You know, in all my reasons I forgot about that 'first king of England' one. Thanks for that! ;) Good call.

Yeah, I don't think he'd have let it stand or anything. Hmm… but looking at it objectively, do you feel like the fact that he died was the tipping point to do something about it immediately? I just get the feeling that he's obviously pissed about Ecbert but could take all the time in the world to plot his revenge. Now…

Fair enough! I see that more now re-watching it after you said something. Great observations. Yeah I'll miss the guy, it's a shame — more fun trying to guess who's going down next! ;)

You raise some really good points that I didn't think about, however I think in time a lot of the reason for killing him off will become evident.

That's an interesting take on the matter. You might be right though, especially after Rollo's meeting with the Seer.

Actually, I think it was Athelstan's time to go. Don't get me wrong, I loved him on the show but he didn't have any reason to be there anymore — his story was complete. He got the ball rolling on the whole Ecbert/Wessex arc, he taught Ragnar their language, he motivated Ragnar into trying to be a king to his people…

I think he even said in this episode that he really only cares what the Gods think, so essentially screw everyone else's opinion on the matter. I think it's that high respect for the Gods that makes Floki standing up to Ragnar despite him being the king, which says a lot about his character. He's pretty polarizing…

I agree that I don't see Ragnar killing Floki, for many of the reasons you've listed but also because he may not be able to find him, haha. He did say to Helga that he was going to dip out for awhile and she couldn't tell anyone about it — I think he intended to mean for a longer span than just the time needed to…

I get where you're coming from, but personally I think he referred to his brothers as "Ragnar's sons" because of the shadow he lives in under his father. His father is a king and Bjorn isn't confident enough to be much of anything yet (as evident when he tells Lagertha that he 'foresaw' he, his mother and father…