Poor Jason Stackhouse. First Crystal dumped him, going off to have kittens with her cousin and leaving Jason with the responsibility for a whole junkyard full of stray werepanthers. Then, last episode, his good-Samaritan caretaking was repaid with betrayal: walloped on the head and imprisoned in an icebox. And now? He comes to, tied to a bed, being copiously licked by one of his teenage were-wards.
"You've got a real nasty gash here," Timbo explains. Euuuuugh. Werepanther medical practice leaves a lot to be desired.
Jason almost convinces Timbo to set him free, only to be burst in upon by... whoa! It's Phil! Crystal is nowhere in sight, and there's a typical manly exchange of bravado—"F--- you!" "F--- me?!" "YEAH!"—until a shotgun next to Jason's face puts an end to the conversation. COULD THIS BE THE END OF JASON STACKHOUSE?!
Well, we'll get back to that.
Meanwhile, disappointment: Last episode's fangs-out cliffhanger has dissolved into bickering, with not a single bite in sight. Sookie wants Eric to leave, he points out that he owns the house, she protests that the house doesn't come with her in it.
"Well, then I seriously overpaid," Eric deadpans. He reminds Sookie that when other vampires catch a whiff of her delicious aroma and word gets out about her sunlight-deflecting faerie blood, she will not be safe—and that he can offer her protection if she'll just be his. (Okay, protection from bodily harm and unlimited access to that body? This deal is looking pretty good to us.) Sookie refuses, but she also finds herself sassing him back in a kinda-sorta sexy way! Eric claims it's her faerie side peeking out—because Faerie Sookie isn't blind, apparently—and leaves with the suggestion that she let her supernatural self take the reins. For her own safety, of course, and not because Faerie Sook digs his Viking charm.
With Eric departed, Sookie heads for Bill Compton's house only to be stopped in the yard by gun-toting guards. Count Bill's royal status among the things she missed during her visit to the faerie garden, and she's baffled. Inside, Bill has just finished bedding witchy informant Katarina after getting the lowdown from her on the coven's dead-bird-raising capabilities; Sookie walks in just in time to see them hurriedly re-robing. Ouch. She asks Bill to help her get her house back from Eric. He promises to find a way, but urges her to shelter herself in another human home for safety. Sookie wants to know how Bill became King Bill... but wait, no she doesn't, because Petulant Non-Faerie Sookie is fully back in charge and she peevishly notes that everything new she learns about him makes her wish she didn't know it.
Not so for the audience, though; it's flashback time! Bill, in full 1980s punk regalia, is cruising an English bar in search of some blood to suck. Turns out he's being stalked by Nan Flanagan, who notes his humanitarian approach to mealtime and asks for his help—specifically, to place him in a position of power, the better to champion out-in-the-open vamping once their scientists synthesize blood for consumption. (Also, Louis Pasteur is a vampire.)
And back in present-day Louisiana, we see the upshot of this conversation: Bill challenges Queen Sophie-Anne to a duel, in comes the backup armed with guns that fire wooden, silver-cored bullets, and SPLAT goes the Queen in a bloody explosion. Viscera-splattered Bill is sworn in as King by Nan, who warns him not to lie to her. (He does anyway, claiming that Sophie-Anne was mistaken and Sookie was "nothing special.")
But let's check back with Jason! Still tied to the bed? Check! And Andy Bellefleur is out in the parking lot, about to hulk out from his need for V. Phil, recognizing a fellow addict, dispatches Andy with a vial of the red stuff before he can make the connection between his missing deputy and the mysterious sounds of kidnapping coming from the garage. And here's Crystal, giddily climbing onto Jason's bondage-bed with the news that they're going to be together. Hooray! Except she's also threatening him with a knife? These two could seriously use some counseling... but there's no time for that, because Phil is infertile, Crystal can't get knocked up and she needs to mate with Jason to ensure that she propagates the werepanther bloodline.
