woensdag 11 oktober 2017

The Last Kingdom season 2

Uther of Bebbanberg is back, in the second season of the stories written by Bernard Cornwell and his The Saxon Stories.

Like the previous one, it touches upon the material of two books, each one going into a 4 episode arc, all covered over by the creation of England by Alfred of Wessex.

In the first arc, Uthred frees a slave and legitimate claimant to the throne of Northumbria.  However, this king, Guthred, is ill councilled by his local abbot, and Uthred is send into slavery for being a pagan, while the clergy strikes a deal with his uncle.  Freed by his half-brother Ragnar, he is forced to renew his vows to Alfred.  But not after he kills the murderer of his adopted father and frees his long lost sister...

What follows is a few years of relative peace, until the brothers Siegfried and Eric return and try to tempt Uthred in joining them.  When this fails, they abduct Alfred's daughter and try to get land and gold to build an all-conquering army instead.  Uthred, mistrusted by Alfred by the machinations of the brothers, is the only hope to stop this...

Like the first season, the series isn`t as visually spectacular as it`s "collegue" Vikings.  But the semi-historical story (Uthred is fictional, the events he gets enrolled in are not) drives on strong storytelling and some very intresting personalities to go with it.

Destiny is all!

1 opmerking:

  1. It's a good story but the books are better. I am trying to find them all in charity shops, only two more to go.

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