As my wife says, TV at this time of year is punishment for not going to the beach. Take last night, for instance - we decided to watch "Empire", which is allegedly about Octavius' (later, Caesar Augustus) rise to power. I say allegedly because of how last night's episode went. At the end, they had Octavius and Marc Antony exchanging "power of attorney" for each other, followed by Antony loosing an assassin on Octavius and a gathering of backers.

Except... according to what I found here (and other places), that's not how things went down at all. According to the sources I read, there was a lot of juggling for power, but most of it involved negotiation and - ultimately - power sharing. Nothing like the assassination attempt portrayed last night is mentioned in any of the sources I looked at.

Most people watching won't look any of the real history up - they'll just accept the portrayal as real. Which is really too bad.