Battles B.C.

[Macilrille]

Well, HBO has made a series for entertainment and drama that is quite historically accurate. The more knowledge you have I think, the more you enjoy it despite its glitches.

It is interesting that a historical fiction series is apparently more accurate than one that claims to be documentary...

[Aemilius Paulus]

Well, HBO has made a series for entertainment and drama that is quite historically accurate.

Ugh. Do not even get me started. Now this thread is going to move on from History Channel bashing to HBO bashing...

Anyway, HBO is quite honest. No one takes them for an educational channel. I really fail to see why they so painstakingly attempted to make HBO Rome so accurate. There is really no point to it. Anyway, the show had ten million "average" people watching it and a couple of thousand of history nerds. Even if the show cut the historical accuracy, the nerd would still stay. Why? Because, remember all that sex?

Which brings me to the next point. That whole series felt more like a porn movie than anything else. Seriously, what did it not have?? It had all the possible fantasies and fetishes: small goateed fat men sex, incest sex, sadomasochistic sex, lesbian sex, gay sex, "normal" sex, sex/nudity centimetres away from child pornography, casual sex, intimate sex, sex with prostitutes, sex in clothing, sex without clothing, sex in armour, etc, etc, etc.... I loved the series, but I wished for a censored edition. If anything, the series was a testament to the benefits of censorship. I found out more about coitus from that series than I had ever known before and more that I ever wanted to find out. If I could only have been warned.

That, I bet, is why the show was so widely viewed. Is it normal for HBO to make such material? After watching the series, I supposed there was considerable outrage after its release, but I did not find anything especially notable.



Now, I wonder how legal was my post. I was only discussing a TV series that pertains to EB...

[desert]

Ugh. Do not even get me started. Now this thread is going to move on from History Channel bashing to HBO bashing...

Anyway, HBO is quite honest. No one takes them for an educational channel. I really fail to see why they so painstakingly attempted to make HBO Rome so accurate. There is really no point to it. Anyway, the show had ten million "average" people watching it and a couple of thousand of history nerds. Even if the show cut the historical accuracy, the nerd would still stay. Why? Because, remember all that sex?

Which brings me to the next point. That whole series felt more like a porn movie than anything else. Seriously, what did it not have?? It had all the possible fantasies and fetishes: small goateed fat men sex, incest sex, sadomasochistic sex, lesbian sex, gay sex, "normal" sex, sex/nudity centimetres away from child pornography, casual sex, intimate sex, sex with prostitutes, sex in clothing, sex without clothing, sex in armour, etc, etc, etc.... I loved the series, but I wished for a censored edition. If anything, the series was a testament to the benefits of censorship. I found out more about coitus from that series than I had ever known before and more that I ever wanted to find out. If I could only have been warned.

That, I bet, is why the show was so widely viewed. Is it normal for HBO to make such material? After watching the series, I supposed there was considerable outrage after its release, but I did not find anything especially notable.



Now, I wonder how legal was my post. I was only discussing a TV series that pertains to EB...

Lol, that reminds me of Caligula, which at $20 million in production costs was the most expensive porno in history.

[Centurio Nixalsverdrus]

Which brings me to the next point. That whole series felt more like a porn movie than anything else. Seriously, what did it not have?? It had all the possible fantasies and fetishes: small goateed fat men sex, incest sex, sadomasochistic sex, lesbian sex, gay sex, "normal" sex, sex/nudity centimetres away from child pornography, casual sex, intimate sex, sex with prostitutes, sex in clothing, sex without clothing, sex in armour, etc, etc, etc.... I loved the series, but I wished for a censored edition. If anything, the series was a testament to the benefits of censorship. I found out more about coitus from that series than I had ever known before and more that I ever wanted to find out. If I could only have been warned.

Well, I gotta say something on this...

1. My favourite scene was when Antonius "met" the sheperd woman at the wayside.
2. "Rome" was more accurate than "Battles B.C." will probably ever be
3. If they can make people watch historically more or less accurate programs by inserting lots of sex, it's just perfect. They will see the sex and learn something at the same time. No need for "300"-style combat any more.

[A Very Super Market]

HBO has made quite a bit of accurate miniseries, although I do think that Rome does have an abnormal amount of racy material

[Aemilius Paulus]

1. "Rome" was more accurate than "Battles B.C." will probably ever be

You are absolutely, without a question correct. How could "Battles B.C." have taught me so much about sexual positions and fornication?? I mean really, there is no way it could have done that! Not to mention Rome's frank and down-to earth depiction of intercourse. What other porn flick could have done the same?? Obviously they are not as realistic. Only Rome is. That is why we should always watch Rome when we ant some pornography and read books when we want some history. Because the days of accurate, unadulterated history on television are irrevocably gone.

