Vikings IX: The Bear Necessities [SPOILERS]

[HexMachina]

I'd love to share Astromech's optimism about Paris, but I've come to realise that there are no actual characters there, they are all cardboard cutouts that I don't care a flying fig about. Odo's S&M chamber is eye-roll inducing and Emperor Charles is ridiculous. Gisla's hasn't had too much screen time but in that short while she has done a complete character 180 all because Rollo learned French and she decided they could have sex after all. The return of Harbard in Kattegat is just icing on the shit cake.

There are still parts I enjoy, especially Bjorm, but the writing has taken such a huge dip this season, it's a real shame. I'll keep watching because I've gone through 3 seasons, but ugh.

 

Also, because of Yidu's insistence on returning to Paris with Ragnar, it's possible she has hopes of escaping and returning to China. Possibly.

[jarl the climber]

5 hours ago, Hrokkan of Skagos said:

Yah I'm starting to get really tired of the whole "mother breastfeeding her obviously too-old son" cliche.

Here's my take on this and it might be completely wrong, but her son is a young parapalegic and as such he might be more prone to infections, so there might be a basis for her doing this in the folklore medicine of the Vikings. Maybe she is a weirdo but a breast milk does have a lot of good properties and it could be she was advised to do this or that this is her natural instinct as a Mother.

[HexMachina]

5 minutes ago, jarl the climber said:

Here's my take on this and it might be completely wrong, but her son is a young parapalegic and as such he might be more prone to infections, so there might be a basis for her doing this in the folklore medicine of the Vikings. Maybe she is a weirdo but a breast milk does have a lot of good properties and it could be she was advised to do this or that this is her natural instinct as a Mother.

I didn't so much mind the breastfeeding as I minded the way it was shot. Like, they had Sigurd staring at her blankly for an uncomfortably long time for no apparent reason. Tbh that whole scene felt unnecessary (I feel that way about a lot of Aslaug's scenes, but this one I think I a, justified in )

[jarl the climber]

Yeah, it was a weird scene.

[SpaceChampion]

14 hours ago, Raksha 2014 said:

Sigurd doesn't seem like a bad kid; just a rather lonely little guy whose bigger brothers have gone away raiding and he's left with Mom and told to go play with the little girl toddler.  He's probably annoyed and feeling at loose ends.  Aslaug has Harbard to help her fiddle away the tedious hours; oh joy.  Maybe he'll teach Boneless to be even angrier?

He?  I thought that kid was a girl, Sigur.

 

 

Is it wrong of me to wish Ivarr had an axe nearby he could have grabbed to split Harberd's head open?

[HexMachina]

18 minutes ago, SpaceChampion said:

He?  I thought that kid was a girl, Sigur.

 

 

Is it wrong of me to wish Ivarr had an axe nearby he could have grabbed to split Harberd's head open?

Siggy is a girl, daughter of Bjorn and Porrun, the little blond child named after Rollo's wife Siggy that Sigurd said was filthy.

Sigurd is Aslaug's and Ragnar's son with the weird mark in his eye who was named after his grandfather. He would be Siggy's...half-uncle, I think?

[Zorral]

Nobody expects us to believe anyone is going to make that little child, Alfred, who is what? 4 years old? WALK all the way to Rome, right?  Especially when there are horse-riding folks with them.  Not even bedouin expect such little children to walk 12 miles a day.  They can't.

Probably, as this gets Queen Kwenthrith's Aethelwulf protector out of the way, this means that Eckbert and Aelle are going to kill queen Kwenthrith and take over Mercia.  Then the Eckbert and Aelle games shall begin, with Judith doing what?  And what happens with Magnus? Who I still swear cannot be Ragnar's son, as fraidy as he is.  For that matter, fraidy as he is, it seems unlikely he's even Kwenthrith's son. 

It's boogying crazy-pants on all fronts.

 

 

[Alia of the knife]

Well, I guess the only thing I have now is "Game of Thrones" and  "Walking Dead."

I will admit that "Strain" is my unabashedly guilty sin. It IS bad TV, and seems to accept it's own fate. So was "Defiance," and alas it didn't make it.

