Some Thoughts on Vikings

[aggienaut]

   If I may be so bold, I'd like to combine two fairly unrelated things in this entry. First I just wanted to post the pictures above and below of Cato posing particularly dramatically. And as long as I'm posting I've been wanting to rant a little bit about the Viking television series so I'm going to go ahead and do that. (Though I'll point out that viking cats are definitely a thing, we can call Cato "Bjornekatt Loðstjärt."(Bear-cat shaggy-butt))

   Now if I have a bunch of criticisms of the Vikings show it's not because I loathe and despise it but because vikings are near and dear to my heart and the show is almost excellent, except for a few things that really grate upon me, which is why I need to get it off my chest.
   I don't intend to include any spoilers in here except for maybe general comments on the personalities of main characters.

   (1) First of all, worst of all, that friggen "seer" is totally fantasy cliche and stolen whole cloth from the movie 300. I like that supernatural things occasionally happen, but I prefer it when they're portrayed kind of ambiguously like it could have just been a coincidence or someone's imagination, but this permanent character who doesn't look like a realistic normal human, doesn't act like one, and I cant' forget that I saw him looking and acting the same way in 300 is just a huge affront to my willing suspension of disbelief and enjoyment of the film.
   (2) What's with the awful haircuts? I googled around about the historical accuracy of the series before writing this and found some stupid puff pieces about how "yes they did have hair braids like that!" ... conveniently ignoring that I'm prrrrretty sure no one could be bothered to painstakingly shave fashionable portions of their head with the tools at hand (which is to say knives and water that would have to be heated over a fire). I feel like in later seasons they toned this down but in the first season it looked like a bunch of bikers with too much time on their hands escaped from hair design school. Also, it's one thing to have it shaved clean but Ragnar's son Bjorne looks like he has his hair shaved evenly at like a no 4 setting on a clippers, which would also be very hard to maintain without, you know, a clippers.
   (3) The immortality of main characters. It's a classic failing of MOST series that eventually you come to realize none of the main characters will ever die. Without giving too much away, several times main characters appear to be killed in battle, shot up with arrows, hacked and then run over by horses, limp corpse carried away... then it turns out they're alive! And walking talking frolicking about in the next scene. Instead of being on the edge of my seat when it looks like a main characters is about to die in battle, as you'd think they'd want the audience to feel, I just roll my eyes and when sure enough it turns out they're actually alive I groan aloud -- not because I specifically want any of the characters in question to die so much as just, come on man.
   (4) the world revolves around them -- it's also a weakness in a series when you start to feel like there's no world outside what's presently on set, and that they're the most important people in the world. In particular, when the viking king comes and hangs out for most of a season or two and has no retainers, seemingly nothing better to do, it seemed pretty odd to me. Doesn't he have at least a town of his own, and I don't know, a best friend? He just floats around like the secondary character he is and it starts to feel like they haven't filled out the rest of the viking world at all.
   (5) I really think they should have cast said king as Ragnar instead of the guy they did. He actually does seem to have the force of presence expected. The guy playing Ragnar seems like he's trying to channel Johnny Depp but it doesn't work for him. He doesn't have a forceful presence, he has a weird retreating twitching not-making-eye-contact not making decisions presence that doesn't seem to me to fit the part.
   (6) Ragnar Lodbroke means "Ragnar shaggy pants," WHERE ARE HIS SHAGGY PANTS
   (7) The tattoos. Did you know, there IS one reference to vikings "being covered in green drawings," by the Arab diplomat Ibn Fadlan who encountered a group of Varangrians (that is to say Norsemen who had settled in what is now Russia) in Bulgaria. Being as this is the only reference in any record, it is far more likely they picked it up in Russia (there's Siberian tribes known to tattoo -- seriously check out these cool tattoos) than that somehow no one in Europe ever thought to mention it and no tattoo implements have survived among the many oddments that have (I call this occam's tattoo needle).
   (8) This doesn't really bother me like the other things, but while I'm mentioning things, despite the two human sacrifices in the series being portrayed as voluntary, and indeed the priests refusing to take a non-voluntary sacrifice, and there are historical references and evidence of sacrifices, there is no historical reference or evidence of a single voluntary sacrifice.
   (9) Cato reminds me that there's no cats. Hmm that's a good point there really aren't.

   But other than the above points I must say I do find it rather enjoyable. I do really appreciate that they make a lot of references to the sagas and historical events. Presently once a week my friend Billie and I get together and I bring a bottle of mead and we watch a few episodes.

Comments

[sobota.livejournal.com]

I agree with pretty much all your observations except for Ragnar, perhaps because I have a soft spot for Travis Fimmel (the actor who plays him) and I hate Johnny Depp so I don't see the connection. Depending on the season you're on, the hairstyles get better (less outré I suppose, minus one of Ragnar's sons goes all out) and they get more authentically 'Nordic' actors in, whose accents are better and stuff. Anyway, I love Vikings haha.

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

I'm most of the way through Season 3.

I can see how Ragnar-actor might have fans, he keeps giving piercing looks to the camera that has Billie aflutter but just, especially in the first season where he's rising to power, he never struck me as really having the presence to go with his rise to power. ::shrug::

[bleodswean.livejournal.com]

*nods sagely* The Seer is my pet peeve and I just grimace every single time. But it does....get worse. It's a fun show insomuch as VIKINGS but whenever it really takes a leap all of us just turn to one another simultaneously and say "HISTORY, it's the HISTORY CHANNEL". And then pour another horn of mead...or whatever. I will say Floki is my beloved.

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Is it by the history channel???