[Aemilius Paulus]

Well, I gotta say something on this...

1. If they can make people watch historically more or less accurate programs by inserting lots of sex, it's just perfect. They will see the sex and learn something at the same time. No need for "300"-style combat any more.

I would not say perfect. The fact that learning history, for most people, necessitates copious quantities of either sex or violence, then I am not altogether too impressed with the today's state of our society. It truly does not say much about it. I wonder how it was in the old days? What drew people to television and films back then?

But seriously, are you not bothered by how we are seemingly turning into something out of those multitudes of fictional, future dystopias where people are zombies of television that is filled with nothing but pornographic material?

[Rilder]

So what your saying is that you want to lead a colony of history buffs to a new planet to start a new historically accurate colony?

[Pontius Pilate]

That, I bet, is why the show was so widely viewed. Is it normal for HBO to make such material? After watching the series, I supposed there was considerable outrage after its release, but I did not find anything especially notable.

yes, alot of HBO's shows do contain alot of adult material. they can put up almost anything they want because they aren't cable. also if you like HBO Rome, you should also check out the "Tudors" on Showtime, it is very similiar to Rome.

I hope this thread doesn't turn into bashing HBO's Rome, because it was pretty historically accurate and my favorite show of all time. also, weren't the Romans very "sexual active" back then as the show portrays?

[A Very Super Market]

Yeah, the Romans were less than moral in their sexual attitude.

AP, your fear of porn-dependant humans is rather misplaced. Rome was cancelled mainly due to not enough ratings and too high production costs.

[Βελισάριος]

THIS. IS. CARTHAGE!!!

Baaaahahaha-cough-cough ROFLMAOTICOAPAD.
For those of you not yet initiated in the refined at of internet abbreviations that means: rolling on the floor, laughing my ass off till I choke on a pretzel and die.

I wanted to say that, but you were faster.

Seriously, though. Depending on how you look at it, it's not that bad.
Sure, it's beyond ridiculous from a historical perspective, but you have to see the bright side. At least this way History (sic) Channel can make enough money to sponsor more historical shows... if they do decide to do that, eventually- which I hope they will.

Also, this way some of those pimpled teenagers who think Leonidas was "kewl" in 300 might actually take a keen interest in (the real) history and study it... eventually ending up enslaved in the EB (II) world like some of the rest of us.

So... it's all good.

And, personally, I loved 300. Amazing on all counts. Frank Miller deserves my respect (though that's mostly for his Batman comics), but even 300. The graphic novel was a little more historical than the movie. But my point here is that Miller was one of the few "mainstream" producers and graphic-novelists who understood what a "hero" was supposed to be, all Jerry Bruckenheimer movies notwithstanding.
Of course the movie was going to be "artistic", what did you expect? And a bit of Hollywood was -sadly- unavoidable, but overall it was great... and much more historically accurate than I expected it to be (although, admittedly, my expectations were considerably low... I honestly thought that, apart from 300 Spartans and some Persians there would've been nothing of history in there). Even the famous "This is Sparta!" was fairly accurate (and great)... although the "punch line" for that one was supposed to be "there are plenty of earth and water down there [the well]" when Leonidas kills the Persian emissary, but hey... they had to add something of their own, right?

But Hannibal looking like some blood-thirsty barbarian out of a D&D video-game/God of War is just... LL

[Aemilius Paulus]

yes, alot of HBO's shows do contain alot of adult material. they can put up almost anything they want because they aren't cable. also if you like HBO Rome, you should also check out the "Tudors" on Showtime, it is very similiar to Rome.

HBO is not cable?? The heck? Oh well, I never watched cable anyway. I do not watch TV either, so I suppose I will just have to trust you. Yes, I have been recommended to watch that Tudor thing. But I will not, as the HBO Rome was the last thing I watched before my self imposed ban on all moves and shows and such. I realised that basically all flicks today are stupid and senseless, with even the older, better films not able to compare to books. So I quit watching anything coming off a television set at all.

weren't the Romans very "sexual active" back then as the show portrays?

