Posted on 10/25/2005 4:36:38 PM PDT by DCBryan1
Episode 4 and 5 tonight in HD!
Episode 4: Stealing from Saturn:
Here we are, refugees in our own land," Cicero says to Pompey and his supporters, anxiously settling into their makeshift camp south of Rome. "We are not refugees, we are maneuvering," Pompey responds sharply, before explaining his strategy to the men: without gold, Caesar will have to resort to violence, and once the blood starts to spill, the people will turn on him with a vengeance. "While he is fighting mobs in the forum, I will be gathering an army the like of which he has never seen!"
Of course, there is still the question of who has the missing gold. Quintus Pompey, a squirrelly version of his father, has arrived from Brindisi to help track it down. With his gift for torturing the truth out of traitors, he delivers the information his father has awaited: the treasury has not fallen into Caesar's hands.
Yet Caesar has returned to the city and taken command, instituting Martial law to control the anarchy left in his rival's wake. His first mission is to win the support of the priests, and he asks that auguries be taken such that the people of Rome know that the Gods are on his side.
Despite the quiet that has befallen the city, Lucius Vorenus is anxious to start his new life as a merchant, and plans a party to enlist trading partners. He intends to import goods from Gaul - trading slaves, truffles, and wine - and to do this he must befriend local businessmen. As he prepares for his guests to arrive, Vorenus receives a surprise visit from Mark Antony, who confronts him about deserting Caesar's army. "I am no deserter! My time was served!" Vorenus insists. "Once over the Rubicon, Romans are citizens, not soldiers. I could not legally do other than I did."
"Foolish like a priest," says Antony, before making him an offer. If Vorenus returns to the thirteenth legion, he will be inducted into the Evocati as a prefect of the first grade, with a large signing bonus. Vorenus declines the offer, angering Mark Antony.
Across town, Atia prepares to host Caesar's homecoming dinner, a lofty honor that she attends to with glee. Her only apparent concern is her son's "distinctly feminine anima" and apparent lack of interest in sex. "When my mother's father was your age, there was not a slave girl safe," she boasts, forcing him to eat goat testicles to put "oak in your penis."
Over at Vorenus's feast, Niobe's sister Lyde arrives with Evander the butcher, Niobe's erstwhile lover and the father of her infant son. "This is my husband, Evander Pulchio," Lyde says, introducing the tense man to an oblivious Vorenus. As other guests arrive, festively dressed merchants and neighbors, Vorenus tries awkwardly to make small talk, while the infant Lucius reaches for Evander, who cuddles with the child -- tormenting his wife. Pouring down the wine, Lyde loses herself by dancing with a young man, until her husband tries to escort her from the party and she makes a scene. Terrified that Vorenus will see the spectacle, Niobe pulls a knife to threaten her. "What good is a knife when you've killed me already?" Lyde cries. As Evander tries to wrestle his wife out of the party, the two knock over a shrine to Janus, god of beginnings - a terrible omen that fills Vorenus with a sense of doom.
As Vorenus's party comes to a foreboding end, Atia's affair heats up. Caesar has greeted his guests warmly, assuring them that he will never give them a reason to regret his friendship, regardless of their past allegiances. As Atia holds court, she becomes preoccupied with Servilia's attendance, determined that nothing come between her and her powerful uncle. The presence of Caesar's wife, Calpurnia, who arrives on the arm of her husband, seems to concern her much less. While Caesar is genial, Calpurnia remains aloof and formal, obeying her role as the dignified wife.
The Chief Augur appears indifferent to Caesar and his guests, until Caesar and Mark Antony offer a large sum as a "birthday gift" to the priest's extravagant spouse. The Augur ups the ante before accepting the generous offer. "She would be under great obligation to you," he tells Caesar. "To think well of me would be her only obligation," he responds.
As Vorenus begins to recover from his hosting duties, he receives another surprise visit - this time it is Pompey's son and his men, in search of the treasury gold. Assuring them he knows nothing, they threaten him with swords, drawing blood from his throat. The standoff is interrupted by the sound of a raucous crowd outside Vorenus's courtyard. They are carrying a man who tosses coins at the beggars and urchins in the street. As the litter is lowered, we see that the man is Pullo. He does not see Quintus's men as he rushes to greet Vorenus. But when they descend on their now-obvious culprit, Pullo throws a bag of golden coins in the air, and the beggars descend in force - allowing Pullo and Vorenus to ambush their would-be captors.