I forgot "Bates Motel" was on.

"Grimm" and "Sleepy Hollow?" Those too went from solid lore to soap operas.

I still had "Vikings."

But wait, I DON'T have "Vikings" anymore. It's been turned into "Fifty Shades of Ragnar." I now can't wait for him to die, and Floki too.

And Kevin Durand who is ALSO on "Strain," and keeps coming back as Harbard didn't want to be Nagen.

I'm going to go drink now.

 

[Corvinus85]

14 hours ago, Alia of the knife said:

Well, I guess the only thing I have now is "Game of Thrones" and  "Walking Dead."

I will admit that "Strain" is my unabashedly guilty sin. It IS bad TV, and seems to accept it's own fate. So was "Defiance," and alas it didn't make it.

I forgot "Bates Motel" was on.

"Grimm" and "Sleepy Hollow?" Those too went from solid lore to soap operas.

I still had "Vikings."

But wait, I DON'T have "Vikings" anymore. It's been turned into "Fifty Shades of Ragnar." I now can't wait for him to die, and Floki too.

And Kevin Durand who is ALSO on "Strain," and keeps coming back as Harbard didn't want to be Nagen.

I'm going to go drink now.

 

Disappointed that you're not sticking to it. With Grimm, too.

I also gave up on Sleepy Hollow.

[GallowKnight]

I might as well start off with the good bit. I liked that they were sailing most of the episode, because the ship stuff is pretty interesting and occasionally feels a bit underused. I also liked Lagertha's scene by Kalf's grave and Ragnar hallucinating about season 1 was great. I didn't even dislike Athelstan's cameo appearance. Floki starting to feel like his old self again is also good. And at least the plot has started moving.

Now for the bad parts.

I get that they are trying to show that Harald and Halfdan are bad people and burning people alive is certainly horrible. But the supposed moral highground of the Kattegat gang rings a bit hollow when they have a pre-pubescent boy using a tied up prisoner for target practice.

Yidu and Ragnar have become tedious as fuck, as has Ragnar's drug habit.

Paris is fucking awful. I guess Rollo is allright but Odo, Charles the Burger King and the weird siblings are terrible. I wonder how much more efficient it would have been if our first glimpse of Rollo this season would have him sitting all fancy on top of that horse by the river?

I don't even know what the purpose of Wessex is anymore.

Auslag is getting weird, Ivar is Crazy and I don't really know how I feel about Harbard.

[Spockydog]

8 hours ago, The_Gallows_Knight said:

Paris is fucking awful.

It could have been so much better if only Rollo hadn't killed all his men. All the 'Oh, your grace, please do not desert us in our hour of need' stuff is just ridiculous. Rollo with no men is worthless to the Franks.

 

[Raksha 2014]

10 hours ago, The_Gallows_Knight said:

I might as well start off with the good bit. I liked that they were sailing most of the episode, because the ship stuff is pretty interesting and occasionally feels a bit underused. I also liked Lagertha's scene by Kalf's grave and Ragnar hallucinating about season 1 was great. I didn't even dislike Athelstan's cameo appearance. Floki starting to feel like his old self again is also good. And at least the plot has started moving.

Now for the bad parts.

I get that they are trying to show that Harald and Halfdan are bad people and burning people alive is certainly horrible. But the supposed moral highground of the Kattegat gang rings a bit hollow when they have a pre-pubescent boy using a tied up prisoner for target practice.

Yidu and Ragnar have become tedious as fuck, as has Ragnar's drug habit.

Paris is fucking awful. I guess Rollo is allright but Odo, Charles the Burger King and the weird siblings are terrible. I wonder how much more efficient it would have been if our first glimpse of Rollo this season would have him sitting all fancy on top of that horse by the river?

I don't even know what the purpose of Wessex is anymore.

Auslag is getting weird, Ivar is Crazy and I don't really know how I feel about Harbard.

 

I thought that the prisoner on whom (?)Ubbe was practicing was already dead.  I'll admit that I don't know for sure.  

