True Blood and Philosophy: We Want to Think Bad Things with You by William Irwin

True Blood and Philosophy: We Want to Think Bad Things with You Reviews

• 
  Isis

  I received an ARC of this book last year before it actually came out, and wrote a review of it for TrueBloodNet.com. My full review can be found here:
  
  
  http://truebloodnet.com/true-blood-ph...
  
  I'll just say that I did enjoy the book for the most part, but there were a few issues that stood out for me with it that made me feel like only certain True Blood fans had written the articles contained within this book.
• 
  Alexandria

  Originally, I had planned on rating this a little lower because I thought it came out after the series. Being that the essays are timely with the seasons it mentions, it's overall pretty good. I enjoyed that it caused me to rethink the way I viewed the series so much that I decided to go back and rewatch it with this new context. The only downside is I felt the first half was relatively easy to get through with intriguing topics and questions being posed in comparison to the second half, which was slightly underwhelming. If you're a fan of the novels or series, you should definitely read this to give you something to think about.
• 
  Todd Hogan

  The fun of this philosophy series is that it uses popular themes and discuss philosophical ideas. From this book I found two very interesting ideas:
  
  1) There is a theory that man uses games to navigate society. Man, Play, and Games by Roger Callois. This is not limited to what we traditionally call games (Chess, Football, Bridge, etc.) but also all the unreal arenas where man has developed a set of rules for proper conduct and to determine success (eg., The Court room, marriage, college). It's a fun idea to explore.
  
  2) Friedrich Nietzche: "Madness is rare among individuals--but in groups, parties, nations, and ages, it is the rule." Plato echoes his thoughts about the pack mentality: any assembled group begins loudly and vehemently praising or blaming anything, "the rocks and the very place surrounding them echo and redouble the uproar of blame and praise."
• 
  Mikael Cerbing

  A better collection of esseys then I thought it would be when I started reading the book. As the philosophical questions are wrapped around a specific theme, True Blood, that I can live with or without (read the book for a course), it is kind of a mixed bag for me. Some esseys where really good, and manage to use the theme very well. Others felt like the writer was more of a fan of the show then a student of philosophy. But I did like the book and I will read more in the same series, only with themes that I am more interested in. I do think that they can be brilliant tools for teachers trying to get not-so-interested-students to think about philosophy.
• 
  Brent

  The philosophy side is probably decent (I don’t read much philosophy). But, the contributors could have done more with basic level vampirology and urban fantasy research. On those levels, they tend to recapitulate as “new” concepts and arguments that scholars of folklore, history, and literature have been making for at least the last few decades.
• 
  Jordan Phizacklea-Cullen

  Another fine addition of the Philosophy and Pop Culture series with extra bite (my apologies).
• 
  Διόνυσος Ελευθέριος

  In the introduction of True Blood and Philosophy the editors state their confidence that our "enjoyment of True Blood will be enhanced by the time [we:] spend...pondering some of the more philosophical quandaries" raised by the show. Does the book live up to that? Boy does it ever. It certainly did for me. My enjoyment of the show was enhanced so much by the end that not only do I have a greater appreciation for the show itself, but I now also hope to read Charlaine Harris's Southern Vampire Mysteries which the show is based on.
  
  One of the qualities of the show True Blood that makes it so enjoyable is the way that it intelligently draws us into thinking about challenging topics. Some of those topics are so challenging that my ability to articulate them in my mind while watching the show was limited. But this book is great because it enhanced the way I could understand the show in often impressive ways. A couple of examples from my experience with the book should demonstrate how it did that.
  
  While I continually recognized the glaring irony in the way most humans in the show have prejudices against vampires, True Blood and Philosophy led me to a fuller understanding of how that irony serves as a decisive social commentary about how humans in our "real world" treat other human beings and even how we treat other forms of life: it may be easy to recognize human propensity for prejudice when the objects are fang-wielding, blood sucking vampires, but it's through that easy recognition that we can see the more difficult prejudices we sometimes have against (among other groups) homosexuals and even animals (these particular themes are discussed in chapters 3 and 7). And it's that kind of revealing, thought-provoking writing that makes philosophy so enjoyable.
  
  The fact that True Blood and Philosophy is able to reveal these kinds of insights so effectively is a testament to the many excellent contributions made to this book.
  
  A second example of how this book enriches the True Blood experience is how it also helped settle a subtle question that followed me throughout the show: what is so attractive about vampires? A brilliant answer to that question is provided (in chapter 9), and it is a succinct one: "True Blood is a Freudian fable: a saga of our species doing what comes naturally." And that sentence is priceless. Fortunately, it's not by any means the only one you'll find.
  
  But, if you think that sentence sounds strange given all the "unnatural" events in the show, consider this: we enjoy the show True Blood because it shakes off the fetters that society places on our "instinctive gratification." Shows like True Blood let us try to experience a world in ways that we aren't able to in our own world, but through that experience we may learn to better accept the world we do have to experience—and it's this kind of penetrating reflection that the book can provide.
  
  I've only scratched the surface here on the many treasures that await the readers of this installment of Blackwell's Philosophy and Pop Culture series. I recommend you sink your teeth into it yourself to uncover even more.
• 
  Michelle

  Each chapter was written by a different person or group of person about different aspects of the story. I would recommend reading this in parts. If you feel like reading a chapter, read it. But reading it as one whole book is a bit heavy. Do not take this book and think, "I love True Blood, let's read about it!" The emphasis, to me at least, felt like it was on philosophy while using the True Blood and Southern Vampire Mysteries as a source. That said, it is not a light read.
  