Yeah, well everyone is. People are always surprised about the statistics on sexual activity. Prostitution, teen intercourse, adultery, and premarital encounters are always more frequent than we perceive them to be, as is the incidence of "unusual" sexual behaviour. Heck, has anyone ever heard of Kinsey and his research? In the 1950's, no less.

Oh, and yes, Romans did have a more liberal attitude to sex. Ours is largely influenced by Christianity, so quite a bit of earlier cultures d less strict moral codes on this matter. Here is a splendid source on Roman sexuality (actually, it is a marvellous website for anything regarding Romans).

[Ibrahim]

And, personally, I loved 300. Amazing on all counts. Frank Miller deserves my respect (though that's mostly for his Batman comics). The graphic novel was a little more historical than the movie. But my point here is that Miller was one of the few "mainstream" producers and graphic-novelists who understood what a "hero" was supposed to be, all Jerry Bruckenheimer movies notwithstanding.
Of course the movie was going to be "artistic", what did you expect?

I beg to differ on a point:

1-the batman series did start out cool, but the remainder was worthy of an allmighty panning..you noticed that he gets worse over time? for example, I still cannot get over that "I'm the Goddamn Batman" part from the second issue...Batman should never say this-he just...doesn't sound right... and the whole comic was a microcosm of either a mental degeneration, or a showcase of Wahnsinn...



for all you who are confused:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=limH...eature=related

check it out.

check out the dialogue under the video too.

[Gabeed]

I've largely stopped watching the History Channel. I'm tired of hearing about the Freemasons, secret societies, and reports of Atlantis near Japan. I loathe it when they have some show called "The True Dragon Emperor," just because The Mummy 3 came out. I have no interest in the history of cheese, or any of that other mundane crap, often about American Industrialization. This Battles BC show looks awful. Honestly, the best part of the History Channel might be the WWII crap that they've beaten us over the head with since the beginning of time.
But my final realization is that the History Channel is not reserved for historians at all. Once in awhile, I'll tune in to a show about the Battle of Qadesh or an Egyptian tomb which is fantastic for any historian, but most shows are clearly for the common layman who just wants to watch something briefly, muse "that's interesting," and forget about it.

[Macilrille]

AP, you need to get out more ;-)

Or perhaps it is just us Danes who see nothing wrong in depicting that part of history/life as it is. Sex is one of the most important themes in any person's life, surpassed by love- but there is lots of that in Rome too, mostly tainted by politics and hatred though and not much ending happily, but it is there. There is hatred, another powerful motivator, and if you know the factors that killed the Res Publica Romana it is truly excellent, for it depicts them all.

[Aurgelmir]

So what your saying is that you want to lead a colony of history buffs to a new planet to start a new historically accurate colony?

wuhahahaha that made my day

I hate it when people trample upon the flaws of humanity....(nerds)....the only word i can think off

[delablake]

Usually I like the History Channel...but that 300 rip-off I can't stomach:
Hannibal baring his teeth, with body-builder muscels and blue contact lenses?
Really sad :(((

[Aurgelmir]

Usually I like the History Channel...but that 300 rip-off I can't stomach:
Hannibal baring his teeth, with body-builder muscels and blue contact lenses?
Really sad :(((

Yeah its like watching a 50-cent video under influence on narcotics lol

And thats really a shame,the footage on itself and the edeting work where not bad,actually quiet good...but why in Brennus name don't they use equipment...what they historially used,like the roman armor's...or the NO armor of hannicent.

No prob when they try to get more audience with good budget productions.But pls...you have the money to make this,why using ribbed cuirass,when you only have to check a book or 2 to see.....hej it looked like this.....
There historians must allready know that.

I really like the technical side of movie/making,camara work,eding,musical composition and go on...
Despite the good animations,i can't watch a docu with such a nice budget and handling the hannibal timeframe...to see how they fuck up when it comes to equipment....And i'm not start again to talk about the next Mr.Universe..he should cast himself in the next terminator movie

[Africanvs]

My favorite part of ROME -- I own both seasons by the way -- was that it was human, and yes part of being human is having sex. Most of that goes on in our private lives, behind closed doors, but ROME took us behind those doors, and into the lives of these people. Sure, some of it was probably to get few million more viewers, but sex is a big part of life, and as a few people have already said, they didn't have the religious qualms about it that people do today. Anyone who has been in one of the many brothels in the ruins of Pompeii knows this. The other thing I loved about it, is it gave human reasons for major world events. Like the part "How Titus Pullo brought down the Republic." I mean who is to say it didn't happen that way? I think as history buffs, we know often times what happened, or at least what happened according to archeology and what sources we have, but we don't know why they happened. Sometimes the humanity becomes lost in historical facts. I always love historical dramas like Alexander, or ROME, because they are human. Even 300 had human elements in it. Battles B.C. is simply crap. It isn't accurate, it isn't human, it's simply a cheap knock-off of the 300 template designed to grab viewers with a hollywoodesque blood bath. And by the way, the blood effects suck.