Yidu and Ragnar are definitely tedious - whatever writer thought their drug-taking scenes would hold the viewers' interest for more than a minute should be fired.  

I'm still enjoying Rollo's adventures in the Land of the Franks.  Wonder why Gisela has a modern hairstyle, now, but it's not that important.  Much too much time is being wasted on Count Odo and Bondage Gal and her creepy brother.  

As far as I can tell, the purpose of Wessex is to be a backdrop for Ecbert's amusing schemes and sexual shenanigans.  I like Ecbert, magnificent bastard that he is.  He certainly knows how to have a good time and keep his kingdom under control - Ragnar should take lessons.

As for the Ivar-Aslaug-Harbard situation; here's how I hope it will end:

Little Ivar took an Ax

And gave the Wanderer forty whacks

When he saw what he had done, 

He gave his mother forty-one.

(with apologies to the author of the poem about Lizzie Borden from which I stole the above)

[SpaceChampion]

On 2016-03-25 at 6:46 PM, HelenaExMachina said:

Siggy is a girl, daughter of Bjorn and Porrun, the little blond child named after Rollo's wife Siggy that Sigurd said was filthy.

Sigurd is Aslaug's and Ragnar's son with the weird mark in his eye who was named after his grandfather. He would be Siggy's...half-uncle, I think?

I completely forgot good ol' Snake-In-The-Eye.

[SpaceChampion]

So how does this work?  Rollo is the ancestor of the Normans, but the Normans are just French except for William the Conqueror, and even he was just a bastard?  How is "Norman" a thing when all his men he killed?  Is he, after this, suppose to win more Northmen over to his side to join him in ruling Normandy?

[-Ghost-]

All this Ragnar drug stuff is just annoying. It looked like he was hurting from not having anything when he was giving his sons their arm bands. He was up there sweating and talking faster than normal. Yidu can basically do whatever she wants now, since she's the only one that knows how to make his drugs.

 I still don't understand how Rollo is so important for Paris.

[Veltigar]

How strange this season is. On the one hand, I feel like I'm witnessing an impressive accident (causing a traffic jam in my own lane because I'm slowing down to observe the carnage in all its splendour EDIT: Not that I ever do that in reall life), it's truly amazing how terrible the writing is (almost Thrones level of bad).

On the other hand, I'm still enjoying this. Heck, I still think this is way better than season three for now. No episode has been particularly good, but depressing fails have so far been kept to a minimum (I'm almost constantly annoyed for sure, but with the exception of Rollo killing his men nothing has deeply pissed me off).

I think the strength of this show is definitely the tone and atmosphere it so skillfully employs. Vikings is certainly the most atmospheric show on TV right now, especially now that we have been forced to say farewell to Hannibal. Strangely enough, I can't really condemn the twenty episode order. Mainly because I think that the scenes that contribute the most to Vikings unique feel would probably be the first to be axed if there were only 13 episodes.

That being said, what is even more incomprehensible is how good this show could be. It's astonishing how easy it would be to resolve some of the problems other posters have already singled out. The fact that a lot of those flaws are even in there makes me believe that Hirst doesn't even bother proofreading them. A lot of this feels like obvious first draft failures (the kind you get after pulling off an all-nighter with way to little sleep). 

The best scenes this episode were the Vikings leaving Kattegat, Ubbe and Hvitserk getting their armrings and Ragnar's vision of his past. Fimmel really deserves some recognition for such a powerful scene their at the end. He's so great! 

On 25-3-2016 at 5:22 PM, The_Gallows_Knight said:

I get that they are trying to show that Harald and Halfdan are bad people and burning people alive is certainly horrible. But the supposed moral highground of the Kattegat gang rings a bit hollow when they have a pre-pubescent boy using a tied up prisoner for target practice.

This is one of the prime examples of easy-to-fix-writing-fails. The juxtaposition simply fails, which is just ridiculous, given the fact that they have all the extra screentime twenty episodes gives them to set it up. An easy fix I would suggest is to use Ubbe and Hvitserk as a vessel audience. Instead of having Bjorn watch the burning, he could have lectured the boys. Something along the lines of cruelty is only warranted when it serves a purpose, not like this. You would have a clear distinction (Ragnar and his Vikings are killers, but not without purpose, while the others are simply cruel bigots).

