Buy Starz Spartacus Blood and Sand

I recently spent some time watching Spartacus Blood and Sand and was surprised that I actually quite liked it. Some shows start off slow and take some time to build up and some get on with it from the outset and this one does neither, it flows at its own pace and does its own thing and makes no apologies for that, often visiting points in the past to show why they reflect on the present.

The idea is the same as the movie of the same name, a warrior is brought into the Roman army to fight a common enemy and then is betrayed, sent into slavery after being torn from his wife and sentenced to execution for the enjoyment of the Sunday crowds. Don't these people ever learn? The whole Roman way of conquest was to use warring regions against each other, making them fight while promising aid against their enemy and then mopping up the pieces and the land left behind and over the course of centuries they were rather good at it.

Anyways, now that Spartacus has been betrayed he is a problem, that the bandits they were supposed to fight are taking another route behind them while they are supposed to march East, leaving their villages and loved ones vunerable. He leads a revolt after some heated words and someone decides to decorate the backs of a couple of Roman soldiers with spears so with no other option he decides to make his way back to his wife and catches the same bandits who he went to fight.

It wouldn't make for a very compelling story if he died there so he kills them all and spends one night with his wife, wakes up to a sword pommel in the face from the Romans that followed him and is dragged off to execution. This does not work out quite like planned as he then proceeds to kill all four of his opponents in the arena, the crowds cry for his life and the legatus has little choice but to grant it. 

This brings him to the ludus where he meets Batiatus. He promises to find his wife in slavery for service but all does not go to plan, he needs to keep him in servitude to him and the only way he can do that is to kill off any dreams of ever being reunited with his loved one, she is brought to him but not before her throat is slashed at the schools gates, blamed on bandits. Which is quite fortunate for the lanista as that will keep him fighting and bringing in money and fame.

Spartacus' biggest rival in the ludus is in Crixus, a Gaul who was undefeated and the champion of Capua, they clash time and again in the early days and in the arena where Crixus once spares his life but when pitted against Theocles are forced to fight together as one. Theocles; the Shadow of Death is a legend in the arena at seven feet tall and never defeated.

Bacus, the beast of Carthage wagers with another gladiator on the outcome of the battle, a gladiator named Ashur who Crixus once wounded at a thousand to one. Ashur, who cannot settle this debt betrays Bacus and lies about the outcome of a mission he took on to save his own skin when he was planning to buy his freedom.

Time passes and Batiatus grows rich and powerful on the blood of his most famous gladiator until such time as he has far broader political aspirations, things don't go too well for him so engages in further intrigue after having had Spartacus kill his best friend Varro on the whim of a boy, eventually killing a member of the senate and setting up an old rival who tried to have him killed in the pit in the process.

Eventually time passes and Batiatus seals patronage from the legatus, Claudius Glaber after having blackmailed him with information that his wife killed the daughter of the wealthiest man in Rome and this brings us to near the end. Now a powerful man in social and political circles Batiatus has to have Crixus killed off so proceeds to poison him and set him up with Spartacus, but not before they can all revolt and kill virtually everyone.......