Now, I do understand that this is a "Hollywood-documentary", in which the historical accuracy often suffers under the focus on dramatization and good story.
However, the inaccuracies and assumptions played off as facts in this series have become unacceptable for me, seeing as it is still claiming to be a documentary. Let's look at the first issue, which can easily be overlooked, but nevertheless might create a false image. The way the battle scenes are depicted are entirely non-representative. First and foremost, the Romans never fight in formation, which was crucial for Roman armies. As soon as two sides clash against each other, the soldiers all break into a one and one fight, which leads us to the next issue: The fighting is absolutely unrealistic and they not only use the gladius wrong, but also slash through plate armour, or pierce through plates of iron, flesh and bones, clothes and then iron once more in just one thrust. This could be easily overlooked, but it still something worth criticizing in a documentary. Not taking the inaccuracies into account, they are also not very well made. The resolution often suddenly changes into what seems like 240p and all in all they mostly consist of shaky cams.
Now, onto the more glaring issue. This documentary obscures so much and gets at least as much wrong. Pretty early in, we are thrown into the Spartacus rebellion, and, oh dear, what a mess. Everything concerning Caesar during this part seems to be pure fiction. Yes, it is quite likely that Caesar fought during the rebellion, as he was the right age. However, there is no proof of him playing any sort of major role, much less stepping into the commander's tent, keeping them from retreating and coming up with an ingenious battle plan, which he then also leads...But the misrepresentation of history doesn't end there. Pompeius at that time was in Spain, fighting another rebellion. During that he gained land, which is why he got the victory parade. In no way was he claiming to have defeated Spartacus, as he was nowhere near Italy, where the Spartacus rebellion took place. They are essentially ignoring the facts to make Caesar look like a hero, a genius that is much better than the other commanders, who is secretly behind even more military victories than he is already credited for and they even make him oppose the crucifixion of rebelling slaves.
These misrepresentation serve a clear purpose, the implementation of a distinctive good and evil. They clearly want to make Caesar a likeable protagonist, whose journey one can follow easily. They want to create a compelling story. Therefore, they need to create antagonists, they need to simplify everything. The show also tries its best to show that pretty much everything was Caesar's idea from the start, setting him up as a genius mastermind. It is a big assumption to make that Caesar was behind the creation of the triumvirate.
This, in general, is a big problem circling around modern film documentaries. The all-knowing narrator and the interviewed people are all talking, as if they were assuming nothing, as if everything they say is an undisputed fact, even if it's clearly not. They very often just state why people did what they did, what their traits were that lead to all of this, without any way of actually knowing this. Oh, also the armour is very often inaccurate for the time.
Onto the few good parts, Jean Bean fits perfectly as a narrator for this series, the recreations are generally well made, with exceptions of the battles, and the actors are doing their part.
Review by BolloggBlockedParentSpoilers2018-07-30T22:00:30Z— updated 2018-08-07T21:36:27Z
Now, I do understand that this is a "Hollywood-documentary", in which the historical accuracy often suffers under the focus on dramatization and good story.
However, the inaccuracies and assumptions played off as facts in this series have become unacceptable for me, seeing as it is still claiming to be a documentary. Let's look at the first issue, which can easily be overlooked, but nevertheless might create a false image. The way the battle scenes are depicted are entirely non-representative. First and foremost, the Romans never fight in formation, which was crucial for Roman armies. As soon as two sides clash against each other, the soldiers all break into a one and one fight, which leads us to the next issue: The fighting is absolutely unrealistic and they not only use the gladius wrong, but also slash through plate armour, or pierce through plates of iron, flesh and bones, clothes and then iron once more in just one thrust. This could be easily overlooked, but it still something worth criticizing in a documentary. Not taking the inaccuracies into account, they are also not very well made. The resolution often suddenly changes into what seems like 240p and all in all they mostly consist of shaky cams.
Now, onto the more glaring issue. This documentary obscures so much and gets at least as much wrong. Pretty early in, we are thrown into the Spartacus rebellion, and, oh dear, what a mess. Everything concerning Caesar during this part seems to be pure fiction. Yes, it is quite likely that Caesar fought during the rebellion, as he was the right age. However, there is no proof of him playing any sort of major role, much less stepping into the commander's tent, keeping them from retreating and coming up with an ingenious battle plan, which he then also leads...But the misrepresentation of history doesn't end there. Pompeius at that time was in Spain, fighting another rebellion. During that he gained land, which is why he got the victory parade. In no way was he claiming to have defeated Spartacus, as he was nowhere near Italy, where the Spartacus rebellion took place. They are essentially ignoring the facts to make Caesar look like a hero, a genius that is much better than the other commanders, who is secretly behind even more military victories than he is already credited for and they even make him oppose the crucifixion of rebelling slaves.
These misrepresentation serve a clear purpose, the implementation of a distinctive good and evil. They clearly want to make Caesar a likeable protagonist, whose journey one can follow easily. They want to create a compelling story. Therefore, they need to create antagonists, they need to simplify everything. The show also tries its best to show that pretty much everything was Caesar's idea from the start, setting him up as a genius mastermind. It is a big assumption to make that Caesar was behind the creation of the triumvirate.
This, in general, is a big problem circling around modern film documentaries. The all-knowing narrator and the interviewed people are all talking, as if they were assuming nothing, as if everything they say is an undisputed fact, even if it's clearly not. They very often just state why people did what they did, what their traits were that lead to all of this, without any way of actually knowing this. Oh, also the armour is very often inaccurate for the time.
Onto the few good parts, Jean Bean fits perfectly as a narrator for this series, the recreations are generally well made, with exceptions of the battles, and the actors are doing their part.