With Quintus bound and gagged, Pullo hatches a plan to escape with the gold to Spain. Vorenus wont have it: "By sunrise everyone in Rome will know what you did, and where you are...My home was invaded and my wife near killed on your account." With this he convinces Pullo to hand over the gold to Caesar, and hope that offering Quintus will earn him mercy.
It earns him more than that, 100 gold pieces (Caesar "does not like to quarrel with Fortune, and clearly she has taken you for a pet."). Quintus is sent back to Pompey with a written offer of a truce, despite the misgivings of Mark Antony and even young Octavian, who speculates that the offering will divide Pompey from his men. This assessment pleases Caesar. Before he can explain his strategy, however, he is in the grips of an epileptic seizure. Posca and a shocked Octavian attempt to hide and restrain him until the violent attack subsides.
When he recovers, a pallid Caesar sends Capurnia home without him, and finds his way to Servilia's bedroom. The next day, with all the priests present, the Chief Augur makes his appeal to Great Jupiter, and in a display carefully orchestrated by his assistants, pigeons fly across the sky from left to right.
Outside the city, Pompey crumples Caesar's offer, at first hiding it from the others. When they learn the limited terms of the truce - legal immunity, mutual disarmament - Cicero, Scipio and Brutus ask Pompey to reconsider. "I must disarm? I am lawful Consul of Rome. He is a criminal. There is nothing mutual in it."
Back in Rome, Pullo returns to Vorenus's with his gold from Caesar, only to find Niobe and Evander in anguished conversation. Vorenus is elsewhere, prostrating himself to the city's Shrine of Janus, begging forgiveness.
Episode 5: Ram against the wall
Synopsis
Chased to the Italian coast by Caesar's legions, Pompey and the senior senators debate their response to Caesar's truce offer. They finally agree to a "cessation of hostilities" based on his terms, though Pompey vehemently insists to his men the agreement is not a surrender. He simply needs time to bring fresh troops from Greece and Spain.
When Caesar and Mark Antony read the response, they decide their rival is trapped and contemplate their triumphant rule over Rome -- with Pompey withdrawing to Spain. The only problem now is public perception. "If I am not a tyrant, if I merely seek legitimacy, why would I not accept such favorable terms?" Caesar inquires. It is Posca who concocts his excuse: Pompey will not meet him in person, therefore the offer cannot be accepted. (This pleases Caesar: "Hoi polloi can understand a reason like that. He refuses to meet me face to face. Man to man.")
On a tip from her kitchen staff - who witnessed young Octavian emerging from a closet with Caesar after his seizure - Atia congratulates her son for seducing his great uncle. "I am not clear that it's decent...but who's to say what's decent in times like these?" she muses, delighting in the thought of the power she will now wield. "Let's see Servilia compete with a soft young boy like you." To set his mother straight, Octavia divulges that Caesar has an affliction, but stops short of explaining any further.
With his slaves due to arrive from Gaul, Vorenus announces to his family that he will soon have enough money for his daughter's dowry, allowing her to take baby Lucius to her young husband and start a proper married life. This thrills Vorena the Elder while distressing Niobe, who stares anxiously at her infant son.
But Vorenus's slaves did not fare will on their journey - all but one of the 12 succumbed to the black blood flu, and the sole survivor is a sickly four-year-old boy. Vorenus has no choice but to take him home and nurse him to health, in the hopes that he can sell him and recoup some of his losses.
Caesar, meanwhile, has been declining invitations from Atia, while accepting them from Servilia, leading his men to suspect her as the reason he is stalling an attack on Pompey. Mark Antony reveals as much to Atia during a late night visit, confirming her worst fears.
Since he's not Caesar's soft young lover, Atia enlists Pullo to teach her son the "masculine arts," which proves to be a challenge. Exertion gives the privileged boy a fever, and he feels he can only kill people who aren't fighting back. Pullo decides to seek the boy's advice on whether he should tell a friend about his suspicions concerning the man's wife. Octavian reasons that "without facts you must remain silent."
Oblivious to any troubles with his family, Vorenus is preoccupied with his finances, and approaches Erastes for a loan to buy more slaves. Instead he gets a job offer - to accompany the businessman on his trades as a sort of bodyguard. During his first assignment, however, Erastes asks Vorenus to kill a man who has failed to pay him. He refuses and quits.
