Journalist, writer and generally broad-minded (at some points in his life he worked as a magician and animal trainer) Daniel P. Mannix’s book “Dying” seemed to give the world everything it could. . After its first publication in 1958, it became a source of boundless joy for decades for all Roman gladiators who were not indifferent to the world and at the end of the 20th century it became the starting point for the script of Ridley Scott’s Gladiator movie. But history is cyclical and after a quarter of a century, “Gladiator” is preparing a sequel and “Doomed to Glory” has a new version on the big screen: the series “Doomed to Glory”.
At first glance, it looks promising: Anthony Hopkins and Game of Thrones star Iwan Rheon in the cast, disaster film expert Roland Emmerich in the director’s chair, Saving Private Ryan screenwriter Robert Rodat as showrunner. But right after the beautiful screensaver, which is clearly copied from Game of Thrones, it becomes clear that the focus here is not on joy. (large-scale costume and historical painting based on an ancient or biblical story) Scott and another significant work in the sword and sandals genre, released about a quarter of a century ago – “Arena” (aka “Gladiatrix”), a remake of Timur Bekmambetov’s 1974 exploitation film of the same name for pennies in the Leningrad region, but often looks better than “Doomed”.
A still from the series “Destined for Glory” (2024)
Paramount Television Studios
It’s hard to explain, but after watching Rodet and Emmerich’s historical series, the amount of knowledge about the Roman Empire seems to have decreased. And in general, the project is full of this kind of paradox. On the one hand, it tries to swallow everything, so that the characters are more likely to quote Wikipedia than to conduct full-fledged dialogues. On the other hand, it does it so chaotically and absurdly that trying to understand what is happening resembles a separate Olympic discipline.
The first episode, given to journalists and bloggers to watch on the eve of the full season’s release, immediately showers the viewer with a bathtub full of characters – including former emperor Vespasian (Hopkins), rival sons Titus (Tom Hughes) and Domitian (Jojo Makari), legendary charioteer Scorpus (Dmitry Leonidas) and the resourceful betting company Tenax (Reon) – so at some stage you begin to identify with Hopkins’s hero, but not here, but from the film “The Godfather” by Florian Zeller, where he no longer understands who all these people are and what is happening in general.
A still from the series “Destined for Glory” (2024)
Paramount Television Studios
What becomes clear only causes regret. The year is 79 AD – this means that there are still almost four centuries left until the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 5th century, that is, we have been here for a long time (it is not for nothing that Hopkins thinks extremely tiredly about the Roman Empire face). The character of Iwan Rheon looks relatively clear and adequate against the background of his suffering friends (roughly speaking, he hopes to earn money for his own group), but the gloomy plot, full of accompanying risks, turns “Fate of Glory” into a war. First, it seems that the series in history would benefit if, by chance, advertising of bookmakers appeared in the frame.
However, the gloomy bookmaker environment is still visible here: local graphics, decorations and costumes are reminiscent of either cinematics from video games from the 2000s or adventure fantasy series from the nineties, and therefore the most interesting element of “The Doomed” is the budget. This amount is reportedly comparable to the spending on Game of Thrones – $ 140 million for a ten-episode season (the cost of one episode of the HBO hit series is $ 15 million give or take). Of course, there is hope that Emmerich will return to the disaster genre in the next episodes, not only in terms of the audience’s impressions, but also in the literal sense of the word, that is, to bring down the moon on the heroes. But there is no desire to check: waiting for the sequel to Gladiator is definitely not so boring as to brighten it up with Destined for Glory. No matter how much you get rid of them in translation, they are still doomed to an inglorious death.
A still from the series “Destined for Glory” (2024)
Paramount Television Studios
Release date: July 18, 2024
Duration: 10 episodes
Manager: Roland Emmerich, Marco Kreuzpaintner
Casting: Anthony Hopkins, Iwan Rheon, Sara Martins, Jojo Macari, Mohammed Hashim, Tom Hughes, Gonçalo Almeida and others
Where to see: “Amediatheka”, Okko
What are you thinking?
Source: Gazeta
Brandon Hall is an author at “Social Bites”. He is a cultural aficionado who writes about the latest news and developments in the world of art, literature, music, and more. With a passion for the arts and a deep understanding of cultural trends, Brandon provides engaging and thought-provoking articles that keep his readers informed and up-to-date on the latest happenings in the cultural world.