Paul Mescal as Lucius in ‘Gladiator II.’ Paramount To some ancient Romans, gladiators were the embodiment of tyranny

Neither “Gladiator” nor its cinematic sequel is particularly concerned with historical fact. For one thing, the emperor Marcus Aurelius had no intention of restoring the republic. Gladiatorial contests were abhorrent displays of cruelty, but they didn’t always end in death. And the Romans didn’t sculpt bone-white statues; they painted them using an array of colors. But I’m most interested in how the two films misrepresent the way Roman gladiators and their bodies were viewed by their republic-minded contemporaries. In the films, the brawny biceps of gladiators Maximus and Lucius reflect “strength and honor” – to reprise the motto of the franchise – as each of these heroes fights to overthrow self-indulgent emperors and to restore the Roman republic with its traditional political values of liberty and self-restraint. However, as I discuss in my book, “Vitruvian Man: Rome Under Construction,” the gladiator represented something else altogether. The most famous martyr of the Roman republic – Marcus Tullius Cicero – used gladiators’ physiques not to celebrate the republic’s valiant heroes, but to deride their bloated muscles as the embodiment of amoral tyranny.