i'm afraid i've completely lost track of your point, slowmotion. you seem to me to be putting words into other peoples' mouths in order to disagree with them (for example, how on earth did you get "every facet of vampire life directly correlates to gays" from what i just wrote above?).

i think the connection has been very clearly established by the show. just look at the opening credits which show a sign that says "GOD HATES FANGS." there you have it.

Todd, this perspective seems to be forgetting the fact that islamic fundamentalists don't corner the market on "martyrdom." lots of idealistic christian boys aspire to die a hero's death as well. honestly, i think if we saw suicide bombers at abortion clinics, a great number of god-crazed fundies would openly speak…

i'm probably not remembering the whole show's history very well (since i tuned out a lot of the bad episodes), but i think one serviceable interpretation is that what vampires have to restrain is the desire to feed, not to kill. i think we do rightly get the sense that to many of them the killing is fairly…

vampire bad rap
your most central argument against the show is that vampire tolerance is implausible, because vampires are evil.

i have missed something…
how did super-confident mind-reader sookie spend so much time with the human traitor guy without realizing he had a poorly-thought out subterfuge going on? don't tell me she was being polite by trying not to eavesdrop.

i must pile on the Jon Stewart love.

let's face it…
however much i felt like threatening to give up on this show while it sucked, i was still going to stay in it for meaningless vampire action.

i heart joyce. so many amazing, imperfect but trying-so-hard mom moments in seasons 2 and 3.

SPOILER I GUESS

we've also seen the first slayer.

Rowan, like you i was predisposed to dislike buffy. for me, the episode that turned me around (and the first i ever watched in entirety) was "hush."

dammit. that was a typo, not a comma splice.

C minus!
i'm surprised that people thought this episode was better than average.

faith made me think Dushku is a highly talented actress (mostly in later episodes), but dollhouse convinced me she's really not; she was just born to play faith.

re the out-of-place anger, it's just that bill always has this weird blind spot when it comes to sookie, even though she's obnoxious. except, for some reason, when she does something that kinda makes sense and that bill never explicitly said was a bad idea, did he? you know, letting the family see their daughter…

not so great.
i definitely enjoyed moments in this episode, like jessica's crying and bill's scary confrontation at the end (though his anger at sookie seems sort of out-of-nowhere and out-of-character), but enjoyed not one second of jason's church camp, which just feels slow, ridiculous, and poorly written, and felt…

re: nothing happening. yeah, i was struck by that when sookie mentioned her grandma was killed just three weeks ago.  it's like that old joke about soap operas, where the coma patient wakes up after ten years and wants to get an update on "days of our lives" or whatever, and the friend says, "ok, it's later, on…

yes, it's gradually established over the course of the show that only full-on direct sunlight instantly kills vampires. smaller shafts of direct sunlight set parts of them on fire, and indirect sunlight just seems to make them weak and uncomfortable. but they're content to be outside in the daytime given enough…

yeah, it's a bit of a television conceit that all universities recognized willow's greatness. we can assume she had a perfect GPA and wrote a splendid essay, but her leadership/extracurriculars are a little light given that she couldn't publicize all the demon-fighting.