Across the whitewashed walls of the city, several crude cartoons have been drawn of a man having sex with a woman - the names Caesar and Servilia etched under each naked form. As Caesar and his procession make their way through the crowded streets, Calpurnia carried high on a litter, raucous laughter breaks out as they pass. When Caesar and his wife take notice of the drawings, the procession abruptly turns back to the villa, where a humiliated Calpurnia threatens her husband with divorce. This alarms both Caesar and his chief attendant. "We cannot divorce now," Posca tells him, "Her family influence will be critical."
Caesar's next visit to Servilia is not so friendly. He coldly informs her they are finished. He is heading south to pursue Pompey and they will not be seeing each other again. Servilia trembles in disbelief. "Be assured, it is not that I do not love you...I must do what is right for the Republic." With this Servilia bursts into a rage, attacking her lover until she draws blood from his cheek. Caesar knocks her to the floor, and as she sobs uncontrollably, slaps her twice more before storming out - leaving her sobbing in a heap.
At the end of his rope, Vorenus returns to Mark Antony to tell him he has reconsidered the offer to rejoin Caesar's army. Antony accepts, but only because Caesar has left him in Rome and he needs good men. Vorenus is soon initiated into the Evocati by an elderly priest, who performs an elaborate ceremony at the Temple of Mars.
After learning that Atia was behind the crude graffiti, Servilia decides to seek revenge. Relying on a book of magic, she carves stick figures into lead tablets, then summons the spirits of her ancestors to invoke a curse on both Atia and Caesar - disfiguring the images with slashes as she pleads to for each of them to suffer deeply. "Let his penis wither. Let his bones crack. Let him see his legions drown in their own blood..."
While Servilia is cursing Atia and her children, Octavian is escaping from his mother's villa in the middle of the night - joining Pullo on a secret mission. The two ambush Evander outside his butcher shop, then torture him until he gives up the truth: he was Niobe's lover, and the infant is his. With this second bit of information, Pullo stabs the man repeatedly. After his bloodied body is rolled into the sewer, Octavian warns Pullo to never speak of the incident again. "Vorenus must never know." Pullo nods in silent agreement. Synopsis
I might have to get HBO.
That is one uuuuuugly man.
Jumping up and down, screaming. Very, very funny.
I have been watching the series and I love it!!
The actors are fantastic and I think the whole look of
the show is beautiful. The actors must be having a ball saying some of those lines. I loved when Atia was going to call the dogs on Octavia's lover. love the whole cast.
Pompeii was great, Octavian, he is fabulous, I believe he was the young actor in Master and Commander. You can go on HBO's site and read all about the cast and see what other viewers are saying. I was thrilled to read about a second season.
I like the actor playing Brutus. Whoever did the casting on this show did an excellent job. IMHO.
Anybody watching Extras? It is a darned funny little show.
He is doing a great job in the part. We just call him Brutus of Many Teeth around here.
I agree, USA network's Attila & Sparticus had battles, hell even TNT's Caesar had at least some fighting. All 3 combined probably had only ¼ the budget of HBO's Rome, yet Rome had two chances with Pharsalus and the Siege of Alexandria and both times they showed nothing.
Pharsalus was one of the most pivital battles in history, it's terrible the way they glossed over it like they did. Part of the reason the Romans are so fascinating is they were such bad asses, and not to see them in battle just takes something away from the show.
Well there's always battles of Thapsus and Munda, but from the coming attractions it doesn't look like that will happen either.
But on the other hand, the writers made sure to put in enough time dedicated to a make out session between Octavia and Servilia.
Really? Dam it, I must of missed it.
Over all though, except for the lack of battles I must say it is a great show
I love ancient history !!
Not really.
ROME is spot on, almost word perfect! If you've ever taken Latin, or read Julius Caesar's and Cicero's works in translation, you'll know a lot of the script before any character says a line, or an action takes place.
Wanna complain about Roman bisexuality? Take it with the contemporaneous writers; whom I quoted as my first sentence.
I,CLAUDIUS was filled to the brim with nudity, sexual acts, and showed less war scenes. I,CLAUDIUS was based on two books of fiction,written by Robert Graves. It too deviated somewhat from factual history, as well as Graves' books.
thanks for the ping!
