Move over Spartacus, this riveting Roman Empire miniseries is the epic follow-up you need right now

If you ask me, it’s a tragedy Starz never went through with a second season of House of Ashur. The original Spartacus was an absolute riot, and I still reckon there’s plenty of life in the dusty corridors of Roman TV drama. Maybe, just maybe, another streamer will have the sense to pick it up. As Quintus Batiatus himself put it: "May the gods grant us a miracle, for the house is in desperate need of favor." I mean, seeing what’s out there, I can’t help but wonder—why on earth does the industry seem allergic to putting the Roman Empire or Republic back on screen? It’s like they’ve all got collective memory loss.

Anyway, even if you’ve seen Attila with Gerard Butler (yes, that’s a thing and yes, it’s fairly wild), there’s another gem tucked away: Julius Caesar, the 2004 TV epic from TNT. Just two episodes, mind, but pretty packed. It deals with the whole of Caesar’s public and private life, from his days as a teenage hostage through to that infamous finale: knife-wielding mates and the Ides of March. All under the slightly mad eye of director Uli Edel, who also did Rasputin: Dark Servant of Destiny if your tastes run Russian.

All-Star Cast, Very Roman Vibes

They pulled in a pretty impressive cast for this one:

• Jeremy Sisto as Caesar (light on the laurels, big on ambition)
• Christopher Walken as Cato (yes, that Christopher Walken—doing ancient Roman statesman, no less)
• Christopher Noth turning up as Pompey

There’s a handful of other faces you might recognise, but honestly, the fun comes in watching blokes who usually do gangster films and nervous New Yorkers poncing around in togas uttering dire threats.

What Spartacus Got Wrong (and Caesar Gets Right)

Look, as much as I loved the original Spartacus series, it didn’t exactly give Caesar his due. Let’s call it what it is—hugely imaginative, but basically making up its own history as it went along. Caesar’s shown as a sort of Roman ninja, personally bringing down Spartacus and then getting slapped about by Ashur, which, sorry, never happened. Then the show kills him off before he ever even puts a foot in the Senate—historically laughable. I suppose points for creativity, but if you’re after the real deal, Julius Caesar is far more true to the facts.

This miniseries actually sets up Caesar as the bonafide lead rather than just another bloke cluttering up the background. Starts with Pompey capturing young Julius in 82 BC, which is pretty much how his political saga got going, then runs right through—stabbings, speeches, and all—to the moment of betrayal in the Senate. There’s an obvious thrill in seeing a version where Caesar is given centre stage, and you can tell the writers were loving it. You’ll even spot a cheeky bit of script now and then—Jeremy Sisto’s Caesar drops this beauty: "There’s a lot of Rome still out there, it just isn’t called Rome yet." You’ve got to respect that kind of optimism, I suppose.

Blood, But Not That Much Blood

If you’re expecting Spartacus levels of limb-lobbing and arterial spray, maybe lower your expectations. Julius Caesar goes in for a subtler sort of menace. There’s one scene in particular—Walken doing Cato’s suicide by sword, refusing to beg Caesar for mercy—that’s genuinely unsettling and weirdly memorable. Not for the faint-hearted, but not exactly a Tarantino flick either.

How Close Does It Get to Real Roman History?

Director Uli Edel and writer Craig Warner aren’t exactly trying to stir up ancient gossip. They cut out a lot of melodrama and keep things marching briskly, trying to keep the story plausible without turning it into some kind of documentary snoozefest.

For any pedants or eagle-eyed classicists out there, yeah, there are a few slip-ups:

• Julia, Caesar’s daughter, appears as a child during Sulla’s Purge (82 BC). Real life? She wasn’t even born—sources pin it at 76 BC.
• Cinna, Caesar’s father-in-law: Show says Sulla executed him, but history claims he was killed by his own troops, long before Sulla was on the scene.
• Caesar’s death: They show him dying alone on the Senate floor, but according to Plutarch, he actually died at the feet of a statue of Pompey.

Despite all that, Julius Caesar does a surprisingly thorough job of charting his rise and eventual doom. It sometimes feels vaguely familiar—loads of tropes and echoes from old-school historical dramas—but manages to feel a bit fresh each time. Maybe not quite the monster classic that Spartacus became, but it gives us a properly fleshed-out, endlessly watchable Caesar. Even I can forgive the short episode count when the end result is as slick as this.