(Minus points for overcrowding, but plus points for Andersen’s star-making turn.)

Season 5’s cast works overtime to hold together an overstuffed, sometimes contradictory narrative. They succeed more often than they fail. If you love intense family drama, brutal betrayals, and performances that swing from whispered vulnerability to battle-cry fury, the Vikings Season 5 cast delivers a bloody, beautiful mess.

The cast is too large. Several promising characters (Hvitserk, Bishop Heahmund) get rushed arcs. The Iceland plot isolates Floki from the main energy for too long.