The setting and culture of Scandinavia in A.D. 796 made Vikings stand out in its first season, but at this point it's just another period soap on cable.
One of the things I love most about Vikings is how visually arresting it is. It has one of the most haunting opening credit sequences that I've ever seen.
The best of what Vikings has to offer, besides artfully, horrifically staged sequences of warfare, is fierce Lagertha. Played by Katheryn Winnick (a black-belt tae kwon do teacher in a past life), she may be the most exciting feminist character on TV.
Vikings exceeds expectations, so long as those expectations aren't up in Game of Thrones territory. What could be a silly exercise in quasi-historical swordplay is instead an earnest, tightly told family drama.
The series greatest strength is the sense that we're visiting a culture, a people that has been so mysterious; that we're seeing both the mundane and extraordinary aspects of what a Viking's life may have been.
This gorgeously shot drama -- and it's one of the most visually striking shows on TV -- is simple but not simplistic, and that's a crucial distinction.
Vikings has emerged in its second season as a series of appreciably higher quality. Its characters and storytelling, all within a world quite unlike any other on the TV landscape, have gone far beyond the cardboard stage.
