And that’s really just the tip of the iceberg. There are chariot-racing Spaniards (Pepe Barroso, Eneko Sargadoy, Goncalo Almeida), the wealthy patricians played by equally scheming Gabriella Pession & Rupert Penry-Jones, and effective supporting turns from Dmitri Leonidas as the most popular charioteer of the era and especially Joannes Johannesson (another “Game of Thrones” vet) as an ally for Kwame. If it sounds like it might get too crowded and cluttered, it sometimes does.
Lion fights, chariot races, and backroom politics – “Those About to Die” checks a lot of boxes, and does so with more artistic gravity than similarly shallow projects. And yet there’s something missing in Robert Rodat’s (“Saving Private Ryan”) plotting that keeps the show from being consistently entertaining. It’s the kind of period drama that works in fits and starts – every time I was about to write it off as a misfire, something would bring me back. It could be a character choice by Martins, Hughes, or Rheon, or a bit of that massive budget showing itself off. Just as an episode threatens to get bogged down in its political machinations or the sense that there are just a few too many characters to track, Rodat will pull out an impressive fight scene or emotional plot twist to get the chariot back on track. But then his show loses speed again around the next turn.
The truth is that it’s a somewhat dry season for original television, which should help “Those About to Die” find an audience. And dropping it in between the Republican and Democratic National Conventions feels like it’s probably not a coincidence. We may be hundreds of years from gladiator fights and chariot races, but the backroom dealings, violent betrayals, and class struggles of “Those About to Die” can sometimes feel surprisingly timely.
Five episodes screened for review. All ten episodes drop on Peacock on July 18th.
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