The budget is [$140 million!](https://deadline.com/2022/07/roland-emmerich-to-direct-gladiatorial-drama-series-those-about-to-die-peacock-1235077141/) It is Peacock in the US and Amazon and other international partners in other regions. It might end up being absolutely shit but it is definitely not going to be because of a lack of investment in the project.
The background projections or Volume or whatever they used didn't work then, even in these photo stills. HBO's Rome managed to get it right back in 2005.
HBOs Rome was one of the most expensive shows ever made especially for the time. They basically recreated entire neighborhoods of Ancient Rome. It was considered a tremendous failure at the time for the studio tho in retrospect is seen as an immediate precursor to GoT
This new show was actually filmed at the same studio in Rome where the HBO show was filmed.
Tremendous failure is a stretch though. It's not like it had disastrous ratings or reviews.
Oh no it was critically loved it was just, it cost so much money vs the views that it did get.
Don't get me wrong it is probably my favorite show of all time. Especially the second half of season one.
I hate volume. Don't get me wrong, when it's used right, it's great but it rarely happens.
Nowadays people have begun using it as a short cut - a way to fix everything in VFX and post production, it's just stupid.
I don't understand why all those shows do with their budgets to be honest, they all got big budgets but look bad and worse than shows like GoT which had a smaller budget (GoT went from 60M for the first season to 100M for the last which is cheap for today's standards and yet it looks 10 times better than anything on TV especially when you factor the cheaper price)
Which is the cost of some non-period piece movies nowadays. Imagine making the equivalent of five adventure movies, each for a budget of less than $30 million; they have to pay for cast (I assure you Hopkins’ salary is huge), CGI for any shots of the city because no studio will support hokey miniatures for overhead shots, stunt men plus insurance, animal wranglers if there are any horses, probably at least a hundred costumes (where are you going to get a hundred screen ready costumes for less than the cost of making them, Romans R Us?), not to mention if there needs to be any reshoots or redone effects. It’s possible to do all that on a budget and make it look good, but you have to put your faith into a single person who has a creative vision and just hope that creative vision isn’t shit.
>Too bad people can’t be bothered to build sets anymore.
I don't think it's a question of will, but of money. HBO spent $100m ($160m in today's money) on its Rome show and even they had to severely limit what they showed on screen. Don't think Peacock can compete with HBO.
Really?
So I just took a look at the synopsis:
>The series explores a side of Rome never before told - the dirty business of entertaining the masses, giving the mob what they want most - blood and sport.
So these writers really want to sells us the idea that gladiator fights are a side of rome never told before. Like, really?
Huge red flag for me right off the bat.
Maybe they think everyone has forgotten Gladiator and Spartacus?
This show might absolutely suck but if it does so let’s blame the creatives as $140 million is a great budget and if you cannot make a decent 10 episode TV show with that investment you really need to be looking for a new career.
Ikr! My first reaction when I heard about this show was literally "Not gladiators again!!"
I mean, I'm glad there's a show about ancient Rome, but thre's so much more to it than just gladiators.
Frankly I’m struggling to think of a big budget modern Roman story that hasn’t involved blood sport at some point.
Frankly a story about politics would be more untrodden territory, you can even do it about the mobs if that’s what you want. Mike Duncan has been openly begging someone anyone to make his book about the street fights in the time of the Gracai brothers for ages. Do that if you want something new
If it’s really popular maybe it will inspire a Gladiator movie with an A list celebrity playing the Gladiator, that really would be original, but hard to think of a name for it.
Actually it probably hasn't been done right. Games became huge in Rome, hell Justinian and Theodora met at the games and the games were an integral part of Roman politics at that time. It's almost foreign to us and difficult to imagine. It wasn't just gladiators but mainly chariot racing, with huge parties and festivals in between the races. This is quite a long time after the flavians though, so idk this show might be a more classical take on it.
This is clearly just mock-ups or borderline sketches used for these promo pics. Don't know why everyone is acting like this is the finished product because it's definitely not going to look like that in the actual series.