Rome (new HBO series)
HBO | August 2005 | some HBO shill
Posted on 09/03/2005 7:52:54 AM PDT by SunkenCiv
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1476409/posts
BBC's £58m Rome is most violent, explicit and costly drama yet
UK Telegraph | 8/21/05 | Chris Hastings
Posted on 08/21/2005 12:09:19 PM PDT by wagglebee
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1467783/posts
Please FREEPMAIL me if you want on or off the
"Gods, Graves, Glyphs" PING list or GGG weekly digest
-- Archaeology/Anthropology/Ancient Cultures/Artifacts/Antiquities, etc.
Gods, Graves, Glyphs (alpha order)
By Jupiter's ears, I hope so. There is so much more to the story after Julius Caesar is murdered in 44 BC.
Going by the last episode, where Caesar holds up his newborn son (presumably Caesarion) the series is now at about June 23rd, 47 BC.
So we are now about 2½ years prior to Caesar's murder in March of 44 BC. After that is when it gets really interesting. The whole story of Octavian's (Soon to be Augustus Caesar) rise to power, the Second Triumvirate, Antony's affair with Cleopatra after Julius Caesar's death, and Octavian's defeat of Antony at Actium (and all the intrigue that led up to it).
Here's a little time line...
47 BC Caesarion (Ptolemy Caesar) born on June 23.
46 BC Cleopatra arrives in Rome, Caesar appointed dictator for ten years; revision of calendar.
45 BC Caesar defeats the Pompeian forces in Spain.
44 BC Assassination of Caesar. Cleopatra returns to Egypt.
43 BC Second Triumvirate: Antony, Octavian, Lepidus.
42 BC Brutus and Cassius defeated by Antony and Octavian at Philippi.
41 BC Antony 'summons' Cleopatra to Tarsus. They become lovers.
40 BC Reconciliation of Antony and Octavian at Brundisium.
36 BC Antony invades Parthia but is defeated.
35 BC Antony returns to Alexandria.
32 BC Antony marries Cleopatra.
31 BC Octavian (and Marcus Agrippa) defeat Antony (and Cleopatra) at Actium.
I noticed that also. Indeed, classic. (Is that a pun?)
I think that the use of Pullo and Vorenus as focal points of the story is fantastic.
Incidentally, the two characters of Titus Pullo and Lucius Vorenus were actual soldiers in the Roman army. They are the only two soldiers ever mentioned in the writings of Julius Caesar. This is why I suspect that the series may end at or around 44 BC when Julius is murdered. For obviously there would be no further mention of these two after his death.
I hope the writers find a way to keep it going.
I had understood that this series was going to tell only this one story about Caesar. A mini series like Band of Brothers. I'm very glad if that is not true, as I cannot find a thing about it on the website.
Anytime fair lady.
It is interesting how Antony carried out Caesar's planned war against Parthia using Caesar's 'back-door' strategy of invading through Armenia, and how he so badly botched it -- starting the campaign too late, leading him to leave his supply train defended by only two legions while he hurried ahead to Phraaspes. These two legions were promptly defeated by the Parthians who wisely avoided Antony's main force. This main force then tried to lay siege to Phraaspes, where Antony planned to stay for the winter, w/o most of the siege equipment. He failed, and was then forced to withdraw, and it was this retreat (weather and lack of supplies) that was responsible for most of his losses, and not the Parthians who (I think???) didn't actually defeat Antony in battle.
Even though Caesar was known for his rapid, bold, and even reckless moves, I have a hard time believing he would have faired so badly.
But anyway, ROME has been renewed for a second season, but it won't start filming until next year, and won't air until 2007. This should actually work to its favor though, as it will allow the actor who plays Octavian to grow into the the approximate proper age for the character at the time of Caesar's death.
I was surprised about Pharsalus as well. I thought that they were saving their resources to put it into a grand recreation of that battle, but apparently even a $100 million budget spread over 12 episodes wasn't enough for that. And you're right, if they weren't going to go all out for Pharsalus, then its a safe bet that Thapsus and Munda will get similar treatment, if they are addressed at all.
The Alexandria battle surprised me a bit as well, even after seeing the treatment that Pharsalus got, because I thought that they could economically film the lower-scale engagements that made up most of that campaign.
And the two actresses playing Servilia and Octavia clearly aren't comfortable filming lesbian scenes.
But still, for the most part, it is an excellent show. My biggest gripe is that they haven't shown enough of Caesar.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.