No flash-forward this week – instead, we open with a jolly dinner party scene. Titus and Lollia have various honoured guests in attendance, and they’re all enjoying some post-scran belly dancing via a nice lady their hostess found in Antioch.[…]

Oof, settle in, folks: this one is a doozy, representing some of the very worst alongside the very best.
The usual flash-forward does not help matters at all, from the onset. Old Clavdivs stumbles towards the communal can, clutching an oil lamp and c[…]

As per usual, we begin with a flash-forward to Old Clavdivs writing in his study when he’s presented with some research materials that were lost among the usual crap squirrelled away in cellars. It’s the final will and testament of Gaius Julius C[…]

The last time we saw old Clavdivs, he was seething with hatred. Now, he’s self-medicating his impotent rage with wine. We don’t linger for very long on his blank expression en route to numbness and sweet oblivion, but flash-forward to another fam[…]

So anyway, Gaius died. 
Old Clavdivs mumbles this to himself while ransacking his study for family history research material, so for the very first time, the opening flash forward actually serves a narrative purpose. He finds the letter he needs up […]

“Family Affairs” begins with disembodied Clavdivs summarising the last nine years of plot: Julia and Marcus Agrippa did get married, but then Livia poisoned Marcus Agrippa and forced Tiberius to divorce his wife Vipsania…somehow? This allowed T[…]

The opening credits for I, Claudius (or Clavdivs, if you will and you probably should, so let’s) have long since passed into National Treasure status. No doubt the most aggressive bugle you’ll ever hear outside military boot camps that bookends e[…]

Puritanical belief in predestination has fallen somewhat out of fashion in modern times, although some might argue that true free will is an illusion, even without an asshole God casting people into the fiery pits of hell without regard to their actu[…]

On the 18th June 2014, I took to the stage (a very small stage, but a stage nonetheless) as part of Geek Show Off to publicly declare my love for all things wrestling.  I could have talked for nine minutes on so many aspects of grappling but focuss[…]

(Soz for the late posting, yr correspondent has completed a GRUELLING 25-HOUR JOURNEY across many time zones including correspondent’s British spouse being detained by US Homeland Security for 2.5 hours of fun! But all HOME SAFE now albeit in a[…]