Only before she can do the sex to him, he needs to become a werepanther, too. Which means that it's time for Crystal and Phil to strip down, morph into cats, and lunch on Jason's rippling torso whilst he screams in agony.
Prediction: This isn't going to end well.
Back at the Stackhouse, Sookie unpacks some groceries when there's a sound behind her and OMG IT'S QUEEN MAB RUN SOOKIE RUNNNNNN oh no wait, Sook's hallucinating, it's just Tara. The two embrace and all is forgiven—although nobody's telling the truth about what she's been doing for the past year—and head into the house for some catchup time... where Eric has taken the liberty of buying Sookie a new microwave, leaving a carafe of blood in the fridge and building himself a sun-free hidey-hole for sleeping purposes. Sookie's status: steaming pissed.
Down at Merlotte's, Arlene still thinks her baby is evil but Terry is having none of it. And Sam's got a brand-new girl! Shifter Luna wasn't having his advances after last night's gallop, but now she's had a change of heart. Girlfriend is clearly battling some demons, though—with good reason, it turns out, since she admits at the next naked group sesh that she's a skinwalker, able to take the form of not just animals but people as well. How'd she get that way? By killing her own mom in childbirth. Cue slightly horrified stares from the assembled group... but before we can unpack that emotional baggage, the scent of shifter fills the air and Sam bolts into the night. It's Tommy, of course. The two do midair battle in bird form, then tumble to the ground and have it out. Tommy, douchebag though he is, really wants a brother to love. Sam, so tenderhearted, suggests that they try to chip away at all the suspicion and mistrust and get their family on. And it's all very moving, even though (or perhaps even because!) this entire conversation takes place in the nude. Which is probably an extended metaphor for, y'know, baring their feelings and stuff, but whatever because NAKED BUTTS.
And let's not forget those witches! Lafayette and Jesus are having the same argument they always do about whether or not it's smart to mess with black magic, but that doesn't stop Laf from accompanying him to another coven meeting—his time with Tara in tow, since Sookie had to bail on their hangout sesh to go give Eric a piece of her mind. The group is discussing what sort of dead thing to revive next, with Marnie leading the push for a person. Looks like we're in for a serious talk... only everything gets derailed by the flash arrival of Eric, who demands that they disband and wastes no time sinking his fangs into Marnie's neck! Tara returns from making a phone call, takes one look at Eric, and runs at him with a wooden stake! He drops Marnie and grabs her, and non-participant Lafayette is all "OH NO YOU DIDN'T," and the coven starts chanting, and then something very peculiar happens to Marnie's face. There's some glowing-eye action, the flickering presence of a mysterious younger woman and Eric Northman starts to look distinctly... un-Northman-esque.
Sookie, meanwhile, has headed to Fangtasia in search of Eric. After hours of waiting around, she heads to the bathroom... and catches Jessica in the act of biting another man. Gasp! Jess and Hoyt are having some trouble—first there was the thing with the eggs, followed by Jess watching helplessly as Hoyt took a beating from some fang-averse protesters, followed by Hoyt's nasty refusal to let Jess heal his wounds with her blood. Obviously, it was a short step from there to anonymous biting in a bar bathroom. Sookie tries to intervene, but Jess gives her a don't-judge-me smackdown and tells her to butt out.
"I can eat whoever I want," she snaps.
Eric's still a no-show, and Sookie isn't sticking around anymore. She gets in the car and heads home...
...only to encounter Eric, shirtless and disheveled, stumbling down the road. Addled Eric doesn't recognize her—"You know me," Sookie snaps; "No I don't," he whimpers—but as he stares vacantly at Sook, his expression changes from blank confusion to childlike wonderment. His eyes widen.
"Why do you smell so good?"
Uh-oh.
Time to speculate! Is Eric's amnesia permanent? Will Hoyt and Jess work it out? And where the heck is Joe Manganiello?!! Sound off in the comments and on Twitter!
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