But having this iconic warrior of modern cinema go the full Jesus route was something that even Crowe himself had to poke fun at, whether or not it landed with his audience at the time.
Keep in mind, Gladiator 2 has seen itself go through everything from the very serious path of Nick Cave’s draft showing Maximus wandering through several reincarnations, to the suggestion Russell Crowe’s agent gave to Douglas Wick that Maximus being revealed as still alive after Gladiator’s climactic fight, as part of a plot to fake his own death.