In the second episode of Inspector Lewis Series II, a gloriously shirtless Bradley James (I'm such a dirty old lady) is involved in boxing. And then a very red-faced, obnoxious English guy gets murdered, Inspector Lewis is seduced, and a kid with a scarf that makes his head look like it's coming out of a vagina jumps off a balcony. And Lewis is like, "WTF?" and Hathaway is like, "Do you honestly think you have a chance with a woman who looks like that?" to Lewis, and suddenly it all makes sense. And then Hathaway goes to Berlin and is freaked out by Deutschlanders and takes illegal pictures of secret documents with his cell phone. THEY'RE NOT GOING TO LET YOU GET AWAY WITH THAT, HATHAWAY! But fortunately he also writes stuff down.
Um, yeah, so I'm pretty sure that made no sense to you unless you've watched Mystery!, and I'm sorry for that. But you should watch it--no free plot handouts! Besides, if you want a review that makes sense, you can read Ruth's at Booktalk & More. Right now, instead of a plot synopsis, I'm going to tell you all the random things I know about Wagner. Brace yourselves.
Richard Wagner lived in the 19th century. He was inspired by folk tales such as the Poetic Edda and many of the operas he wrote tried to revive a noble and glorious Germanic past. Nietzsche was in love with his wife and saw Wagner as keeping them apart (duh). Anywho, another 19th-century personage who loved the Poetic Edda was Guido von List (though he was not actually "von" List, or anywhere for that matter, and just made up that name so he'd sound more aristocratic). Like Wagner, of whom List was a huge fan, he wanted to revive the glorious German past; to that end, he studied ancient standing stones and whatnot, and pretty much invented runes. Well... he had visions of what the runes meant and how to read them delivered by Odin. Or so he said. And then, after WWI, List wrote that the dead would rise up for vengeance against all of Europe like an ancient and crusading army and that Germany would take Russia as its due. And guess who read that? That's right, Hitler was a HUGE fan of List (and Wagner) and that 1. is why only one of List's books has been translated into English; and 2. everything I know about Wagner. Well, that and Inspector Morse was a huge fan.
And now for a change of topic and a token question--What do you think of Bradley James' acting skills? I think he's okay, but Ruth says he could use some work.
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