Vikings Recap: Episode 3, In Which Athelstan's Life Sucks and Lagertha Is Better Than Everyone

The episode starts with Ragnar & co. sailing back from Lindisfarne with all their treasure; among said treasure is Adorable Monk (™) Athelstan, whom Ragnar elected not to kill in episode two because he speaks the Vikings' language. Lucky dude. Not so lucky is the monk sitting next to him, who died during the journey and whose body gets unceremoniously thrown overboard. This is instance number one of approximately 15 dozen in this episode of Athelstan's life being complete and utter shit.



Also in this scene, Rollo and Floki keep to their modus operandi: Giving people the stinkeye and giggling like a loon, respectively.

Not even two minutes into the episode we get our first example of Lagertha being badass: Earl Haraldson's bald henchman, whose name I don't know but whom I refer to as Viking Kevin Pollak, shows up at Ragnar's farm to ask Bjorn where his father's gotten to. Lagertha, seeing this, nonchalantly picks up an axe, walks over, puts her arm around her son, and tells Viking Kevin Pollak that Ragnar's gone fishing. He knows she's lying. She knows he knows she's lying. But are you really going to call her on it when she's holding an axe and looking like she's ready to smash your head in? I didn't think so. Unfortunately, Viking Kevin Pollak decides to take another little boy—one whose mother is not so badass as Lagertha (but who can be?)—as insurance.

Actually, should he be Viking Weasley or Viking Gimli?

When Ragnar gets back to his Viking village he doesn't even have to say "I told you so," because an anonymous Viking I've dubbed Viking Weasley shows up on the docks to give a triumphant speech about how Ragnar was right all along, let no one say it's impossible to sail to the West, suck it Earl Haraldson. (That last part is implied.)

Knut's there, too. Remember, he was the skeezy little so-and-so who said he'd sail with Ragnar only to turn around and narc to Earl Haraldson. Ragnar, displaying an impressive or groanworthy (your mileage may vary) love of puns, tells Knut "You're too late. You missed the boat." Ba-doom-CH.

"I do like them, actually."

Knut wasn't just there to be punned at, though. He tells Ragnar and his fellow shipmates that they've been summoned to see Earl Haraldson, who asks them how they made it to the West. Ragnar's answer: We were lucky, and Thor likes us.

The Earl doesn't buy it, and he promptly calls dibbs on all the treasure. Did Ragnar seriously think he wouldn't? Sure, Ragnar and Floki paid for the boat, but you go behind the Earl's back and you just assume he's going to let you off scott free? Since no one ever said he was a bastard (except everyone ever), the Earl lets everyone take one piece of treasure. Ragnar, showing more intelligence than he did five minutes ago when the Earl played him like a fool, chooses Athelstan. (ATHELSTAN! I CHOOSE YOU!)

When they leave the meeting Rollo gives Ragnar shit for letting the Earl take their stuff. The latter quite reasonably points out that he had to because the Earl was looking for an excuse to kill them, God, Rollo, don't be stupid. Rollo then defies that suggestion by showing that he's taken more than one item of treasure. Ragnar says that he'd better not let the Earl know he stole from him. I smell foreshadowing.

Then there'a a scene where Siggy, the Earl's wife, has a monologue telling the Earl how great he is and he has ultimate authority blah de blah de blah, and then there's some attempted sexing but the Earl can't seem to get it up. Can't blame him, Siggy was being a little creepy intense.

Hey, you remember how I said Athelstan's life is complete shit this episode? Here's where that starts in earnest. Ragnar takes him back to his home to meet the wife 'n' kids. Bjorn makes fun of his hair and the daughter (whose name is... uh....) makes it weird by asking him, if he's a priest, who his his favorite god is. God, Viking daughter, you can't just ask someone who their favorite god is! Awkwaaard. Then the following lines of dialogue occur:

Ragnar: You can touch him.

and

Bjorn: Are we keeping him?

Yes, Athelstan is the new family pet. Except no, that's weird, because the very next scene Ragnar and Lagertha ask him to share some, er, quality time with them. Athelstan declines because, y'know, monk and all. Then he angstily shaves his head and Bjorn laughs at him for it, the little shit. Hey, Tintin, you're not allowed to mock people for their hair.

Then Ragnar and Athelstan drink together, and Ragnar asks if Athelstan will teach him his language, and it's kind of adorable until the very next scene, when you realize that Ragnar just got Athelstan drunk so he could get information about England out of him. Meaning: More raids! Athelstan sees some of his monk buddies strung up and killed, and Ragnar (quite douche-ily) offers to let him leave, both of them knowing he has nowhere to go.

I just want to snuggle Athelstan up in a blanket and feed the poor guy some soup and hot chocolate.

While other husbands may give their wives flowers or chocolate or girly shit like that, Ragnar's A+ good idea present for Lagertha is to invite her on the next raid. Which means Athelstan has to babysit. You can see the terror in his eyes, and that's before Lagertha threatens to pull his lungs out through his chest if anything happens to her kids. Uh, Lagertha? Athelstan can't defend himself, nevermind two kids. Something tells me this isn't a good idea. (Though, surprise!: The idea was Ragnar's. Lagertha doesn't have bad ideas. She glares at bad ideas until they become good ideas.)

Cut to: The raid! Ragnar, having learned ancient Anglo-Saxon remarkably fast, is chatting with an English sheriff about how ohhh, no, we're totally just traders, you say you want to take us to meet your king? Yeah, cool. Rollo—because he may be a stupid douchebag at times but he's a smart douchebag at times, too–sees this for the trap it (probably) is and says they should just kill the Englishmen now.

Gotta say, he has a a point. Strange dudes (+1 lady) with weapons rolling up on the shore? There's no way the Englishmen actually think they're traders. But Ragnar has a point, too: The Englishmen can take them to the town so they're not just wandering around unfamiliar territory surrounded by who knows how many enemies? They should discuss it, is what I'm saying. What was supposed to be a Vikingocracy is turning into a Ragnartatorship.

Of course, Floki then proceeds to fuck shit up by stealing one of the knights' crucifix necklaces, because his weird thing for Christianity has carried over from the last episode. I really want a scene that's just five minutes of Floki being weird at Athelstan. It'd be glorious. Anyway. Stolen crucifix leads to fight fight. The Vikings win. One Englishman gets away. Cue beautiful final shot.

I can't wait to see the different ways in which Athelstan's life sucks and Lagertha is amazing next week.

Categories: recaps, The History Channel, Vikings