spotlight: Vikings

It's been awhile, I know, but I've got the perfect dose of humor for you tonight. Let's talk Vikings--new show on History Channel. One of the roommates decided to give it a whirl with me. We found some tidbits extremely amusing.

History Channel, you are not HBO, not even Showtime. You should just stick to the biographies and the ridiculous Modern Marvels and alien programs.

Stop trying to be Game of Thrones. It's not happening. The blond son of super-killer, Olaf (typical Scandinavian name, yet I can't get ice cream out of my head), looks eerily like a young Joffrey, and, like the other characters, sloooowwwwwlllyyyyyyy talks in this bizarre mélange of Scottish-Irish-modern-era-British speech that's supposed to hearken back to the Middle Ages and before. Yet, apparently, the perfect recipe for a period piece = British accents........wtf?
And I'm pretty sure the blond son's name is Bran or Bronn. It's hard to understand their convoluted accents...so there's that.

Cue the historical inaccuracies:
The scene where they Vikings show up with headbands. Commentary as followed:
"Give it up, LeBron."
"What are you, an ad for Nike?"

Then there's their cleanliness:
"They definitely didn't bathe that often."
"Well maybe they have a brook right outside their hut?"
Kara inserts her history expertise: "The wedding bouquet tradition started because people stank so badly because they never bathed. Even their teeth rotted. So the bouquets were meant to mask the smell. And the idea of  June weddings started because that's when they would generally bathe during the year."

Me: "oh Lord."

Kara continues: "And the expression of throwing the baby out with the bath water comes from the fact that there was a hierarchy to bathing. The man of the house and so on down the ranks. So, foreseeably, you could put the baby in the bath and it would be so dirty that you'd accidentally throw it out with the water [because it was so opaque]...............and these guys' fingernails are too clean."

There's the cheese factor.....no pun intended:
Olaf (definitely still not sure that's even his name) says "I have something that will change everything." Retrieves a spherical-shaped object from within his cloak...
Kara: "It's a compass."
Me: "It's a wheel...of cheese."
(It was definitely a compass.)

There's the "gods" aspect:
Random Viking warrior wannabe: "Oh, thank the gods you're here."
Let me guess, are there Seven Hells too?

There's the hierarchy:
The chieftain of the "clan" is played by Gabriel Byrne. I had such high hopes for him, but he just sounded and looked ridiculous. You're not Tywin Lannister. Get over yourself. Then there's wifey. And.....wait for it..............she's played by the chick who is Mr. Schue's psycho wife on Glee. That doesn't help the creep factor at all.  She basically smooches two 12 year-old boys to signify their transition into manhood in an awkward bar mitzvah-esque ceremony.

When all was said and done, I was just waiting for Thor to show up shirtless.......so there's also THAT.