  Some articles were better than others. One read as very preachy, an attempt by the author to convince his or her readers to become a vegan. You could definitely tell where a person's expertise lay. One of my favorites considered the possibility of actually incorporating vampire society into American society. It considered the logistics of it given the American government and cultural ideals with those of the vampire society we see in the series.
  
  I would also like to offer another warning. I have read up to about the fifth book of the Southern Vampire Mysteries. I am completely caught up with the True Blood series. Even so, some authors referenced much later books in the series, creating spoilers for me. While I should have acknowledged the possibility of that happening, it still bummed me out that I now know things about the characters that I hadn't gotten to yet.
  
  It was enjoyable, and I'll probably reference different parts of it or look back at some of the other questions. But I can't say it's one of my favorite books.
• 
  Lindsay

  “True Blood and Philosophy: We Wanna Think Bad Things with You” is a philosophical look at the cultural implications within the world of the HBO series True Blood. As it is not likely that the issues presented by the presence of vampires in our human society will actually become a problem for the world any time soon, this book shows the reader the parallels between the True Blood world and our own. The same issues that the vampires in True Blood experience (racism, hypocrisy, the fight for equality) have been seen throughout history by any number of minorities. Women, Homosexuals and almost every race at some time or another has fought the “norms” of society to include them and afford them the basic rights given to everyone else.
  
  “True Blood and Philosophy: We Wanna Think Bad Things with You” is a book that any intellectual can enjoy…assuming they also have a bit of imagination and don’t mind being compared to vampires in one way or another. So, sink your teeth in.
• 
  Debbie

  I've been a big fan of Charlaine Harris' Southern Vampire series and am in the process of catching up on the True Blood series so my interest was peaked when I was asked to review this book. It was an interesting book and the best part are the examples pulled for each philosophical argument from the books and TV episodes. Each chapter opens up with a quote from one of the characters are the perfect collection of one liners that make you laugh or remember why everyone enjoys the series so much. The main down side was after awhile it started to sound repetitive. Some of the quotes about coming out of the coffin/closet were used so often I started to skim over those parts. The best part were the questions it brings up that makes the reader started arguing the various sides of each question asked like should vampires be granted the same rights as other US citizens or when does a vampire have the right to change someone else into a vampire.
  
• 
  Alicia Evans

  I love this series to pieces and this installment lived up to that ideal. Here we see several authors discuss Harris's world intelligently and thoroughly. The only issues that I could see readers having were that there were a few instances of repetition from article to article, though this isn't necessarily something that can be avoided in the academic community. Also, this book covered both the show _True Blood_ and Harris's _Southern Vampire Mysteries_ book series. For fans of only the show or only the books, the facts can get a little convoluted.
• 
  Michelle Boyer

  It is hard to rate this book as a whole. A few of the studies are pretty well done, and make informed conclusions about how to use philosophy to discuss True Blood (both the tv series and the show). However, other studies leave me wanting more analysis--they just don't offer enough to be their own essay in an anthology, in my opinion.
  
  You may like a few of the essays here, but there are others that you could easily skip. Some of the research itself is "average" but we all know that C's earn degrees now days.
  
  A good attempt. But overall, just a bit average.
• 
  Candace

  I enjoyed True Blood and Philosophy. Sometimes the philosophical jargon can become too much at times, but I enjoyed it nevertheless. The articles truly opened my mind beyond the surface of the True Blood series. I would recommend this book to any Truebie, especially after they have read both the Southern Vampire Mystery series and watched True Blood as well. It's a great complement. As much as I enjoyed it, I do not see myself reading it again. Well at least for awhile anyway.
• 
  Tami Winbush

  Though I am a big fan of the series, I honestly wasn't a big fan of of the book. I guess I wasn't expecting something so utterly philosophical and educational. It read too much like a text book and with me not being in college anymore, I really didn't want to think that hard on the series.
  
  I can imagine this would be a good book to use in an actual philosophy course in college. It would be a relateable topic for the youth of today!
• 
  Ashley Logan

  This is a pretty confounding and interesting book if at sometimes also ridiculous. It looks at True Blood from a philosopher's point of view. Some of the essays made you think while others made you wonder wtf are they talking about lol. My favorite essay out of it was Sookie, Sigmund, and the Edible Complex by Ron Hirschbein. I still say it is a must for any Sookie Stackhouse series novels and/or True Blood library.
• 
  Kimberly

  It's very clear that the author has not actually watched the show, or actually read the books. They had quite a few major errors in there that to me would be important in making a credible statement about the philosophical influences of the show. I am disappointed by that as, for me, that negates their credibility. I was looking forward to this book for a long time. It's still interesting but inaccurate.
• 
  Melissa

  This was the perfect book for me, who loves True Blood, loves philosophical thoughts, and loves analyzing things that are hard to explain. The essays in this book discuss everything from religion to theories on how Sookie's telepathy works. Any True Blood fans who like to delve deep into the subject would love to read this book.
• 
  Rose

  It was quite interesting, and I think a True Blood fan with an early interest in philosophy will find it helpful and interesting. As someone who is far more interested in philosophy than True Blood, it didn't add much for me. The different chapters/articles often repeated ideas (though they were written by different people), which at times made it a little monotonous.
• 
  Meg

  Philosophy 101 for people who have never taken a class. Accessible and interesting, using examples from True Blood (the series, as well as the novels) and making philosophy relatable to everyday life.
• 
  Mystee

  
  http://amomentwithmystee.blogspot.com...
• 
  Juliandra

  A thoughtful and amazing gift from James! xo <3
• 
  Alysa H.

  Review forthcoming.
• 
  Johanna Hammarström

  If you like True Blood, read it.
• 
  Naela

  Hilarious