‘Vikings’ Season 6 Episode 3 Review: Brilliant cinematography keeps us engaged despite the slow-paced plot
This review could contains spoilers!
Whenever we talk about cinematography and production quality, there’s a standard expectation from historical shows or movies. And most camera works follow that standard. Typically, you will find wide angles, muted color tones, grayed filters, and so on. However, most of us barely notice the camera angles, lightings, art etc. because we are so engrossed in the story or busy focusing on our favorite actors. But here’s the catch. Sometimes, the flow of the plot or the tempo thereof can go a few notches down. What do you do then? You have no choice but to shift your focus from the forefront to the background. And that is what we found with the second episode of the final season of ‘Vikings’.
Not that we didn’t notice the breathtaking settings of Kieven Rus in the first two episodes (which were actually shot in Canada and Iceland), this particular episode made us look more into the production than the plot. After the intense buildup in the premiere, we were expecting a little more action on Oleg and Ivar’s end, perhaps planning a battle against Bjorn. Or, perhaps something happening in Kattegat, while Bjorn is away to rescue King Harald. But nothing of that sort happened. Well, Bjorn does set out on his journey to save King Harald from King Olaf’s captivity, and Ubbe decides to go on a trading spree.
Elsewhere, Ivar accompanies Oleg and Prince Igor to Kiev. Beyond Ivar’s budding friendship with both Igor and Oleg, there’s nothing much happening on the Russian front. So we decided to shift our focus towards the brilliant cinematography in the episode, which we often tend to miss. Like for that scene between Ingrid and Bjorn for instance. When Ingrid tries to seduce her and Bjorn refuses, there’s a moment when his face is held in a close up view, only to reflect his scars and the strain on his face, and hold his gaze of wonder and denial. Such aesthetics of cinematography make it more artistic than being simply dramatic. Furthermore, there’s also the scene when Oleg’s convoy passes through the endless stretch of snow. The entire scene is shot from a long distance, but enough for us to get a panoramic view of the forest, the icy cold weather, and the thick blanket of snow on the ground.
We particularly, cannot get over two scenes. One, when Dir and his army are resting in the forest and Oleg’s men ambush him from the thickets. The slow motion action with effects on the snow and the fuzzy tone makes it perfectly dark and enigmatic. And two, in the ending scenes when Olaf’s men take a guerilla attack on the shore where Bjorn and his army swim through. The combined effect of fire in the dead darkness, the top shots combined with long shots of the ring of fire on the sea, along with Olaf’s monologue in the background, was simply breathtaking to say the least.
With such aesthetics, we can easily overcome how slow the plot turned out to be and hope that the story picks up pace, as it always has, in the previous seasons.
Watch the ‘Vikings’ back in action, every Wednesday, 9 pm, only on History Channel.