[SwissBarbar]

ROME = awesome
300 = cool
Battles BC = crap

[Fluvius Camillus]

Ugh. Do not even get me started. Now this thread is going to move on from History Channel bashing to HBO bashing...

Anyway, HBO is quite honest. No one takes them for an educational channel. I really fail to see why they so painstakingly attempted to make HBO Rome so accurate. There is really no point to it. Anyway, the show had ten million "average" people watching it and a couple of thousand of history nerds. Even if the show cut the historical accuracy, the nerd would still stay. Why? Because, remember all that sex?

Which brings me to the next point. That whole series felt more like a porn movie than anything else. Seriously, what did it not have?? It had all the possible fantasies and fetishes: small goateed fat men sex, incest sex, sadomasochistic sex, lesbian sex, gay sex, "normal" sex, sex/nudity centimetres away from child pornography, casual sex, intimate sex, sex with prostitutes, sex in clothing, sex without clothing, sex in armour, etc, etc, etc.... I loved the series, but I wished for a censored edition. If anything, the series was a testament to the benefits of censorship. I found out more about coitus from that series than I had ever known before and more that I ever wanted to find out. If I could only have been warned.

That, I bet, is why the show was so widely viewed. Is it normal for HBO to make such material? After watching the series, I supposed there was considerable outrage after its release, but I did not find anything especially notable.



Now, I wonder how legal was my post. I was only discussing a TV series that pertains to EB...

What? Rome was one of the most awesome (and with some effort towards realism) tv-series ever. Sure you can get furious by seeing a tv channel who has an educative function sell itself out for ratings. But come on, this serie was great, perfect characters, I could identify a lot of characters with people I know (no, the people I know are not murderers nor have sex every hour), I mean their personalities were awesome. The cunning of Atia, the extremely smart octavian, vulgair but also cunning Marc Anthony, and I can go on and on.

Perhaps this serie was not historical enough, but come on, once in your life have fun instead of pursuing realism, this show at least portrays a Rome a lot better than the now extremely commercialized History channel. No I am not the nerd you mention who watches it for the sex, I love the characters, the fights were between realistic and 300. Also the humour! Every great fan can never forget how erastes fulmen smashes a jar against his servant's head to show how far he can go, or the random remarks of mark anthony, or Pullo's excuse how Evander dissappeared.

Censor? Blasphemy! The thing I hate most, especially on television are those lame scrambles, vagueness, beeps or other American , that thank the heavens does not exist in Europe! (nothing against America, I just pity them that the government uses censor there).

Maybe people watched it because it was a porn movie for them, well I'm not one of those, I enjoyed ALL aspects of this excellent show! I bougth both dvd boxes right away when they came out!

Not trying to offend anyone!

Your's sincerely,

~Fluvius Camillus

P.S. If this is in any way against a rule, I will remove this as soon as I notice it.

ROME = awesome
300 = cool
Battles BC = crap

100% Agreed!

[Centurio Nixalsverdrus]

I agree with you, Fluvius Camillus! I remember a quote of somebody who said:

"For Americans sex is an obsession, for all the rest of the world it's a fact."

[Africanvs]

"For Americans sex is an obsession, for all the rest of the world it's a fact."

Sure why not make broad, sweeping, and stereotypical generalizations.

[antisocialmunky]

Well its not really false for large portions of America. Its just part of many American world views because of historical factors. The sex sells strategy is not really unique to America though but the American media tends to use it too much because its the easy way to make a buck because it combines sex with the 'taboo' card. I dunno the rest of the world is more overtly sexual but in America the issue is danced around.

[Macilrille]

No lover of American "culture", but I have nothing against enlightened Americans, in fact I find them to be amongst the most enlightened people in the world, so let us not degrade into America-bashing (which we have not, but are nearing IMO).

