Hercules/Xena (Spoilers)

[JD]

I take it you didn't watch Lost or Revolution, and don't watch Once Upon A Time or Arrow.

 

[kirk55555]

I take it you didn't watch Lost or Revolution, and don't watch Once Upon A Time or Arrow.

I watched the first season of Lost. It was ok, but I didn't feel the need to watch season 2. I've also watched all of Arrow so far. I like the show, and the first season flashback stuff on the island was decent, although the second season flashback stuff was pretty bad. I don't think I've ever heard of Revolution. All I know about Once Upon a Time is that its an ABC show that might be a fantasy show, although I'm just basing that off the title.

I don't object to flashbacks in general. I just don't want to see Xena's past. Unlike Arrow, there aren't any major mysteries to learn about her past. We were told all we needed to know about her past in her first few appearances. When she was young her village was attacked. She tried to defend it with others, and her brother died. She became angry and became a warlord, albeit one who was slightly less random kill happy than many of them. Eventually, she ran into Hercules, and changed her ways.

Now, parts of her past have been revealed and used in the show, and that's fine, but we didn't need to spend 45 minutes showing evil Xena, for example, burning down Callisto's village. We were told what happened in a few minutes, and it set up Callisto's backstory well. Xena's past is important, but there is nothing that can't just be said in a few minutes of exposition. I don't need to waste 90 minutes just to hear where she got her nickname from. She spent the time between leaving her village and meeting Hercules being evil, I don't need to see her starting wars, burning villages and killing people. I know that stuff happened, I have no desire to see it. As far as I'm concerned, her past is something to be told about to help service the stories that matter, not something to waste time watching.

Anyway, onto the Hercules episode I just watched

Once A Hero (Hercules) - Hercules and Iolaus meet up with their old friends (who we've never seen before), Jason and his argonauts. It was a pretty entertaining story, with some good guest characters and a kind of cheesy but cool fight with some CGI skeletons. Some of the city establishing shots were really bad, but the boat stuff was done well. Overall, this was an enjoyable adventure.

 

[kirk55555]

A Day in the Life (Xena) - I decided to watch this episode, and it was pretty good. The bathing scene was extremely awkward and pointless, and the guy and his girlfriend were annoying, but the episode was fairly entertaining and had some pretty funny scenes. I liked the fight over the cooking pan, and the scroll thing was hilarious. Overall, this was a very good episode, although I'd probably call it great if the guest characters hadn't been so obnoxious.

 

[kirk55555]

Heedless Hearts (Hercules) - This would have been a forgettable episode about Hercules helping rebels and falling for a woman, but Iolaus helped make it entertaining. He gets struck by lightning for insulting the gods, and starts having visions of the future. This leads to some grat scenes of Iolaus predicting stuff right before it happens. Besides that, the Hercules romance subplot goes nowhere when the woman's supposedly dead husband is found to be alive, and the rebels end up defeating the evil king with the help of Hercules and Iolaus.

 

[kirk55555]

Let the Games Begin (Hercules) - In this episode, Hercules creates the olympics to stop two groups from fighting. We see the return of Atalanta (the weirdly dressed blacksmith first seen in Ares) and Salmoneus also shows up. This was a pretty entertaining episode, with some good humor and action scenes. The bad guys get defeated in a weird way, but it was funny seeing the soldiers transformed by Ares explode OVerall, this was a very good episode.

 

[Forbin]

And the first Olympic Games occurred in 776 BC, which one would think locks down the time period of the show, except for all the other real-world things mentioned that happened during the show which span about two millennia.

 

[kirk55555]

For Him the Bell Tolls (Xena) - I ended up watching this, and I regret it. Joxer was entertaining, and Cupid was ok, but Aphrodite was intolerable. She's easily the worst of the greek gods they've shown so far, and one of the more annoying characters. I don't know why they went with some bizarre 90s surfer type thing for her personality, but it was unbelievably annoying and out of place. I don't expect the show to take itself super seriously, but this was just irritating and weird.

The main plot of this episode is also pretty bad. Aphrodite gets mad that some of her temples will get knocked down if two people get married, so she casts a spell to make Joxer a warrior to break up the marriage. Ted Raimi did a good job as "warrior" Joxer, but overall the story was lame and having Aphrodite in it just made it worse. Overall, this is far from the worst episode of the show, but it was still pretty bad.

 

[Timewalker]

Aphrodite is a caricature at first, but as the series goes on, she does have some character growth, learning some life lessons from the mortals.

 

[Forbin]

Aphrodite's costume lets me forgive ANYthing.
Yes, I'm that shallow.

 

[Timewalker]

Aphrodite's costume lets me forgive ANYthing.
Yes, I'm that shallow.

When both Aphrodite and Ares are in the same episode, there's enough to please just about everybody.

 

[Mudang Harada]

Anybody got a good listof all the good episodes of Xena?

I will have to use the Voyager strategy for this show.

 

[kirk55555]

The Execution (Xena) -This was a mediocre episode. Gabrielle meets her friend Meleager from the pretty bad episode The Prodigal as he's been on trial for murder and sentenced to death by a famous judge. He claims he's innocent, and Gabrielle wants to help him while Xena is skeptical. Its a pretty generic story afgter that, with a "twist" I saw coming a mile away. Overall, this was pretty forgettable.

