Season synopsis
Contains spoilers for this season and earlier seasons.
Season four opens immediately after Sookie steps into the fairy world, then reveals that she has been gone from Bon Temps for more than a year. She escapes back to find Jason a deputy and her house sold. Bill is now King of Louisiana, while Eric has bought the property and claims Sookie as his. At a witches’ meeting, Lafayette’s boyfriend Jesus introduces him to Marnie’s coven. Marnie’s contact with the spirit Antonia strips Eric of his memory, and Sookie hides the confused vampire while the witches’ power grows.
Marnie and Antonia’s shared campaign against vampires pulls Sookie, Tara, Lafayette and Jesus into a struggle over possession, revenge and control. Eric gradually falls for Sookie while unable to remember his past, and her fairy power helps restore him. Bill and Eric try to manage the danger as King and Sheriff, even as Marnie uses bewitched vampires to attack a public tolerance event. Elsewhere, Tara returns from New Orleans, Jason escapes the were-panther community, and Sam’s attempt to help Tommy ends in Tommy’s death after he is injured in a fight.
Jesus and Lafayette break Marnie’s binding of Antonia, and the vampires kill Marnie, but her spirit later possesses Lafayette. In the finale she uses his body to kill Jesus and take his magic. Antonia and other spirits, including Sookie’s Gran, persuade Marnie to let go, ending the coven crisis. Russell’s concrete grave is found empty, so his escape remains unresolved. After Sookie rejects Bill and Eric and chooses to be alone, Debbie Pelt breaks into her house with a shotgun. Tara pushes Sookie out of the way and is shot. Sookie kills Debbie with the shotgun, then cradles Tara and screams for help.