Netflix’s Barbarians was launched this weekend and it is based on one of the most famous historical moments – the Battle of Teutoburg Forest between Germanic Tribe and the Romans.
After the first episode, you might think that this is a fierce high school content set in a historic background but you will be surprised from the second episode as the series gets intense very fast. It is not only intense in action but also portrays vehement emotional scenes.
At no point in the series will you feel bored or blank. It maintains a good supply of content throughout the show. Along with action, it also provides an ample amount of romantic content. Thusnelda and Folkwin are the two main love interests of the series who goes through periods of loss and aggression throughout Barbarians.
Barbarians is not all action, which most viewers must be expecting, and that makes this series even more interesting. It is a character-driven show where each character brings different kinds of twists on the table. All of them work on emotions but their priorities bring a big difference in their actions. Sometimes the character’s actions may get emotionally heavy on you, but then you realize that it’s a German series and it was obviously going to get brutal.
The show does not shy away from showing the drama inside the two camps in the beginning and thus, not restricting itself like other suspenseful action series. This show is a testament to the writer’s faith in the content and the direction that the team wanted to take from the beginning. Also, it does not stay back in following the same pattern of sex and violence that we see in other similar series. Rather, Barbarians has an intriguing narration with more dialogues than just meaningless shouting and blood.
Although the actors, director, editor, makeup team and writers have done a brilliant job, improvements are expected on the part of art and sound director. In a lot of scenes, you can feel that it is a set instead of a real place. We expect that if such things can get better in the upcoming seasons, then it has the potential to win a lot of hearts that it might not be able to win with its first season due to an oversupply of the same kind of content in the internet market.
Also, the presence of so many historic action shows makes it harder to love it and we are left stuck on liking it. The memories of other shows will strike your mind and you will unconsciously start comparing it, because of which you won’t be able to appreciate the show a lot and some of the viewers may also not like it due to the lack of action sequences. A lot of the viewers are bound to juxtapose it with the famous action thriller Vikings.
Overall: Barbarians
During these trying times, Netflix has provided us with some great international dramas and I must say that Barbarians is one of those. It’s a good mesh between action, drama and romance that makes it an engaging and intriguing watch. Although yes, there’s not much of blood-soaked mayhem, it’s a show with a different flavour. You will not be disappointed with this series too much.
Barbarians is streaming on Netflix.
Read our other reviews here.
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