I must share a little about the way that the ROME mini-series is portraying Brutus. He was introduced in Episode 1, visiting Caesar in Gaul, and I find the portrayal verrrrry thought-provoking in terms of what we do know about Brutus.

Basically, he comes across as VERY patrician Urban Roman, nose rather in the air, quietly contemptuous of the 'mob,' (not that I entirely blame him), intellectually arrogant, but very smooth and polished in a high-class kind of way. I can quite see, already, that he thinks he has better solutions for problems than anyone around him - including Caesar.

In the series, the affair between Servilia and Caesar is still ongoing, and since the only thing we know about it is that it WAS going on during Catiline's conspiracy (c. 63 BC), they're using the Servilia/Brutus connection to not only show Caesar's relationship to Brutus and his mother, but to contrast his actions with those of the entrenched Optimates.

Interesting thus far! It surely vastly outweighs that really awful portrayal of Brutus in the EMPIRES mini-series this summer, in which Cassius was a gibbering Mussolini and Brutus was left merely to wail and follow stronger fellows.