Day One Hundred and Eighty-nine - Erik the Viking, "Myth, Legend, and Farce... all in one."

When your world is nothing but barbarism and the gods have forsaken you, what is left? Do you throw your lot in with entropy and continue in the murderous revelry, or do you search for something else... something to push back at the night?

For Erik the Viking (Tim Robbins) it's all really quite literal.

Fenrir the Wolf has swallowed the sun and all men fight and die in the Age of Ragnarok, but Erik doesn't want to follow in those footsteps. In fact, thanks to a tragic, yet enlightening conversation with an ill-fated peasant, he decides to go on an epic quest to storm Valhalla and wake the gods.

Of course, he takes all the menfolk of his village with him, warriors more used to raping and pillaging than high adventure and diplomacy, but they all make do... or die trying.

Along the way they meet the tone-deaf, but peace-loving people of Hy-Brazil, battle the giant dragon of the North Sea (a humongous anglerfish), repel the villainous Halfdan the Black, and come face to face with Odin and the pantheon of Norse gods.

And Erik finds true love... while trying to save the soul of his first.

Combining the raw satire of Monty Python's Terry Jones with the epic cheese of Corman adventure flicks, Erik the Viking straddles the line between whimsy and melodrama... all while asking some really rather profound questions about humanity, faith, and the myths of our forefathers.

I admit, it's rather difficult to get behind Tim Robbins as a peace-loving viking. He has a kind of "aw shucks" mentality with him throughout the whole film, pretty much. Still, the trials he must overcome are often quite amusing, even if they are utterly ridiculous.

Take, for example, the sea battle with Halfdan, where Erik makes use of his ladylove Aud's invisibility cloak which, unbeknownst to him, only works on her father and Harold the Monk... both men of blind faith. While it works in confusing Halfdan's forces into being routed, it's never really sold by Robbins' delivery.

That's not to say I don't like the sequence... as John Cleese is brilliantly funny as the affable villain, Halfdan, playing a similar role to his take on Robin Hood in Time Bandits, but Erik is definitely the weakest link in the film.

Still, for as much as he... and the overall roughness of the film... brings the production down, it still manages to be redeeming both for its dry humor and for its searching questions concerning love, faith, and existence.

I just wish it didn't feel like an over-long and shoddily shot episode of Hercules or Xena.

Until tomorrow, Potatoes~

Day One Hundred and Thirty - Blackadder: Series 1, Episode 1, "Shakespeare for the really rather thick."

The Brits seem to have two sorts of comedy... subtle and damned straight-forward.

Blackadder occasionally tickles the former, but most often is entrenched in the latter, spewing forth obvious sarcasm and bald insults. In that, it very much is like theater, going for the direct method in reaching the funny bone.

The first series is set in medieval England in an alternate history where Richard III won Bosworth Field against Henry Tudor, but was beheaded as a common horsethief by the first Blackadder (who is always played by Rowan Atkinson). After quite a bit of panic, Edmund the Black Adder gains courage in the fact that he hasn't been found out in assassinating the king and plots to take the throne from his father, Richard IV (Brian Blessed), while he is off on a Crusade to the Holy Land.

Blackadder the First has Edmund starting out as a simpering coward who sort of grows into his malicious ways, becoming bolder but still prone to panic and easily discoverable lies and deceptions if anyone bothered to check. In later series he's purely an arrogant, sarcastic courtier who clearly deserves to be thwarted, but this first iteration actually gains my sympathy. Sure, I think he still deserves to have his schemes torn down around him, but his betters aren't all that sympathetic.

Also ever present are series mainstays Baldrick (Tony Robinson) and Lord Percy (Tim McInnerny) who are both a bit dim, though the former is always ready to support Blackadder's plots and the latter is too stupid to notice he's being taken advantage of.

I do like the series.

Sure, it hams up the Shakespeare quite a bit, particularly in this first episode where Peter Cook and Brian Blessed recite familiar lines with the occasional twist, but there's something fun about its simplistic humor. Rarely are the quips high comedy, but those that are please and aren't overshadowed by the lowbrow.

Production value-wise, Blackadder is your typical BBC fare for the era, ranking higher (at least, in my estimation) than Dr.Who. It's all dated, to be sure, but it is still fun in that dinner theater sort of fashion.

Don't get me wrong, though... the "dinner theater" bit isn't an insult. It's oddly great how rough it all is, even down to Peter Cook's green-screened head. There's just something quaint about the technical limitations that adds a sort of savor to the production.

I think Blackadder is one of those series that's best seen as a late-night, wind-down feature as you're getting ready for bed. It doesn't strain the brain or nerves and is suitably pleasing joke-wise. Not something that really gets you going, but good when you're dozing. It's certainly no Monty Python... but it ain't bad, really.

Until tomorrow, Potatoes~