 

[kirk55555]

Blind Faith (Xena) - Part of this episode was ok, part of it was really irritating. A blind Xena teaming up with a wannabe warlord was pretty good, even if the idea is similar to the Hercules episode As Darkness Falls (where Hercules went blind after being poisoned by Lyla, coincidentally played by Lucy Lawless pre-Xena). The irritating part was Gabrielle being kidnapped as a wife for a queen, and being taught how to act like a queen. Those scenes were really annoying, especially the guy trying to teach her to be royalty. Overall, this episode would have been better if the forced wedding stuff wasn't so bad. As it is, the episode has some good points, but is solidly mediocre.

Ulysses (Xena) - This was a pretty good episode. Xena and Gabrielle meet Ulysses, who is trying to get back to his home but is being blocked by an angry Poseidon. The adventure to get back was entertaining, especially how Gabrielle reacted to traveling on the ocean The Xena/Ulysses romantic subplot had a very predictable ending, even if I hadn't already known what happened to Ulysses when he got home in the original story. Ulysses himself was an interesting character, even if I wasn't a fan of the predictable romance angle between him and Xena. OVerall, this was an entertaining episode.

 

[kirk55555]

The Price (Xena) - Xena and Gabrielle find some Athenian soldiers under siege by a group called The Horde, who Xena had fought as a warlord. Xena tries to help the soldiers, but she hates the Horde so much she starts becoming ruthless like her old self. Gabrielle manages to bring Xena back to her senses with an act of compassion for the enemy, and Xena defeats the Horde leader in a one on one battle to end the fight. This was a very good episode. We saw how Xena can react badly to situations that scare her (and the horde very definitely scared her, based on her past experience with them) and we also saw, once again, why Gabrielle is so important to Xena. She helps keep Xena from going back to what she was, and she was an important factor in bringing an end to the fighting.

The Horde was an ok enemy, although I do kind of wonder how having a "warrior's code" works with torturing and possibly eating helpless wounded/prisoners. It felt like they were built up to be people so vicious that the concept of truces or honor doesn't fit well with them. Still, it didn't really hurt the episode, I just think it was a bit of a problem with the enemy. Overall, this was a very good episode.

 

[kirk55555]

Lost Mariner (Xena) - Xena and Gabrielle meet a sailor cursed by Posideon to sail forever without returning to land, with a crew of people whom he captures who get cursed to never leave the boat. The cursed mariner Cecrops (played by Tony Todd) was interesting and written/acted well. Gabrielle on a boat again was entertaining, and like the last boat episode the boat set was great (I'm not quite sure if its a real boat or a big set floated on water or what, but I'm assuming it was made for something else and reused on Xena because it seems too expensive to build for just a few episodes). One goofy moment was xena flipping onto the boat to go after gabrielle. She's always doing superhuman flips, but in this episode it was hilariously over the top even for Xena OVerall, this was a very good, entertaining episode with a great guest star and a good story.

 

[Forbin]

I enjoyed that one too - Tony Todd always delivers.

 

[kirk55555]

A Comedy of Eros (Xena) - This episode was ridiculous, but in a good way. cupid's young son takes his dad's arrows and sneaks out, coincidentally appearing in a town where Xena and Gabrielle (along with Joxer) are trying to save a group of Hestian virgins from Draco, a Warlord seen in the first season of Xena. Cupid's son starts shooting arrows, leading to people falling in love. Xena with draco, Gabrielle with Joxer and Draco with Gabrielle. There are some pretty funny scenes and the situation is entertaining in general.

So, this is the end of Season 2 of Xena, Warrior Princess. I liked so many episodes its hard to pick a favorite, but notable ones to me were: Warrior...Princess...Tramp, A Solstice Carol, A Day in the Life and Lost Mariner. My most hated episode is easily Girls Just Want to Have Fun. It had an interesting idea with the vampire women, but the writing was really bad and the cinematography was just horrible. When the episode wasn't tedious it was outright irritating.

Overall, this was a pretty good season. Some misses, but more good than bad. I still have seasons 3 and 4 to watch right now (along with the rest of season 2 and all of Season 3 of Hercules), and I'm hoping (and expecting) that it stays a generally great show.

 

[kirk55555]

The Furies (Xena) - This was a very good episode. Ares gets the furies to inflict madness on Xena, in a scheme to get her to follow him again. Xena being crazy was great, they did a good job with it. Sometimes she was hilarious, sometimes menacing. We also learned a bit more about Xena's history (specifically the fate of her father), and that was interesting. Overall, this was a great way to start the season.

 

[kirk55555]

Promises (Hercules) - This episode was ok, but pretty standard. Hercules and Ioalus travel to the wedding of the son of a dead king they knew. When they get there, the king's bride gets kidnapped, and they have to save her. There is a twist to this, which I saw coming a mile away and I'm betting most people would, to. It was a decent episode, but forgettable.

 

[kirk55555]

Been There, Done That (Xena) - This was a great episode. Xena repeats the same day over and over, trying to figure out what she needs to do to make things go back to normal. She's the only one who remembers what happens over the day when it starts over, and eventually she manages to figure out that she needs to stop a feud between two families and save the life of a woman to save the day. This groundhog day style story was done very well. It was interesting to see what would change as she went along, and her frustration as she kept failing was great. At one point she just kills Joxer because, in the last day she had repeated, his stupid idea had gotten them killed She also one time just ties Joxer and Gabrielle up to keep them out of the way (and she probably didn't feel like explaining her situation for the millionth time). Overall, this episode was just awesome.