Spartacus Vengeance Review: Blood and Sex

Spartacus Season 2 Review

The retirement (and later passing) of Andy Whitfield hurt this Spartacus Vengeance season in ways that the shows producers probably couldn't imagine. In the prequel it could be hidden because the writers created a new great lead character (Gaunicus) but in season three there was no escape. The creators of Spartacus needed a new actor. Andy made the role of Spartacus, and was majorly responsible to the success that the show got in the first season of Blood and Sand. 
I know that no matter who the producers would fill in as Spartacus, it would not be the same. I still think that they could have done better than getting Liam McIntyre.

Spartacus: Gods of the Arena
Spartacus: Gods of the Arena (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
I don't know if Liam McIntyre did the gladiator camp or not, but one of the reasons he doesn't look like a credible Spartacus to me, is his physic. Every time that Liam McIntyre stands near Agron or Crixus during their strategy meetings its so visible. As if he is some kind of a puppy standing next to a couple of San-Bernarr's. How can i as a viewer believe that this skinny dude is leading a pack of the best gladiators in Capua (especially after the first season and the prequel when we saw that most of the decent gladiators need to be cut minimum as Greek gods).
Another problem with Liam McIntyre is that you see that he is trying to hard, and generally its a great thing but in acting it can be noticed. The emotions that Liam is showing through the entire season are to extreme-
when he is supposed to be serious and do his motivation speeches. he is to serious like a principal in a school .
When he is supposed to be angry you can see him making this really angry faces that seem to be an overkill .
When he supposed to be happy he has this fake laugh that is misplaced.
If stuff like that are noticed, it hurts the eyes and makes the show harder to watch.

Enough about Liam McIntyre, lets move on to Crixus and Naevia.

In Spartacus blood and sand Crixus was a vicious war machine that was great to watch. In the prequel Spartacus gods of the arena we saw the intriguing story of how Crixus became that war machine he is now (at least was).
This season in Spartacus Vengeance I'm sad to declare that Crixus became a little bitch. Not only that but he is Spartacus's (a puppy Spartacus if i may add)  bitch. This is a too drastic of a change for me. 
Why did he became that  bitch in Spartacus vengeance ? the answer to that is ... Naevia (or the new and "ugly" version of Naevia as i call her) . 

I know that this is the Crixus section, but i have to rant on the new and "ugly" Naevia . 
This chick looks like a frog with boosted silicon lips. How can Crixus have the hots for that ? Even after her sad story that all the Romans bosses used her to please themselves, and all the petty smelly/dirty/disgusting Romans servants used her (multiple times) as well. I still don't care for her. The thing that pissed me most of all was that this LAMO frog killed Ashur. Not only that but she took his head of and went bragging about that to Crixus . When i was watching the fight between Ashur and the new and "ugly" Naevia i was like "Jupiter's c0ck just let Ashur survive this fight, kill that annoying chick and through her from the cliff. Whatever would happen after that would have been reasonably acceptable". 

When the worst had happened. I'm thinking to myself WTF ??? How did that happened ? How can that skinny frog beat a gladiator, not only that but a gladiator from the house of Batiatus (the best gladiator house in Capua). That same Ashur that took out 3-5 roman soldiers by himself a few episodes before, and was killed by skinny girl. How can a skinny girl take a dudes head off  ? I would like somebody to explain that to me. I know it took her a multiple number of blows but still ... come on . 

Agron is gay now

i liked Agron in Spartacus blood and sand. I liked Agron in this Spartacus Vengeance season as well (most of the time), but there was something small that bothered me a lot . 
I remember that in season one Agron's brother mentioned that Agron had a wife and a kid. How come in this Spartacus Vengeance season Agron is attending some soft p0rn scenes with gay orientation ? 
This season in general had to much sex - straight sex (i cant believe i said that). The male on male gay sex made me vomit every time. I know that the writers killed their gay characters in the previous seasons so they needed somebody to turn gay. In this case i guess Agron got the short end of the stick. Still the majority of the shows audience are males (straight males) i don't understand why the writers insist to add the male on male gay stuff to the show.

Spartacus Vengeance Villain - The Egyptian

The villain that was really hard to kill this Spartacus Vengeance season was the Egyptian. Unfortunately his main weapons were a couple of small daggers. What made his battles and his victories against opponents with swords just not logical. 

The death of Lucretia  

The end of Lucretia was ... well i just didn't get it. she was always a survivor and ending her story like that was just ... inconsistent to her character.

Not everything was bad this Spartacus Vengeance season.

The good stuff :

The destruction of the arena was a major event in this season . The build up that led to the event was great.

One of the unforgettable and shocking scenes this season was when Ilithyia saved Gaber's life by killing Sepia and than doing Glaber in Sepia's blood. What was even greater in the entire scene, the writers gave viewers the impression that Glaber is the one that is going to die (its always great to be surprised).


I need to mention that it was really fun to see Ilithyia and Ashur's characters progress this season . The reason i mention those two is because they are not predictable and it was great to see what they did every step of their way. On the one hand you have Ashur that acts according to his own logic (and if you try to enter his shoes you will see that most of the things he did was to survive and avenge people that didn't accept him or tried to kill him). On the other hand you had Ilithyia that changed alliances like every five minutes, clearly only a spoiled woman like Ilithyia can do that.

Killing Mira - don't get me wrong i loved watching Mira. In parts of the season it looked like she wore the pants in the relationship. I liked the scene where she died because again i didn't see it coming . Even when her corpse lied on the top of the mountain i expected her to get up any moment. Unfortunately it didn't happen.

Next season - Spartacus War of the Dammed



I'm interested to see how will the next season turn to be. With a weak Spartacus in the lead and after they killed of the majority of the supporting cast. It will be hard for them to recover, if not impossible. 
On the bright side. Gaunicus is still with us ,Ilithyia as well (i really hope she will return for another season) so is Crixus i pray to Jupiter that he will find his pair of balls again and ditch the frog next season. He must, if its the last season he should break free from Spartacus and cause the death of them all.


Spartacus is a cool TV Show and i hope that next season Spartacus war of the dammed will be awesome. If you are a fan of the Spartacus show or you haven't seen it yet but want to see it. Bellow there are Amazon links for purchasing the three season of Spartacus from Amazon.

Spartacus DVD links

Spartacus: Blood and Sand - The Complete First Season [Blu-ray]
Spartacus: Gods of the Arena [Blu-ray]
Spartacus: Vengeance - The Complete Second Season
Spartacus: War of the Damned - The Complete Third Season [Blu-ray]


photo credit: warriorwoman531 via photopin cc




About Sasha Shapiro

Sasha is the founder and editor of Cool Reviews Rule. He is very passionate about Movies, TV Shows and some Books. His favorite genres are: Action, Fantasy, History, Horror, Sci-fi and Adventure.
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