only a marginal improvement over Season 5. Sarah Newlin (Anna Camp) teams up with Governor Burrell (Arliss Howard) to eradicate the vampires, and not even the turning of the governor’s daughter is enough to stop him and Sarah from putting vamps in camps. The storyline was a Holocaust allegory at the time of its airing… and we hate that it’s so relevant today.
4. Season 4
The fourth season wasn’t exactly be-witching, but it’s the last good chapter of the show. Sookie returns from the Faerie dimensional plane, and not a moment too soon: A witch coven led by the spirit-possessed Marnie (Fiona Shaw) is threatening the vampires. When she’s not taking on witches with vendettas, Sookie starts dating Eric (Alexander Skarsgård) — which, in our books, is a big upgrade from the snoozy Bill. And Lafayette (Nelsan Ellis) goes steady with Jesús (Kevin Alejandro), which is a big upgrade for one of our favorite characters.
3. Season 3
As if the show weren’t hunky enough — or supernatural enough — Season 3 blesses us with Manganiello as the werewolf Alcide. Another boon to the cast is Denis O’Hare as the tyrannical Russell Edgington, the Vampire King of Mississippi and the series’ most engaging villain. Less exciting are the fae who show Sookie she’s one of them. With such an expansion of mythology in its third season, True Blood certainly broadens the canvas, but the seams start to show, and some storylines are downright ragged.
2. Season 1
True Blood’s debut season is its most straightforward. Sookie falls for Bill, but their budding romance is waylaid when Bill has to sire the impetuous Jessica (Deborah Ann Woll). Meanwhile, Jason starts seeing Amy (Lizzy Caplan), who becomes the latest of his dates to fall victim to the local serial killer. And that killer turns out to be — gasp! — René (Michael Raymond-James), who’s actually a very un-Cajun guy named Drew. But the real success of Season 1 is its world-building. We’re immediately immersed in the humid, horny town of Bon Temps, where, dare we say, the temps are not always bon.
1. Season 2
Finally, we have our pick for the best season — and probably the most fun. As our heroes deal with the disappearance of the millennia-old sheriff Godric (Allan Hyde), they also contend with the arrival of the powerful maenad Maryann, who knows Sam’s (Sam Trammell) secret, takes Tara under her wing, and whips Bon Temps into a frenzy. (Michelle Forbes makes an excellent antagonist, as she has on TV many times before.) Plus, Terry, Jessica, and the Newlins get bigger roles, and Evan Rachel Wood makes a memorable debut as Louisiana’s vampire queen. Call us a fangbanger, but we love the bite of this season.
Anna Paquin
Stephen Moyer
Sam Trammell
Ryan Kwanten
Rutina Wesley
Alexander Skarsgård
Chris Bauer
Kristin Bauer
Lauren Bowles
Nelsan Ellis
Joe Manganiello
Carrie Preston
Deborah Ann Woll
Kelly Overton
Anna Camp
Dale Raoul
Adina Porter
Rutger Hauer
Jurnee Smollett-Bell
Amelia Rose Blaire
Tara Buck
Gregg Daniel
Aaron Christian Howles
Noah Matthews
Bailey Noble
Nathan Parsons
Karolina Wydra
Janina Gavankar
Lucy Griffiths
Todd Lowe
Michael McMillian
Arliss Howard
Robert Kazinsky
Jim Parrack
Christopher Meloni
Valentina Cervi
Scott Foley
Denis O'Hare
William Sanderson
Lindsay Pulsipher
Courtney Ford
Jessica Tuck
Marshall Allman
Kevin Alejandro
Evan Rachel Wood
Fiona Shaw
Vedette Lim
Alexandra Breckenridge
Gary Cole
Michelle Forbes
Michael Raymond-James
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