In the pilot of this show called "The last Kingdom" we meet Uhtred of Bebbanburg. He is the son of Lord Uthred. When Lord Uthred goes to the battlefield, his son follows him, to prove that he is brave and useful. But during this fight the Lord dies, and Uthred gets captured by the Vikings they fought with. Now we follow him during his time with the Vikings, and how he tries to get the title back that he deserves.
The directing is good, for me at least. It is almost all hand held camera, which can be a bit obnoxious for some people. I like it though. It isn't shaky cam, which is good. Everything is still very good visible, which is also good. And the best thing is that it brings you into the moment. This is a good thing, because it creates good tension. For example. In the begin battle sequence you can see the technique that they used very good. A lot of close up shots, which was a bit less good, but it creates tension. And again, put you in the moment. But there are also shots from the sideline, which make you feel like Uhtred. Especially due to the hand held camera. So that is why I think that this is the best directing choice they could have made. Another director who uses this is Kathryn Bigelow. She has directed "Zero Dark Thity" and "Hurt Locker", which are both war movies. Here they used the hand held camera also well. But to get back to this show. The cinematography is very well. It looks all very pretty, but the flaw that I have is like I have said earlier is the close ups in the fight scene. And to come back to the fight scenes these are handled very well. There were no real shaky cam moments. And now I am going to discuss something totally different. The clothing. The clothing was very good. It looked worn out and fitted the time period. The set design was cool too. it looked real, at times, but also a bit CG- ish. And now maybe something weird. I absolutely loved the intro. It had good music and was fun animated. But the music overall was a bit cliché.
The acting was decent. The kid actor of Uhtred was OK. He wasn't so fantastic, which was a bit disappointing for me. He was the main character so I hoped that they chose a good actor for him, but unfortunately. It isn't that he couldn't act at all, but he had some bad moments. The next actor I am going to talk about is Alexander Dreymon. He played the adult version of Uhtred. Lukily he was better, because we are going to see him more. I have seen only a bit of him, so I can't really say how good he was. But for as I have seen he was good. Peter Gantzler played Earl Ragnar. He bought Uhtred. I liked him, there is just one little over the top thing that happens at the end of the episode, which bothered me. Matthew Macfadyen was Uhtred his father. He was OK, I guess? don't really have a opinion about him. The rest of the kid actors and actresses were good, just as the rest supporting cast.
The script is well. It is a bit unnatural but gives the English men a more chic look. The unnatural script doesn't count for the Vikings, though. They are portrayed more like... You know... Vikings. Which brings me to another little thing that I didn't like (I am nitpicking by the way, absolutely loved this episode) is the portraying of the knights. They looked like loyal soldiers (I have no clue if this is as in the books) but knights in real life were untrustworthy and mean. But the story overall of this episode was good. It ended well, and made you want to watch the next episode.
Overall this was a good pilot, from (I hope so) a good show. Thank you for reading this review, and I am sorry for my bad English.
