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  • who I love so much.

  • with the newest resident in Bon Temps,

  • Nathan Parsons.

  • ( cheering, applause )

  • And then the beautiful Jessica, Deborah Ann Woll.

  • ( cheering, applause )

  • Lafayette himself, Nelsan Ellis.

  • ( cheering, applause )

  • ( woman shouts )

  • Thank you.

  • Miss Arlene, Carrie Preston.

  • ( cheering, applause )

  • And his first time at Comic-Con,

  • Chris Bauer, Andy Bellefleur.

  • ( cheering, applause )

  • And the now Buddhist Sarah Newlin, Anna Camp.

  • ( cheering, applause )

  • ( laughs )

  • Executive producer Brian Buckner.

  • ( cheering, applause )

  • Bauer: Dead man walkin'.

  • Pam, Kristin Bauer van Straten.

  • ( cheering, applause )

  • Man: I love you, Pam!

  • - ( Stack chuckles ) - ( cheering, applause )

  • The dearly departed Tara Thornton,

  • Rutina Wesley.

  • ( cheering, applause )

  • Stack: Look at that jacket! That's such a cool--

  • I love that jacket.

  • Sam Merlotte, Sam Trammell.

  • ( cheering, applause )

  • Mr. Bill Compton, Stephen Moyer.

  • ( cheering, applause )

  • And the lady who without this show wouldn't exist,

  • Sookie Stackhouse, Anna Paquin.

  • ( cheering, applause )

  • - Audience members: Go, season eight! - Okay.

  • - ( laughs ) Season eight. - Season eight.

  • This is crazy.

  • Well, you guys, let's go back--

  • since this is maybe one of the last times

  • you'll all be together onstage,

  • what do you all remember from shooting the pilot?

  • Did you immediately think, "This is something special"?

  • Did you think, like, "I can't believe this--

  • I don't know if this is gonna go"?

  • What did you guys think? What are your memories of that pilot?

  • - Moyer: Can anybody remember seven years ago? - ( laughter )

  • There was that little lot--

  • I just remember that "The Suite Life of Zack & Cody"

  • was shooting right next door

  • and we had all these naked bloody people walking around.

  • That's my memory.

  • What about the rest of you guys?

  • You have any memories? Anna, Stephen?

  • - No? - I mean, yeah, but somebody else go first.

  • - Stack: Okay. - I remember Merlotte's.

  • - Stack: Yeah. - One of the only sets that was actually built

  • at the time was his bar,

  • and I remember walking around

  • and looking at every single detail,

  • every beautiful little-- there's loads of posters that you won't have seen

  • of the Louisiana peach-eating competition

  • or the best peach in Louisiana.

  • - Paquin: I think it's Peach Festival. - Peach Festival.

  • And all of these little posters up

  • that were brought in by Ron and Suzuki Ingerslev

  • and just thinking, "Wow, this is amazing,

  • this-- the world that they're setting up."

  • Trammell: Yeah, they literally have, like, cards

  • for carpenters and plumbers from Louisiana,

  • like real people tacked on the back of the bar.

  • It's really detailed. It's pretty amazing.

  • Rutina, do you have any memories?

  • I love when Tara yells at that lady in the store.

  • That's, like, my favorite-- I love that.

  • Wesley: I think that's one of my favorite scenes

  • of the whole series.

  • I remember from the pilot for me just being terrified

  • because it was my first job--

  • almost my first job out of school,

  • and I was like, "Oh, my God, just please don't fire me.

  • Please don't fire me."

  • But I remember just having a lot of fun,

  • learning a lot really quickly.

  • And all these guys, of course, were so welcoming,

  • so it was a lot of fun.

  • And Nelsan, Lafayette was supposed to die originally

  • and you-- I think Stephen told me the story

  • that you-- I think you were, like, with Alan.

  • You guys were, like, "We can't kill this guy off. He's too good."

  • Woman: Yeah, he is!

  • ( laughter, cheering )

  • Well, I'm glad he kept me with a job.

  • ( laughing )

  • It's funny because what I remember most is

  • I was like, "Do my shirts have to be this tight?

  • Jesus, okay."

  • Do you guys have-- over the course-- over seven years now,

  • do you guys have favorite sort of, like, what-the-eff moments?

  • Sort of fave-- I always think about the meat tree.

  • I love the meat tree. I think the meat tree is just--

  • I like the idea of it.

  • But, like, Stephen, do you-- the Lorena sex where you--

  • I'm just gonna go back to something

  • 'cause you just made me think of it, Nelsan.

  • There was a moment in the pilot

  • that we talked about before, Tim--

  • there was a moment in the pilot where Nelsan

  • is cooking grits or something.

  • Was it, Nelsan? What were you cooking?

  • Ellis: I think I was cooking burgers.

  • Paquin: When you started humping the thing--

  • And he starts basically doing this...

  • Ellis: Oh, six gear.

  • That was my six gears.

  • - What was it? - That was my six gears.

  • ( Buckner laughs ) It's your six gears.

  • And at which point he turns around and says,

  • "Everybody love the pussy.

  • John, even you. You scared of the pussy, right?"

  • And there was this guy,

  • this extra that was there just for the day

  • that was Big John, as he became known,

  • and because of that moment when Nelsan turned around and said,

  • "Even Big John's scared of the pussy," even at that moment,

  • Big John has been in every single one of our episodes ever since.

  • - Because of him. - Stack: Oh.

  • Because of Nelsan.

  • I like that, I like that.

  • Brian, there's been a lot more flashbacks, I think, this season,

  • especially with Bill and Pam and Eric.

  • Is that a conscious decision to show--

  • I mean, do you guys want to bring things full circle?

  • Because it started with Bill and the Civil War stuff.

  • Well, with Bill-- we've got a character

  • who we turned into a vampire god.

  • And he wasn't that nice when he was a vampire god,

  • so, honestly, the thinking there was,

  • as Bill tries to find his way back to himself,

  • let's give him a little help by flashing back to his human life.

  • And that's kind of the case across the boards

  • with a lot of the flashbacks--

  • to give a little bit more context, you know.

  • How Pam and Eric came to Shreveport in the first place.

  • Just filling in holes that were out there

  • and learning something else about these characters

  • who we've already spent a lot of episodes with.

  • So, yeah, for sure conscious,

  • but we've always done flashbacks.

  • There's just some purpose to them.

  • - Stack: Right. - Yeah.

  • I love-- my favorite flashback so far this year

  • was the fact that Pam and Eric owned a video store franchise.

  • Mm-hmm.

  • Who came up with-- where'd that come from?

  • Was that your idea? How did that even come to be?

  • We wanted to do a flashback to how they came to Shreveport.

  • There was, um--

  • we're like, it needs to be the worst punishment imaginable.

  • Like, the worst punishment imaginable.

  • And it was one of our writers, Craig Chester,

  • who actually said, "A video store."

  • And, yeah, so that's how we came to that.

  • And, Kristin, how-- those must've been so fun to shoot.

  • I mean, the '80s clothes-- I know you love your costumes as Pam,

  • but those were, like, another level, I think.

  • Was that a blast to shoot?

  • Yeah, the '80s was another level

  • and it was really fun to go back there and have even more hair,

  • and it really is so brilliant

  • that we end up in this fluorescently lit video store

  • and then also that the throne,