Despite their newfound fame, the trio of Jason, Pythagoras and Hercules remain penniless and enough time has passed for Jason (Jack Donnelly) to become bored with his lot. He fails to understand his place in the Kingdom and another trip to the Oracle does little to help.
When a distraught old man seeks their help to find his missing daughter, the at least is the promise of adventure. Despite him being penniless, Jason agrees to investigate but it soon discovers that the Maenads, fanatical female worshippers of the god Dionysus, have abducted the girl.
Other than the welcome arrival of the bright and resourceful Medusa, we learn little about our heroes this week. Jason remains essentially a one-note character, driven by the loss of his father. He fails to listen to advice and is reckless with his own life, although not above a bit of grandstanding when desperate.
One thing that appears muddled too is his outsider’s perspective as he now appears to talk like a local, spouting things like “did she die at your hand?” His reaction to the name Medusa was at least funny though, almost recoiling in horror at her name.
Of the other two, Pythagoras (Robert Emms) was ill served but the story as he paled in comparison to the more interesting Hercules (Mark Addy). The larger man not only hogs all the best lines but the better part of the action too, with his physical presence and unsavoury habits.
With much of the action taking place in the Forset of Nysa, there was a minimal royal presence. We did however enjoy a brief exchange and more lingering looks from the Princess. A potentially more interesting female character was Korinna (Hannah Arterton) the palace servant who aided Jason at the risk of her job, but sadly we found out nothing about her.
The Maenads were suitably scary, with creepy chanting and a horrific attitude to male intruders. While visually impressive, we discovered little else about them other than their obsession with adding to their number and their loyalty to their god. Most enjoyable was the anticipation, with our three heroes referencing all manner of myth before the encounter. Their hairy servants the Satyrs, left us a little cold to be honest, with the most interesting thing about them being their recoil from Jason.
With some well staged action sequences, this episode acts as the second half of the pilot, introducing another (thankfully female) principal character and prefiguring her destiny with an ominous, if unintelligible curse. It also offers a further layer of mystery for Jason, with the unsubtle hint that his parentage conceals a magical element.
Aired at 8.25pm on Saturday 5 October 2013 on BBC One.
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