'True Blood' series finale: The ending you expected?

This post contains plot details of the True Blood series finale that aired on Aug. 24. Get our quick take—and add your own—while our full recap is in the works. Update: Read the recap here.

The producers of True Blood wanted the series finale to be unpredictable, and it definitely was—other than Jason and Brigette ending up together with kids in the time jump. But is unpredictable always a good thing?

The fact that there was no sex or nudity in the episode’s rating was a tip-off that this wasn’t going to be your typical episode of True Blood. Fans expecting a bloodbath at Sookie’s with the Yakuza didn’t account for the drive time between Shreveport and Bon Temps. Bill had enough time to explain to Sookie that he wanted her to use her fairy light ball to kill him, so she could have the normal life he so desperately wanted her to live in his absence, and leave before they arrived. Meanwhile, Eric had enough time to feed Sarah Newlin Pam’s blood and set her free, set fire to Mr. Gus in the tunnel as he chased after her, and fly to Sookie’s house to kill the Yakuza before Sookie even knew they were there.

The hour then became about Jessica granting Bill something he never got as a human—the chance to walk his daughter down the aisle—and Sookie weighing her belief that we’re all born this way against the power of free will. Hearing Bill’s thoughts for the first time at Jessica and Hoyt’s wedding confirmed the illness had brought him to his most human. Sookie heard his love for her, his desire for her to someday wed, and his suffering. In the end, she had his grave dug up and met him in the cemetery. As he laid in his coffin clutching the photo he’d taken with his daughter before he went off to war, Sookie got her light ball ready. But she couldn’t do it. Being fae is a part of her. Instead, she broke off a makeshift stake from a shovel, straddled Bill in his coffin, and helped him drive the wood into his chest. Of course, Bill could have had himself staked at any time, but he wanted what most humans do—someone they love to be with them when they go. (Though most loved ones don’t end up covered in that amount of blood.)

The finale ended with multiple flash-forwards. Pam and Eric synthesized Sarah Newlin’s blood and filmed an infomercial for New Blood. A few more years down the line, they’re back at Fangtasia where Eric sits on this throne and Pam lets vampires pay $100,000 to drink directly from a chained Sarah Newlin, who will forever be haunted by hallucinations of Steve. All the Bon Temps residents we know and love have gathered at Sookie’s for Thanksgiving. The couples are still together, including Hoyt and Jessica, Arlene and Keith, Andy and Holly, Adilyn and Wade, Lafayette and James, and Jason and Brigette, who have three children (at least two of them girls). Sookie is pregnant to a man whose face we never see. Sam and Nicole, who have a second child, are there as well.

On the one hand, it’s fitting that Bill be the only one to die. Part of you still believes he deserves it, and all of you believes he wants it. But on the other, it almost feels like the makers of the show loved the characters too much to give viewers the adrenaline rush they’d expected from True Blood. And though in real life, Sookie’s fate is absolutely the right one—she stayed fae but found a way to live a fulfilling human life—that may be a bit of a letdown for fans who’ve invested in seven seasons of a sexy supernatural drama.

While we process the hour more in our full recap, it’s your turn.