I'll be reviewing each episode of the second season of Rome on HBO. I'll try to resist giving away anything about the fictitious elements, and the rest, as they say, is history...
Rome returned to HBO tonight. The first hour was as vivid and powerful as the best shows last season, perfect in its portrayal of political conniving and jockeying in the aftermath of Caesar's murder, and appropriately grim in the fictional account of Vorenus and the destruction of his family.
First let me mention what I missed. No "friends, Romans, and countrymen" oration by Mark Antony, just as there was no "et tu, Brutus" from Caesar last year. The reason, no doubt, is that that's all Shakespeare, not history, and HBO's Rome is sticking to whatever more or less accepted history we know, plus its own - excellent - embellishments. Still, Shakespeare has become close enough to a real history, an expected history, that I missed the oration - and especially so given the fine performance that James Purefoy gives as Antony. You can practically feel him itching to give the great speech. (This is also due to the fine writing - what we do hear this Antony say in Rome.)
I also missed seeing more of Atia, played ever temptingly by Polly Walker.
But Max Pirkis as young Octavian commanded every scene he was in, and David Bamber was infuriatingly deceitful as Cicero (though, as an admirer of the real Cicero's writing, I'm hoping that the sliminess of this Cicero is artistic license.)
And the story of Lucius Vorenus, played just right by Kevin McKidd, was heart-rending. If the creators of HBO's Rome left behind the inventions of Shakespeare, they're offering a gripping story of the underside of Rome that we haven't quite seen before.
All wrapped up in a package of marvelous opening credits, with a libretto delivered by news reader Ian McNeice that makes me wish we had a little more of that - and less news anchor and newspaper - in our own world...
3-minute podcast of this review
Rome - The Complete First Season
Rome: Music From the HBO Series
I, Claudius 1977 BBC-HBO series
my latest novel: The Plot to Save Socrates
2 comments:
Nice review. I have fallen in love with this show all over again since last night, and now the anticipation grows by the second for the next episode.
Welcome to the blog, Zak - I know just what you mean about falling in love with the show - there's nothing else quite like it on television (I said the same thing about 24 - and it was true both times).
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