'True Blood' Season 5, Episode 7 Recap - 'In the Beginning'

Karaoke! Lilith! Severed heads on microwaves! Bandanas! This episode had just about everything in it, including another healthy dose of craziness. Let's get down to it:

Bill/Eric:

Our bromantic duo escapes the scuffle with Russell unscathed, which is more than you can say for Roman, who is now a pile of goo. That leaves Bill and Eric a bit confused, as they figured Russell would kill them the first chance he got. Instead, he stakes Roman and then lets the SWAT team put him in yet another net.

The reason becomes clear later, when Bill and Eric meet with Salome and Nora only to find Russell chillin' with them in a spiffy new suit. Apparently he's over that whole ruffled shirt thing and is going for a more modern look... and apparently it was Salome who dug him up!

Yes, Salome and Nora planned to bring Russell in to stage a coup to oust Roman, as nobody else could take him on. Russell has done his job and seems to be playing nice for now, though his praising of Lilith is pretty clearly less than genuine.

That doesn't stop him from drinking a bit of Lilith's blood in a ceremony, though. In fact, the whole council, plus Bill and Eric, partake of the vial too. Fun fact: when vampires drink the blood of Lilith, they get totally high. It's their own version of V juice. With it apparently comes a mean case of the munchies, as the whole gang, Bill and Eric included, parade down the French Quarter until they find a wedding party at a bar and proceed to drain everyone in the place.

That brings about the arrival of Lilith herself, though it's tough to say if she's real or just an illusion brought about by the blood. Most likely the latter. Eric, who has thus far called Nora a "bible-banging cunt" to her face, sees the spirit of his father as well, who tells him that what he's doing is wrong (duh) and that he should save Nora. Will he? Or is that human he's eating just too darned delicious?

Lafayette:

Lafayette continues his little trip through Crazytown, though the poor guy still only gets a few minutes of screen time each week. This time, it brings him to Jesus' family, who have what appears to be Jesus' actual severed head on a microwave with the mouth stitched up. Ew.

Jesus' father tells Lafayette that he stole his family's power from Jesus, and seems to have a ritual lined up to get it back. It involves an unborn baby, Lafayette being stitched up himself, and some cutting with a knife. Fortunately, Lafayette's pregnant savior seems to have other plans.

Sam:

Sam continues his vigilante kick, sniffing out a box of Obama masks and keeping on the trail, all while still managing to be a pain in the ass at the hospital. His hanging around ends up helping him, though, as he sniffs out one of the members of the murdering hate group, who either works at the hospital or was pretending to.

Alcide:

Alcide's few minutes of screen time this week are all shirtless, which is par for the course. The bandana, however, is new. And totally killer. And necessary, because everyone knows you can't train for a big fight without an awesome bandana on your head. Seriously, ask Mr. Miyagi.

JD also makes an appearance, saying that his "vampire friend" told him there was a war brewing between vampires and humans, and that the pack should drink V to prove their allegiance. That serves the purpose of showing Martha that JD is, indeed, a total dick.

Jason/Jessica:

The lovebirds are at it again. Jason, upon learning about the real reason for his parents' death, heads over to Jessica's to find a shoulder to cry on, but instead gets a mouth full of blood... the blood of the guy that Jessica was feeding on before she kissed him. She bites Jason, Jason shoots her in the head, he tells her he would never fuck a cow... you know, your usual lover's quarrel.

Arlene/Terry:

Arlene goes through her wedding video, which is a nice way of reminding us of our characters' pasts: there's a shot of Hoyt and Jessica, happy as ever; there's Lafayette and Jesus, being cute; and there's Terry, not being stalked by an Ifrit.

Terry and Patrick's confrontation with the Ifrit didn't go exactly as planned: they waited for it out in a field, and sure enough it showed up. But the fire monster just turns away without doing anything, which puts Terry into a fit that has him about to blow his own head off with Patrick's gun. In short: Terry is still in a pretty bad state.

Side note: Patrick yells "suicide is for Muslims!" in attempting to dissuade Terry from killing himself. Is Patrick an opportunistic racist? This was not part of his character before.

Hoyt:

Hoyt was picked up by the hate group, where he is accepted with open, hate-filled arms. Is this how hate groups work? People sit around and talk about hating stuff, and then love each other for hating the same things? There was a lot of talk about what was in people's hearts.

Anyway, the name of the guy in the weapons shop was Junior, and he was definitely part of the group. Now Hoyt is, too, and his desperate attempts to fit in somewhere continue. Oh, Hoyt. If only you had a spine.

Tara/Pam:

Tara is now stripping at Fangtasia, which she appears to like a little better than bartending. She's pretty good at spanking herself. Unfortunately, her mother comes in to say that Tara is now dead to her for becoming a vampire, which seems both unfair and kind of a waste of a trip.

Pam witnesses all of this and actually gives poor Tara some words of comfort, which brings on a big vampire hug from Tara. Of course the bonding doesn't last long, but it's cute while it does.

Sookie:

When Sookie comes to in the fairy club, she is being measured for her luminescence, which is a fancy way of saying that they're seeing how much fairy juice she has left. It turns out that since Sookie is only half fae, if she uses her magic too much she'll run out of it. That doesn't mean she'll die, it just means she'll be a normal human… one that can't microwave people with her hands, or read anyone's mind.

That actually sounds like a pretty good deal to Sookie, so she goes outside and starts zapping nothing in particular. Will this be the end of fairy Sookie?

Notes & Quotes:

- "The view from up here is spectacular"

- "Fuck you I'm depleting!"

- "Don't get literal on me, Rambo"

- "Do I suck at this, Bud?"

- "Well lah dee dah."

- "I'm like a tree in the wind, I'm just happy to be included!"

- More Russell, more Reverend please. Can they just have their own show?