Episode Title: "Utica"
Original Air Date: October 30, 2005
Episode Grade: C
Well, we're back to dull.
Not every episode can revolve around Titus Pullo impregnating Cleopatra, though I confess I'd probably watch that sitcom ("Oh no! Caesar's home! Quick, go out the fire escape!" "Seize her? I barely even know her!" *cue laugh track*). And "Utica" seems more about setting up the last two episodes of this first season than any other task.
Still, "Utica" is also an episode that goes down some weird, silly, pretty gross story paths, and to no apparent end. It also focuses heavily on Octavia and Octavian, neither of whom have been well-defined enough to make their plots particularly interesting.
But let's start with the good, which for once is something happening around Lucius Vorenus but isn't about him. Ray Stevenson's been game enough so far as Titus Pullo, but despite the writers' desperate insistence that Pullo is charming and interesting, the character just hasn't been of much value so far. Yes, yes, Pullo likes to drink and carouse, and he's very happy to tell you these things, but a man is not the sum of his vices and habits, and that's how Rome has treated Pullo before now.
So it's interesting and gratifying, if a little cliched, to see him fall into a depression in "Utica." Pullo and Vorenus have finally returned home from the wars, Vorenus to the loving embraces of his children and the bed of his beautiful wife, Pullo to...what, exactly?
It's a question we can see Pullo asking himself as he watches Vorenus' family reunion. Pullo doesn't really have any family (we find out later in the episode that his mother was a slave and he never knew his father), and we've never actually seen him live anywhere. He's a soldier and a drinker, and that's all we know of him.
So it's good to see Rome realize this and nod at something more. Stevenson does great work simply with his facial expressions in this episode; the envy and sadness on his face as he observes Vorenus and Niobe are palpable. And so is his desperation as he tries to convince himself that he has something similar with his slave girl, Eirene.
There are a couple of touchingly pathetic scenes between these two, and if Chiara Mastalli, the Italian actress playing Eirene, isn't particularly dynamic with her limited dialogue, she also expresses a lot with her face. Pullo gifts her a bracelet he looted from Egypt, and the awkwardness of the moment is clear just from looking at Eirene.
And toward the end of the episode, when a drunken, bellowing, teary-eyed Pullo finally takes the inevitable step and embraces a naked Eirene, less in lust than in a desperate search for connection, there's nothing sexual about the scene. It's thoroughly pathetic, in fact, and there's something quite chilling about the dead-eyed look we see on Mastalli's face as the scene ends.
Of course, none of this means that Vorenus is left out of the fun. I've been pretty effusive in my praise for Kevin McKidd's work so far, and if "Utica" doesn't give him his juiciest scenes, there's still plenty here to enjoy.
Some of Rome's best scenes have come from showing the awkwardness of Vorenus' interactions with his family. This awkwardness doesn't come from masculine disdain or even apathy; he clearly loves his wife and children very much. He's simply uncomfortable with an environment with actual, expressed emotions, and he doesn't know what to do with himself when he's not a soldier.
As a result, "Utica" is concerned with how Vorenus is going to find his way after the wars. He spends a month hanging around the house, boring the children with his war stories and generally not contributing anything. But his brief attempt at learning the butcher's trade ends with him embarrassing the underling of a local crime boss (the same one he briefly worked for earlier), which puts his life and his family's life in danger and is not generally how a butcher's day goes.
This particular plotline ends with Caesar making an unexpected appearance at Vorenus' house as he waits for the crime boss to come for him. Caesar has a different idea: he wants Vorenus to run for the magistracy of the neighborhood. And after a rather amusingly short period of reluctance, Vorenus accepts.
There's not much to that particular development in this episode, but I look forward to seeing how it evolves. There's a lot of humor and drama to be mined from the straight-laced, blunt-speaking Vorenus politicking for votes, and I expect good things from McKidd.
Sadly, I had no such expectations for the other plotline in this episode, and in those low expectations I was proven quite correct.
The "relationship" between Servilia and Octavia, which was first established in "Pharsalus," has always been curious. It was a rather transparent attempt by Servilia to establish an in with Atia's family and find some way to exact her vengeance. But the endgame was unpredictable, as it was never clear how having sex with Octavia would end with the destruction of Atia.
Well, this particular plant starts blooming in "Utica..." only to be destroyed immediately.
Octavia lets slip to Servilia that Caesar has some sort of serious affliction, which interests Servilia a great deal. She tries to guilt trip Octavia into pumping her brother (phrasing!) for information, and when that fails, she wins over Octavia by claiming that Atia had Octavia's former husband killed.
Octavia does not cover herself in glory in this episode. She immediately believes Servilia's claim that her men had captured one of the murderers. Atia later points out how ridiculous this is (Octavia didn't even ask to speak to the guy), and Octavia crumbles and believes her mother. Sure, Servilia is telling the truth (or at least she's right about the husband's murder), but Octavia's swings are utterly unbelievable.
And her initial attempt to get the information from Octavian are clumsy and ineffective ("Tell me a secret"), though she does get Octavian to disclose his role in the death of Niobe's lover, a fact of which Servilia is appropriately scornful.
This brings us to the "ew" moment of the episode. Servilia somehow manages to convince Octavia that she should seduce her brother to get the information. Again, Octavia goes from "no way" to "yeah, sure, I'll sleep with my brother" with shocking celerity.
Now, to her credit this goes better than her first effort, and she does succeed in seducing her brother. So...kudos to Octavia, I guess?
Accept this doesn't actually accomplish anything. Octavian knew what she was doing the entire time. His reaction when she starts to ask for her favor is to say "Ah" and explain that he was expecting her to ask again about Caesar's infirmity.
It's...it's just all so pointless and stupid. Servilia gains no particular advantage from knowing about Caesar's epileptic fits, aside perhaps from the ability to spread accurate rumors instead of lies. Octavia is so easily persuaded it's laughable; agreeing to ask for more information is one thing, but allowing yourself to be talked into having sex with your brother in order to please your lesbian lover who has a grudge against your mother is just soap opera shit. Octavian's role in this is all a little odd as well (he admits that incest is really, really awful, not just a societal more), but it's probably best not to focus too much on his mindset here.
None of this works out for Servilia, of course. Octavian immediately tells Atia (why on Earth...), who dispatches her man to do some dirty work. His gang ambushes Servilia's litter in the streets, kills her guards, cuts her hair and strips her naked in public.
So, that's a pleasant way of ending "Utica," an episode that focused on two under-developed characters doing awful things together with no explainable motivations and to no discernible end. Yay.
Notes
- The episode begins with Cato and Scipio, the last two anti-Caesar holdouts from the Senatorial party, retreating to the African city of Utica after losing yet another battle. Cato kills himself, followed shortly by Scipio. Say goodbye to two characters with whom we never spent any time. I don't think Scipio had ten lines of dialogue before this episode.
- We're shown the aftermath of this glorious battle: a couple corpses and some burnt wood. And a dying elephant! I think the elephant must have exhausted Rome's budget, based on how the show has handled battles so far.
- Pullo, upon seeing Vorenus in the tunic of a political candidate: "You look like laundry."
- "You're a virtuous woman, so you must know seducing your brother is wrong."
- Octavian to Brutus: "I believe your capitulation is sincere." "How nice of you to say so."
- Oh, and sister-banging Octavian is going to be a pontiff, which is a very Borgia approach to high religious office.
- I just have "EW" written in my notes.
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