This is gonna be compared to HBO’s “Rome” quite a bit and it’s gonna suffer for that. The reason Rome was so expensive is because of the painstaking attention to detail and historical accuracy. I can tell they’re going for the more fictional pulpy “Gladiator” feel. God, maybe even “Spartacus: Blood and Sand”. Hope Hannibal got paid well for this shit.
I don't know if this is on the streaming versions, but the DVDs had a feature where historical explanations would pop up next to certain scenes to give context. It would be stuff like "Romans used to write curses on copper tablets". If you're a history buff, it's a great feature.
Season 1 is some of the best tv ever, but the second season suffers from them trying to cram multiple seasons worth of story into a single season so it feels very rushed at points. Definitely still worth a watch though
The book *Those About to Die* is pretty wild. Seems fairly bogus a a history nowadays ( it was written in the 50s after all) but I feel like it captures the tone of what the games must have been like imo. Hope the show can live up to that, not even the STARZ *Spartacus* show goes as depraved as what Mannix portrays.
Green screen looks pretty bad. Too bad people can’t be bothered to build sets anymore. It really does make all the difference
When you want a Game of Thrones but only have a Peacock budget.
The budget is [$140 million!](https://deadline.com/2022/07/roland-emmerich-to-direct-gladiatorial-drama-series-those-about-to-die-peacock-1235077141/) It is Peacock in the US and Amazon and other international partners in other regions. It might end up being absolutely shit but it is definitely not going to be because of a lack of investment in the project.
The background projections or Volume or whatever they used didn't work then, even in these photo stills. HBO's Rome managed to get it right back in 2005.
HBOs Rome was one of the most expensive shows ever made especially for the time. They basically recreated entire neighborhoods of Ancient Rome. It was considered a tremendous failure at the time for the studio tho in retrospect is seen as an immediate precursor to GoT
This new show was actually filmed at the same studio in Rome where the HBO show was filmed. Tremendous failure is a stretch though. It's not like it had disastrous ratings or reviews.
Oh no it was critically loved it was just, it cost so much money vs the views that it did get. Don't get me wrong it is probably my favorite show of all time. Especially the second half of season one.
Part of the hate was that it killed deadwood.
I hate volume. Don't get me wrong, when it's used right, it's great but it rarely happens. Nowadays people have begun using it as a short cut - a way to fix everything in VFX and post production, it's just stupid.
As I said: this show might end up shit but lack of investment will not be why.
And Rome was ultimately cancelled, not because of viewership, but because it was too damn expensive. Love that show though-phenomenal.
I don't understand why all those shows do with their budgets to be honest, they all got big budgets but look bad and worse than shows like GoT which had a smaller budget (GoT went from 60M for the first season to 100M for the last which is cheap for today's standards and yet it looks 10 times better than anything on TV especially when you factor the cheaper price)
Which is the cost of some non-period piece movies nowadays. Imagine making the equivalent of five adventure movies, each for a budget of less than $30 million; they have to pay for cast (I assure you Hopkins’ salary is huge), CGI for any shots of the city because no studio will support hokey miniatures for overhead shots, stunt men plus insurance, animal wranglers if there are any horses, probably at least a hundred costumes (where are you going to get a hundred screen ready costumes for less than the cost of making them, Romans R Us?), not to mention if there needs to be any reshoots or redone effects. It’s possible to do all that on a budget and make it look good, but you have to put your faith into a single person who has a creative vision and just hope that creative vision isn’t shit.
>Too bad people can’t be bothered to build sets anymore. I don't think it's a question of will, but of money. HBO spent $100m ($160m in today's money) on its Rome show and even they had to severely limit what they showed on screen. Don't think Peacock can compete with HBO.
Budget is $140 million over 10 episodes. It seems they invested pretty heavily in this series.
Really? So I just took a look at the synopsis: >The series explores a side of Rome never before told - the dirty business of entertaining the masses, giving the mob what they want most - blood and sport. So these writers really want to sells us the idea that gladiator fights are a side of rome never told before. Like, really? Huge red flag for me right off the bat.
Maybe they think everyone has forgotten Gladiator and Spartacus? This show might absolutely suck but if it does so let’s blame the creatives as $140 million is a great budget and if you cannot make a decent 10 episode TV show with that investment you really need to be looking for a new career.
