The last episode of Rome has aired and how I miss it, so I cast around to see what I could see and reluctantly took a look at the Showtime series "The Tudors". Let me begin by asking isn't absolute monarch enough? Does he have to be rock-star absolute monarch? I fully understand the "sexy edge" it is supposed to confer (rock-star vampires) and a modern sensiblity is not going to find late medieval power politics sexy per se. But Henry the VIII is a king even the most history hating have heard of and are minimally aware of the six wives the divorces etc. Strutting around in an open collar and thigh high boots with maidens in flowing prom hair (bangs!) is so far from the mark that I had to scramble for the clicker. He is an attractive young man in a ferrety sort of way and as a fictional character on the sidelines of the Tudor court he would be very compelling. Where are the hats? Where are the squishy toed platypus slippers? Looking sexy in the real clothes of the period takes skill, possibly more skill than this actor possesses.