Rome “Philippi”

At one point in this episode, Vorenus wishes Pullo good luck on a task he is performing.  Pullo says “luck” is hit middle name.

See, even he knows at this point.

Well, we’ve come to the end of the road for Brutus and Cassius.  Their twenty Legions turned out to be only fourteen.  But then it turned out that Antony and Octavian’s combined Legions equal nineteen.  Brutus doesn’t seem to be much of a strategist anyway, and Cassius is more of a number cruncher.

But numbers are important when it means you need money to pay for your soldiers.  And it turns out that Octavian has a plan to deal with that, namely by having rich supporters of Brutus and Cassius killed and their money and property confiscated to pay for the 19 Legions.  But then Marc Antony wants to add names to that list.  You know, like Cicero.  Oh, and Atia wants to add a name.  Not Servilia.  Octavian is pretty clear on that, no women.  No, she just wants the father of Octavia’s Greek pothead friend on there.  No one really knows why, but he has a rock quarry, so why not?

The net result of that?  Well, the killers manage to murder, oh, Pothead Friend’s entire family.  She might have been a bit abused herself before she got away to stay at…Atia’s house.  Yeah, if Atia were the type of character who actually, you know, learned things, then maybe she’d see that just casually adding names to a murder list because you don’t like the victim’s kid is maybe not ideal.

But someone has to carry out these attacks, and that falls to mob boss Vorenus.  Vorenus is still being the bad dad that he is by angrily telling his oldest daughter not to wear make-up, particularly when the lesson comes from Gaia, who may or may not be a prostitute.  You know, Gaia, who has already slept with Vorenus, and is now flirting with Pullo.  Pullo won’t hear of that.  He loves his wife.  And when Eirene sees the two together, he does some quick thinking and suggests a picnic in the countryside for everybody.

That’s sweet.  Oh wait, Pullo was given the Cicero task, while the other hits were divided up amongst the other gang leaders.  And those guys didn’t appreciate it when Vorenus suggested using the money to give away food to poor people.  One guy was a bit sneaky about it and has some creepy guy flirting with Vorenus’ oldest child.

But, see, Pullo isn’t just some assassin.  He’s actually, well, kinda polite.  He asks Cicero’s permission to have some peaches from the Senator’s orchard first, waits until the older man is ready, does it as quickly and painlessly as he can, and doesn’t take out anyone else.  And since Cicero knew there were killers coming, he was able to dash off a quick letter to Brutus warning of the alliance between Octavian and Antony.  Oh yeah, and Lepidus.  That poor guy.

That would have been a useful message for Brutus to get.  But the messenger almost ran over young Lucius, and after a stern talking-to from Vorenus, got back on his horse to keep riding.  And he forgot the message pouch, which young Lucius found and made the letter into a hat.  Oops.

Pullo is a bit worried.  While Vorenus believes they can find peacetime occupations, Pullo only knows soldiering, and he might rejoin the army if he didn’t learn Eirene was pregnant.

But, without the warning, Brutus and Cassius face a much larger force then they prepared for.  They lost.  Badly.  And in a very ahistoric moment, Brutus’ body was lost and looted by grave robbers.

Brutus’ actual death, though, being mobbed and stabbed by a bunch of guys, sure did look a lot like Julius Caesar’s…

Oh, and Agrippa and Octavia consummated some stuff while issuing a series of lies that probably fooled absolutely no one.