You can't take this episode seriously. It's not meant to be. The writers are having fun in collusion with the viewers. Lawless does a wonderful serio-comic turn as the Xena fan who thought she was the reincarnated Xena, only to discover she was the despised Joxer. O'Connor is real as Mattie, the fake New Age Therapist. Hilarious lines in places, especially when she is worrying about what she may be reincarnated as in a later like for her sins. Ted Raimi gets to be smooth, coordinated, and brave as the reincarnated Xena. Don't think of this as a steak dinner, this is a big dish of Pavlova. And the actors get to break out and be someone unexpected.
2 Reviews
The Fathomless Mastery
ttapola20 July 2010
Warning: Spoilers
Previously, on Xena... Xena and Gabrielle are crucified and die. Now *that* would have been a bold ending to a season, but apparently they were one episode short, so we get this unholy mix of a Weird Episode and a Clip Show. And it's a sequel to episode #2.10, "The Xena Scrolls", which took place in the 1940s.
The Weird: Unlike "The Xena Scrolls", the story takes place in present day (1999 from our perspective) and features Xena, Gabrielle and Joxer's souls reborn in new bodies. Also, as was shown at the end of "The Xena Scrolls", Robert Tapert (who appeared as himself in that episode) greenlit the TV show Xena, and now, 2½ years later, the show is a success and the center character, Harry's wife Annie, is a big fan. Then she starts to think she is Xena reborn, and harry takes her to see Mattie, an expert.
The Clips: Annie, Mattie and Harry go into trance and see flashes of Xena's adventures (the clips, duh). They then, trance by trance, start to realize that they all are the reborn souls of Xena, Gabrielle and Joxer, but - and here's the "genius" twist - unlike in the 1940s, Xena's soul now isn't in her (or Annie's) "own" body. Because there isn't enough story yet to prevent the clips to take the bulk of the running time, the writers add the sequel aspect to the mix.
The Sequel: In the 1940s, Ares was buried in a tomb by Xena. Somewhere during the intervening 50+ years, he's managed to free himself and come up with a plan to regain his status in the eyes of the mortals. And that plan is Y2K! Yes, really. Ares, the God of *War*, plans to throw the world in chaos with the Millennium Bug, somehow thereby shoving the gods worshipped in 1999 aside and becoming the top dog. It doesn't make any sense.
How do these ingredients make this episode a disaster? Well, aside from there not being a *need* for a *story* after "The Ides of March" to end the season, the whole Annie & Harry plot is boring and with the clips it becomes even more boring. Things improve a little, when Ares makes his entrance, but then he does something so stupid it beggars belief. The main problem, however, is that even by Xena the Series' standards, the plot doesn't make sense. At the time it was first shown, "The Xena Scrolls" made sense, but after "The Ides of March" (and various episodes hinting at the existence of the One God), that episode and this one do not.
This story supposedly takes place in our world, where Christianity, Judaism and Islam have billions of believers in the One God. In "The Ides of March", Callisto implied at the existence of the One God and His Adversary. Even before the first episode of season 5 confirms this to be true in the Xena Universe, we have serious big picture problems. For some completely unfathomable reason, Callisto went *automatically* to Hell when she died, which implies that the One God is the True God and the gods of Romans, Greek, etc. are all false. Yet in Xena Universe they are not. In the Xena Universe, the One God has but a few followers. Of course, according to the teachings of Christianity, Judaism and Islam, the One God does not *need* believers like Ares, His power is absolute, regardless the number of believers. So how does Ares exactly plan to overthrow Him? What about His Adversary? Introduction of the One God to the supposedly fictional Xena Universe destroys everything. Since the Xena Scrolls were actually found in our world at the end of "The Xena Scrolls", the fictional universe and the real universe merged. Even the "mythology" of The X Files makes sense when compared to the coherence (or lack thereof) of The Xena Universe. Do the writers realize this? Do they even care? Yet another nail in the coffin of a series that could have been classic instead of just cult. My vote is 4/10.
The Weird: Unlike "The Xena Scrolls", the story takes place in present day (1999 from our perspective) and features Xena, Gabrielle and Joxer's souls reborn in new bodies. Also, as was shown at the end of "The Xena Scrolls", Robert Tapert (who appeared as himself in that episode) greenlit the TV show Xena, and now, 2½ years later, the show is a success and the center character, Harry's wife Annie, is a big fan. Then she starts to think she is Xena reborn, and harry takes her to see Mattie, an expert.
The Clips: Annie, Mattie and Harry go into trance and see flashes of Xena's adventures (the clips, duh). They then, trance by trance, start to realize that they all are the reborn souls of Xena, Gabrielle and Joxer, but - and here's the "genius" twist - unlike in the 1940s, Xena's soul now isn't in her (or Annie's) "own" body. Because there isn't enough story yet to prevent the clips to take the bulk of the running time, the writers add the sequel aspect to the mix.
The Sequel: In the 1940s, Ares was buried in a tomb by Xena. Somewhere during the intervening 50+ years, he's managed to free himself and come up with a plan to regain his status in the eyes of the mortals. And that plan is Y2K! Yes, really. Ares, the God of *War*, plans to throw the world in chaos with the Millennium Bug, somehow thereby shoving the gods worshipped in 1999 aside and becoming the top dog. It doesn't make any sense.
How do these ingredients make this episode a disaster? Well, aside from there not being a *need* for a *story* after "The Ides of March" to end the season, the whole Annie & Harry plot is boring and with the clips it becomes even more boring. Things improve a little, when Ares makes his entrance, but then he does something so stupid it beggars belief. The main problem, however, is that even by Xena the Series' standards, the plot doesn't make sense. At the time it was first shown, "The Xena Scrolls" made sense, but after "The Ides of March" (and various episodes hinting at the existence of the One God), that episode and this one do not.
This story supposedly takes place in our world, where Christianity, Judaism and Islam have billions of believers in the One God. In "The Ides of March", Callisto implied at the existence of the One God and His Adversary. Even before the first episode of season 5 confirms this to be true in the Xena Universe, we have serious big picture problems. For some completely unfathomable reason, Callisto went *automatically* to Hell when she died, which implies that the One God is the True God and the gods of Romans, Greek, etc. are all false. Yet in Xena Universe they are not. In the Xena Universe, the One God has but a few followers. Of course, according to the teachings of Christianity, Judaism and Islam, the One God does not *need* believers like Ares, His power is absolute, regardless the number of believers. So how does Ares exactly plan to overthrow Him? What about His Adversary? Introduction of the One God to the supposedly fictional Xena Universe destroys everything. Since the Xena Scrolls were actually found in our world at the end of "The Xena Scrolls", the fictional universe and the real universe merged. Even the "mythology" of The X Files makes sense when compared to the coherence (or lack thereof) of The Xena Universe. Do the writers realize this? Do they even care? Yet another nail in the coffin of a series that could have been classic instead of just cult. My vote is 4/10.
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