#if it doesn't start with lucius killing the senators idk what to tell you lol

[ragnarssons]

so, i re-rewatched gladiator II and i gotta say, i feel like this movie wouldn't struggle with its story anywhere as much, had the first movie been honest with its protagonists and who they were. marcus aurelius (movie-wise, even) wasn't a "fair, pro-democracy" emperor, during his reign, rome conquered a lot of territories and enslaved a shitton of people. heck, macrinus' character exists precisely because of that: because marcus aurelius also conquered and enslaved people. maximus was, sure, a "defender of rome", he also was just like acacius, a general, conquering cities, killing men, women and children to do so, burning their bodies in mass graves, feeding off the blood of people who would then end up as slaves to rome. the first movie (and by extension, the second movie) glorifying these characters into "role models" just takes away all the complex (and interesting) ambiguity that is brought up by characters like lucius/hanno, macrinus, acacius, etc. and where the second movie doesn't delve nearly enough into these complicated, intricated questions, it could be because ridley scott (or anyone involved in the movie tbh) didn't dare question what the narrative was for the first movie. you can't just take a character like maximus, adored by fans, and 20 years later, question whether or not he truly was a hero. because in the first movie (the timeframe portrayed in the movie, i mean), he was a hero. he thought for freedom.... once he was in the arena. once he became a slave. once he was betrayed by the rome he'd spent decades of his life serving. and we needed this hero as a source of inspiration to a character with his morality muddled like lucius. i guess i'm not as troubled by the glorification of maximus as i am of marcus aurelius, tho. because at the end of the day, macrinus is portrayed as being wrong, awful, and worse than his own enslaver??? because, the gladiator saga as it is, has characters who serve the purpose of denouncing the colonialist politics of rome, while also glorifying it through other characters??? and then the narrative being like "oh but it's the fault of these bloodthirsty emperors" (either comodus or caracalla/geta) but actually not, because even "nice democracy guy" marcus aurelius and "liberty hero" maximus fought to conquer and enslave people, sooo? 🤷‍♀️ when it's just...... so much more complex than that? and it would be so interesting to have had either maximus question that in the first movie, lucilla question than when faced with macrinus, lucius just serving lucilla's narrative to question that. i feel like the movie goes so fast that we brushed over so many character moments that could've been interesting, like literally acacius learning about how his conquests literally murdered lucius' wife? or lucius questioning how his father is actually literally just like acacius and how many widow(er)s, orphans, did maximus (and marcus aurelius) leave in his (their) wake? or, to go back to the first movie, have maximus, who bonded with juba just THINK for two seconds about the fact that it's because of him, the system of marcus aurelius, that juba ended up as a slave? like sure, the first movie being more "bottled", it feels like it's less lacking than a movie about literally "the heir taking the throne", but both movies suffer from the same.... lack of nuances and questions being put in front of the characters, moral dilemmas or times for the characters to introspect. it would've worked perfectly fine, had gladiator stayed one movie, but if you're gonna build a saga about "freeing rome from tyranny" like why don't you question the whole SYSTEM of rome which is itself a tyranny, no matter who has the power? a system who upholds men like comodus, caracalla and geta, a system that is held together by these same senators who are corrupted to the bone and NOT AT ALL the ideal "democracy guys" that lucilla (anyone in rome) should rely on to change the system? (like biiiiiiiiitch wake tf up... oops too late i guess). idk 🤷‍♀️