MichaelHirst

The story I'm telling comes out of my historical research. I don't have a fictional story that I just add historical details to. Everything I do starts in research, and reading. And during the research / reading, storylines and characters start to emerge. And although I can take these characters for a walk, I never leave their historical reality behind. It's like putting down an anchor from a ship - you could sail the ship away from an anchor to an adventure, but you are still anchored to the reality, or what you know of the reality. So for me, that's the dichotomy between fiction and history. It's something I am very proud of, that VIKINGS is as real as we can make it - I don't like fantasy myself, because fantasy can be very, very entertaining, but it's ultimately meaningless because it doesn't hold a mirror up to us the way that history does. Whereas a show like VIKINGS can get people interested in Viking culture, and if they are interested in Viking culture, they can go read history books, check out the facts, see what is real or perhaps what I might have pushed too far. But it's a real show about real people and real events, and it's also done in a real way, and that is something else that I am proud of. We do use CGI - of course we do, for that sense of scale - but we don't use very much of it, and our cast (women and men, Vikings and Shield-Maidens) - they really fight. The show is choreographed wonderfully, but they really fight, they ride horses, they row boats. We shoot it in a very real way. And i think that marks it out from other shows, and even something like the movie THOR where all the action is CGI. I am very, very pleased and happy that we do it for real.

So of course you're not watching history, you are watching a show - this is the twenty-first century, and we're in a studio, and our actors are dressed-up - but having said that, everything you see on the show is researched. The buildings, the costumes, the furniture - everything has been researched, and talked about, and is as real and authentic as we can make it.

laughter

I'm not quite sure...how to respond to that?

I think, it's true, of course, that part of the appeal to VIKINGS to women is ... Ragnar, and there are a number of other good-looking guys. But I don't know how to help you.

I mean, it is an extraordinary thing that VIKINGS is on History channel, and traditionally, it's a male-skewed channel, but VIKINGS has developed a big female audience, and I think for 2 reasons: one is the good-looking guys, the other is the strong female characters.

Who knew you'd have to go back to the Dark Ages to get good, strong, female characters?!

It's a kind of criticism of where contemporary TV is today.

And you've just got to grit your teeth and watch it.

Ehm - yes I do!

VIKINGS, in a very important way, is a family saga.

It's about a man, his wife, his children, his extended family, and I think it's one of the reasons the show is a success - because people are engaged by the family, are engaged and interested in the people, and can identify with the dynamics of family life, and that specific family, from hundreds of years ago.

So Ragnar continues to be the central character, a wonderful character, a very interesting man, a very deep man, and his son Bjorn is grown-up now and will likely represent a challenge to him in the future, and he has other sons of course... And historically, his other son did things just as extraordinary as Ragnar himself. So the story of Ragnar and his sons is very rich in exploration, and dramer, as we move forward through this next season and hopefully seasons beyond.

And there are some very sexy scenes towards the end of season 3 (with very sexy women) that you should look out for!

Ehm... oh I have lots of favourite scenes. I think one of the most powerful was the blood-eagling in Season 2. I knew, when I wrote this, that it was a controversial scene and would be difficult to shoot, and it was challenging to shoot because it's very extreme, but I wanted to write it and wanted to shoot it because it takes us deeper into the heart of the Viking experience and the Viking beliefs and Viking society. So that was an important scene. I loved writing the episode called "The Sacrifice" in season 1, that had many wonderful, I think, revelations... it took us deeper into the heart of the Viking Paganism. But at the same time, I love writing the family stuff.

I really enjoy the idea that the show is also about love, and the women, the parents, the children, and in that respect, one of the greatest scenes - for me - was Ragnar on the beach, at the beginning of season 2, the first episode of season 2, talking to his dead daughter. I wrote this - it was very emotional for me to write it, because i have several daughters, many daughters, and I was thinking of them when I wrote it. But Travis, who has no children, made it even more emotional when he delivered it - and he himself said it was his favourite scene so far as a Viking. And it was beautiful.

And the reason it was beautiful was because it was not just historical, it was a human scene - it could happen at any time, to any one. And that's really what I am trying to do, with all my writing, really - is to connect the past to the present, so that we are looking back at a different culture which happened hundreds of years ago, but seeing them as human like us, they had feelings like us.

And scenes like Ragnar lamenting the death of his daughter make that connection for me very strongly.