Spartacus: “Blood and Sand” or “Blood and Sex”?

Spartacus: Blood and Sand could perhaps be the worst show ever.  Ripping off stylistic and story elements from 300 and other more recent sword and sandal flicks, STARZ’s first attempt at an original series comes up less epic and more of an epic fail.  The end result is a combination bloodbath/comedy hour that makes Hercules: The Legendary Journeys look like high-brow entertainment by comparison. They should have just called it “Spartacus: Blood and Sex.” 

Clocking in at under an hour, Spartacus managed to squeeze in no less than four lengthy sex scenes complete with full-frontal female nudity (including the obligatory lesbian make-out session at the equally obligatory Roman orgy, and even some merkin action) and countless images of slow-mo, freeze-frame instances of blood-splattering, painfully CGI-ed gashes, and the compulsory decapitation.  In one of the show’s most unintentionally hilarious moments, a gladiator with both of his legs hacked to bloody stumps attempts to crawl away from an enraged Spartacus.  The scene plays more like Monty Python than Gladiator. The only thing missing was a psychotic white bunny and the gladiator declaring “It’s just a flesh wound.”