Gladiator 2’s ending was just a violent duel between two slaves. On one side, there was a Black man, Macrinus, a former slave of Emperor Marcus Aurelius, who despised the dead emperor from the bottom of his heart and wanted to erase his idea of “the Roman Republic” from the hearts of men and women. On the other side, there was an abandoned son and a grieving lover, Hanno, also known as Lucius Verus, the son of the greatest Gladiator, Maximus Decimus Meridius. [Spoiler Alert] Hanno, a fictional character in the film, had a very simple desire. He had lost everything on the battlefield just because a few greedy and ambitious men like Macrinus desired something as meaningless as the throne of the Roman Empire. Hanno lost his father to an insecure emperor. Later, he lost his wife, just because two evil brothers wanted their names to go down in the history books. And lastly, he lost his mother, Lucilla, because a slave wanted to be an emperor.
You see, it’s not an evil thing to be ambitious or desire something from the bottom of your heart. Macbeth was ambitious, and there was nothing wrong with in itself. Problems arise when ambitious men get blinded by their desires and cross the line. Macbeth became evil when he overstepped and killed his own uncle. This evil of greed spreads like a wildfire and soon engulfs entire cities and nations. The greed of the young emperors, Caracalla and Geta, to expand their Roman Empire soon reached Numidia, where their General, Marcus Acacius, killed Hanno’s wife, Arishat, in order to save his own men. So, who’s at fault here?
In the final act of the film, Hanno forgave his mother, Lucilla, for sending him away when he was just a child. He understood her reasons and accepted his father’s ring, implying that he was not only ready to protect the dream but was also willing to die for it. With the help of Ravi, he planned a coup to take over the city and overthrow the evil brothers. Hanno gave Ravi his father’s ring and asked him to show it to Darius Sextus, the general of Acacius’ army, who was waiting for his command to attack the city. Acacius was already dead, and therefore Hanno filled in his shoes and continued the rebellion to bring evil to its knees. However, by the time the 5000 troops arrived, Macrinus had already killed Caracalla and Geta and declared himself the emperor in their absence. And as soon as Macrinus found out about Acacius’ troops marching toward the city, he commanded the Praetorian Guards to stop them at the gate. Macrinus had just tasted glory and wanted to protect his new title at any cost. His sole desire was to remake Rome in his own image. His dreams, however, never came true.
During Gladiator 2’s ending, Hanno met Macrinus at the city’s gate and challenged him for a duel. Hanno didn’t want any more men to shed their blood for another person’s greed and ambition and therefore decided to deal with Macrinus on his own. During the clash, Macrinus tried to drown Hanno in the water and tried to stab him with the blade in his hand, but he couldn’t pierce Hanno’s armor. The chestplate belonged to the fallen hero of the Roman Empire, Maximus, and in a way, Maximus was still protecting his son, even after his death. While still underwater, Hanno once again saw himself near purgatory, where the ferryman might be waiting for him to take him to the afterlife. Hanno had the same dream when he lost his wife and fell into the water during the siege in Numidia. This implied that Hanno wanted to reunite with his wife in the afterlife and yearned for a courageous death like Arishat, but in the end, he didn’t want to die anymore. He wanted to stay alive so that he could fulfill the dreams of his grandfather, his father, and his mother. Finally, Hanno came out of the water and severed Macrinus’s hand from his body so he could no longer harbor the dream of becoming a “Roman God,” even in the afterlife. And after putting an end to the evil man and his greed, Hanno finally turned to his fellow countrymen and requested them not to spill any more blood in the name of tyranny. He wanted them to pursue the dream of his grandfather, the dream his father died for. But what was that dream? From what I grasped from Ridley Scott’s film, I guess here Hanno was talking about bringing back the Roman Republic, where the Senate and the people of Rome would rule, with no emperor to blunt the vox populi. But will it be possible?
You see, before his death, Macrinus had branded half of the Senate as traitors along with Lucilla, because these were the people who refused to swear allegiance to him. It was obvious that Macrinus wanted absolute control of the empire and would have gotten rid of the Senate or stripped it of what little power it had left. But before he could do so, Hanno killed Macrinus and decided to end the idea of the “Roman Empire.” I guess, as soon as Hanno comes to power or helps elect new Senators, he will most likely put an end to all the imperial expansion campaigns. You might remember a scene at the beginning of the film where Caracalla asked Acacius to prepare his army to conquer Persia after the fall of Africa. But Acacius didn’t want to shed blood anymore, and that was one of the reasons why he planned a coup against the young emperors. It could be assumed that Hanno, who’d lost his wife in such an expansion campaign, would put an end to all such campaigns and direct all resources toward rebuilding the city and protecting his people. In short, these political reforms mark the beginning of the end of the Roman Empire, which I guess would further be explored in the third Gladiator film, which has already been announced.
In Gladiator 2’s ending, Hanno went back to the same arena, the Colosseum, inside which he had lost both his parents. He touched his mother’s blood, still wet on the chariot wheel, and picked up the very sand that once was soaked in the blood of his father. He wanted his father to meet his mother in the afterlife, and that’s what he was trying to do. And finally, he closed his fist and asked his father to speak to him for one last time. In the closing shot, we saw Russell Crowe’s hand passing through the wheat field, wearing the ring that Hanno now has, suggesting that Hanno’s last wish had finally come true. His father finally spoke to him.
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