Well, he's our "Basil Exposition," isn't he?

But with a twist, in that some of the subtlties of the political maneuvering
would actually be lost on the two buddy-soldiers, and even some of the others surrounding this young emperor-in-the-making, so it isn't jarring when he rattles off what happened, why, and possibly what might happen next. I like how whenever he is done we see the looks on other people's faces (the mist clearing) and they often glance toward one another with "why didn't we see that?" looks. I, too, like Octavian very much. They are definitely making good use of Octavian in many ways, i.e. exposition, foreshadowing, comic relief, etc.