Vikings Star Travis Fimmel Reveals His Motive For the Biggest Battle Yet

Get ready for the explosive end of Vikings Season 3 as Ragnar Lothbrok himself, Travis Fimmel, reveals what is driving him.

Last week’s Vikings saw the inception of the raid on Paris, as Ragnar Lothbrok continues his push into lands unknown. Always driven by ambition, Ragnar now has an additional motivation.

“He’s doing it for Athelstan,” Vikings star Travis Fimmel told IGN prior to the Season 3 premiere. Sitting outside of a tent on the Dublin set of the History Chanel series, we spoke with the actor as stuntmen were lit on fire and tossed into a small man-made river beside the wooden ladders they clung to. The cast and crew were in the middle of production on the raid on Paris, as Fimmel took a moment to reflect on what brought Ragnar to this point and think about where he’s headed.

We hadn’t yet learned of Athelstan’s ultimate fate when we sat down with the actor, but we were aware that there was a big death planned for the season. When asked what that event meant to him, Fimmel said that the loss was devastating for Ragnar and marked the most significant event for his character this season.

As far as Paris is concerned, Fimmel says loyalty to his fallen friend propelled Ragnar to invade.

“Athelstan comes up with idea to sack Paris,” the actor reflected. “So he wants to do it for him. He wants to do it for his buddy Athelstan. He’d said that there is no way you can get in, so Ragnar is gonna prove him wrong, but do it for him. Out of friendship.”

The invasion of Paris may mark Ragnar’s most ambitious move to date, but it’s still only one element of a packed season of Vikings. Take a look at the rest of our chat with Fimmel below and get ready for the conclusion of Season 3’s epic journey.

IGN TV: Ragnar has a very revealing bit of dialogue. He says, "This was never about my happiness. When was this ever about my happiness?" For you, what is it about for him? What’s motivating him?

Travis Flimmel: I think in Season 1 he's more the explorer. It's always been about learning. He always wanted to learn more about the world, and there's knowledge out there that he wants to learn and see and be involved in -- other-world stuff that he doesn't know. He's always had that explorer in him. Then in Season 2 he got caught up in a lot of relationship-driven stuff, a lot of personal problems. This year he gets back to being on the boats a bit more. Then he settles a farm in Wessex, and finally he can do what he wants to do. He heads to Paris, because he's heard it's such a challenge to penetrate. I think he's excited, more than anything, to be discovering again.

IGN: It’s often seemed to be so much about family and legacy for Ragnar, but he’s had some notable conflicts with his two sons: Boneless, who he has mixed feelings about even being alive, and Bjorn, who he can be rather hard on. He cold-clocks Bjorn for letting this pregnant woman enter the fray on the battlefield in one scene. Can you talk about that a little bit?

Flimmel: Of course, he loves both sons so much, but it's hard for a parent, knowing that Boneless is going to have such a difficult life. Maybe Ragnar takes it out on his wife. He thinks that maybe she is the reason why his son is like that. It might be unfair that he does that, but it's just this human instinct, which causes a lot of turmoil in their relationship. Bjorn, he just desperately wants him to man up and be responsible. It’s dangerous to have a pregnant woman in battle in any time period. One day, Bjorn may have to take over and be a leader. Ragnar's all about making him strong enough to do that. Of course, this creates conflicts between Ragnar and Lagertha, the mother, because she babies him too much.

IGN: I don't if she babies him... [Laughs]

Flimmel: She's just always coddling him and being too sweet. Like, even the difference when he went away as a youngster and coming back -- when he was younger, he was a lot harder, you know? When he's older, he comes back a bit lovey-dovey.

IGN: So Ragnar has to whip Bjorn into shape a little bit?

Flimmel: [Laughs] Yeah.

IGN: Talk a little about Athelstan, because Ragnar has that moment where he says to him, "You're the one that I trust." How do you think they got to that point in their relationship? That he trusts this man more than his own people he’s known his whole life?

Flimmel: I think he's always -- since day one, there's been something about Athelstan. He's been more honest with Athelstan than anybody. There's no one he can be as honest with. His wives, he has problems with. They're about other stuff. His son's not mature enough yet to be able to talk to. He tries to talk to his son about certain stuff, and sometimes he feels like it's just pointless, talking to his son. But Athelstan's always been there, always been knowledgable. That's the thing too; you grow up being a Viking and spend your whole life there, it's hard to learn from people who have done exactly the same thing as you, lived the same lifestyle. You can learn so much more from somebody who grew up differently.

IGN: I think that's also true in any time period.

Flimmel: Yeah, for sure.

IGN: Speaking of getting information from people who are very different that you, Ragnar made a connection – of a sort - with the Princess of Mercia. How do you see that evolving?

Flimmel: That's more political. She has a bigger army. Wessex couldn't beat Mercia. So I think Ragnar's always like, "Well, I want to be friends with the bigger army." So it's another political game that he plays.

IGN: It’s interesting, the more he’s immersed himself in other cultures, the more he got to that place that Athelstan had, in terms of being open to the idea that these two religions could exist at the same time. That it’s not the end of the world. Can you talk a little about that, because that's actually what happened with the Vikings historically, yes? They assimilated.

Flimmel: Yeah, a lot of them did. I don't know the exact history, if it was a belief thing or political gains again. But so much of it back then was just political stuff. The politics come with religion. But, once again, Ragnar's just so intrigued by everything. He's just so open to learn and tries not to judge too much. He's certainly got his beliefs about personal stuff, and he's wrong a lot of the time, but he's also just very open.

IGN: Do you think he would start to bring in other elements of the European way of life, like the fighting styles? Would he start to incorporate things like their weapons?

Flimmel: I don't think Ragnar cares about fighting that much. He's more just, ‘You have to fight, because that's the world.’ I don't think it excites him that much to fight. He'd rather be sitting and talking to King Ecbert, playing mind games.

IGN: Well, he certainly is right to play mind games with him. He absolutely can’t trust him.

Flimmel: He's such a brilliant actor, Linus. The biggest request of mine is to do more scenes with Linus.

IGN: After the experience he had with Horik, why do you think Ragnar collaborates with Ecbert?

Flimmel: We spoke about that a lot of the time – Linus and I. I think it's just a judgment call. He knows that I'm different. He knows that I killed Horik. There’s a great scene where we both sort of admit that we're up to stuff. We've both got agendas, and we both lie to each other, but we both know that we're lying. So it's a real good chess game that we've got going on. I'm really enjoying that. I just think, if we were in the same world, we would be really good friends, Ragnar and King Ecbert. Unfortunately, we're on different sides, but I think they're very worthy adversaries.

IGN: They are. You said that Ragnar doesn't care too much about fighting, but he's really good at it.

Flimmel: I think everybody is, really. It's just a survival thing. They've got to be. If you're alive, it means you're pretty good at fighting. In that world, you'd be so lucky to get through two wars, let alone surviving the whole time.

IGN: That's true. But I do think there's something to the Viking way, where they just want to eliminate all of the enemies. But Ragnar doesn't always make that decision. I mean, he notably didn't with Horik's son.

Flimmel: Oh, yeah. I'm still trying to work that one out. It was in the script. [Laughs] But I think he had a bit of spunk, Horik's son. He thought a bit differently than his dad. He was a bit of mongrel. He's just interesting. I think Ragnar is more happy to kill people that bore him than interest him.

IGN: It's like how Hannibal Lecter kills people that are rude.

Flimmel: [Laughs] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Watch Vikings Thursdays at 10pm on History.

Roth Cornet is an Entertainment Editor for IGN. You can follow her on Twitter at @RothCornet and IGN at Roth-IGN.