'Medici' Season 3 Episode 1 sets up the final years of Lorenzo's life and eventual fall of the Medicis
The Medici family was one of the most influential families in 20th Century Europe. The family served as bankers for the Vatican and ended up becoming one of the biggest political dynasties in the world at the time.
The British-Italian series, 'Medici' chronicles some of the most defining events in the Medici family history and its third and final season will land on Netflix on May 1.
The third season chronicles Lorenzo de' Medici's (Daniel Sharman) vengeance for the murder of his brother Giuliano de' Medici (Bradley James) during the Pazzi conspiracy that was shown in the final episode of Season 2.
Three of the conspirators were dealt with in the Season 2 finale: Jacopo de' Pazzi (Sean Bean), Francesco de' Pazzi (Matteo Martari) and Archbishop Francesco Salviati (Jacob Fortune-Lloyd).
Lorenzo is not done — he has one more person to cross off his revenge list: Girolamo Riario (Jack Roth), the Lord of Imola. The Vatican has its plans for the Medici family, however, seeing as Pope Sixtus IV was one of the people behind the scenes during the Pazzi conspiracy.
The first episode of Season 3 of 'Medici' begins with the Pope excommunicating Florence and its citizens until Lorenzo goes to him and apologizes for the death of Salviati.
However, Lorenzo knows this is a ploy to get him alone and therefore finish him off. Moreover, Lorenzo wants to end this on his own terms after what was done to Giuliano.
Sharman does a good job of portraying the pain Lorenzo is going through — history tells us that Lorenzo de' Medici was one of the greatest strategists ever, and he must have been to come out on top of the war with the papacy, but we often never get to see what the human toll on the Florentine leader was.
Admittedly, the show has inaccuracies, but the show still makes for a good watch and gets a lot of things right.
In the first episode, we also see the appearance of Giulio de' Guiliano de' Medici — Giuliano's bastard son who was adopted by Lorenzo and became his favorite. Giulio went on to become Pope Clement VII during a period when Europe was under a lot of turmoil.
The first episode goes a long way in setting what is to come in the final season of the show. Lorenzo — while a great politician did make a lot of mistakes in his life.
The Medici family started to lose their influence towards the final years of his life, especially because of the presence of Girolamo Savonarola, a friar, and preacher who worked against the Medicis. All episodes of 'Medici' Season 3 are now streaming on Netflix.
