Why is Marcus Aurelius getting so popular these days?

[Anna_Gein]

I don't think Gladiator or The Fall of the Roman Empire created his popularity. If anything they are modern example of a popularity that started in ancient times.

For example Ammianus Marcellinus on Valentinian virtues :

It is fitting after this to pass to those acts of his which were praiseworthy and to be imitated by right-thinking men; and if he had regulated the rest of his conduct in accordance with these, his career would have been that of a Trajan or a Marcus [Aurelius]. He was very indulgent towards the provincials and everywhere lightened the burden of their tributes; he was always timely in founding towns and establishing frontier defences. He was an excellent critic of military discipline, failing only in this, that while he punished even slight offences of the common soldiers, he suffered the serious offences of his higher commanders to go to excess, often turning a deaf ear to the complaints made against them. The result of this was turmoil in Britain, disaster in Africa, and the devastation of Illyricum.

I think is good reputation is natural. He seems to have been an emperor who reigned with moderation just as he was moderate in his own life. He had to face great difficulties but managed to overcome them.

Personally I prefer him to a trajan who caused the conflict he participated with a first which add little to the Empire and a second which was completely pointless and could only create more and more complication.

I don't think his choice of his son for succession is bad. The Roman Empire was a monarchy that did not assume itself as such until some centuries but the dynastic logic was there from the beginning. The so-called adoptive emperors were forced to act as such because they either had no surviving children if they had some at one point or all of them were women. With Commodus, Marcus Aurelius just returned back to the "normal" situation after a long long time of irregularity started with Trajan "unorthodox" ascension to power.

That Commodus reign lastet 12 years and that his murder was a spontaneous attempt within his inner circle suggests that he was actually quite successful. The same with Domitian who also reigned over a decade and was killed be a rather small gang. Even Caligula could be counted to them. All three have in common that they were actually quite popular among the people, Domitian not as strong as the others, but except their relationship with the senate, they had a successful government. Their only problem was that they were on confrontation with the senate and 99 % of the historians were senators.

I agree.

[Dromikaites]

Personally I prefer him to a trajan who caused the conflict he participated with a first which add little to the Empire and a second which was completely pointless and could only create more and more complication.

Trajan didn't have much choice.

The Dacian War
The Dacians were the only organized European power.

They had had their own version of an empire 100 years before Trajan, when under king Burebista their state stretched from modern day Slovakia to modern day Bulgaria and controlled half of the Black Sea ports.

During Trajan's time, under king Decebal they were rebuilding Burebista's state. And just like Burebista before him, Decebal was keen to adopt the latest in military technology, actively hiring military engineers from the Roman empire and covering Dacia with a network of fortifications. And while he was doing that, he was also raiding the Roman territory south of the Danube river.

What was Trajan supposed to do? Wait till the Dacians make their territory impregnable and from that base they launch a full scale invasion? Assisted by the Sarmatians and the Bastarne (bought with Dacian gold like in 102) and quite likely by the Yaziges (which would have been subdued by the Dacians had Trajan not intervened)?

It took 4 years (101 - 102 and 105 - 106) to subdue the main part of Dacia and something of a genocide in 121 in order to fully assert the Roman control over that area. And that didn't eliminate the Dacian threat completely. Before the Goths took over in the 3rd century, the Free Dacians were the leaders of the barbarian coalitions which kept invading the Roman empire.

Allowing Decebal to complete the conquest of Pannonia (the subjugation of the Yaziges), to fortify Dacia and to accumulate a large arsenal of siege equipment (what did Decebal need siege equipment for? To conquer the Yaziges' tents?!) would have definitely been a bad idea.

The Parthian War
The Parthians were the only other organized power near the Roman Empire and a much more formidable threat than Dacia. Parthia was therefore the next logical target. Especially since now the Roman Empire was literally sitting on a mountain of Dacian gold to fuel the campaign.