WiC Watches: Vikings Season 5, Part 2

Image: Vikings/History
Image: Vikings/History /
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Episode 515: “Hell”

Let’s get one thing straight: “Hell” was only ever going to be about the huge battle between King Harald’s Vikings and King Alfred’s Saxons (with a whole heaping amount of help from Ubbe, Torvi, Bjorn and Lagertha). Floki and the island of misfit toys didn’t make an appearance this episode, thank the gods, and Ivar’s story was all about how he is slowly turning Kattegat into Jonestown.

Ivar killed the old seer last week and actually thought he could get away with it, and he would have if it wasn’t for his darn brother Hvitserk. If there’s one person left in Kattegat who hasn’t drunk the Kool-Aid, it’s Hvitserk.

Okay, now to the main event. The night before the battle, Heahmund has a dream where a deer he claims was Jesus Chris told him to stop knocking boots with Lagertha or he’ll go to hell when he dies. There was some trippy imagery, like a man with goat horns and legs, and another with the head of a wolf, and then there was a baby in a cracked egg. I don’t know what Heahmund was smoking, but it’s not available over the counter.

Anyway, he tells Lagertha they can no longer sleep together, so sayeth the deer. She gets pissed and goes into the next day’s battle super angry. Had King Harald known this, he probably wouldn’t have even taken the field.

Having been spurned by his half-brothers, Magnus joins up with Harald. After Ubbe comes to parlay with him, something Magnus says makes Harald realize that Ubbe was simply stalling for time, so the Saxon army could outflank his own. Curses, foiled again!

Finally, the time comes and the two armies faced each other across a scorched field. Alfred sees a deer and takes it as a divine sign, and battle is joined. (Does the deer regularly symbolize Jesus or is it just here?)

The two armies seem evenly matched, with champions from both sides carving their way through entire battalions of red shirts. And just as I’m thinking that it was going to be another boring battle with no stakes, Heahmund takes several arrows to the chest and back as he watches Lagertha kill anyone who gets close to her. He falls to his knees and calls her name. She looks up and sees a random Viking skewer Heahmund right through his back and out his chest.

Soon after, the Saxons begin to dominate the battle, and Harald called for a retreat. The last we see of him and Magnus, they’re on a boat sailing away with their ponytails between their legs.

But wait, there’s more: In the heat of the battle, Lagertha goes missing. Despite a thorough search, Ubbe, Torvi, and Bjorn cannot find her. Did she see her lover die and then simply walk off to mourn his passing? She didn’t seem to be in the boat with Harald and Magnus — they didn’t mention her, at least — so her fate is still up in the air.

Finally, as Aflred is feasting his victorious army back at Wessex, his mother tells him that his brother Prince Aethelred was the one who was leading the men who had planned to overthrow and assassinate him. Alfred ends the episode glaring at his brother, probably secretly blaming him for his new haircut. Sucker.

This episode was fun because it got back to what made Vikings popular in the first place: the action. And with Heahmund dying in the battle and Lagertha gone missing, the stakes were actually real this time.

Jonathan Rhys Meyers did an excellent job as Bishop Heahmund, and despite my many Henry VIII and William Shatner jokes at his expense, he brought some much-needed fresh blood and badassery to the show, especially after the exit of Travis Fimmel (Ragnar).

Episode Grade: A