User Reviews

The show completely dies in season four. SO MUCH WASTED POTENTIAL in the final seasons with Ragnar's sons, more specifically, Ivar. In history, he was the last true Viking to battle the heathens and try to take over their colonies. It started off so promising, too. Bjorn becomes only good for trying to bed every semi-attractive woman who carries a sword. It turns into stupid drama and begins to more so ressemble a cable TV soap opera.

I'm finishing it because there's only season 6 left anyways. It was a great show for its majority, and I hope that season 6 can redeem itself.

Poor casting and not enough direction from the writers in the later seasons is what ruins it.

Be thankful for what we got.. seasons 1 through 3. Fascinating program. The story of Ragnar, the acting of Travis Fimmel and the extraordinary detail made the first three seasons compelling. Tostig. My god, the guy had what less than twenty lines and stole the show. And then the bottom fell out of the show. Supporting characters were tasked with carrying the show and they weren't up to it. What was an epic story morphed into an epic cluster____ of pointless events, battles and internal squabbling to the point where I don't care who wins or loses anymore. And I"m sick of Lagertha and Boneless. Oddly enough, a secondary character, King Harald, had potential. Too bad he's sidelined as semi-comedic material. Excellent actor.

But give the show credit -- remember how great the first three seasons were.

Vikings is fresh, smart, as historically accurate as it can be considering the people they're talking about had runes as an alphabet, but the charisma of the story was the rise of Ragnar and his precise & quiet war strategy and tactics. Once that was gone and a bunch of Disney kids took over, it fell flat and stale. Unfortunate really because seasons 1-3 are possibly the beat thing on TV since The Sopranos. Killing Athelstan was also a bad choice because his dynamic with Ragnar was the real love story of the show. Still, a big fan, but now I watch it more out of obligation then pleasure, which is a sign that maybe I should stop? Tell me Seer! Should I give up on Vikings?

(Review updated after Season 6).

The story of Ragnar Lothbrok who, in the 9th century, rises from simple farmer to King of the Vikings. Along the way he deals with internal crises, family issues and foreign foes, and discovers a few new lands (and invades them, of course)...

Superb drama series, for nearly four seasons. Takes about three episodes to hit its stride and from then never slows down. After that it is a non-stop roller coaster ride of battle scenes, internal and external politics and relationship dramas, all with a large dollop of actual history thrown in. Admittedly, some of the history has been tweaked for dramatic effect, but the basic plot is reasonably accurate.

Some good humour too and solid performances.

The pinnacle was probably Season 2 where the mix between action and drama was perfectly balanced. Season 3, while still brilliant, edged more towards the action side. By Season 4A, the dial was firmly over on the action side, though the plot was still quite tight.

Season 4B was necessary from a closure point of view, and is reasonably emotional for that reason. However, the writing in this season becomes quite sloppy, with incongruous sequences of events and characters behaving inconsistently.

The other problem is that the season goes on for several episodes beyond its natural ending. I could see the logic to this - a sort of action and reaction effect and revenge theme - but with the main character gone and the only other character worth supporting (Lagertha) hardly featuring, there is nobody to root for.

What's worse, one of the new supposed "heroes", Ivar, is pretty obnoxious, something like a cross between Damien of the Omen and Kevin in We Need To Talk About Kevin. Very little engagement left from me, and I was left only watching for the battle scenes (which are very good, by the way).

And now, in a jumping the shark moment that lasts 40 episodes, we have Seasons 5 and 6. The show should have ended after Episode 15 of Season 4. Not that the remainder of S4 was bad, it just wasn't necessary or of the same quality that came before.

Season 5 was wholly unnecessary and, to crown it all, the writing gets quite weak and sloppy. Engagement is almost non-existent as there's no main characters to root for. Lagertha would be one to support but her screen time is limited and her character gets very one-dimensionally drawn in Season 5. Furthermore, direction becomes pretty much style over substance.

Season 6 was more of the same.

Ending the series after S4 E15 would have seen this series remembered very fondly and hailed as a dramatic masterpiece. Instead, Vikings joins the list of series that history will remember with less reverence.

Season ratings: S1 9/10, S2 10/10, S3 9/10, S4 8/10, S5&6 5/10.

Really enjoyed this show early on. Seasons 1 & 2, moved more slowly, but told a great story. Then the show started downhill with the fading of Ragnar. His character became a drag on the show until he was killed and instead of turning to Bjorn and Lagertha (likeable characters you were invested in from the beginning), they went to Ivar, who is incredibly unlikeable.

