This series was disappointing for me. I saw Pillars of the Earth which was very good and so I was expecting something better.I didn't give this series a one-star rating because the costumes were very well-made and some of the cast like Miranda Richardson, Oliver Jackson-Cohen and Nora von Waldstätten performed very well.But there were too many rape scenes, and I didn't like the incest. Is it really necessary to show incest in so many TV series? The anti-Catholic theme (lesbian nuns, gay monks, evil prior, executing healers, old priest draining blood) was over-the-top. In reality, most at that time in history were very religious and their behaviour was influenced by the fear of eternal hell-fire.People were unrealistically naive and too easily fooled by Godwyn and his mother as they kept on murdering people, episode after episode. I was disappointed in the then age 14 Edward III being cast as an age 33 actor in the first episode. Later we do not see his beautiful wife, and first-born son, just his third child Joan. The old queen mother had no power after 1330, yet we see her and Joan trying to manipulate Edward into going to war with France. Edward III is cast as an indecisive, wimpish, dark-haired little man, but was in fact very confident, tall, broad-shouldered and fair-haired (a typical Plantagenet in appearance). Edward III has been one of my favourite people in history since I first read about him as child, so I was unhappy to see him portrayed this way. Was that battle in France supposed to be the Battle of Crécy? It happened nothing like what is shown! In fact, the French in far superior numbers attacked with crossbowmen and mounted knights, and were slaughtered by the longbows. Where is Edward's son the Black Prince? He was just a 16-year-old at Crécy, yet did very well in the midst of the heaviest fighting. There is plenty of interesting drama in real history during that time period, like the story of how Edward took Calais. But of course the producers decided to ignore that.

It starts in 1327. The old king Edward III loses the civil war to his french Queen Isabella. She installs her son Edward III in as the new king. A knight Sir Thomas escapes after the murdered of the imprisoned former king to the fictional town of Kingsbridge. He seeks sanctuary as a monk. The toad Sir Roland uses his influence with the Queen to take over as Earl of Shiring. He launches a reign of terror condemning Edmund Wooler as well as the old Earl and others to death. Edmund's evil sister Petranilla (Cynthia Nixon) who poisoned Edmund's wife bribes to get Edmund freedom. Edmund's daughter Caris (Charlotte Riley) has the feel for medicine but the backwards world has little use for her except Petranilla is sending her to marry the brutal Elfric Builder. Petranilla's son is the weasel Godwyn (Rupert Evans). Roland spares the lives of the old Earl's sons taking Ralph as his squire while Merthin is given as Elfric Builder's apprentice. There are about twice as many other important characters.It's a maze of characters. This feels like a cheaper version of shows like Game of Thrones without the dragons. It's work to stay on top of every character. Basically the theme is bad things happen to good people. The world is an ugly place and people are ugly, too. It feels very repetitive. The best ugly people has to be Cynthia Nixon and Rupert Evans. That's a crazy mother and son duo. Caris feels a little too modern. She should realize what comes with the world she lives in. She seems to be always shocked at the injustice. Overall, there are good actors in a reasonable mini-series.

Really! The first 15 minutes of the movie were such an egregious deviation from the original plot that I knew it would only go downhill from there. Where do I start? First let's start with the ages of Ralph, Mervin, Caris & Gwenda and the lack of the latter 2 characters from one the most important plots of the book which sets the stage for the character's future behavior. The introduction of Sir Thomas with his secret message & how that took place in the book with his intimate interaction with Mervin. Mattie showing up at the monastery taking over Sir Thomas' medical procedure...not only is it so far off the plot but also from reality. Women wouldn't have been allowed to barge in & take charge like that during that time period. The nuns that served as nurses barely had a say.

Okay, as it says, there are spoilers below.I read the reviews. Seems like those that did not read the book enjoyed the miniseries, while virtually everyone who read the book did not enjoy the miniseries.I agree completely. I read the books and the miniseries left a lot to be desired. My issue is, why change the plot so significantly? In the miniseries, many key characters were missing, Caris marries Elfric,Petronella and Godwyn are murderers, the queen hates Kingsbridge, Sir Gerald was Earl, there is no mention of Shiring, etc. etc. and I am only half way through the videos. I understand cutting it short for film, but why the huge changes? And why did Ken Follett agree to this?Did he think it was an improvement on the book? (Maybe it was, I don't know). I was just looking forward to the video version of the novel. I found myself simply comparing all of the changes which seemed needless. 1) Maybe if you haven't read the book or seen the series, watch the series first. The book is much more detailed and it will still be fresh because of the huge differences.2) The only reason I gave it 7 out of 10 is that if you have not read the book, it probably would be an enjoyable miniseries. The acting is good, the characters are good. I want to be fair to the screen version and not tainted by my having read the book. (BUT WHY THE NEEDLESS CHANGES?)3) Mr. Follett, I really hope they paid you a huge amount of cash for the video rights. Not for it being bad, just for it being basically so different from the book.Hope this helps!!