In the latest episode of the History
Channel's first original TV show 'Vikings', Ragnar Lothbrok (Travis
Fimmel) sails to the Kingdom of Northumbria for a third time with a
larger company of wariors to raid and pillage. This time though, with
memories of the attack that ended their last raid, they get to work
setting up camp along the riverbank, not even stopping when they spot
spies.
Much like Ragnar has learnt from his
past two raids in England, King Aelle (Ivan Kaye) is expecting the
viking raiders and sends out his brother, Lord Eadric, to fight them.
The king's brother makes the wrong move, waiting and watching instead
of attacking them straight away as they made camp. Ragnar takes
advantage of the English hesitancy and ambushes them in the dead of
night and takes Lord Eadric and his men captive.
On the advice of his lords, King Aelle
invites the viking raiders to his castle in the hopes of making a
deal with them to get his brother back. When Ragnar arrives in the
English castle, the slow motion effect and muffled music attempts to
convey Ragnar's unfamiliarity with his surroundings and the
strangeness he must feel comparing his culture to theirs. Yet, the
end result is somewhat more confusing. The camera focuses too much on
the floor and Ragnar's feet to make too much sense. Although the
juxtaposition between the English nobility and the vikings was able
to achieve was the slow motion effect could not.
The feasting scene was one of the
highlights of the episode, aside from Rollo's baptism which'll be
discussed below. Admittedly, I got quite a bit of second hand
embarrassment during this scene but that didn't take away from the
humour of the two cultures colliding. There is one particular
instance where Floki smashes a plate against his head, breaking it
and you can't help but wonder why plates specifically are so strange.
Did they not have plates in Ancient Scandinavia? The vikings reaction
to having music played during the feast is just as hilarious,
describing a choir of men as a “terrible noise”.
Eager to discuss terms of the captive
lord, Ragnar demands 2000 pounds in gold and silver for the return of
the king's brother which King Aelle agrees to, with the added
conditions that Ragnar and his men can't leave their camp and raid
the surrounding countryside, and the one of the group must be
baptised into the Christian faith. The vikings laugh at the idea of
becoming Christian and it seems as if the compromise may come to a
stalemate, until surpising Rollo volunteers. While the vikings all
laugh at Rollo's baptism (what is this oil you are trying to put on
my head, priest?) Floki surprisingly reacts in anger, convinced that
Rollo's actions have angered their gods for denouncing them.
Ragnar's men keep their promise and the
gold arrives as the King said it would. Although something seems
fishy the moment it is carted into the camp. The messengers are quick
to leave, and don't bring the chests to the vikings but instead dump
it halfway up a hill. This can obviously be explained as the men
being nervous of the viking invaders and scared for their lives,
except that as the vikings soon discover when they check the chests,
it's a trap. The chests are empty and they are ambushed by a cavalry
of the King's men.
Their work earlier in the episode pays
off and the army charges right into Ragnar's booby trap. Soon the
vikings are fighting, and the English dispite having many advantages
are defeated. Particularly noteworthy though is the way the camera
emphasises the presence of females in the viking group fighitng
amongst the men since, as Lagertha proved, there were shieldmaidens
in the Viking culture and many were able to fight not just defend
their lands. Rollo battle rage is terryfing and even long after the
fighting has ended he falls from still dying Englishman to Englishman
driving his axe and finishing them off, crying out to Floki “how
many Christians did I kill?”
Ragnar is unhappy that their deal was
broken and Lord Eadric, still held captive tries to offer to
negotiate with his brother on the vikings behalf, but its soon
evident that Ragnar has other plans and a horse carrying a body is
scene riding into the castle of King Aelle. Ragnar gets his 2000
pounds of gold and silver and leaves as promised with his viking
raiders but in return gets the eternal hatred of King Aelle.
Meanwhile in Kattegat, a heavily
pregnant Lagertha (Katheryn Winnick) is in charge of ruling the people in Ragnar's
absence and it's great to see the sort of ruler she is. She's
presented with a case where a man is accuses his wife of adultery and
that her son is not his. She surpasses the previous rulers easily
just by asking the woman her side of the events. Then when it seemed
like the woman was indeed guilty, and obviously being aware of what
would be in store for her if her husband left her, relates the story
of one of their gods who was known to come to Midguard in disguise
thereby giving the husband no choice but to not cast out the wife or
child.
She's also visited by Siggy (Jessalyn Gilsig), the widow
of Earl Haraldson, who has come asking Lagertha to be in her service.
It's an interesting change of events and I can't help but wonder if
Siggy has a secret motive since in previous episodes she looked to
enjoy her high class status and seemed ambitious enough to keep it.
However, we've yet to see Siggy in the service of Lagertha, except in
the final unfortunate scene in which Lagertha loses her baby.
Vikings is proving to be very
entertaining, although surprisingly historically inaccurate
considering the channel it airs on. And rather frustrating in the
constant time jumps so that the audience is left confused at how long
it's been since the series began (at least a year, I've estimated).
However, despite these issues it was a
good episode, not the best that we've seen so far this season but it
does set up for the legendary emnity between Ragnar Lothbrok and King
Aelle.
Review by Sofie Kiriakidis
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