Okay, so Lady Rhino, who is a petite little Italian-Greek girl, hates my love for everything North related. I think all the art and cuisine is great, but that’s not what makes the world go ’round. Scientists and warriors do. So just humor me okay? I think Italian and Greek Americans are super hard working, I’m talking about the idiots lounging in the sun. Capiche?

I didn’t do a recap for the first episode, as I just had the idea tonight. So our Protagonist is Ragnar Lodbrok, based upon the hero from Norse legend. In the early part of the “Viking Age,” which began with the destruction of the abbey on Lindifarne on  8 June 793, the Vikings had not yet sailed west to England. They normally sailed east every summer to modern day St Petersburg and the Neva River, raiding settlements down river and along the tributaries. These settlements had little more than they did, as they too were exposed to harsh winter weather conditions.

The early Vikings had very little contact with the riches of the Mediterranean and southward. After hearing about places with riches to the west, and tired of being cold and poor,  they had nothing to lose by risking it all to sail west. That’s what we saw in this episode. Ragnar, with some trusted sailors/soldiers, set sail, against the wishes of Earl Haraldson, his feudal lord. So ol’ Haraldson gets all crazy and tests the loyalty of his right hand man– who seems to be a total idiot –by offering up sex with his wife, as a test. The idiot fails horribly.

That same stupid mongrel reported Ragnar, his shipbuiler (Floki), and his brother’s (Rollo), ship sailing. Floki had designed an all new ship that was ocean fairing, with a way to navigate by the sun, using a crude compass, and a sun stone. With their Earl not letting them go west, they go anyways. After some uncertainty, they reach these monks at Lindifarne in Northumbria, present day England. They then, at least in the show, proceeded to kill almost all of the monks. This lead the lady to saying “this does not make the Vikings look cool.” I agree with her, but you have to understand their culture.

They lived in horrendous conditions, having to basically hibernate during the winter. If they weren’t raiding others to survive, they were being raided. Their gods also valued fighting to the death and killing. They didn’t have priests that just stood their while they were slaughtered, they always fought. It was in their nature. This looks extremely barbaric, but you have to understand that the Moors and other Germanic tribes were doing the same to southern Europe, and Charlemagne was consolidating western and central Europe into his empire, thus becoming the first “Holy Roman Emperor.”

Shocking I know, but things were closer to nature then. Natural selection was a serious reality. The Earl is a real dick though, like a scared little girl scout. We all saw what happens next week, he takes all the spoils for himself, because they disregarded his orders. I can’t imagine this sits well with Ragnar, especially after he learns that the Earl killed his blacksmith by shoving his face into a fire in front of the blacksmith’s own daughter.

I can’t wait for next week. I won’t be watching next week’s show tomorrow, even though I can with DirectTV, it’s just not fun that way. If you guys think this recap sucks and I need to either make it funnier, or it’s not worth my time, let me know.

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