The Last Kingdom: Seven Kings Must Die (2023)

May 3, 2023 9:11 PM

In the wake of King Edward's death, Uhtred of Bebbanburg and his comrades adventure across a fractured kingdom in the hopes of uniting England at last.
posted by porpoise (5 comments total)

I generally enjoyed this conclusion to the show, though, while I expected someone close to Uhtred would perish, I wasn't too keen on it being Ingrith. Aldhelm was also a tough pill to swallow, he's been a favorite since forever. The coolest dude with the worse haircut.
posted by Atreides at 7:00 AM on May 4, 2023 [3 favorites]

The way Netflix hyped this, I thought it was a standalone movie and I had no idea it was a capper to a multi-season series and was kind of confused at first. I enjoyed it but it took a quick look in IMDB to realize there was a lot of back story and history I wouldn't know about.
posted by jazon at 2:46 PM on May 4, 2023

I'm glad that this got made, and with such production values. It was neat picking out hero costumes and where and when economy is being employed.

At the Battle of Brunanburh, there was a shot of men emptying their pockets of ... coins? ahead of joining battle lines. Was this a thing in the era (feel squeamish about men going through your pockets if you snuff it?)?

The interpretation at the end was touching.
posted by porpoise at 6:48 PM on May 4, 2023 [1 favorite]

It definitely was a bit confusing with the advertising. Unless you knew it was the finale of The Last Kingdom show (well worth checking out, especially if you enjoyed the film!), you wouldn't know.

At the Battle of Brunanburh, there was a shot of men emptying their pockets of ... coins? ahead of joining battle lines. Was this a thing in the era (feel squeamish about men going through your pockets if you snuff it?)?

I don't remember coins being dropped, but I may have missed it. Given that they wanted to show some men vomiting and others peeing themselves, which at least one historian applauded as being more realistic, it may have had some kind of historical precedent. This time period in Britain's history isn't the best documented one unless the events wandered their way into the periodic chronicles being kept (I believe the chronicle is mentioned a couple times in the movie, even). So there's always a bit of speculation involved. Maybe it was supposed to be a symbolic gesture that the warriors could not be paid to switch sides or simply leave, if they are being disdainful of their money before the battle begins.

That ending was really great. A part of me felt, no, he can't die yet, he needs to enjoy peace in his castle he's spent most of his life trying to get back. Then I have to remember, he's enjoyed quite a bit of peace in the castle since the events of the last season. The use of the blanket, almost like a shroud, heightened the moment as he stood in the darkness between two worlds.
posted by Atreides at 6:28 AM on May 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

We watched this two weeks ago and it felt flat to us. We watched the series about six months ago and really liked it. Because the series occurred over decades there were so many characters but it felt like very few of them made it into this one. (And perhaps some of them died at the end of the series that I didn’t remember). I guess I wanted some of the character arcs that the series had and that just wasn’t possible in this format. I did like the fade to today’s castle at the end.
posted by Sukey Says at 5:57 AM on May 13, 2023