But yeah that seer. Ugh.

[found-world.livejournal.com]

Have you read Njal's Saga? Given your interest in vikings, I thought you might be interested in it, but I'm not sure. Icelandic saga.

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

I've always been very interested in the sagas but haven't found a good translation of any (not that I've googled specificlly lately, it's been on my to do list though it really has!).. is there a good translation of this available?

[found-world.livejournal.com]

I've only read Njal's Saga, and I can't tell if it was a good translation or not. I think it was a "Penguin Classic" edition and probably something an older sibling had to read in college and then years later I read the same book since it came into my possession. I guess all I can say is that I liked reading it.

Checking quickly, I see there are various places you can get some versions online. Don't know how they compare with what I read.

http://sagadb.org/brennu-njals_saga.en

http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/17919

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

I'll probably be looking for physical books on amazon ... nothing ships to Australia but I have books shipped to my parents house in the States and then either pick them up when I go there or have them bring them when they come. I find sitting in the arm chair reading a book so much more satisfying than staring at the computer screen (:

[furzicle.livejournal.com]

Like

[ryl.livejournal.com]

Yes, yes, so much yes. The Seer also gets on my nerves. Was he a burn victim or something? Where does he get his powers? What is his purpose in the village?

I can deal with the goofy hair and the tattoos because I can accept that as visual shorthand for "badass". Although after watching Athelstan try to maintain his monk cut in the first season before giving up on it makes me wonder why they'd put up with cutting their heads up so much with those primitive razors.

Have you gotten to the fourth season yet? You haven't seen bad hair until you meet Harald Finehair's brother Stupid-Do. It is truly a painful thing to look upon.

Seconding the Njal's Saga rec above. The best part is Hallgerd's third wedding.

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Yeah that seer... ugh. I mean he's literally the exact same guy from 300 I think, lack of eyes, black around the lips. They're like ehhh let's not bother thinking up costuming and character design for this one, look what I found in the prop closet!

I have to admit what annoys me the most probably is Bjorne's stupid little tiny puff of a man-pony-tail IT'S SO STUPID! ...I can't claim it's as inauthentic as the shaving because it would actually be more period possible but god is it stupid.

I'm most of the way through season three now I think? I forget if we got to the season finale yet. They're beseiging Paris still.

As I said above, is there a good translation of Njal's Saga? Despite my interest I haven't actually read any of the sagas but rustling up some translations has really been on my to-do list.

[ryl.livejournal.com]

The Penguin version translated by Magnus Magnusson is really good. Not the most recent Penguin ed., the one from the 1980s.

I will say this for Bjorn: they did a really good job casting that role. He looks more and more like Ragnar as he gets older.

BTW, how do you pronounce "Loðstjärt"? I'm going to start calling Samantha that because she's very proud of her fur pants.

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

"Lothstjhieart" if that makes any sense? The whole stjä assembly becomes a kind of "shjea" and I think you barely hit the t. (:

[lab-jazz.livejournal.com]

I haven't been watching the Vikings...but that's one hell of a beautiful cat...

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

Thanks! He's the best! :-3

[sinnamongirl.livejournal.com]

I've seriously considered getting the Siberian "princess" tattoos recreated on me; I think they're so awesome. I enjoy Vikings myself, just as a silly soap opera with gore type of thing, but I'm the kind of person who can almost always suspend disbelief and just watch something without getting too antsy about it. One detail that I DESPISE, though, is in the shows and movies where people are firing off guns with no ear protection then turn to each other and have a perfectly normal conversation, as though their ears aren't ringing with the ricochet.

That said, on a slight tangent, I did recently read that a lot of Scandinavians/vikings were blond(e) because they'd bleach their hair in order to kill lice, preemptively, because it was hard to bathe in the cold times (which is like most of the time at a certain longitude), and I just found that interesting because I've also read that, before bleach was a thing, urine was the most common bleaching agent, due to the ammonia in it. So now I'm intensely curious as to whether Scandinavians were in fact bleaching their hair and, if so, did they use urine? Did they just reek like piss all the time but it was okay because it killed the lice??

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

It's funny in movies people always seem to be able to hear eachother even like when they're in two cars side by side or two biplanes or by a large helicopter or jet without headphones on....

Hmm I had heard that about the bleaching with urine about the celts, wouldn't be surprised if the vikings did too!

[sinnamongirl.livejournal.com]

It drives me insane. NOISE. HURTS. EARS. /sigh

I hadn't heard it with the Celts, but that makes sense, so maybe it was common? I'd like to explore this more if I can remember to put it on my list of "random things to research."

[furzicle.livejournal.com]

In my inexpert conjecture, (1) At that time and place, bathing was not too common, so they probably did carry about and were used to smelling fairly strong bodily odors, and (2) urine was commonly used in tanning hides, so I'm guessing they saw the benefits of bleaching with urine and had few of the phobias associated with the substance that we modern people have.

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

As I commented above, I had read that the celts were known to bleach their hair with urine, so it wouldn't be surprising if the vikings did too.

[pundigrion.livejournal.com]

Cato is gorgeous!

I have only glanced over K's shoulder admittedly while he was watching the show, but I shall submit my pet peeve. Inaccurate livestock! Ya weren't even trying there numbskulls, that was totally a Light Sussex that just clucked by. I mean really!! Least you could have done was chosen something with slightly closer colouring, but it is fairly agreed that the modern Icelandic chicken landrace is pretty much as close as you can get to a Viking chicken (ditto for goats and sheep and horses)

[emo-snal.livejournal.com]

lol!!