UPDATES WITH VIDEO: True Blood may be into its final season, but the HBO show wasn’t treating its likely last Comic-Con appearance with anything but a ravenous appetite and a bit of bite. Specifically it was former GOP VP candidate Sarah Palin who got chomped. “She’ll weigh in on anything,” castmember Kristin Bauer van Straten said disdainfully of Palin revealing that she turned down the attempt HBO made to get the ex-Alaska governor on the show for its most recent broadcast. Besides a bloodbath at a fictional fundraiser for real-life Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, the July 20 episode had several digs at the GOP including one character referring to herself as “a Republic**t.”
Needless to say, Palin wasn’t impressed.
“The brilliant minds of True Blood were brazen enough to ask me to do a cameo on their show, apparently so they could insult a conservative woman in person instead of just all conservative women in general,” Palin revealed to Breitbart earlier this week. “Their offer wasn’t presented in any negative way, perhaps to benefit from a surprise factor after the guest appearance. I turned them down anyway.” HBO confirmed that the offer in a statement that “casting directors for the show reached out to Ms. Palin’s representative but did not receive a response.”
“It’s sweet many, many years later that I’ve made her angry, I had fun doing it,” said the actress who plays vampire Pam Ravenscroft of first hearing Palin’s name and the way she reacted to the cabler’s offer. Van Straten’s remark got huge applause from the thousands in Ballroom 20 of the San Diego Convention Center.
Besides a brief mention of “Republicans” by van Straten on the panel in reference to the recent episode, there was nothing else said of real GOPers that have figured prominently in TB lately . This season has seen a reference to one character’s strained friendship with former First Lady Laura Bush and the Cruz fundraiser at the George W. Bush Presidential Library.
Of course there was more than politics on the menu at Comic-Con for TB today. The cast sent most of the time remembering the past seasons and the end of the show. In fact, before today’s panel even started, the series showed a specially made Goodbye Sucks video starring key cast members. “It meant the world to us that you made this show what it was,” said Deborah Ann Woll to big cheers. With similar remarks from Stephen Moyer, Sam Trammell and more, the short video ended with a blown kiss from Anna Paquin. Debuting on June 22, the last episode of the last season True Blood will air on August 24.
Now well into its seventh and last cycle, the SDCC vet brought not only Moyer, Paquin, Trammell, Woll and van Straten to the fans in the flesh, but also EP Brian Buckner along with cast members Nathan Parsons, Carrie Preston, Chris Bauer, Anna Camp, Nelsan Ellis and Rutina Wesley, who got huge applause as did her blood dripping satin jacket. The panel ended with a brief self-titled “True To The End” video previewing the final 5 episodes of True Blood. Check it out:
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