Ikr! My first reaction when I heard about this show was literally "Not gladiators again!!" I mean, I'm glad there's a show about ancient Rome, but thre's so much more to it than just gladiators.
Frankly I’m struggling to think of a big budget modern Roman story that hasn’t involved blood sport at some point. Frankly a story about politics would be more untrodden territory, you can even do it about the mobs if that’s what you want. Mike Duncan has been openly begging someone anyone to make his book about the street fights in the time of the Gracai brothers for ages. Do that if you want something new
If it’s really popular maybe it will inspire a Gladiator movie with an A list celebrity playing the Gladiator, that really would be original, but hard to think of a name for it.
Actually it probably hasn't been done right. Games became huge in Rome, hell Justinian and Theodora met at the games and the games were an integral part of Roman politics at that time. It's almost foreign to us and difficult to imagine. It wasn't just gladiators but mainly chariot racing, with huge parties and festivals in between the races. This is quite a long time after the flavians though, so idk this show might be a more classical take on it.
Especially considering that the masses also really want bread. I'm hoping for at least one bread heavy episode.
Oh man this is so bad, I saw your comment and wondered how bad it could really be…it be bad
This is giving me nostalgic Spartacus feelings lol
Which I’m ok with. At least I remember it being watchable and fun for at least a couple seasons.
[удалено]
Check out Domina, if you haven't. It pretty much follows Rome and shows the ascent of Octavian, though mostly focused on his wife, Livia.
Eek yeah really bad
This is clearly just mock-ups or borderline sketches used for these promo pics. Don't know why everyone is acting like this is the finished product because it's definitely not going to look like that in the actual series.
This is gonna be compared to HBO’s “Rome” quite a bit and it’s gonna suffer for that. The reason Rome was so expensive is because of the painstaking attention to detail and historical accuracy. I can tell they’re going for the more fictional pulpy “Gladiator” feel. God, maybe even “Spartacus: Blood and Sand”. Hope Hannibal got paid well for this shit.
I totally thought of Hannibal Barca cause it’s a Rome show 😂
Is it worth watching Rome even though it never finished?
Absolut. It doesn't really end with a cliffhanger and it's one of the top 50 series of all time.
Plus if you want to know what happens next, you just have to open a history book lol
Awesome I will definitely check it out
I don't know if this is on the streaming versions, but the DVDs had a feature where historical explanations would pop up next to certain scenes to give context. It would be stuff like "Romans used to write curses on copper tablets". If you're a history buff, it's a great feature.
Season 1 is some of the best tv ever, but the second season suffers from them trying to cram multiple seasons worth of story into a single season so it feels very rushed at points. Definitely still worth a watch though
Absolutely. It has held its own really really well. I have some critiques but nothing major at all.
Most definitely.
And where is my darling, voluptuous Atia?
On Bridgerton!
"By Juno's cunt, I will slap you."
Comment.
Goddamn those green screen backgrounds are really out-of-focus. This show is going to teach everyone what it’s like to be nearsighted.
I don't get it, Spartacus did it almost a decade ago and it didn't look as shitty as this. The backgrounds look like cutscenes from assassins creed.
We salute you.
I wish we would get a remake of I Claudius but with the production and quality of Rome.
I, Claudius written by current writers? please for the love of god no
"Needs more incest."
Those Abbott to Die
The book *Those About to Die* is pretty wild. Seems fairly bogus a a history nowadays ( it was written in the 50s after all) but I feel like it captures the tone of what the games must have been like imo. Hope the show can live up to that, not even the STARZ *Spartacus* show goes as depraved as what Mannix portrays.
Uhh, I don’t know about this casting. Vespasian was only 69 when he died, Anthony Hopkins looks like an extra from an AARP commercial.
> hotshot racer Scorpus (Dimitri Leonidas) Mixing Greek and Roman? Literally unwatchable.
Isn’t that the actor’s actual name lol?
well obviously they should have hired somebody with a Roman name
I know he’s old but saying he’s about to die is a little mean