What to Watch? – Have you seen Spartacus?0

I was thinking today that I should really do my thoughts on a TV show considering TV shows take up the majority of my time. Including time with friends, girlfriend, work and sleep, TV is still definitely the largest chunk of my life. Probably not my proudest moment admitting that but still I really should have written an article about a show by now.

So I guess the big question is what to talk about. My eyes have finally dried after the finale of LOST and I’m ready to move on. Most of my other shows from the beginning of the year like Big Bang Theory, Smallville, Stargate Universe, Family Guy and How I Met Your Mother have wrapped up their seasons. Yes I still watch Smallville, don’t judge me. Heroes finally got put down like the dying animal it was, releasing many people like myself from the delusion that it could still be good again one day. Plus Dexter doesn’t feel like it will ever get here, “get on with it”. But this does give me some time to catch up on Fringe and Breaking Bad, which I think are both awesome.

I’ve decided to talk about a less known show that caught my attention a few months ago. I heard about it at a dinner party when someone said that there really isn’t that much sex and violence on TV lately to which came the reply you obviously haven’t seen Spartacus: Blood and Sand. Then and there my interest peaked and I had to give it a look. They weren’t kidding. It’s hard to explain just how this show does things; so to help I’ve constructed this pie chart to demonstrate how most episodes of the show break up their time.

So you can see they are not messing around. So from what I can tell without doing any research what-so-ever, is that back in 2006 someone from the company Starz saw the movie 300 and said, “That would make a good TV show,” and here we are. Okay there’s a bit more to it than that but in all honesty that’s good enough for me. This is set in ancient Rome centred round a gladiator school. If you know the story of Spartacus or saw the 1960 Stanley Kubrick, Kirk Douglas film then this is basically the first act of that. About a man who ends up as a slave and trained as a gladiator dreaming of freedom blah blah blah, I don’t want to give anything away in case you don’t know the story.

Like 300 they give the show a hyper feel with CG sets and that, sometimes annoying but mostly cool, slowmo-speed up thing for the fight scenes. Speaking of the fight scenes they are really well executed and the amount of blood that flies is ridiculous. I wouldn’t be surprised to see a character stub their toe only to be followed by an explosive gushing wave. Totally over the top, but you have to want more.

As for the sex scenes, well it’s hard to mess up a sex scene. There are some really hot ones and then there are these other sex scenes where the characters are just killing time or even just to spice up the conversation. It’s a bit bazaar. But for all those Xena fans out there you get to see Lucy Lawless do things you never saw the warrior princess do and she is looking so good for her age I don’t mind telling you (the wigs help).

It also stars John Hannah (Mummy, Four Weddings and a Funeral) as the owner of the gladiator school and all round total bastard. He’s great in this and you love him but just when you think “hey he really isn’t that bad” he will do something that’s so evil it will disturb you.

The Australian actor Andy Whitfield does a good job playing title role of Spartacus. However with the popularity of the show taking off, the inevitable second season was in doubt when Andy was diagnosed with cancer. But in recent months he has been cleared and is eager to come back. Due to this delay the creators have started on a short prequel series before starting into season two. This is pretty cool because there are a number of great characters, which due to the nature of their occupation won’t appear in the following series.

Anyway I totally recommend you give this show a look unless of course you have a problem with violence, blood, dismemberment, gore, sex, group sex, full frontal male nudity, full frontal female, the F word, the C world and historical inaccuracy. In that case I wouldn’t recommend the bible either. This is a brutal show and the season finale is a very fitting end to it. It’s a nice thirteen-part show that might be a fun way to wait for Dexter to come back. Seriously how long is it going to take?

Rowan