Will watch the rest of season 5 in the hope that things turn around, but I loved this show the most when Ragnar was King The show is still good, but just doesn't have the same spark it had when Ragnar and Rollo were key figures in the story. I'm puzzled about why Ragnar's sons never took his body or his bones home for a proper Viking funeral to honor him, where was he buried if they didn't? They went all the way to the place he apparently died, but there's no mention of a grave?

First of all let me say the first 3 seasons were good, in fact the first two were just great. There is Viking tradition, there are interesting social and cultural differences between Northmen and others, there is vibrant Viking society and mainly, there is Ragnar; cunning Ragnar, who would "give far more than his eye to acquire knowledge". He is a man of progress, whose logic and wit wins against rigidity and stupidity. He is the man, who comes up with new ideas and surprises everyone who wants to defeat him. Finally, he is the only one capable of carrying this show and pushing it forward.

The third season is also pretty good, although it had slowed down a little bit, dragging the story slowly around, but who cares when Ragnar is going to raid the Paris whatever the cost!

As much I like the first three seasons, there is one thing that kept bothering me throughout second and the third one especially. Every time Ragnar kills some of his enemies (earl Haraldson, king Horik), he creates some kind of vacuum in the society he is not able to fill. Yes, he becomes earl and than king nominally, but he doesn't quite behave like one! I mean as Haraldson had been an earl, he had counselor Svein for the dirty stuff and his guard, he was a judge (in fact), blessed children etc. and all in all there was a lot of things happening around him in Kattegat. Not so with Ragnar; he is just kind of there, not ruling whatsoever, and sometimes it just feels like anarchy there, which I find not entirely plausible. Additionaly, as I have mentioned, there is a feeling of emptiness because of this, emptiness, which I am not quite able to describe. Maybe it is happening, because the second and third series already follows more story lines and can't concentrate on Vikings more, which is in my eyes a threat for this show.

Season 4 takes the good things from its predecessors - throws them away - and builds on flawed stuff of the first three seasons - which is emptiness, story distraction and fade-away from Ragnar. Starting with the most serious issue - Ragnar, it was perhaps the worst decision in the whole show to screw him up. For the entire season 4a, he feels old and tired, doesn't have any desire to explore and raid, doesn't care for his people and children much, and as if it wasn't already too bad, we have to watch him as he becomes a drug addict. This alone is just enough for me. The writers basically take the character majority of viewers cares about most and flush him into toilet. I know he must die eventually, but instead of seeing him suffering for about 9 hours (!!), it would be better to kill him off at his zenith.

Another issue, that hardly appeared in the first three series - there are many meaningless scenes which just kind of fill the time. Consider the whole Wessex feminist thing with Judith - so much time is wasted on her becoming tough and independent, but I don't see a reason why - this is something suitable for 20th century, not 9th. On the other hand there is not much explanation on key events such as why Rollo gave up on his manhood and turned into french nobleman and loving husband so easily.

The emptiness and anarchy I was talking about is really apparent in season 4. It is no more the king Ragnar and his people or the vibrant society from early seasons, it is a mixture of random characters with no depth being around. Typical ruling day of king Ragnar consists of throwing knives, ignoring everyone, doing crazy stuff and taking drugs in the shack, stalking on the rooftop and making a foreplay with that Chinese girl. Björn tries to look as serious as possible, which makes his character so flat it makes me wonder about Ragnar's successor's ability to lead the show (I doubt any of the sons is capable of that). Than the whole thing with Erlendur's revenge is wasted, as everybody knows from the start Björn will not die and Erlendur has even got no plan; when Kalf was still alive, there was a chance to take advantage of it, but now he wants to kill Björn and then will see what's next, probably.

I totally agree with others that it has become a soap opera. Consider king Finehair's arrival. It peaks at the end of an episode, when he basically says in front of everybody he wants to overthrow Ragnar, but that situation is not expanded in the next episode, which is typical for soap operas. Speaking of new characters, they are very uninteresting, and especially Yidu is a complete waste of time, and besides I find presence of a Chinese in the fjord disturbing, she just shouldn't be there; her only purpose is to be a drug dealer anyway. Then there is lot of uninteresting talking about family, children (everybody is with a child now, hearing this gives me an allergic reaction) and how it is being a father, which is just boring. And I can't help myself, but the families look like projections of 21th western family values - different from earlier seasons where we could see more freedom in sexual life and less sensitivity about children and death. Overall the episodes are too talkative and while basically nothing happens in most episodes, everything must have happened in the last one and it created a big mess, but I will not comment on that.

For me, Vikings end with the season 3 and the 4a just does not exist. I am actually reviewing the first season recently and friend I enjoy it as never, because I have found the old Ragnar again and the true nature of Vikings with him.

Loved the show and would have given it a solid 9 but since the writers killed Ragner they killed the show at the same time. It's as simple as that.