Review - True Blood: Tainted Blood #1 by Marc Andreyko, Michael McMillian (writers) and Joe Corroney (artist)

I'm not usually one for reading comics based on material from another medium. Back in the 90s that amounted to Alien and Predator comics, but having a liking for the immensely popular True Blood television series, I thought I'd have a look at the latest comic offering from the True Blood franchise. I've also read a couple of the Charlaine Harris Sookie Stackhouse books on which True Blood is based and, well let's just say that for me, the television series did wonders with its base material.

This first issue basically revolves around red-headed vampire Jess missing a high school prom because, well, she's a vampire and her boyfriend Hoyt goes about organising one for her. The ongoing story involves someone poisoning Louisiana's True Blood supply with something that turns normally placid vampires in homicidal and suicidal freaks.

I was expecting something in-between Harris's books and True Blood and that's pretty much what I got, if a bit more skewed toward the television series. That's not surprising. When you've got characters created by the masterful Alan Ball then, why change? All the main characters from the television series make an appearance, none deviating from their television persona. Sookie is sweet; Tara quips sarcastically; Jason laments times of easy women; Bill broods. You get the picture. To their credit, writers Andreyko and McMillian capture the tone of each character very well. I'm assuming though, that as writers they don't really have too much scope with character development that would be at odds with the TV series so Tainted Blood really has to deliver story-wise. It's always hard reviewing a first issue as they generally only give hints at where the story is going, but I'm not sure that it's quite there. Turning vampires, whom are essentially killers into worse killers? If the poisoning doesn't have something to do with the anti-vampire religious nuts then, I'll be quite surprised.

Corroney's art effortlessly captures the likenesses of the actors which makes me wonder if there isn't some whiff of tracing going on. Not that I particularly care in this instance (although I'm sure some do). There's not much point in having the characters only slightly resemble the TV actors. For all intents and purposes, Anna Paquin is Sookie Stackhouse so she may as well look like Anna Paquin in the comic too, not some artist's riff on what they think Sookie looks like.

All up True Blood: Tainted Blood is a decent effort that has all the elements that makes the TV show great without quite reaching those heights. Still it should keep fans satisfied.

This: For the fans
Forthcoming: Don't know if I'm enough of a fan