I claim to be a Medieval Danish historian first, but a Roman historian second and with good rights since I wrote my Ba paper on it. There are faults in Rome, but not that many and all the actual facts that only nerds know are there as well (I wrote a post about the fall of the republic a month or so ago, look there). And it is DAMN good presentation of those facts, personally I believe such shows will make some of its viewers interested enough to go and read books...

And the sex, as I said before and others have as well, sex is important to most people and there are things much "worse" than depicted in Rome going on between consenting adults this very moment, some of us probably enjoy such at times looking statistically at it. So let us not get too heated up about it. Depictions of life will include depictions of sex and Romans were as obsessed by it as we are.

[antisocialmunky]

I live in America, I thought it was a fair critique.

[Macilrille]

It is a general warning ASM, not pointing a finger at you ;-)

[Aemilius Paulus]

It is true Americans are supposedly conservative about sex, and that they are outraged when it is showed at their children, but honestly, Americans are hypocrites. They love sex. The American kids make me sick. All they talk about generally is girls and fornication. I am an asexual myself. I am not interested in females, but nor am I gay. I do not approve of society's obsession with sex. It is damaging.

There is nothing wrong with sex, or having it, or watching material about it, but HBO Rome was not just an accurate depiction of sex. It was a porn flick designed to appeal to the sex-hungry males whose nervous system centres around their genitals. HBO Rome did not show realistic sex. It did not show it for the sake of realism or just for the sake of showing sex. Normally, sex is never so appealing. The women are never always so beautiful, nor do they have impeccably shaved legs and pubic area. I highly doubt Roman women did that. Face it, the series was history diluted in porn to make it palatable for public. If Rome sexual content was about realism, then why is it that all the women involved in the nude scenes were young and fairly attractive? Why did they not feature any sexual content with older people? Why? Because it was not about realism. It was about pornography.

Everyone seems to be obsessed with sex. Americans are not frank about it, and they prefer hypocrisy. Europeans are more open and they admit it. That does not give either the moral high ground. Sex and food are the most animalistic urges we have. To show such level of interest in them for supposedly such higher-order beings as we are fond of calling themselves is absolutely inappropriate. Looks like we aren't much different from animals after all...

[antisocialmunky]

I agree with you about American kids and people in general being obsessed with sex and can appreciate your view but I don't understand why you've decided to segway this thread to a 'sex in modern culture' through the 'lack of realism of ancient sex on HBO' from the original topic of 'bashing History Channel as retarded mindwank.'

Besides, this is HBO: a seperate non-cable channel that along with Showtime are notorious for the skin flicks they show at night. Criticizing HBO about explicit sex is like King Lear yelling into the storm.

[Centurio Nixalsverdrus]

I didn't want to bash America, sorry.

I was so amazed about Aemilius Paulus' reaction on the sex depicted in Rome. I thought it somehow "typically American again." I reduced it to what seems to be a typically American habit from a European point of view: being so hypocritical and prudish etc. "I don't want to have sex before I marry, I think it's better to wait..." seems totally awkward to us, like e. g. the case of Sarah Palin's daughter and what a scandal it was that she was pregnant; and the Jackson woman (intentionally) letting slip her tits out and the reaction it provoked among the US media (few seconds delay in live shows); etc. For us it is part of the really, really weird American folklore.

Of course I figure that Americans want to have sex like every one else wants. I'd want to know why they have so much problems with it. Why is it such an issue? Does it have something to do with the pilgrims?

It a (rather sad) fact that much of this prudishness has arrived here in Europe as well. Some ten years ago, it was absolutely normal to have high-quality nudity in most movies as well as in commercials. For example a deodorant was a long time advertised with a big-busted (natural! all natural over here) woman having a shower on some tropical island. The epitome was a prime time commercial for wood varnish that featured a totally naked couple doing the "rider" (dunno what it's called in English). The man looked at the wooden ceiling and could not concentrate on the woman because all he could think of was the varnish of the ceiling... Was rather awkward as well I must admit. ;) Nowadays sexuality in German tv has moved to the night hours and has degenerated greatly. It is reduced to telephone-sex advertisement with really low end women featuring moaning and fake masturbation. Other sex contents are naked girls supposedly doing sports or faked home videos.

Oh, and back on topic, I'd sacrifice every second of ahistorical 300-style combat for ahistorical porn-depiction if either one of these is necessary to attract viewers.

P.S. Another interesting thing might be the treatment of prostitution. In the US, you can get incarcerated for visiting a prostitute, whereas in Germany you can get incarcerated sued for not paying her. :D