As you may know, the Television Critics Association summer presentations are going on this week – right after Comic-Con, yikes – and we can usually count on some good news of some sort coming from the networks about our favorite shows. Or at least we hope.

THR reports that showrunner Alan Ball made the happy announcement during an HBO presentation yesterday:

Ball had this to say,“there will be an end for me at some point but I just closed a deal to do another season.I don’t have any desire to leave because I’m having more fun than I ever had in my life.” He also said that this is an exclusive deal with HBO and that he has a couple of other pilots also in development there. Ball added that “we’re creating new characters for Season 5″ including “how a vampire is made.”

Although this came out during the network presentation, the network itself has not yet officially announced the 5th season pickup. Still, they didn’t pull him off the stage, either.

While we’re waiting for that official confirmation, and the next episode, here’s an Inside Look at last week’s episode:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-_-WJTlmks[/youtube]

True Blood airs Sundays at 9/8c on HBO.