Review of Spartacus: Blood and Sand

Back in August, 2009, I said of the trailer for Spartacus: Blood and Sand that it looked a bit like a cross between 300 and Gladiator but with more sex, violence and Lucy Lawless, a formula that I think is hard to go wrong with. The first season has now finished, 13 episodes strong and complete with clunky, leaden dialogue, pornographic levels of sex and nudity, heavily-stylised violence and gore and some appalling acting from a cast mostly chosen for their ability to look good oiled up than for their theatrical credentials. It was the trashiest thing I'd seen for a long time, a show not just with a target audience of 14 year old boys but apparently a production and writing crew of a similar age. I watched the whole thing from start to finish and loved it to bits, and not even ironically. →