Well I enjoyed this documentary a lot. Aside from bringing the actual plotters back to life to have everyone have their own say first hand, all we can do is recreate as best we know how and therefore, everything is 'academic' if it's not happening right in front of us.
I thought it was strongly acted by a solid cast, well-scripted and it paid attention to detail. It was not difficult to follow and quite absorbing from my point of view. Mostly I thought it dealt with the depth of feeling these men held for their preferred Catholic faith and the lengths they would go to, to achieve their goals.
I felt, because of the title, as if it was definitely trying to draw parallels with the fact that terrorist plots are made up of the same type of fanatics hundreds of years apart, that the inward-looking mentality survives and human emotion like rage, bitterness, revenge, wrapped up in a cause, is no different now than it was then. The ingredients are all there: one faith feels 'picked on' by another and wants to punish it, then there are internal squabbles but nothing serious, loyalty is shown, men undergo unnecessary torture to keep their secrets and ultimately, like all terrorist plots, it fails in one way or another, in that it affects the world only for as long as the dust settles and then it's a new day, time moves on, things supersede it. It's what terrorists don't understand, that they're not that important. But the fanaticism and the desire for change, never changes down the centuries, despite a change of clothes. This wasn't shoved in your face by the programme, but it got me pondering afterwards.
For someone like me who didn't know much about the background to the plot it was interesting to find out Guy Fawkes hated a certain other nation almost as much as he hated the Protestant authorities and he was brought to life by the actor who portrayed him as unwavering/stubborn and brazen. Well worth a watch.
