Domina Review: Treason (Season 1 Episode 7)
It’s unfortunate that Domina Season 1 Episode 7, “Treason,” is the penultimate episode of the series’ first season, because it is the show’s worst outing to date, following up the super dramatic family poisoning of last week with a dull and confusing political plot involving multiple people we don’t really know — or remotely care about.
With just an episode to go in the season (or series, should Domina not land a second, but let’s keep things positive), this weird celebrity sham trial is deeply uninteresting. What is the purpose of it? We know that Gaius is a dictator who does what he wants without thought for the whims of the Senate. We know that Livia is a master political operative. What else does this prove?
Plus, Domina is and always has been at its worst when it focuses on the seemingly endless sea of near-interchangeable dark-haired men with crew cuts, and that’s basically all this episode is.
The group of senators who were hoping to install Marcellus as their puppet dictator a couple of episodes back are still scheming to oust Gaius by any means necessary and stage an elaborate show trial involving a man Primus that we’ve never heard of before, who is set to accuse Gaius of violating a Senate-approved treaty to attack the tribes of Macedonia.
This is all presented as being very dramatic, but Gaius absolutely did the thing he’s being accused of because, again, the man is a dictator and has zero regard for the Senate and its power. I mean, we learned that in the series’ third episode!
There’s very little tension to be found here, since we also know that Gaius is destined to rule for many more years and whatever this poorly conceived plot is will fail. There’s not even much good character drama to be found here until the final five minutes when Gaius literally goes on a murderous rampage.
It’s just all so uninteresting. The stuff that we should have spent more time on — Portia’s decision to betray her cousin with Crassus, Scribonia’s choice to save Gaius’ life from a murder plot — got barely a mention.
Another reason this episode fails to land (for me at least) is that it includes another weird time jump, and the events herein take place a year after Marcellus’ murder. As a result, Domina once again skips past the emotional meat of the story to a distant fallout whose impact is lessened because of it.
Sure, we didn’t need to spend an hour on Scribonia and Octavia crying, but it might have been nice to see something of Julia’s apparent year-long slide into debauchery, Drusus’s decision to become a teenage rebel, or Antigone’s miscarriage (an event that barely merits a throwaway line here!)
How did the fallout from Marcellus’s murder play out? What did Gaius do about the succession issue? And — really — it’s been an entire year and no one’s found that scratched out grave Tycho dug?
The best part of “Treason,” however, has to be Livia’s slow and dawning horror that her grand — if poorly thought out — plan to turn Rome back to the Senate is basically toast because the son she meant to hang it all on is an idiot.
To be fair, Drusus actually seems quite sweet and well-meaning, but with his love of chasing women and getting in fights, he’s hardly emperor material.
Livia seems personally offended that her second son isn’t as intelligent as she’d hoped, but I’m not sure if that’s because she doesn’t think he’ll believe her sales pitch about turning power back to the Senate, or because she doesn’t think Gaius could ever be convinced to name Drusus his heir.
Either way, it looks like her grand plan — such as it ever was — has hit something of a roadblock.
Stray Thoughts and Observations
- I have to laugh every time some Senator refers to “the divine Julius” like these people literally did not stab that man in the back themselves.
- This episode has the first real fight we’ve seen between Livia and Gaius in some time and it underlined, for me, that Livia doesn’t actually have as much power as she thinks sh doeses.
- I’m sorry Tiberius asking his mother if she had an affair while they were in exile is gross.
- While I suppose the Antigone suplot where she finds and rescues her former informant who was sold as a field worker is nice, I don’t entirely see the point of it. She doesn’t spend all her time poisoning people, I guess?
What did you think of this episode of Domina? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
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Domina airs Sundays at 10/9c on Epix.
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Lacy Baugher
Lacy is a pop culture enthusiast and television critic who loves period dramas, epic fantasy, space adventures, and the female characters everyone says you're supposed to hate. Ninth Doctor enthusiast, Aziraphale girlie, and cat lady, she's a member of the Television Critics Association and Rotten Tomatoes-approved. Find her at LacyMB on all platforms.
3 comments
I found episode 7 really confusing. And you’re right, all these dark haired white men all look the same I can’t keep them straight. I watched it twice just because I thought it was me but NOPE it was the episode.
Thank you the confirmation that this episode was confusing and full of holes. I had to pause my binge-watching to Google and clarify what just happened.
Truly right. I equally found this episode very confusing, I actually thought I had skipped a whole episode. It’s only after I have read this excerpt that I now fully understand. Quite intriguing I guess.
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