Stop pushing at the back!

I enjoyed it hugely. Never mind the battle locations, budget, size of armies... this series aimed to put us in among small companies of fighters with close focus on individuals, not to give us 35mm widescreen overviews of entire battlefields. After all, how many people at Fulford, Stamford and Hastings would have seen the big picture? It's also Channel 4, not Lionsgate. We may be getting the (often grisly) POV of a handful of men and women, but that's a very canny way of working within obvious budget limits and maintaining realism. I'd rather watch that any day than be served an unconvincing splash of expensive CGI hordes and sanitised slaughter-by-pixels.

The languages, accents, and explanations of unknown, half-known and well-known words, phrases and beliefs were neatly worked in. I particularly liked "Stop pushing at the back!" Not only because it echoes a memorable punch-up in Asterix, but also because I'd bet anything it's been shouted countless times through history and not just by unfortunate bods finding themselves first in the queue for a 6-foot-plus axeman wearing an unsettling grin.