On 25-3-2016 at 5:22 PM, The_Gallows_Knight said:

Paris is fucking awful. I guess Rollo is allright but Odo, Charles the Burger King and the weird siblings are terrible. I wonder how much more efficient it would have been if our first glimpse of Rollo this season would have him sitting all fancy on top of that horse by the river?

I think this suggestion is a really good one. It would completely fix pretty much all the problems of the Paris arc so far.

On 24-3-2016 at 11:26 PM, SpaceChampion said:

Is it wrong of me to wish Ivarr had an axe nearby he could have grabbed to split Harberd's head open?

Seems like a perfectly sane suggestion. I like Durrand, but his character in Vikings needs to be killed with fire ASAP.

On 24-3-2016 at 8:50 PM, HelenaExMachina said:

I'd love to share Astromech's optimism about Paris, but I've come to realise that there are no actual characters there, they are all cardboard cutouts that I don't care a flying fig about. Odo's S&M chamber is eye-roll inducing and Emperor Charles is ridiculous. Gisla's hasn't had too much screen time but in that short while she has done a complete character 180 all because Rollo learned French and she decided they could have sex after all. The return of Harbard in Kattegat is just icing on the shit cake.

On 24-3-2016 at 8:50 PM, HelenaExMachina said:

Also, because of Yidu's insistence on returning to Paris with Ragnar, it's possible she has hopes of escaping and returning to China. Possibly.

I think she's looking for Coldplay  

On 24-3-2016 at 9:56 PM, HelenaExMachina said:

I didn't so much mind the breastfeeding as I minded the way it was shot. Like, they had Sigurd staring at her blankly for an uncomfortably long time for no apparent reason. Tbh that whole scene felt unnecessary (I feel that way about a lot of Aslaug's scenes, but this one I think I a, justified in )

It felt like Hirst was hinting at Sigur developing an oedipus complex  I sure hope he won't bring incest into play here

 

15 hours ago, Raksha 2014 said:

I thought that the prisoner on whom (?)Ubbe was practicing was already dead.  I'll admit that I don't know for sure.  

The prisoner was dead when we cut to the boys shooting him. Of course, he could have been alive when they started feathering him, but they don't show that  

17 hours ago, Spockydog said:

It could have been so much better if only Rollo hadn't killed all his men. All the 'Oh, your grace, please do not desert us in our hour of need' stuff is just ridiculous. Rollo with no men is worthless to the Franks.

 

 It's simply infuriating isn't it  

 

[Alia of the knife]

On 03/26/2016 at 11:56 AM, Corvinus said:

Disappointed that you're not sticking to it. With Grimm, too.

I also gave up on Sleepy Hollow.

No, I'll continue with them, just trying to figure it out.

[dbunting]

There are spots that shine, Ragnars visions of his season 1 family and home, but they are out numbered by the paralyzed child axe murderer breast feeding parts.

 

[JoeyBanana]

I'm not that pessimistic about the rest of this season. Lagertha, Ragnar, Björn, and Floki are now in one place, with most of the bores far away. Rollo betraying Ragnar is classic and likely necessary given the lack of proper antagonists in Paris. Harald and Halfdan are acceptable rivals. Ragnar's younger sons are all ripe to be developed properly now. I fear Sigurd will be awful but hey, 4 out of 5 isn't bad at all. Aethelwulf is on his way to have a zealot off with the bigot bros and reveal Ragnar's secret.

Wessex is going to suck but that's no surprise. If Ivarr continues to deliver, Kattegat will be fine. Maybe Kwentrith also does something interesting, like leave Wessex and seek out Ragnar for protection.

 

[Buckwheat]

How is it possible that nobody has come to complain about the boy that Ivar killed in the previous episode?

At least they remembered there is a Little Siggy!

I think Floki will betray Ragnar for good this time. I still hate Floki.

Gisla's hairstyle is about 1100 years too modern. I was under the impression that court women in that time kept their hair covered or at least knotted/braided.