"Binge watching" is one of those terms nowadays that just about everyone uses, along the same lines as "Hot Karl" or "Sucking Chest Wound".
Just the other day I sat down to take in 3 episodes of the Irish-Canadian produced series Vikings, and I quite enjoyed it. Solid acting, and it took me a while to adjust my thinking to just how primitive it was back in the 9th century. In fact, if a real life Viking hopped into a time machine to 2015, I'm pretty sure he'd lose his mind immediately. This is the time when rudimentary navigational tools were just being crudely shaped and invented. What's not too different is their belief in silly religious deities, and specifically the viking god Thor, who, incidentally I always thought was a DC Comics creation. Who knew?
In any event, one particularly interesting aspect of the show is that it begins in all the regular ways, with you empathizing with the plight of the poor peasant farmer and his family. But then something happens. I guess you can take the boy out of Scandinavia, but not the Scandinavia out of the boy, because soon enough, this same peasant farmer starts gettin' down to the whole Viking raping and pillaging business. And to make it crystal clear just how brutal these dudes were, one early episode features them rolling up into a peaceful community of Monks to slice, steal, dice and kidnap. As a result, I felt a little conflicted. I mean, those Monks were just living their peaceful little delusional lives, and in comes Grog and his medieval brutes to wipe them out. Having said all that, the Monks did have those terrible Monk haircuts where the crown of their heads are shaved in a tiny circle, so in the final analysis, I suppose that justifies murder.
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| A screen shot from the show, accurately depicting a Viking woman. |
In any event, one particularly interesting aspect of the show is that it begins in all the regular ways, with you empathizing with the plight of the poor peasant farmer and his family. But then something happens. I guess you can take the boy out of Scandinavia, but not the Scandinavia out of the boy, because soon enough, this same peasant farmer starts gettin' down to the whole Viking raping and pillaging business. And to make it crystal clear just how brutal these dudes were, one early episode features them rolling up into a peaceful community of Monks to slice, steal, dice and kidnap. As a result, I felt a little conflicted. I mean, those Monks were just living their peaceful little delusional lives, and in comes Grog and his medieval brutes to wipe them out. Having said all that, the Monks did have those terrible Monk haircuts where the crown of their heads are shaved in a tiny circle, so in the final analysis, I suppose that justifies murder.
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